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Sustainable Development 101

'SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT' THE EVIL FACING AMERICA

SC County should protect property rights
Tree ordinance will trample on rights of Greenville residents

Righting a wrong on property rights

Kelo backlash puts property rights measures on the ballots

Topping 2006 ballots: eminent domain

Court Ruling Fuels Dispute in West Over Eminent Domain

Eminent domain is a government tool to be used sparingly

Eminent domain battle now on national stage

Will the Government Take Your Home?

Eminent domain battle now on national stage

The Sentinel

Edison, NJ

August 8, 2006

by Greg Bean Coda

Long Branch Mayor Adam Schneider and the members of his "Schneider Team" should be so proud - they've gone from being villains on a local and regional level to villains of national renown.

If you read a daily newspaper, chances are that last Sunday you noticed that a Long Branch family, the Hoaglands, were featured on the cover of Parade magazine, along with the headline "Will the Government Take Your Home?" Also featured on the cover were a poster urging a halt to eminent domain abuse and a photo kicker stating, "A family fights back."

The three-page story that accompanied the cover photo chronicled the battle that the Hoaglands, and others around the country where local governments are taking property by eminent domain for redevelopment, have undertaken to save their properties.

It even included a take-out box outlining what you can do if the government says it wants to take your property for redevelopment, and discussed the national backlash that resulted from last year's decision by the United States Supreme Court in the Kelo v. City of New London (Connecticut) case. In that case, the court ruled that local governments do have the power to seize homes and turn the property over to private developers, on the theory that the new developments will bring in more tax dollars.

The Hoaglands are members of MTOTSA (Marine and Ocean Terraces and Seaview Avenue), the group of homeowners who stand to lose their properties to eminent domain, so a developer can build 185 expensive condominiums. Their story has gone from creating outrage around New Jersey and the region, to creating outrage on the national stage in the pages of publications like The New York Times and now Parade magazine, the largest circulation publication (35 million weekly) in the entire United States.

Long Branch has truly become the national poster child for eminent domain abuse, its sad story shared with what Parade magazine claims were likely 78 million readers last Sunday alone.

Over the last two years, Greater Media Newspapers - in particular the Atlanticville and reporter Christine Varno - have written dozens, if not hundreds, of stories about the eminent domain battles in Long Branch. We were on the story long before any other publication in our area, and we have stayed on it week after week because we believed, and still believe, that this conflict playing out in our backyards has significant implications for every homeowner - not only in New Jersey, but in every other state in our nation - who goes to sleep at night under the mistaken impression that his home is safe from the whim of a government that might decide that a new Starbucks or Pump 'n Munch franchise is a better use for the property.

The national spotlight now being trained on Long Branch proves that we were right, and I expect other national publications will pick up the story in the very near future.

Parade magazine used one of our photographs by staff photographer Miguel Juarez, but did not mention the body of work we have published on the eminent domain controversy in Long Branch. So last week, before the Parade article was published, I asked Sean Flynn, the author of the article, what had drawn his attention to that community.

Initially, he said, his interest was piqued because the eminent do-main dispute in Long Branch was brought to his attention by someone at the Institute for Justice, a national nonprofit organization that has taken the issue on as a crusade. He visited the city in early June.

"It's a beautiful, beautiful place but the tension between the city's need to redevelop and the people's rights to live in their homes was dramatic," he said. "In my mind, what is going on in Long Branch really crystallized the issue. I certainly wouldn't say those properties are blighted ... the shabbiest part was the 'Stop Eminent Domain Abuse' signs."

Will the national attention help the MTOTSA families save their homes? Flynn doesn't know.

"I don't know if it will do them any good," he said. "You look back at the Kelo case, and it didn't do those people any good."

But Kelo did start a national backlash, and Flynn agrees the Long Branch dispute is serious fuel for the fire.

On July 30, Adam Liptak, writing for The New York Times, discussed that very subject, the national "tidal wave of outrage" generated by the Kelo case.

"Sometimes," he wrote, "Supreme Court cases have a way of highlighting issues that had been absent from the national agenda, and the cases can provoke reactions that have a far greater impact than the ruling itself."

He quotes Douglas Laycock, a law professor at the University of Texas, who said, "I always tell my students that one of the best things you can do is lose a case in the Supreme Court."

And later, he quotes Dana Berlinger, from the Institute for Justice, who said, "The decision brought to light this incredible rift between what lawyers and cities thought was the law and what the American people thought was the law. This is certainly the situation of losing the battle and winning the war."

In other words, the Kelo decision didn't help the people who lost their property in Connecticut, but it may wind up saving the properties of thousands.

