The Texas Observer

It’s no secret that the 18-foot steel border wall is devastating the environment and disrupting wildlife corridors along our southern border. Environmentalists and landowners have filed lawsuits in federal court — to no avail — in order to compel the Department of Homeland Security to lessen the destructive impacts of the wall.

The Sierra Club commended 43 congressional members today for sending a letter to DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano. The members ask DHS to work with other agencies to lessen the impacts of the wall, fund efforts to buy comparable land for wildlife and provide environmental training for their employees.

In the letter, the congressional members wrote the following to Napolitano:
“As you are aware, hundreds of miles of new border fences and patrol roads have been constructed by DHS along the US/Mexico border in the past several years. This massive federal project has had deleterious consequences upon natural and cultural public resources, and has caused hardship for private land owners, whose lands have been condemned and livelihoods have been disrupted.”

Already $50 million has been allocated to borderlands mitigation, the congressional members note, but far more funding will be necessary to address the extent of the damage done, they wrote.

Besides the damage done there is also the cost of upkeep. We are now the owners of a 670-foot long steel wall which costs anywhere from $2 million to $11 million a mile. Besides the environmental degradation and the destruction of wildlife we will also being paying to keep it upright. The Congressional Research Service estimated it might cost up to $16,000 a mile just to  keep the wall intact.

 A campaign to recycle plastic bottles in downtown Tepoztlan

Tepoztlan, Mexico — For decades Mexico’s beautiful rural countryside has been choked by plastic bottles and bags. Mexico has been slow to adopt municipal recycling programs because of the cost and lack of infrastructure. In one small town an hour south of Mexico City, however,  city leaders have started a recycling program to try and save money and help protect the environment.

The small town of Tepoztlan, population 33,000,  is fighting to keep it’s scenic mountains green and its waterways clear of plastic bottles and shopping bags.

Every weekend the population of the town nearly doubles with tourists visiting from nearby Mexico City. The trash generated by the growing city and its busy tourist trade brought the town’s landfill to the “brink of collapse in 2007″ said Efren Villamil Demesa, Tepoztlan’s mayor.

“We had to come up with a solution quickly because we were running out of room,” said Villamil. The town is nestled in a valley and surrounded by jagged mountains. “There wasn’t anywhere left to go,” he explained.

In 2007, the town started a recycling program. Villamil said the city has spent more than $4 million pesos (approximately $308,000 USD) from its treasury on the recycling program. They bought three trucks and designated a center for separating the trash to be recycled. The service is free, he said. The city has also invested at least $1 million pesos in educating the population about recycling.

“We’ve had people go door to door to show residents that they can recycle glass and plastic,” said the mayor. “The most difficult thing is convincing the older people to recycle because they are used to the old ways of just throwing the trash in a creek or river.”

Businesses that cater to tourists in Tepoztlan are also striving to be green. Norma Avedano, the manager of Cacao, a chocolate store, says her business only uses biodegradable to go containers. “The containers cost more but we are trying to make an effort to help the environment so it’s worth it,” she said. Avedano says her store also participates in the city’s recycling program.

Villamil said Tepoztlan and one other neighboring town are the only two cities in the entire state of Morelos that have recycling programs.  “So far we think it’s been a success,” he said. “We’ve reduced the amount of garbage going into the landfill by 40 percent.”

The millions of pesos generated by tourism are also on the line if Tepoztlan becomes another garbage strewn suburb of Mexico City. The world’s 3rd largest city of 23 million looms just on the other side of the scenic mountain peaks of Tepoztlan.

“We’re so close to Mexico City,” Villamil said. “So we are always reminded that we need to do all we can to protect the environment.”

Norma Avedano, manager of a Tepoztlan cafe, says her business pays extra for biodegradable containers to help the environment.

John Hall, a regulator-turned-lobbyist, is gunning hard for the top job at the regional EPA office. Like Zelig, Hall’s been showing up everywhere—in D.C. to plead his case with the feds, in Port Arthur, Austin and Corpus Christi to try to and convince community activists and enviros to back off their criticism of of him.

Hall’s problem—perhaps an insurmountable one—is that he’s gotten very rich exploiting the revolving door between industry and government. Since 1997, following his tenure (’91-’95) as chairman of the state environmental agency, then called the Texas Natural Resources Conservation Commission (TNRCC, or “trainwreck”), he’s earned up to $6.3 million lobbying for refineries, chemical companies and landfill outfits. This lucre has enabled Hall to own a 7,600 square-foot mansion in West Austin valued at $3.25 million.

