Now we will find out what kind of stuff the Colorado legislature is made of.
THE GAZETTE
October 21, 2007
Fort Carson creating department to manage Pinon canyon site
By TOM ROEDER
Fort Carson will move its environmental services under another entity while creating a new department to spearhead management and possible growth of the Piñon Canyon training site.
The post’s Directorate of Environmental Compliance and Management will cease to exist next month, while a new and still unnamed office will take on the Piñon Canyon controversy and other issues. The new office will fall under Tom Warren, Fort Carson’s top environmental officer.
The organizational shake-up makes it clear that the Army is not giving up on its controversial proposal to expand the Piñon Canyon Maneuver Site in southeast Colorado.
Warren said the changes will put extra emphasis on Piñon Canyon issues, including the Army’s plan to add 418,000 acres to the 235,000 southeast Colorado site, while ensuring that the post’s other environmental and wildlife issues get handled.
The expansion plans are on hold after Colorado lawmakers worked to block Army spending on the proposal.
“The importance of Piñon Canyon to the Army and to Fort Carson, Colorado, is an imperative in my mind,” said Warren, who has led efforts to convince lawmakers and landowners that changing Army tactics and growth at the Colorado Springs post justify the massive land acquisition proposal.
Warren will also have responsibility over how the existing Piñon Canyon land is used, to ensure that training exercises don’t cause environmental damage.
The organizational change was mandated by an Army-wide move to ensure that all its installations had the same management structure.
The bulk of the post’s environmental work, from cleaning up toxic sites to managing endangered and threatened species in training areas, will fall to the post’s public works office, which will absorb the bulk of employees from Warren’s old agency. The rest will go over to the new office with responsibility for Piñon Canyon.
The management changes are unlikely to make a fiscal impact on the post’s budget. Warren said the changes are not expected to add or cut payroll.
“It’s a zero-sum solution,” he said.
*In game theory, zero-sum describes a situation in which a participant's gain or loss is exactly balanced by the losses or gains of the other participant(s). It is so named because when the total gains of the participants are added up, and the total losses are subtracted, they will sum to zero.
Zero-sum solution? Not so fast, Jack. This is supposed to be a Democracy. Remember Lincoln's word at the Gettysburg Address?
The Army has time on their side.
"that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain--that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom--and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth."
The problem with letting the environmental impact issue become too prominent, is that it lets the camel's nose under the tent. They would love to break the Expansion Project down into smaller pieces, divisive issues. They are doing it already by creating a need which is only on paper. It is not based on real need. The need being put forward is nothing but a sham. The real intent is to destroy the notion of private land ownership. It's being done all over America now.
Forget all the yada-yada about game theory, and all the bullshit about environmental responsibility. The only tenable position for Colorado to take is: No, you can't have the land. Period. Make do with what you have. Or go somewhere else. That's an option, too.
Otherwise, the Army will continue to test the waters, look for vulnerabilities. It's like the schoolyard bully. If you don't get in his face right away, he will continue to hound you.
The BLM did the same thing on the Roan Plateau.
Understand this: rights must be fought for, or we will lose them. People have a hard time getting their heads around the scope of the deception of the US Government. At the current rate of acquisition of public and private land, in 50 years there won't be even the notion of sovereignty.
If Coloradans don't unite on this thing, the
You better let the politicians know you mean business. Either that, or else get ready to vacate the premises for the new landlord - OUR GOVERNMENT.
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