By extension, the national outrage generated by the coverage of the Long Branch battle may be too late to save the MTOTSA members' homes, but it may steer the country's course when it comes to future cases of eminent domain abuse.

That, in reality, will be the "Schneider Team's" legacy. To go down in American history as the leaders of the community that caused a nation to say, "Enough is enough."

Gregory Bean is executive editor of Greater Media Newspapers. You can reach him at gbean@gmnews.com.

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Will the Government Take Your Home?

Across the country, Americans fight to protect their property.

By Sean Flynn

Published: August 6, 2006

Parade.com

Joy and Carl Gamble bought an English stucco house in Norwood, Ohio, in 1969. They raised two children there and worked seven days a week in their small grocery store to pay off the mortgage. “ We had the house fixed up just the way we liked it,” Carl says. “When we retired, we planned to sit down and enjoy it.”

But now the Gambles live in their daughter’s basement. Their house stands vacant in the weedy field that was their neighborhood—seized by the city and transferred to a developer who wants to build shops, offices and condominiums.

In Long Branch, N.J., Denise Hoagland, 39, has an endless view of the Atlantic Ocean from the cottage she and her husband, Lee, bought 13 years ago. Their garden blooms with so many flowers that their three daughters call home “the place where the butterflies fly.” But Long Branch wants to take their home and about 35 other properties so a developer can build luxury condos. “It’s theft,” Denise says. “It’s legalized theft.”

Technically, it is a forced sale, because the government has to pay for the property. And it is legal: In June 2005, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that state and local governments can seize homes to make way for private development. The decision in Kelo v. City of New London triggered a sort of government land-grab.

In the one year since Kelo, more than 5,700 homes, businesses and even churches were threatened with seizure for private development, according to the nonprofit Institute for Justice (IJ), and at least 350 were condemned or authorized for condemnation. By comparison, about 10,000 were similarly threatened or taken over from 1998 through 2002.

Government always has had the power to force the sale of private property for public use—a process known as eminent domain. But what is “public use”?

Historically, it meant highways, railroads, schools and sweeping urban-renewal projects, such as the redevelopment of the Baltimore waterfront. But Kelo made clear that middle-class homes could be replaced with malls, offices, luxury homes—anything that might increase tax revenue.

“It’s a blatant example of reverse Robin Hood—taking homes from the poor and the middle-income and giving them to the rich,” says Scott Bullock, the IJ attorney who argued (and lost) Kelo.

“The fact is, a shopping mall does usually produce more taxes than a house,” says IJ attorney Dana Berliner. “An office building does produce more taxes than a church. But if that’s the rule—that anyone’s home can be taken away from them because something else will produce more taxes—then no one’s home is safe.”

But Kelo also has sparked a backlash. In the past year, more than two dozen states introduced or passed legislation and constitutional amendments to stop what critics call “eminent domain abuse.” Even the U.S. House of Representatives approved a bill aimed to restrict eminent domain. Residents also are fighting back through courts of law and public opinion.

In Norwood, the Gambles and two other property owners represented by IJ brought their case to the Ohio Supreme Court. (At press time, the court had yet to rule.) [See editor’s note below.] In Long Branch, two dozen residents, also working with IJ, are suing to stop their neighborhood from being replaced with 185 condominiums. And in Lakewood, Ohio, my hometown, the people of Scenic Park waged such a successful public campaign three years ago that voters spared their homes from being taken.

In each city, the process unfolded almost identically: A private developer, with the government’s backing, wanted a big piece of property—cliff-side homes with valley views in Lakewood, ocean-front cottages in Long Branch—and tried to negotiate deals with each owner. When some refused to sell, the cities threatened to invoke eminent domain to clear the holdouts.

In order to do that, however, city officials first needed to declare the neighborhoods “blighted.” But the legal designation of “blight” bears little resemblance to a commonsense definition. In Lakewood, for example, Scenic Park is a charming neighborhood of older, well-kept homes. But because they lack such modern touches as attached two-car garages and central air-conditioning, the city deemed them blighted—a standard by which more than 80 percent of Lakewood, even the former mayor’s home, would likewise be blighted.

“We always bit on the word ‘blight,’” says Julie Wiltse, 63, who helped neighbors distribute 20,000 fliers and sponsor a series of blight events: a Blighted Block Party, a Blighted Chili Cook-off, even a Blighted Groundhog Day (which predicted four more months of blight). TV cameras and newspaper reporters loved that stuff.

“We were very successful in explaining to the community, ‘If we’re blighted, you’re blighted,’” Wiltse says.