Hall was the first African-American to head TNRCC but his track record there didn’t exactly impress many in the environmental justice community. For example, in 1995 Hall voted to approve—over the objections of hundreds of citizens and an administrative law judge—the dramatic expansion of a landfill in Ferris, Texas, a largely black community near Dallas. The dump, owned by garbage giant Waste Management of Texas, practically swallowed Ferris. Many residents have since fled the town’s stench and pollution. Two years after approving the Waste Management dump expansion, Hall left TNRCC and went to work as a lobbyist for Waste Management. From 1997 to 2009, Hall earned between $625,000 and $1.25 million from the company, according to Texans for Public Justice.

In 1997, one of Hall’s TNRCC colleagues, public interest counsel Mark Alvarado, told a Texas House committee that Hall’s main interest was pleasing the industries the agency regulated. From an April 11, 1997 Observer article by former editor Lou DuBose:

Mark Alvarado stood up, was sworn in, and began to explain what environmentalists have alleged, industry lobbyists deny, but no public official dares say in a public forum—and certainly not under oath. That is: that the TNRCC—the single agency that stands between the public and environmental health hazards—doesn’t consider the public its client.

“I was there for six years and I heard it time and time again,” Alvarado, the agency’s former public interest counsel, said. “The primary client of the TNRCC is the industry it regulates.”

[…]

It’s more than personality, Alvarado explained. “I can point to the changes in procedural rules, changes in the permitting process, changes in organization,” he said. “There are policy decisions, access to management.”

Several environmental activists around the state told me that Hall has been emphasizing his public affairs consulting gig and downplaying his lobby work.

“He tried to justify working for industry, [saying] that he worked to bring the community and industry together to work on their issues,” said Suzie Canales, a refinery reform advocate in Corpus Christi. “I don’t believe that but even if it was true he was still getting a paycheck from the polluters. How can you be neutral ever again?”

Hall’s pitch has apparently worked on others. Hilton Kelley is an indefatigable organizer in Port Arthur, a town constantly dealing with toxic emissions from its high concentration of petrochemical and refining facilities. Recently, Hall and Kelley sat down for a face-to-face.

“What I told him was, ‘John I really don’t trust you’, I told him that straight out,” said Kelley. “’One minute you’re working for TNRCC and the next minute you’re working for industry helping them to circumvent what community activists are doing.’”

But, Kelley now says that he thinks he might be the man for the job.

“If I had to pick one of the lesser evils I would go with John Hall because I think he has a better working knowledge when it come to refineries, chemical plants and underground injection wells.”

Brigid Shea, a former Austin City Councilman who runs an environmental consulting firm, said she thinks Hall is trying to drive a wedge between environmental justice activists and the more mainstream groups.

Some prominent environmental groups are taking a studiously neutral stance. Sierra Club, for example, has neither endorsed nor rejected Hall while signaling that they are eager for a change. Neil Carman said that the issue of who would lead EPA Region VI, which includes Texas, didn’t come up at a May meeting with EPA administrator Lisa Jackson, but he said they told her that Texas was “under siege” and needed real environmental enforcement. “She got the message. She said this is like the Battle of the Alamo.”

The heat index is 115 today and the ozone action level is high — sounds like the best time to talk about Texas’ dirty air. The Environmental Protection Agency released its national assessment yesterday of air contaminants across the country.

The I-35 corridor (San Antonio, Austin and Dallas) and Houston had the highest number of respiratory and cancer causing contaminants in the state. The EPA looked at 80 cancer causing agents from industry, autos etc.. People living in these hot spot areas had a 100 in 1 million cancer risk whereas the national average is 36 in 1 million.

The data comes from 2002 — the most recent numbers the federal agency had to work with. While this is an interesting barometer on the state of our air quality– the real news is that the Environmental Protection Agency is finally starting to crack down on the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality.

On June 12, Lisa Jackson, the new director of the EPA came personally to Dallas to speak with Texas environmental groups including Sierra Club, Environmental Defense and Public Citizen. Jackson said that Texas’ environmental regulation had become a major concern, according to a Dallas Morning News report.

Neil Carman, a policy expert in air quality for the Lone Star Chapter of the Sierra Club, said the EPA is especially taking issue with Texas allowing companies to have flexible permits. Passed by the Texas Legislature in 1995, Carman characterizes these flexible permits as a “license to pollute.”  Essentially the permits allow companies that may have several episodes of toxic releases to average out the number of pollutants over a period of years. This makes it appear that they are polluting less.

