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Obama delists 12 endangered species, adds hundreds more

Posted By Marjorie Haun @ Watchdog.org / June 3, 2015 / 2 Comments

CELEBRATE GOOD TIMES?: While the Obama Administration is credited with delisting the most“endangered” species under the ESA, the amount that has been listed should not go unmissed.

By Marjorie Haun | Watchdog Arena

Although the Obama Administration has delisted as many species as all administrations combined since the Endangered Species Act was passed–a total of twelve– the numbers of species being added to the list is staggering. Since 2007, 299 new species have been listed as “endangered,” and there are currently 36 species waiting in the wings.

According to a report by Corbin Hiar, a reporter for Environment and Energy Publishing, species taken off the “endangered” list by the Obama Administration are poised to surpass the number of species delisted in the forty years since the ESA was passed if deadlines are met. According to the report, another 18 species, including birds, mammals, plants, reptiles, and fish, have been removed from the list since 2009.

Given the scope and impact of the ESA, which now empowers the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to address all threatened or endangered species internationally through the “Branch of Foreign Species,” Obama’s record is not necessarily a cause for celebration.

Greg Walcher, former Secretary of Colorado’s Department of Natural Resources, in a 2014 Watchdog Wire report, claimed that of the thousands of species listed as endangered by USFW, only around one percent have been delisted, and ten of those were due to extinction.

Delisting endangered species is also often subjective. USFW, tasked with assessing and listing potentially threatened and endangered species, often adds species to the list with no clear criteria for recovery. Walcher exposed this significant weakness in the ESA listing process, indicating that recovery plans and criteria for what constitutes species recovery are not required for the process by which species receive their“endangered” designation.

The identification of threatened or endangered species by USFW is more than a race to restore populations of specific animals. The economic and political stakes are incredibly high, especially in those states where the protection of “endangered” species means closing off millions of acres of land to human development.

The Yellow-billed Cuckoo is one such species. With habitat covering vast regions of the western states, preservation of its habitat could potentially effect farming, ranching, mineral exploration and extraction, industrial and residential development, and access to native water resources for millions of people.

Colorado’s species of note is the Gunnison Sage Grouse, a near-identical relative of the Greater Sage Grouse, which lives in many Western Slope counties where oil and gas development, mining, and ranching are key economic drivers. Elected officials at all levels of government, including Gov. John Hickenlooper, have united to dissuade USFW from its plan to move the Sage Grouse, which is currently designated as “threatened,” into the endangered category.

In a lawsuit filed against USFW, its flawed listing processes and lack of transparency were documented. But potentially massive economic repercussions were also pointed out. According to a March 18, 2015 Washington Times article about the lawsuit:

The Greater sage-grouse’s habitat is enormous, spanning 165 million acres in 11 Western states, 64 percent of which sits on federal land.

The Fish and Wildlife Service has until Sept. 30 to decide whether to list the Greater sage-grouse as endangered or threatened under the Endangered Species Act, a move with potentially devastating economic consequences for the Western United States.

The Endangered Species Act was first passed in 1973, largely in response to alarming declines in the populations of several apex predators, including the Southern Bald Eagle and Polar Bear, as well as some iconic critters such as the Whooping Crane and Bighorn Sheep. In 1978, the ESA was amended to include plants, and marine and terrestrial invertebrates.

Due to intensive conservation efforts on the part of federal agencies, state and local governments, and non-profits, a few species have recovered sufficiently to be relisted as “threatened” or “recovering.”Between the time of the enactment of the ESA and 2007, 18 species–including plants, invertebrates, birds, reptiles, and mammals from the United States and other countries–were taken off the “endangered” listing because their numbers were on the rebound.

The recovery of a species struggling on the cusp of extinction is undoubtedly a cause for celebration, and most Americans support the goals of the ESA. But as hundreds of new species are listed, many of which are virtually unknown or may be dubious subspecies of a thriving species, the present goals of USFW in its application of the ESA are being called into question with its potential to do ravage economies.

This article was written by a contributor of Watchdog Arena, Franklin Center’s network of writers, bloggers, and citizen journalists.

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Wolves at the door: Court ruling triggers backlash over Endangered Species Act - Miles Kuschel could have taken aim to protect his cattle from the pack of six gray wolves stalking his herd Easter morning. Since pulling the trigger meant risking a prison term, he didn’t. But when Kuschel returned to his farm after Easter services, he found a calf’s bloody carcass. “They came, they killed and they left, but they’re still around. They just move on to the neighbor’s place,” said Kuschel, president of the Cass County Chapter of the Farm Bureau. Federal wildlife authorities confirmed wolves did indeed kill the 80-pound calf.

