Is Chelsea Clinton gearing up for a congressional run?



Like the Kennedy’s and Bush’s, it’s the family business.


Adam K. Raymond reports in the Daily Intelligencer:

Just when you thought the Clinton family’s time in electoral politics had reached an end, the New York Post has a report today that says Chelsea Clinton is being “groomed” for a congressional run.

The seat Clinton is reportedly eyeing is currently occupied by Democrat Nita Lowey, who was just reelected for her 14th term representing New York’s 17th Congressional District in Westchester County.


The Post’s source says Clinton, who lives in Manhattan but is expected to move into a home next door to her parents’ Chappaqua residence, will run for the seat when Lowey retires.

“While it is true the Clintons need some time to regroup after Hillary’s crushing loss, they will not give up. Chelsea would be the next extension of the Clinton brand. In the past few years, she has taken a very visible role in the Clinton Foundation and on the campaign trail. While politics isn’t the life Hillary wanted for Chelsea, she chose to go on the campaign trail for her mother and has turned out to be very poised, articulate and comfortable with the visibility.”

This isn’t the first time Clinton’s name has come up in connection to Lowey’s seat. Five years ago, New Rochelle Talk reported that Chelsea Clinton was planning to run upon Lowey’s expected retirement in 2012. Two terms later, the 79-year-old shows no sign of slowing down.  


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Is uranium mine the answer to Greenland money problem

Michael Oneal reports for The Washington Post:


With a territory larger than Mexico and a population that could fit inside a football stadium, Greenland badly needs new sources of income to provide jobs and combat chronic social ills. Its economy leans heavily on one major export — shrimp — and is propped up by an annual block grant of more than $500 million from Denmark.


The question is what to do about it. Many in Greenland, including Prime Minister Kim Kielsen, view resource development as the nation’s best chance for self-sufficiency. 


The issue is tightly intertwined with Greenland’s fervent movement to win independence from Denmark, which began colonizing the sprawling territory almost 300 years ago. Greenland negotiated the right to self-rule in 1979 and has since built the institutions of a modern democratic society.


The next step, pro-development interests think, is to launch large-scale mining projects to jump-start a diversification of the economy. Opponents counter that courting foreign mining interests amounts to swapping one form of dependency for another, with the added risk of environmental degradation.


The policy debate is playing out in Nuuk, Greenland’s capital, but the struggle is more palpable in Narsaq, where mining companies propose digging into a treeless mountain called Kvanefjeld that rises imposingly just outside of town. 


The mine would produce 3 million tons of ore per year when at full production. It would be the world’s second-largest rare-earth mine; its overall footprint, including disposal areas and housing for workers, would be close to five square miles.


See in-depth story, photos and graphics here


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Study finds two New Jersey salt marshes ‘losing ground’

USGS scientist Zafer Defne Measuring water and sediment movement at Forsythe National Wildlife Refuge in NJ
Justin Auciello reports for NewsWorks:

Scientists working on an assessment of salt marshes along the U.S. coast say half of those they studied will be gone in up to 350 years if lost ground isn’t regained.
Salt marshes provide vital habitat for animals and are important for their role in coastal protection. But the ecosystems along the coasts are falling victim to pressures such as sea-level rise and changing land uses, and are flooded frequently by seawater.
The U.S. Geological Survey set about to determine the danger erosion poses to eight salt marshes on the two coasts. The agency says it was surprised to find all eight of the marshes losing ground, some severely.
The study involved marshes in California, Maine, Maryland and New Jersey.
In the Garden State, researchers studied Reedy Creek and Dinner Creek at New Jersey’s Edwin B. Forsythe National Wildlife Refuge and Schooner Creek.

They employed remote sensing techniques, including aerial photography, to determine how much of an individual marsh is open water and covered by marsh plants.
From there, the researchers compared the ratio of ponds, channels, and tidal flats to the overall vegetation to determine the chance of survival during changing environmental conditions.

