Posted on 08/28/2015 7:45:43 AM PDT by Hojczyk
I hate the EPA and am particularly outraged by their recent egregious attempt to control America’s waterways but Reno might have a point. When I read the article, my first thought was ‘I bet there is more to this story.’ It seemed very one-sided.
How is a $16 M fine not cruel and/or unusual?
Come and take it!
The owner says the EPA is saying he is messing up the green river, over a hundred miles away.
I hope the corrupt courts don’t take this family’s land away from them.
This was a state abuse of power. But the same
https://www.mackinac.org/3963
He tried to pay the fees-to the county. They wouldnt accept them.
All they had to do is set up a trust to do so.
The BLM, violated the contract. OVER A GD TURTLE! Which was the excuse.
He built a dam on a creek without a federal permit, required by the Clean Water Act according to the EPA interpretation.
>Section 404 of the Clean Water Act (CWA) establishes a program to regulate the discharge of dredged or fill material into waters of the United States, including wetlands. Activities in waters of the United States regulated under this program include fill for development, water resource projects (such as dams and levees), infrastructure development (such as highways and airports) and mining projects. Section 404 requires a permit before dredged or fill material may be discharged into waters of the United States, unless the activity is exempt from Section 404 regulation (e.g. certain farming and forestry activities)<
From the EPA letter of violation:
>On October 11,2012, the United States Army Corps of Engineers (Corps) conducted an inspection of the Site and confirmed that Respondent or persons acting on his behalf had discharged or allowed the discharge of approximately 12 cubic yards of dredged and fill material below the ordinary high water mark of Six Mile Creek during construction of a darn. The work resulted in filling an approximately 40-foot reach of the creek and inundation of an approximately 745-foot reach.<
This goes hand-in-hand with the EPA claiming jurisdiction over non-navigable intermittent streams and ditches. A federal judge just blocked them, but the EPA states that it will continue to enforce it in states that don’t sue to stop it. (WTF?)
Downstream neighbors likely complained about it and it escalated from there.
Its not a stock pond. It has a spillway and mechanical gate. Its built across a creek and the down stream neighbors complained.
The Corp tried to work with him but eventually had to turn it over to EPA.
Some think that the govt/epa/courts don't have the authority to tell them what to do on their private land. Even though the stste eng told him he needed a permit he wouldn't apply and would never respond.
I am afraid what is happening here is a person, while taking due diligence, gets squeezed between state and federal regulations. The EPA is very heavy handed with water issues on private property. The most common thing seems to be declaring land to be wetlands when it isn't. Once declared it is really hard to get reversed. It isn't just an EPA problem. There are plenty of local agencies that do the same thing.
Sounds like the EPA is hanging this on the clean water act. Wish the article would explain exactly how that applies to this case.
That is what the EPA would like you to do, wonder WHAT this man did wrong. He is the criminal by default.
That is the way a lot of good people look at this, because they cannot bring themselves to face the fact that the EPA (and the IRS) are the twin faces of government tyranny, a form of taxation without representation or trial without a jury of their peers.
This is the way the EPA does business, much like the IRS.
This is the same entity that can dump millions of toxins into a body of water which I DO believe was intentional (if you read a letter to the editor of a local paper who predicted what the EPA was going to do a week before their visit where they made their “little” mistake that will probably require a super fund designation had half a billion dollars to address.) and then they cover their mouths and say “Tee Hee...we made an oopsie...so sorry about that!”
Nobody is accountable at the EPA. Nobody is fired at the EPA. Nobody is even reprimanded or punished at the EPA, that I have heard.
And these are the same people that put their foot on the neck of a rancher who probably DID follow every rule.
If only they would hang themselves on the clean water act, after what they did recently.
They have made so many laws, regulations and rules that they truly are the comrades of Beria who said to Stalin: “You bring me the man, I’ll find you the crime.”
That is where we are, in my opinion. And I don’t believe it is unintentional, either.
I think they wrote a letter.
Beautiful.
It says he didn’t ask for a permit from EPA and he could possibly be messing with the flow of the green river, which is over a hundred miles away.
The EPA made sense when it was created. It now ought to be high on the list of agencies that should be abolished.
Not only do you not have a grip on the facts in the Bundy case, I don’t think you have a grip on the meaning of tyranny.
This should be impossible because of the 8th amendment. Unfortunately the federal government no longer considers itself bound by the Constitution.
And WHAT facts am I missing with Bundy. He contracted to graze on public lands, then didn’t pay, refused to remove his cattle. Pretty simple. And he then came up with stories about legacy rights and all that he never had. Not credible representative of the idiotic sage brush rebellion or whatever they want to call it today. Sorry, I like that 82% of the land is public and that I can travel and hike and visit it all without fences and no trespassing signs. Try that in the Adirondacks where there is no public lands.
The EPA was established by an executive order. It can be eliminated- lock, stock and barrel- by exactly the same action.
All we need is the right Chief Executive.
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