Christie has no receipts for quarter-million dollars in expenses - Details of New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie’s $82,000 spending spree at NFL games remain a mystery – despite a release of expense account receipts by the governor’s office. Receipts for Christie’s purchases at New York Giants and Jets home games during the 2010 and 2011 seasons are missing from 597 pages of receipts New Jersey Watchdog obtained through an Open Public Records Act request. The governor’s office does not have documentation for more than $247,000 in expenses – two-thirds of the $360,000 Christie has spent from his state expense allowance since he took office in 2010, according to a New Jersey Watchdog analysis.

Christie buys $300k of food & booze with NJ expense account - Chris Christie’s expense account tells a story of appetite and ambition, one that pits government waste against the New Jersey governor’s waistline. Christie spent $360,000 from his state allowance during his five years in office. More than 80 percent of that money, or $300,000, was used to buy food, alcohol and desserts, according to a New Jersey Watchdog analysis of records released by the governor’s office. In addition to his $175,000 a year salary, the governor receives $95,000 a year in expense advances, paid quarterly by the state. In the state budget, it is listed as “an allowance of funds not otherwise appropriated and used for official receptions on behalf of the state, the operation of an official residence, for other expenses.” While Christie returns surplus funds to the state each year, Treasury officials say he does not submit receipts or accounting for the public monies he spends. The governor’s ledger, obtained from Christie under the Open Public Records Act, offers a rare, if partial glimpse of a controversial expense account shrouded in secrecy.

New Jersey pension mess to hit fan in Supreme Court - New Jersey’s $170 billion pension mess will hit the fan this week in state Supreme Court. Whatever the high court decides, the verdict could be bad news for state taxpayers, public workers or both. The justices are scheduled to hear oral arguments Wednesday on whether Gov. Chris Christie is unlawfully withholding $1.57 billion from this year’s required $2.25 billion payment to the state’s pension system. The governor is appealing a lower court decision ordering his administration to obey a 2011 pension reform he once called his “greatest governmental victory.” Ironically, Christie now contends the statute he had championed is unconstitutional, and therefore unenforceable. “The court cannot allow the state to ‘simply walk away from its financial obligations,’ especially when those obligations were the state’s own creation,” ruled Mercer County Superior Court Judge Mary C. Jacobsonin February.

Pension reform promises $18 billion savings, but questions linger - After what was touted as a historic vote in the state Senate, Pennsylvania is still a long way from getting any relief from its public pension problems. A major pension overhaul bill cleared the state Senate along party lines last week, but it still needs to make it through the state House and get a signature from a skeptical Gov. Tom Wolf before becoming law. Senate Bill 1 is likely to end up in court, if it survives the state House and gets a signature from Gov. Tom Wolf, that is. Even then, much the bill’s $18 billion in promised savings could be wiped out by a legal challenge in the state courts. “If this bills gets passed, as written, and signed by the governor, someone will definitely sue over it,” predicts James McAneny, executive director of the Public Employee Retirement Commission. A huge part of the supposed “savings” in Senate Bill 1 come from changes to existing employees’ benefits. Those savings come from two elements of the proposal: a cap on pension benefits based on employees’ salaries and, for some employees, the removal of a provision passed in 2001 boosting benefits…..But it will ultimately come down to a question of interpretation: Does the court see the 2001 benefit increase as set in stone permanently, or can those additional benefits be taken away as easily as they were given, now that their costs have become more apparent?

Nosier than the NSA? Shadowy bureau may have your credit card info - While the domestic spying National Security Agency has been under the red-hot political spot light, another quasi-governmental agency has quietly gone about the business of collecting nearly 1 billion U.S. credit card records without consumer consent. The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, CFPB, unlike the NSA, operates with no congressional oversight and with little public transparency, even as it demands complete transparency from the businesses it targets. As Brian Wise puts it, the rogue agency created under the Obama administration to protect consumers now serves as “judge, jury, and executioner” in determining winners and losers in U.S. business and consumption.….. Last year, a congressional hearing found CFPB officials were working with the Federal Housing Finance Agency to mine data on the 53 million residential mortgages taken out by Americans since 1998.

Feds pour $32 million more into beleaguered solar industry - The Department of Energy has doled out another $32 million to support the solar industry, a sector fraught with technology challenges and scandal – and nevertheless propped up with billions of taxpayer dollars during the Obama Administration.This latest funding is dedicated to training a workforce of solar technicians, developing new technology and implementing a database to share performance data, the DOE announced in a press release last week. The training goal is 75,000 workers by 2020 and an undisclosed amount of “other professionals” in other fields such as real estate, finance, insurance and fire and safety. What the release didn’t say was that the Obama Administration has spent $150 billion on green initiatives between 2009 and 2014, yet the industry cannot survive without government giveaways, a Brookings Institution study found.

Surprised solar customers find themselves with liens -For Jeff Leeds, installing solar panels from SolarCity was like partnering with the devil - a deal full of skyrocketing electric bills, contract violations, and a lien on his home.