Carman contends that the permits are illegal under the federal Clean Air Act. Environmentalists hope that the EPA will revoke TCEQ’s authority over the Clean Air Act which they find woefully lacking. For example, TCEQ’s commissioners allowed the Asarco copper smelter in El Paso to renew its controversial air permit. Environmentalists and the city of El Paso celebrated when the EPA — just days after the Obama Administration took over — nixed TCEQ’s renewal of the Asarco permit.

Today Sierra Club applauded a ruling by Administrative law judges to put more stringent restrictions on a new coal-fired power plant. The New Jersey-based NRG Energy Inc. is planning to expand the power plant in Jewett to burn an additional 4.3 million tons of coal every year. The plant would emit up to 10 million tons of carbon dioxide a year. We already lead the nation in carbon dioxide releases.

Controlling air toxins sounds like a good idea, however, the matter will now come before the commissioners at the TCEQ.  These same three commissioners approved  Asarco ’s permit to emit lead and mercury into the air surrounding El Paso. Ken Kramer, director of the Lone Star Chapter of the Sierra Club, said the ruling underscores once again  the failure of TCEQ to draft air permits that protect public health and the environment.

“The TCEQ has a chance to redeem itself by denying the permit when it comes before the three TCEQ commissioners,” he said in a press release today.  “Now is the time for Texas to look forward to a clean energy future by rejecting the dirty energy sources of our past.”

Voters in Andrews, the West Texas oil-town that’s ga-ga for radioactive waste, have an interesting proposition before them as they go to the polls this week. They’re being asked by Waste Control Specialists - who’s paying for the election - to authorize the issuance of $75 million in general obligation bonds to finance the construction of Waste Control’s radioactive waste dump. Even for a company that has a long record of ballsy moves, this one takes some major cojones.

Harold Simmons, who owns Waste Control, is the 146th richest man in the world, according to Forbes, down from 66th last in 2008. Even after losing $3 billion, the man is still worth $3.6 billion. But there he is, going before the people of Andrews (poverty rate: 16 percent) like a pauper with an open palm. Hubris, thy name is Harold Simmons.

It’s worth asking if some voters will understand what they’re voting on. The ballot, as approved by the Andrews County Commissioners Court, refers to a “solid waste disposal facility.” No mention of radioactive waste.

County Judge Richard Dolgener says he stands behind the wording.

“I feel [t]hat the ballot language is correct when the court voted on it to be placed on the ballot,” he wrote in an email and referred further questions to the county’s bond counsel, who did not respond to a phone call.

Granted, folks in the Andrews area have been hearing about Waste Control’s plans for radioactive waste for quite some time and may be well aware that they’re voting on an issue connected to that. On the other hand, a 2006 public opinion survey by Austin-based pollster Baselice & Associates produced some surprising results. (TCEQ ordered Waste Control to do a more scientific poll after the company submitted interviews with the town’s business and political elite, who were almost universally in favor of radioactive waste disposal.)

Some even think it’s a local landfill.

The company says it needs taxpayer-backed municipal bonds because credit is too expensive otherwise. At least a few people in Andrews who have supported the company through the years are now saying tough titty. One couple, Rhonda and Tom Stark wrote to the county and Waste Control:

My wife and I have an infinite respect for the work WCS does for the county and also, importantly for our country. We believe in nuclear power and responsible environmental protection.

My issue with you is the hasty, high pressure sales pitch and lack of disclosure about WSC’s [sic] and Valhi’s financial state.

Waste Control says the deal won’t cost the county a dime and that if something does go awry, the county will be left holding $500 million in stock and assets. But the Starks think the deal is still too risky. In an email to the Observer they pointed to the collapse of Valhi stock and Fitch’s downgrading of the company’s credit rating to ‘junk’ status. They also question the true value of WCS’ “assets” that the county would presumably own in the event of a bankruptcy.

“What’s the value of land, buildings and equipment contaminated by radioactive waste?”

Still, Waste Control continues to have the full faith and credit of the town’s business and government leaders. Here’s an excerpt of a recent Andrews County News letter to the editor from one Bob Stewart, Andrews businessman:

If you don’t think this is a credit problem, then you need to go back to the homework deal. There is a good reason that he is a Billionaire—why pay 16 percent when he can get 7.75 percent from Andrews. That is just good business!

The revolving door between government and the private sector is a time-worn tradition in Texas. But here’s a case that on its bare facts is particularly egregious.