Likewise, the Hoaglands’ neighborhood  in Long Branch isn’t “blighted” in any meaningful way. With one or two exceptions, it’s a few blocks of low-key bungalows where families have lived side-by-side for decades, even generations. The shabbiest touches, ironically, are the posters in nearly every home’s windows with the words “eminent domain abuse” inside a red-slashed circle and the several homes that have been bought by the developer and boarded up. What the area doesn’t have, however, are the $500,000 condos or the restaurants with $12 hamburgers that were built immediately south of the neighborhood.

“When they want to revitalize,” says William Giordano, 41, whose great-grandfather built his house, “suddenly we’re not good enough to live here.”

The city has put prices on the houses it wants to take: $400,000 for the Hoaglands’ house, $374,000 for Lori Ann Vendetti’s, $410,000 for the home her parents built across the street and $325,000 for Anna DeFaria’s tiny gray cottage. Those might sound like hefty sums, but not on the Jersey shore. “ I can’t get anything in Long Branch for three and a quarter,” DeFaria says, “let alone an ocean view.”

But what’s money? “The memories are here,” says Lori Ann Vendetti. “They can come in with a million dollars, two million—we won’t take it. A lot of people think we’re bluffing, that everyone has a price. The Vendettis don’t have a price.”

Neither do the Gambles. Most of the properties that the Gambles and their Norwood neighbors owned—6 9 out of 75—were sold to the developer, who was required by the city to pay at least 25 percent above market value. Three others later settled with the developer. Then the city used eminent domain to claim the last three, concluding that the neighborhood was deteriorating, based on a study that was paid for by the developer.

Tim Burke, a lawyer for the city, argues that the government had to clear the holdouts, especially because there were so many other property owners who had agreed to sell. “Would Norwood have used eminent domain if it had to acquire 69 of the properties? Clearly not,” he says.

As Burke explains it, Norwood is an old industrial town that lost its industry and a third of its population. The city needs to redevelop to generate new revenues, and clearly most of the Gambles’ neighbors weren’t opposed. “When you’re a community like Norwood, you’ve got to be concerned with the entire citizenry,” Burke says. “And, yeah, there are going to be instances where, in order to better the lives of the many, the property of the few will have to be taken.”

But what if you’re one of those few? “That this is happening here,” says Joy Gamble, “in the land ‘ of the people, for the people, by the people…’” The thought trails off, and she just shakes her head.

What You Can Do

Stay informed: Eminent domain projects  usually are years in the making—but quietly and  without public reference to “eminent domain.” Watch for words like “redevelopment,” says Scott Bullock, a lawyer with the Institute for Justice. 

Make noise: March, rally, call local newspapers and TV stations. Try to turn community opinion to your side.

Ask for help: Several organizations may take your case for free. But even if you have to hire your own lawyer, you can fight City Hall.

Pester your state legislators now: Some states already have passed new rules that restrict eminent domain.

Fight for the best deal: If you simply cannot save your home, make it as expensive as possible. An analysis by The Cincinnati Enquirer revealed that owners in Norwood, Ohio,
were paid on average twice the appraised value of their homes. However, the ones who fought got even more.

Editor’s Note

On July 26, the Ohio Supreme Court ruled unanimously that the city of Norwood can't use eminent domain to take Carl and Joy Gamble’s home solely for economic development. The United States Supreme Court had ruled previously that there is nothing unconstitutional about a government taking private property, with just compensation, solely for economic development but left it to state courts to decide whether such takings violated their own state constitutions. The Ohio Supreme Court further rejected Norwood’s claim that it also could use eminent domain to eliminate the Gambles’ neighborhood because it was a “deteriorating area.” The court ruled that the phrase “deteriorating area” was too vague—that it was, in effect, a standardless standard. The court ruling means the development group has to return the house to the Gambles. “Our state supreme court did what the the U.S. Supreme Court did not do: It protected our home,” Joy Gamble told reporters.

