NEW JERSEY TO PRIVATIZE LAND USE PERMITTING — Contractors to Write Wetlands & other approvals

NEW JERSEY TO PRIVATIZE LAND USE PERMITTING — Contractors to Write Flood Control, Coastal Wetlands and Other Approvals


Trenton — New Jersey is now looking for private companies to review applications and draft permits for all of its land use programs, according to a request for proposal posted today by Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER). The five-year contract would radically extend Governor Chris Christie’s privatization agenda into regulatory decisions traditionally seen as inherently governmental.

The request for proposal quietly posted on a state web site solicits bids from contractors to assume permit review and drafting for virtually all state land use regulations, including permits for flood control, coastal protection, wetlands, tidelands, stormwater management, the touted Highlands area protections and even threatened and endangered species reviews. Up to $600,000 “is expected to be available” during the first year of a five-year base contract that could be extended to a total of eight years, however, the source of funds in a strapped state budget are not identified. Bidding is slated to close on November 4, 2010.

“This is not just the fox guarding the henhouse; this is the fox issuing henhouse tickets to other foxes,” stated New Jersey PEER Director Bill Wolfe, noting that privatization of air pollution permits under former Governor Christie Whitman scandalously imploded after state consultants were discovered stealing proprietary information from permit applications. “This is a hurried, secretive corporate giveaway of the entire suite of safeguards for soil, water, wildlife and landscapes.”


http://www.peer.org/news/news_id.php?row_id=1407

Nobody in New York is surprised.

Shouldn't you be more worried about the possibility of Carl "Horse Party" Paladino getting elected?

But I do occasionally mention Connecticut.

that is beyond the pale

This is RW nuttiness run amok.

environmental protections. We are going to look back at the last few decades of environmental regulation as a lost golden era, as imperfect as it was.

Of course, only Obama is a dictator to R-Wers.

screw over New Jersey - HEY, CAN YOU FOLKS IN JERSEY IMPEACH THIS SOB?

...and from what I've seen in recent polls, somehow NJ voters apparently approve of him.

I guess during an economic downturn people are drawn to a combative personality - even when he is doing destructive things.

Is it the Star Ledger -- or Asbury Park Press that are very right wing?

Used to read them like once a week and reply in the days when some of us

hoped that responding might change things!

The other thing is that NJ keeps putting in Democrats every where .... except

my Town Council! Everytime we get just one or two Dems on the Council everything

changes for the better!! And, yet seems like every other election a Repuke fascist

is in place in Governor's office!!

Can't get Town Council to even begin to react to the voting computers, either!!

That's also insane --

And these things began to come in during the mid-late-1960's .... large ones used by

MSM. Remember when they could only report ACTUAL vote tallies? Large computers

gave them new powers to PREDICT and CALL elections and winners/losers! We saw those

new powers reversed in 2000! These computers also began coming in just as America

was passing the Voting Rights Act!

I'd question every election back to Nixon/Humphrey -- another squeaker!!




:eyes:


:)

:grr:

The Christie administration appears to be moving quietly behind the scenes to take the next step in privatizing the Department of Environmental Protection, without filling the public or the Legislature in on the plan. Environmental advocates who’ve learned about this plan are understandably alarmed.

Here’s the story: The Treasury Department has just issued a Request for Proposals on behalf of the DEP. Treasury is seeking a private contractor who will review and process a variety of DEP land use permits, including applications to develop in wetlands, flood hazard areas, and riparian areas.

This raises some very troubling questions. Why is this being done with no public debate? Where are the safeguards that should make the public comfortable that these private contractors will be properly screened and supervised? Or is this merely an end-run around civil service requirements and union contracts, so DEP can replace those pesky employees who often say no with more sympathetic contract permit reviewers?

To be fair, DEP and other state agencies have occasionally used private contractors to help with paperwork backlogs. Yet the job description for these new contractors far exceeds the role that “temps” would normally play, and few application backlogs exist in this down economy. In fact, when describing the qualifications that successful bidders should have, the RFP mimics the requirements of several DEP job descriptions.

Further, the RFP states that the contractor would be responsible for determining administrative completeness of applications, conducting the technical review of the application, writing the final permit decision document and then recommending to the appropriate DEP supervisor whether the permit should be approved or denied. Given these responsibilities, it is hard to imagine how a DEP land-use supervisor could do anything but accept the contractor’s recommendation.


http://blog.nj.com/njv_guest_blog/2010/09/a_stealth_move_to_privatize_la.html