In January, six months after stepping down as the executive director of the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality, Glenn Shankle signed on as a lobbyist for Waste Control Specialists, the company recently licensed by TCEQ to build a massive radioactive waste dump in West Texas. His lobby contract is worth between $100,000 and $150,000, according to the Texas Ethics Commission.

When Shankle left TCEQ in June 2008, the agency was readying, per Shankle’s orders, two licenses authorizing Waste Control to bury millions of cubic feet of radioactive waste. The four-year license review process had been one of the most time-consuming and contentious in agency history.

Shankle’s own technical staff, geologists and engineers had concluded definitively that the dump could not legally be permitted. An Aug. 14, 2007, memo drafted by two geologists and two engineers bluntly stated that the landfill’s proximity to two aquifers made it “highly likely” that radioactive waste would leak into the groundwater. The site, they wrote, “cannot be improved through special license conditions.” They recommended denying the license. With little explanation, Shankle overruled them. His only sop to the staff were license conditions requiring additional studies before construction.

Amazingly, Shankle said in a brief telephone interview yesterday—one of the few times he has ever spoken to the press—that he had never heard of any of this.

“I was not aware of that,” Shankle said of his own technical staff’s recommendations. If true, that’s stunning. According to the Houston Chronicle:

When WCS President Rodney Baltzer learned of the [August 14] memo, he immediately sought out meetings with the agency’s executive director, Glenn Shankle, who decided in December [2007] to begin drafting the license.

In fact, records from TCEQ, previously discussed in the Observer, show that during the time period after the staff’s recommendation, Shankle was frequently meeting with Waste Control officials, attorneys and lobbyists. Waste Control is owned by Harold Simmons, the Dallas billionaire and major Republican donor who helped bankroll Swift Boat ads attacking John Kerry in 2004 and television ads in 2008 linking Barack Obama to Bill Ayers.

Baltzer left nine messages for Shankle and four for [Deputy Executive Director Dan] Eden between July 2007 and January 2008, according to phone logs that reflect only missed calls. Eden met with Waste Control officials at least five times during that period. Former Republican Congressman Kent Hance, a Waste Control investor and chancellor of the Texas Tech University System, paid a visit to Shankle’s office in early November.

Cliff Johnson, a principal in Textilis Strategies, an Austin-based firm that lobbies for Waste Control, visited with Shankle in September. Shankle also met with Giblin, Baltzer, and Mike Woodward, a Waste Control lobbyist and attorney with Hance’s law firm, during that period.

The outcome of this full-court press was the Shankle-ordered drafting of the coveted disposal licenses, permits that are worth untold millions to the company. In fact, without these licenses Waste Control is a losing venture. Last year, Waste Control lost $21.5 million, according to SEC filings for Valhi, Waste Control’s parent company. In other words, Shankle had done a very big favor for Waste Control.

The move so upset his staff that three of them quit in protest. One of them, Glenn Lewis, who coordinated one of the license review teams, reacted with disgust and anger when told yesterday that Shankle was lobbying for Waste Control.

“Even the Mafia was more circumspect than this,” Lewis said. “To find out now that Mr. Shankle—who was in constant communication with WCS throughout this ordeal—now is on retainer for [WCS] is shocking in that it is so brazen and such an insult to everybody who worked on that application. It just shows that any objective appraisal by the TCEQ was from its inception a fantasy and that big money and a lot of political power won once again. … They should have just issued the license the day after it was received and saved everybody a lot of trouble.”

When it was suggested to Shankle that there was at least the appearance of a quid pro quo, he responded: “The freedom of the press can go so far. You’re making some very serious allegations.” Then he hung up.

I can hear the sobs all the way from Grupo Mexico’s Mexico City boardroom. Federal Judge Andrew Hanen in Brownsville ordered Grupo Mexico to return its majority share of stock in a lucrative Peruvian mining company and an additional $1 billion in damages. Altogether, the company stands to lose more than $6 billion.

After a tense court battle in Brownsville  which the Observer covered back in October, Hanen issued an opinion that Grupo Mexico had fraudulently transferred the stock. The mining and transportation conglomerate Grupo Mexico is the owner of Asarco but lost control of the company after filing for bankruptcy. The independent board that currently runs Asarco while it is in bankruptcy proceedings contends that Grupo only bought Asarco so that it could get at the mining company’s most valuable asset — the Southern Peru stock.

This should significantly benefit the new owner of Asarco which looks to be the Indian “metal king” Anil Argarwal. No doubt there will be more to report in the upcoming days.