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Posted on Sun, Oct. 08, 2006 Kelo backlash puts property rights measures on the ballots 12 states to decide government's role in zoning disputes WILLIAM YARDLEY New York Times News Service   PICABO, Idaho - More than a year after Suzette Kelo and several of her neighbors in New London, Conn., lost their battle against eminent domain in the U.S. Supreme Court, the reaction against the ruling has made property rights one of the most closely watched ballot issues nationwide. Thirty state legislatures have enacted restrictions on eminent domain in response to the ruling. Now voters here and in 11 other states will consider property rights measures in November. Most of the measures would limit eminent domain to some degree, while others, in Western states, would go further, imposing new restrictions on government's ability to enforce zoning laws. In the Kelo case, the court ruled that government could transfer private land from one owner to another for the sake of economic development. But the court said that states were free to change their laws. Opponents of the measures predict years of court fights if the measures pass. "This thing is an abomination, the way it's written, the way it's being sold," said Nils Ribi, a City Council member in Sun Valley who opposes the Idaho measure. Supporters of the ballot efforts in the West - often called "Kelo-plus" - say they want to stop so-called regulatory takings, the idea that government effectively takes private property when zoning laws limit how it can be used. Opponents say the regulatory-takings initiatives are essentially a ruse, that they are trying to exploit anger over the Kelo decision to roll back zoning regulations that are critical to controlling growth, protecting the environment and preserving property values. Affluent outsiders have been drawn to Idaho in recent decades, lured by technology jobs, mountain recreation and abundant sunshine. Boise has boomed, as has Sun Valley, where newcomers from California build second homes not far from ranchers who herd sheep over the Sawtooth Mountains. About two-thirds of Idaho land is under federal control, and frustration runs deep in rural areas with newcomers who, after buying their piece of paradise, try to restrict land use further in the name of preservation and environmentalism. Rob Struthers, 59, a rancher here, said: "Now all these people come in and say, 'Wow, what a beautiful place.' But they don't trust us to keep it that way. Instead of rewarding us, they're penalizing us."

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'SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT' THE EVIL FACING AMERICA
By Tom DeWeese
NewsWithViews.com

