State
TREADING WATER | UNFOCUSED AND UNDERFUNDED, GOAL OF CLEANER WATER FALTERS
The Gazette
America’s Midwest faces worsening trouble with undrinkable well water, recreational lakes choked with toxic algae and water treatment plants requiring budget-busting upgrades to remove pollution washing from farm fields and industries.
How states are faring
It’s impossible to make apples-to-apples comparisons between the states on how they are living up to their goals because the federal government, which created the Gulf Hypoxia Task Force, let each chart its own path.
Without real pressure from the EPA, few of the states have consistent funding, some aren’t documenting what steps they’re taking and there’s little urgency, despite the clock ticking on an interim deadline of seeing a 20 percent reduction in nitrate and phosphorus by 2025.
Here’s a breakdown:
Mississippi
Mississippi talks a good game, with officials claiming the state is the “leader in the development and implementation of nutrient reduction strategies” in its 2012 draft strategy. But that document never has been adopted and there are no reports since on what state officials are doing to clean up the river that shares the state’s name.
“At this time, MS (Mississippi) does not publish annual updates to the strategies,” Natalie Segrest, who works with basin management and nonpoint sources for the Mississippi Department of Environmental Quality, said in an email.
State officials meet once or twice a year to talk about progress within three geographic regions: delta, coastal and upland, Segrest said. The state has seven years of data from the delta region and now is beginning to analyze it, Segrest said.
Mississippi doesn’t have baselines, but officials estimate conservation projects from 2007 to 2014 cut phosphorus by 217,873 pounds per year and nitrogen by 506,406 pounds per year.
Oyster season may end on sour note
WLOX
PASS CHRISTIAN, MS (WLOX) - This year’s oyster season is coming to a close, ending just as quickly as it began.
Dog bite slows trash collection
Daily Leader
Children say the dog ate their homework.
Arrow Disposal Service Inc. says the dog ate their garbageman.
Climate change has chipped away at home values on the Mississippi coast, new analysis says
Clarion Ledger
Sea-level rise is already hurting home prices in certain communities on the Mississippi Gulf Coast, a new analysis finds, erasing some $264 million in value since 2005.
State Government
AG: Retirees could serve at Capitol without pension hit
AP
Mississippi Attorney General Jim Hood's office says retired state employees may serve in the Legislature while continuing to receive their government pension, if certain conditions are met.
Davis joins Mississippi State Personnel Board as general counsel
MBJ
The Mississippi State Personnel Board recently announced that Richard Davis will serve as the agency’s general counsel. In this role, Davis will be chief advisor to the executive director regarding policy, procedures, and administrative programs. He will also be MSPB’s liaison to the governor’s office and legislators.
Regional
Neighbors Want A Stop Put To Proposed Landfill In Their Backyards
MEMPHIS, Tenn. (localmemphis.com) - Another landfill proposed in Memphis is facing a challenge by people living nearby.
Decreasing prices for alligator skins contributing to slow wild harvest season in Louisiana
AP
Here’s a fashion trend that’s good news, if you’re an alligator in Louisiana: Prices for skins are down to less than half what they were just five years ago, making for a slow wild harvest.
The director of the state’s alligator program estimates that about 18,000 were taken from the wild this year.
National
Trump's pick for EPA already rolling back climate change protections
CNN
Andrew Wheeler, the former coal lobbyist who is now acting administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency, was a "driving force" behind the agenda of Sen. James Inhofe, who called climate change a "hoax," according to people familiar with Wheeler's work for the senator.
Agent Orange’s Other Legacy—a $12 Billion Cleanup and a Fight Over Who Pays
WSJ
The Ironbound neighborhood of Newark, N.J., has been revitalized. The tree-lined river that runs beside it has not.
Shell to Link Carbon Emissions Targets to Executive Pay
WSJ
LONDON— Royal Dutch Shell RDS.A 2.38% PLC plans to set short-term carbon-emissions targets and link them to executive pay, the company said Monday, capitulating to months of investor pressure.
Busted! Recycling smuggling ring netted $16.1 million, California officials say
USA Today
LOS ANGELES – California authorities say they've broken up a smuggling ring that was hauling empty cans and bottles into the state so they could cash in the recycling refund.
Opinion
Supreme Court Deals Unanimous, Welcome Blow to Administrative State in Frog Case
George Will
National Review
Unanimity is elusive in today’s America but the Supreme Court achieved it last week. Although the dusky gopher frog is endangered, so are property rights and accountable governance. Both would have been further jeopardized if the frog’s partisans in the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) had gotten away with designating 1,544 privately owned Louisiana acres as a “critical habitat” for the three-inch amphibian, which currently lives only in Mississippi and could not live in the Louisiana acres as they are now.
Press Releases
Secretary Perdue Names NRCS Chief
WASHINGTON, December 3, 2018 – U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Sonny Perdue announced today the appointment of Matthew J. “Matt” Lohr to serve as Chief of the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS).
EPA Announces 2018 Safer Choice Partner of the Year Award Winners
12/03/2018
WASHINGTON (December 3, 2018) — The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is recognizing 12 Safer Choice Partner of the Year award winners across eight states for outstanding achievement in 2017 for the design, manufacture, and promotion of cleaning and other products that carry the Safer Choice label for use in households and facilities nationwide.
NFWF Announces $521,833 in Grants to Support Sustainable Fisheries in Six U.S. States
Seven grants will build capacity of fishermen and fishing communities, improve recreational fisheries strategies, reduce bycatch and advance aquaculture projects
WASHINGTON D.C. (December 3, 2018) –The National Fish and Wildlife Foundation (NFWF) today announced $521,833 in grants to support sustainable fisheries through fishermen and community-led projects in California, Florida, Louisiana, Alaska, Massachusetts and Hawaii.