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New funding source sows green into NJ farm preservation


Appropriation from corporate business taxes would be first since voters passed constitutional amendment in 2014

farmland

Tom Johnson reports
for NJ Spotlight:

For the first time in a few years, the state is starting to dole out tens of millions of dollars in grants and aid to help preserve farmland across New Jersey.
The Assembly Agricultural and Natural Resources Committee is scheduled to consider a package of four bills on Monday that would mark the first appropriation to set aside farmlands since voters approved a constitutional amendment in 2014 dedicating corporate business taxes to this purpose.
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It is has been a long time coming, according to conservationists.
“We’ve been waiting quite awhile for the farmland preservation program to get back going,’’ said Ed Potosnak, chairman of the New Jersey Keep It Green coalition, which lobbied for the preservation ballot question.
In the past, the state largely relied on bond issues to finance farmland preservation, but the passage of a ballot question committing a portion of corporate business taxes for conservation purposes provides a stable source of funding to protect open space and agricultural land.
The four-bill package is identical to three measures introduced earlier this month in the Senate, which also have yet to be acted upon.
One of the bills (A-4580) appropriates $2.9 million in grants to nonprofit groups to help preserve farmland. A second bill (A-4581) would steer $22.3 million to the State Agricultural Development Committee to purchase easements or other titles to help protect agricultural land. Another measure (A-4582) would set aside $32.5 million in money for county farmland preservation projects from the corporate business taxes.
The final bill in the package (A-4584) would provide up to $7.5 million in incentive grants to municipalities for farmland preservation projects.
Typically, the projects receiving such appropriations in the package win final legislative approval before the summer budget recess.

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EPA extends comment period for two proposed TCE rules


The USEPA posted this announcement this afternoon:


EPA is extending the comment period for two proposed rules on Trichloroethylene (TCE), a toxic chemical with human health concerns identified by EPA in a 2014 risk assessment.  

EPA proposed these rules in December and January to ban certain uses of the chemical in aerosol degreasing, as a spot cleaner in dry cleaning facilities, and in commercial vapor degreasing.  

The comment period for the proposed ban on TCE as an aerosol degreaser and for spot cleaning in dry cleaning facilities is extended to March 16.

The comment period for the proposed ban on TCE as a commercial vapor degreaser is extended to April 19.

Read more about the proposed rules:

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NJ, PA House GOPers only no votes on weaker enviro rules

Rep. Frank LoBiondo waits for an elevator with fellow N.J. Republican Rep. Chris Smith. (Star-Ledger)

Jonathan D. Salant reports for NJ.com:

Just four House Republicans voted against repealing U.S. Interior Department regulations requiring federal officials to use the best available science, including addressing the impacts of climate change and moving toward clean energy, in allowing development on public lands.



Three of them are from New Jersey. [Editor: 1 from Pennsylvania]
The 234-186 vote on Tuesday was the latest in a series of House GOP efforts to roll back environmental protections enacted in the final months of President Barack Obama’s administration. House Republicans earlier also repealed a regulation that could block individuals with mental illness from buying guns.
Reps. Frank LoBiondo (R-2nd Dist.), Chris Smith (R-4th Dist.) and Leonard Lance (R-7th Dist.) voted no. The only other House Republican to vote now was Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick (R-Pa.), who represent a district across the Delaware River in Bucks County. 
“I’ve tried throughout my public service to be a strong proponent of protection of public lands,” Lance said. “We recognize it’s important to preserve land.”
5 regulations N.J. Republicans helped repeal
5 regulations N.J. Republicans helped repeal
Republicans blocked regulations affecting gun owners and the energy industry, whose campaign giving favors the GOP.



LoBiondo and Smith also dissented last week when House Republicans voted to repeal regulations on coal companies designed to protect streams and drinking water supplies.
Smith also broke away from the party line and opposed efforts to repeal a rule requiring U.S. oil and gas companies to disclose payments made to foreign governments. Foreign oil companies already are required to reveal such payments.
He also voted no this time.
“Our public lands contribute to economic prosperity, provide recreational and tourism opportunities for sportsmen and travelers, and promote biodiversity,” Smith said. He said the regulation, “while not a perfect rule,” will help “to protect open spaces and critical habitats.”
The Interior Department’s Bureau of Land Management oversees more than 245 million acres, mostly in 12 western states.
The new regulations announced in December were designed to speed up land-use planning and involve state and local officials. According to BLM, the planning process also will take into account the best available science to address issues such as droughts and wildfires that are increasing in intensity, efforts to develop clean energy sources, and changing animal habitats.
Obama’s BLM director, Neil Kornze, said the new rule would increase “collaboration and transparency.”
House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) said on the House floor that U.S. officials in Washington shouldn’t make decisions about publicly owned land.
“This was devised by people who don’t live on our land and who don’t know our land and they just try to dictate how to use our land,” McCarthy said. “They are undermining the very idea of multiple use of federal lands by making the lands entirely off limits for any type of economic purposes.”
President Donald Trump endorsed the repeal. In a memo to Congress, White House officials said the law would give priority to regional and national interests over those of states and localities.
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