My friends, we come here today from many walks of life. A wide variety of reasons got each of us started on the road to activism. Some of us started simply because we noticed something funny about our child's curriculum in school. Some of us were outraged by government trying to take away our guns. A good many of us suddenly found government agents and members of private groups plotting to take away our land. Some have had their livestock confiscated. Some have found themselves facing jail just for doing what their fathers and grandfathers have done on the same land for decades. Some of us just wanted to be allowed to go to church, pray to God and celebrate Christmas without being fined for it. A few of us would even like to be able to go to a restaurant and order food we like - even if it is greasy, fattening and full of carbs and calories. All of us just want to live in an America where our rights and pursuit of happiness is protected. And so we fight. And now we've found ourselves here today in a room with hundreds of others in the same boat. I have one thing to tell you. You are not going to win. Because the other side has cut us up into little pieces. They've divided us and conquered us. They've succeeded because you think your fight is against gun control. Because you think your fight is against bad schools. Because you think your fight is against the Endangered Species Act and roadless programs, and wetlands regulations, and water rights and Heritage Areas. Because you think your fight is against Democrats and not Republicans. Because you think it's a fight between evil liberals and good guy conservatives. You're wrong. Your fight is against a well-planned, well orchestrated agenda for the complete transformation of America. And unless you learn that fact now, today... and unless you fully educate yourselves to every aspect of that agenda and fight it on the proper terms… then you cannot win! I'm here to tell you that every one of these issues you are facing is interrelated. There is an agenda being implemented before your very eyes. It's called Sustainable Development. And I will tell you now, if you want to keep your guns, your property, your children and your God… if you love liberty… Then Sustainable Development is your enemy! So what is Sustainable Development? Imagine an America in which a specific "ruling principle" is created to decide proper societal conduct for every citizen. That principle would be used to consider everything you eat, what you wear, the kind of homes you live in, the method of transportation used to get to work, the way you dispose of waste, perhaps the number of children you may have, even your education and employment decisions. Sustainable Development is that "ruling principle" for the implementation of what former Vice President Al Gore said we must all suffer through in order to purify our nation from the horrors of the Twentieth Century's industrial revolution. In his book, "Earth in the Balance," Gore called it a "wrenching transformation of society." Those are pretty powerful words that should concern anyone who values liberty. It's a warning that the rules are changing. That a new power elite is taking control. Perhaps you are beginning to notice such changes as you go about your daily routine, but haven't understood where those changes, and the ideas behind them, are coming from. But Sustainable Development is a very difficult concept to grasp. It's written in an almost foreign language - designed to mislead and refrain from alarming you. Let me put it in the simplest language I possibly can. The Atkins Diet is not sustainable. Now, why do I say that? Because on page 350 of the UN's Global Biodiversity Assessment Report it says that the grazing of livestock, including cows, sheep, goats and horses is not sustainable. One reason for that concept is because Sustainablists contend that the animals pollute and damage the banks of streams. Getting us to stop eating beef is a major effort needed to fully implement the Sustainable Agenda. Since they are cowards who fear your reaction to an outright banning of eating meat, they have to try to trick you into thinking that not eating meat is your idea. So they use scare tactics. For years they have told you that eating meat raises your cholesterol. Fat is bad for you. Meat causes heart attacks. With PeTA's help they were succeeding in turning us all into little sissies eating salads. Then along comes Dr. Atkins who shows us that a low carb beef diet will help you lose weight in a healthy way. Suddenly the nation has gone Atkins crazy. Beef sales are sky rocketing. The Sustainablists are in a tail spin. They've lost control of your eating habits. Now watch what they are doing to get you back on track. Suddenly reports are being published in leading women's magazines about Atkins being dangerous to your health. Lawsuits have begun to pop up against the diet. Do you see how it works? That's how the Sustainable Development agenda is implemented. Behavior modification based on fear. Freedom of choice is not part of Sustainable Development. And so I repeat, - the Atkins Diet is not sustainable. Now, perhaps you'll understand why there are Sustainable Development papers, guidelines and regulations to impose the ruling principle: On our public education system - to prepare our children to live in a sustainable world. On our economy - to create partnerships between business and government, making sure business becomes a tool to help implement the policies. On the environment - leading to controls on private property and business. On health care - the new drive against obesity is leading directly toward controls on what we eat. On farming - Sustainable Development policies affect farmers' ability to produce more crops by regulating or banning precious chemicals, biotechnology and genetic engineering in the name of environmental protection. On our social and cultural environment - where political correctness is controlling policy hiring practices, immigration policy, multiculturalism, marriage laws, etc. On our mobility - with emphasis on carpools and public transportation and away from the freedom of personal transportation. And on public safety - where the rule of law and the court system is being challenged by new regulations that affect the right to privacy and unreasonable search and seizures. It's important to understand that these leading issues we face today are not just random concerns that find their way into the forefront of political debate. They are all interconnected to the policies of Sustainable Development. And you must understand that Sustainable Development is the official policy of the government of the United States of America - and every state, city and small burg in the nation. It is completely bi-partisan. It is being equally implemented by Republicans and Democrats. No matter the outcome of any election - the Sustainable Development agenda moves forward unabated. What we are telling you here today, my friends, is that Sustainable Development isn't just some land use policy. It is a complete transformation of American society; away from the rule of law; away from the ideals of property ownership, free enterprise, free travel and even free association. Sustainable Development. It's a life plan. Planned by someone else. Not you. And Sustainable Development is not a myth, or a theory or a conspiracy - as I've heard some in our own movement call it. Since the 1970's literally hundreds of issue papers, charters, guidelines and treaties have been presented at scores of international meetings, each becoming a building block in the creation of what would eventually become Sustainable Development. Finally in 1992 the UN's Earth Summit in Brazil brought all of these ideas together in two major documents called "Agenda 21" and the "Biodiversity Treaty." Here the ideas were officially presented to world leaders that all government on every level, needed to be transformed into top-down control over housing, food production, energy, water, private property education, population control, gun control, transportation, social welfare, medical care, and literally every aspect of our lives. To get the full picture, add to these the UN's Convention on the Rights of the Child and the Convention on the elimination of all forms of discrimination against women, both of which create UN-mandates on abortion, child rearing and government interference on families. In 1993 President Clinton created the President's Council on Sustainable Development. From that Council came a flood of policy papers and recommendations to enforce it as government policy. And the Clinton Administration didn't need Congress to get into the act. All Cabinet officials had to do was change some wording of existing programs and reroute already-approved funding to begin to implement the agenda - without Congress and without debate. Former Commerce Secretary Ron Brown told a meeting of the President's Council that he could implement 67% of the Sustainable Development agenda in his agency with no new legislation. Other agencies like Interior, EPA, HUD and more did the same thing. To help it all along, Clinton issued a blizzard of Executive Orders. The American Heritage Rivers Initiative was born that way. So were roadless policies designed to stop logging in national forests. National parks have become core biosphere reserves designed to shut out any human activity. And the buffer zones around them are designed to shut off existing human activity, allowing the core to continually grow like a cancer tumor. Any possible excuse to control human development or activities began to sprout up - from rails-to trails bikeways - to wet lands regulations - to historic preservation projects. Endangered species, real or made up, have been used to close down industry and steal private lands. Valuable natural resources have been locked away in national parks and preserves. In this way an international agenda to transform the world into global governance under Sustainable Development policy took hold and became official policy of the United States of America.

