Boondocks No. 63

Tuesday, April 8, 2008

Wednesday, April 9, 2008

Thursday, April 10, 2008

Friday, April 11, 2008

That Burn Barrel Ban the DEC Forgot About? Remember a few months back when a few eyebrows where raised when the DEC announced that it was thinking about going forward with state regulations banning rural trash burning—by a single paragraph in the NYS Association of Towns' monthly newsletter.

When it hit the AP newswire, after first being mentioned in the Schenectady Daily Gazette, there was a lot of discussion and passion on both sides of the issue. Then two weeks later, the Governor resigned, when he became known to the world from Albany to Tokyo as Client 9.

DEC Commissioner Pete Grannis, kept very quiet about the issue, and has not issued any proposed regulations, on anything, since.

Part of it may have to do with the fact that the DEC is still under a bit of a shake-up since the resignation, and Grannis has not been officially re-appointed. Another part may be that the powers to be might have told the DEC that pushing forward on this, particularly at this time might not be a good thing.

What we know as a fact ...

Chris Neurath, the biggest proponent of a burn ban, has left the North Country to move to Boston, M.A. and spend his life convincing the residents of that city that flouride in the water is killing them.

Assemblyman Koon's burn barrel ban bill is not one of the Assembly's Earth Day package bills that will be voted on Tuesday.

It has not been a "Super" bill on Environmental Action of NY's list since 2004. It passed the Assembly last year, but since Robert Sweeney took over the Assembly EnCon Committee it has not passed out of it. Environmentalists have lost interest in the bill, even though it's still on their lists as a good bill. NYPIRG nor EANY reported that they did not even do any formal lobbying on this bill last year.

Deputy Scretary of Environment, Judy Enck is busy trying to save her ass with Paterson and the environmental community, after taking a real hit over her support of the Bellyere Mountain Proposal, which under further scrutiny by the environmental community and prominent politicians has become politically unacceptable. She isn't going to push for anything controversial these days, or get her hands dirty on this matter. Moreover, I don't think this ever was a big lobby issue for her, during her long career at EANY.

The Republican Majority of the Renselear County, passed a resolution in opposition of such legislation or regulation. The Majority Leader of Renselear County also published two letters to local papers in opposition. Widely seen as a surogate of Senator Joesph Bruno, they are in regular communication.

Press Spokeperson of Joesph Bruno, Michael McCardle, in 2003 announced that the majority of members in Senate Republicans in conference, opposed such legislation, eventhough a senior majority member (George Maziarz of Niagara-Orleans Counties) was carrying it. Since then, Senate EnCon Chair, Carl Marcellino, has not allowed Koon's bill out of committee.

The reality is...

The Senate Majority does not have any real power to stop the DEC from pushing forward with such a regulation. But the reality is without legislatively proscribing backyard burning, it's going to be hard to enforce a ban by regulation.

Towns certainly don't have the power to enforce air quality regulations, and their simply is not enough Environmental Conservation cops out there to enforce such a regulation. They probably are busy enough chasing after power plants, industrial smokestacks, and kids on ATVs. Code officers can't enforce it unless their is town ban in their town code, police officers can't enforce air quality regulations either. P'Link

Vermont Still Trying to Find Old Roads. Ever since the state required towns figure out which roads and farm tractor trails are to be maintained or forgotten, the state has been trying to figure out which roads are actually roads through historical investigation.

This is important that their state is doing this, even though New York State has never tried anything like this in the past. There have been a number of legal battles in the Adirondacks over old roads, being closed by the DEC, that where popular for use on ATVs and 4x4 trucks.

It's a tough decision to make, particularly if the old records are gone. In many cases, rural areas where much more populated then they are now, with farms going right up the mountains. Now only the most profitable farming areas are in active use, and many of the old roads have been forgotten.

The thing is that if you start opening up old roads, that can also bring unwanted development, noisy ATVs and snowmobiles, and other access to forests and other lands that you might not want. But you have to balance that with the demands for more access to the land, especially when people in the past have been allowed to ride up there.

I don't see New York State doing anything similar in the near future, as it would be too politically controversial. Instead, it will happen one DEC decision and court case at a time in our state. But I still think Vermont is doing the right thing on this matter. P'Link

Senator Eric Adams' New Bill. On the NYS Riffle and Pistol Association's blog they had a note about this legislation, which would create essentially a gun licensing requirement for both long and short guns alike.

Sen. Eric Adams introduced S.7486 which requires gun owners to register all firearms at a cost of $15 each and renew the registration every year at a cost of $10 per firearm.

Not that it's going anywheres, but it's something that raises at least a few eye brow. I'm sure he's just appeasing a constituency that told him it would be a good thing. P'Link