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Sustainable Development 101

As the American Policy Center steps up its war against Sustainable Development and the UN’s Agenda 21, many readers have asked me to supply an overview of the issue. To answer that request, I have gone to the foremost expert in the nation on the subjects of Sustainable Development and Agenda 21—Henry Lamb. Below is a series of articles written by Henry back in 1996. These are the articles that first taught me about Sustainable Development. The only update necessary is to point out that most of what Henry warned about has now taken place. Every single community in the nation is now developing "sustainablism." Read them, as I did years ago, learn, and begin the fight to take back your communities. -Tom DeWeese Sustainable Communities—Vanquished Freedom By Henry Lamb "Sustainability" is a term that is just beginning to reach Joe A. Citizen; in the months and years ahead, it will dominate virtually every aspect of American life. Since the concept was first defined in the 1987 report by Gro Harlem Brundtland (Vice-president of the World Socialist Party), it has swelled into a tidal wave that is washing across the world and has now crashed onto American shores and will soon inundate every American Community. The "sustainability" paradigm rests upon the firm belief, as expressed by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), that: "Humanity's collective imperative now is to shift modern society rapidly onto a sustainable path or have it dissolve of its own ecologically unsustainable doings." The same document, prepared for the World Bank and for the United Nations Habitat II Conference in Istanbul, says that society has two choices. "One choice is to go as we go and do as we do." Or, "We shift our consumption, extraction and harvesting patterns and technologies; reframe our ethical choices," and reshape and redesign planned communities "within the dictates of natural ecology." The first choice, which to some may sound like freedom "to go as we go and do as we do," is the unsustainable, unethical choice, according to HUD. The ethical choice is: "The vision for `Community Sustainability,' defined as the condition of social, economic and ecological harmony that people require, deserve and must create where they live, if their lives and their inheritors' lives are to be meaningful, wholesome and hopeful." Joe A. Citizen, who now is pretty much free to go as he goes and do as he does, might be surprised to learn that HUD considers his life meaningless, unwholesome, and hopeless. The HUD document, the report of the President's Council on Sustainable Development (PCSD), as well as the United Nations documents that call for the drastic reorganization of society, all claim that: "By science's consensus we have but decades to recast the ways we operate as a modern society with respect to earth's natural ecological systems of support." Instead of producing specific, peer-reviewed scientific evidence to support such claims, the "precautionary principle" is offered, which says that if a serious threat is thought to exist, action must be taken even in the face of scientific uncertainty. Every alleged ecological calamity—global warming, population explosion, and biodiversity loss—is widely challenged throughout the scientific community. For every scientist on the calamity bandwagon, there is another scientist of equal stature to refute the allegations. At the very least, society should be aware that there is no scientific consensus to justify the dramatic changes that are planned. Proponents of sustainability label detractors as unethical, and continue the push to recast society into planned communities, managed through an evolving system of "good governance" that dilutes the authority of elected officials and elevates the power of NGOs (non-government organizations). The objective of "sustainability" is to integrate economic, social, and environmental policies to achieve reduced consumption, social equity, and to preserve and restore biodiversity. "Sustainable communities" is but one facet of a much broader sustainable agenda. It is the initiative that will touch most Americans first, and in fact, is already being advanced throughout communities across the country. The U.S. Forest Service has awarded $700,000 to the Chicago Region Biodiversity Council, a collaborative effort of 34 federal agencies and environmental groups, established to begin the process of making Chicagoland into a "sustainable community." Similar processes are underway, funded by government and private foundations, all across America. The PCSD recommends that tax money be used to provide incentives to communities that engage in collaborative community planning for sustainability, and that funding authorized under other federal programs be denied or delayed for communities that are slow to begin the collaborative process toward sustainability. Originated by the United Nations, embraced by the Clinton-Gore administration, implemented by an army of coordinated NGOs, the tidal wave of "sustainability" is crashing across America. Most Americans have not seen the warnings and will not recognize the dangers until they are drowning in sustainability. Sustainable Communities: Yours Could Be Next If your community has a population of 50,000 or more, someone is working to create a "sustainability council," or it has already been done. Smaller communities, your time will come—soon. The federal government, in collaboration with selected NGOs, is encouraging the creation of local "sustainability councils" which are to become the driving force in the reorganization of society. These councils may have a variety of names. Regardless of the name, however, their function is pre-planned, their procedures are pre-conceived, and the outcome of their work is pre-determined. Your community is about to be reorganized, according to the Department of Housing and Urban Development, so your life will be "meaningful, wholesome, and hopeful," whether you like it or not. The initiative in your community could come from any federal agency through a grant to a municipality or directly to an NGO. Or the initiative could be funded by a private foundation and coordinated by an NGO. By using a variety of start-up mechanisms and an assortment of names, the well-coordinated effort disguises the appearance of the massive federal/international social re-engineering project that is underway. The council, by whatever name, will enlist the support of all relevant local, state, and federal government agencies, then add representatives from the academic community, carefully selected individuals from the business community, and the leaders of cooperating NGOs. This phase is usually completed before the community at large knows it has been done. Frequently, the first few meetings of the council will be attended only by invited guests, chosen from the membership lists of participating NGOs, or for some other strategic purpose. Sympathetic individuals in the media will have been provided background material and enlisted to support the effort. Most community residents will become aware of the effort through a 60-second TV news item or a brief story in the local newspaper. The story will make it appear that the entire community has come together to solve common problems and build a beautiful future. Exactly what that future includes will not be revealed. Each of the reorganizational components will be revealed over time, only as necessary, to avoid the inevitable backlash from private citizens as they learn how their lives will be impacted. The work of the council is to devise whatever mechanisms may be necessary to achieve several objectives: reduce consumption—especially energy; restore biodiversity through an ecosystem management approach; stop urban sprawl; and convince local residents that they are "unethical" if they fail to support whatever it takes to achieve these objectives, through massive, coordinated re-education and propaganda campaigns. Here is a picture of your community when it has been reorganized to become "sustainable," taken from HUD's report to the United Nations: For this hopeful future we may envision an entirely fresh set of infrastructures that use fully automated, very light, elevated rail systems for daytime metro region travel and nighttime goods movement, such as have been conceptualized and being positioned for production at the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis; we will see all settlements linked up by extensive bike, recreation and agro-forestry "E-ways" (environment-ways) such as in Madison, Wisconsin; we will find healthy, productive soils where there is decline and erosion through the widespread use of remineralization from igneous and volcanic rock sources (much of it the surplus quarry fines or "rockdust," from concrete and asphalt-type road construction or from reservoir silts); we will be growing foods, dietary supplements and herbs that make over our unsustainable reliance upon foods and medicines that have adverse soil, environmental, or health side-effects; less and less land will go for animal husbandry and more for grains, tubers, and legumes. Gradually, decent standards of equity will be in place for women, for children and for the disadvantaged; the "peace dividend" will be forced upon us as the insane costs of military armament become challenged globally. The purpose of the "sustainability council" is to give the appearance that the reorganization of society is the result of local initiative and reflects local desires. The fact of the matter is that how you are to live in your own community has been determined in Gland, Switzerland, confirmed by the United Nations in Rio de Janeiro, embraced by Al Gore in Washington, and is now being imposed upon you in the name of "sustainability." Sustainable Communities in the Bioregion The Sierra Club has proposed the reorganization of North America into 21 bioregions delineated by their ecological characteristics (Sierra, March/April, 1994). Each bioregion includes several states, counties, municipalities, and communities. The "sustainable communities" initiative is the first building-block toward the construction of bioregions and the total reorganization of America into a "sustainable" society as envisioned by the United Nations. Sustainable communities must be seen in the context of the broader, published agenda, which limits privately owned property to no more than 25% of the total land area, removes human populations from at least 50% of the total land area, and requires that the remaining land be managed by government/NGO partnerships. The Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) suggests that the time frame for reorganizing sustainable societies can be no more than three decades. Others believe it will take 50 to 100 years. Whatever the time frame, the process has begun with the sustainable communities initiative. Each community, regardless of size, will have its own "sustainability council." A common characteristic of these councils is that they are dominated by individuals from government agencies charged with the implementation of the government's sustainability agenda, supported by representatives from NGOs whose salaries are paid by grants from the federal government or by cooperating foundations. Local government officials, who are enticed by incentive grants from the feds, and local residents are typically outnumbered and outmaneuvered. The first function of the sustainability council is to complete the "visioning" process. This process produces a document that describes how the community should be organized to achieve the goals required to make the community sustainable. In the context of bioregions, individual communities cannot be left to design their own future. HUD says "there will be the linking up of networks of communities of varied sizes within quite varied and multiple regional contexts, such as `community constellations' linked by compacts based upon common interests. Between communities will be rural landscapes—highly functional landscapes— based upon entirely fresh understandings of landscape ecology and its integral relationship to the sustainability of urbanization." Translated into plain English, this means that sustainability councils will coordinate their "visions" to achieve a regional or bioregional vision consistent with the ultimate outcome that has already been determined. To achieve the predetermined outcome, some smaller communities will have to be completely shut down. That process is already underway in the northwest and other parts of the country near federal forests and public lands. By banning logging on public lands, as the Sierra Club has proposed, residents of logging-dependent communities have no choice but to move out to find new sources of income. By denying grazing and mining permits, still more communities are evacuated and gobbled up by the wilderness required by the bioregional agenda. It is the mid-size communities, suburbs, and bedroom communities that will feel the next crunch. These are the communities that are described as "urban sprawl" which is to be stopped. These are the communities that have devastated "greenfields" and are destroying ecosystems. Visions of sustainable communities will put an immediate stop to future geographical growth. The vision documents will also reveal a planned reduction or elimination of infrastructure support to communities outside the "approved" area of urbanization. Financing for activities outside the approved "greenlined" area will become impossible. Land use restrictions outside the approved area will tighten. Farming outside the approved "management" areas will become impossible, and people who choose to live outside the approved sustainability ethic will be ridiculed and made to feel inferior. People who do not get on the sustainability bandwagon can expect to be treated very much like the people who choose to smoke cigarettes. The common thread that weaves the various councils together is the NGO. Coordinated by their national and international headquarters, and fueled by federal and foundation funding, NGOs will see that the various community vision documents mesh into a bioregional vision that is consistent with the global agenda. When your community's sustainability council is formed, look for a representative from the Sierra Club, whose International Vice President, Michelle Perrault, is a member of the President's Council on Sustainable Development, and whose Board member, Dave Foreman, is largely responsible for developing "The Wildlands Project," the master plan for bioregions. Sustainable Communities Means Managed Societies "Sustainability"—sustainable communities, sustainable development, sustainable agriculture—is not simply a comprehensive approach to environmental protection. The recurring theme throughout the sustainability literature is the integration of "economic, equity, and environmental" policies. That grandiose language is translated by specific policy recommendations which use the environment as an excuse to manage the economy to achieve social equity. Throughout the literature, terms such as "harness market forces" describe proposals to impose consumption taxes on products that "management" deems to be unsustainable. Air conditioning, convenience foods, single-family housing, and cars are among the products already determined to be unsustainable. "Equity" means forcing those who produce an income to provide for those who do not. "Environmental protection" means constraining individual freedom to accommodate "management" to prevent the impending impoverishment of the planet. "Management" is not the government. The government is simply the instrument for enforcing the dictates of management. Management is actually the NGOs, headed by the big three—the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN); the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF); and the World Resources Institute (WRI). These three NGOs have set the ideological agenda. They have created a world-wide network of affiliated NGOs, well-positioned and adequately funded to implement the agenda. And they are acquiring the legal status to manage national, state, and local governments, as well as the lives of individual citizens. Sustainability councils, dominated by NGOs and public officials paid to implement the sustainability policy, are being formed in every community. These councils coordinate their activity with regional councils also dominated by NGOs. Ultimately, each bioregion is to have a bioregional council to coordinate, or manage, the activities within the bioregion. The function of governments within the bioregion will be simply to enforce the dictates of the council. Ultimate enforcement is to come from the United Nations. Official documents now published by the UN call for the creation of a Petitions Council, and an Assembly of the People, both selected from representatives of accredited NGOs. The function of the Assembly of the People is to review resolutions of the General Assembly. The function of the Petitions Council is to review compliance petitions from bioregional councils and direct the petitions to the appropriate agency within the UN for enforcement. All of the environment—including private property—is to be placed under the "trusteeship" of the UN Trusteeship Council, consisting of no more than 23 individuals selected from accredited NGOs. The existing World Trade Organization as well as the proposed Economic Security Council, have unlimited authority to impose a wide range of sanctions—including military action by a standing UN army—against any nation deemed to be not in compliance with any treaty or UN dictate. The Law of the Seas Treaty has already created the International Seabed Authority which has legal jurisdiction over all non-territorial waters. Anyone wishing to salvage a shipwreck or harvest ocean resources must obtain a permit and pay annual royalties. Application fees may be a quarter-million dollars or more, and unspecified royalties are authorized by the treaty. The United States has not ratified the treaty, but Secretary of State, Warren Christopher, told a Stanford University audience on April 9, that ratification of the Law of the Seas Treaty and the Biodiversity Treaty would be top priority items on the Clinton/Gore agenda for 1997. The plan for a world-wide, managed society is in place, published extensively in the literature of the United Nations . The plan is so massive, so complex, so bizarre, that it is difficult to comprehend in its totality . The public has seen only small segments of the plan at any one time . The various world conferences over the past four years have drawn only limited publicity for a short time. The President's Council on Sustainable Development has conducted its work in a public vacuum. And any negative discussion about the UN or about the environment is quickly denied and cast aside by the administration and the media as nothing more than the rantings of right-wing extremist wackos. All the while, day by day, the plan unfolds. In every community, a net is being deployed to surround every American. Over the next few years, expect the net to be slowly drawn around all individual freedoms, and tightened relentlessly until the managed activities of human beings produce the sustainability envisioned by the international managers. Henry Lamb is the executive vice president of the Environmental Conservation Organization and chairman of Sovereignty International.

© 2006 American Policy Center

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