Water war: Senators blast EPA’s‘end-run’ rule - California’s drought has worsened under government edicts that have siphoned water from the Central Valley, the state’s agricultural breadbasket. Virginia’s 21 Republican state senators say a “Waters of the United States” rule targets farmers and could cost the state and landowners untold millions of dollars. Sen. Ben Chafin, R-Lebanon, called the proposed regulation by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency “an attempted end-run around Congress and two Supreme Court rulings.” “(It) would significantly expand the scope of ‘navigable waters’ subject to the Clean Water Act jurisdiction by regulating small and remote waters,” the senators stated in a letter to EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy.

State Sen. Ben Chafin says EPA regulations are bad news for farmers and ranchers. “By increasing federal jurisdiction over lands, the rule would establish federal power to regulate farming and other land uses,” wrote Chafin, an attorney and farmer who sits on the state Senate’s Agriculture, Conservation and Natural Resources Committee. No Democratic senators signed the letter. State Sen. Chap Petersen’s office said the Fairfax Democrat had “never heard”from Republicans about the issue. Speaking to Virginia ranchers and farmers, Chafin said, “Ditches and small ponds on your farm would be considered waters that are under the nearly unlimited jurisdiction of the EPA.

 

Will the EPA’s Clean Power Plan save you money or clean your clock? - The Obama administration and the Environmental Protection Agency is on the verge of instituting a Clean Power Plan that would mark the first federal measure to regulate carbon dioxide emissions from the nation’s existing power plants. The EPA says the new rules will save money in the long run, but a recent study comes to a much different conclusion — estimating that 43 states will see their electricity prices increase by double-digits in the next decade, with 14 states having peak-year increases of more than 20 percent. “You see no benefits from spending all this money and it’s driving up energy prices for families,” said Paul Bailey, senior vice president for federal affairs and policy at the American Coalition for Clean Coal Electricity, an industry group opposed to the proposed rules.The group also questions whether the new rules will make

Union bosses are lovin’ $15-an hour fast-food protests - Officials with six-figure salaries led “Fight for $15″ strikes across the country Wednesday. They want fast-food workers to unionize, so they can keep filling up while union membership rates in other industries run dry.

Freedom’s just another word for mandatory dues, union says - Labor union logic: true freedom means paying a union to keep your job.

Elizabeth Warren, the real estate profiteer - Fun fact: Before the crash that she blamed on speculators, Senator Elizabeth Warren made a bundle by flipping houses.

Hillary’s 2016 ‘Equal Pay Day’ announcement misses thepoint on‘ paycheck fairness’ - Hillary Clinton said she wants to be America’s“champion,” noting that 90 percent of American voters support policies to help women earn “equal pay.” But does the wage gap really need her help?

Inside one more sketchy Sharpton-family nonprofit - Al Sharpton’s daughter Dominique has recently grabbed headlines for her $5 million lawsuit against the City of New York over a sprained ankle, but the shakedown may not stop there. New records reviewed by National Review show Sharpton’s daughter and her boyfriend, Marcus Bright, together run a shadowy nonprofit that shares corporate donors, board members, and office space with Al Sharpton’s National Action Network, and they won’t answer any questions about it. In tax filings, Education for a Better America (EBA) states that its mission is “to build a bridge between policy makers and the classroom by supporting innovations in the delivery of education and disseminating information and findings that impact our schools.” The nonprofit’s publications show the group hosting or participating in education-focused assemblies, speeches, summits, and events in New York City, Miami, Atlanta, Philadelphia, Chicago, and Washington, D.C., among other cities.

Gun Sense Vermont and Bloomberg’s Everytown spend big but still lose gun fight - Gun control groups like Gun Sense Vermont and Michael Bloomberg’s Everytown for Gun Safety poured tens of thousands of dollars into anti-gun legislation in Vermont in recent months - but have little to show for it.

Vermont gun club ignoring noise ordinance citations - Members of the half-century-old North Country Sportsmen’s Club in Vermont say shooting sports continue undisturbed weeks after the Town of Williston sent police to shut them down with a dubious noise ordinance citation. Two weeks after police issued dubious noise-ordinance citations to a gun club in Vermont, club members say they have no plans to pay the fines, and that shooting fun is back to normal at the range.“Shooting’s been good. We haven’t been cited in the last two weeks,” Tim Riddle, treasurer at the North Country Sportsmen’s Club, told Vermont Watchdog on Thursday.North Country Sportsmen’s Club, located on Gun Club Drive in Williston, Vt., is a half-century-old shooting range that offers trap and five-stand shotgun shooting for the whole family.While the club has long history in the community and no record of trouble, something was amiss when police officers arrived May 3 to halt a typical Sunday trap shooting event at the facility.According to Riddle, Williston police and town officials tried to shut the club down despite years of lawful sporting activities on the property……“The agreement was about notifying the town, not asking permission (to shoot). And it was mutually severable and could be amended at any time when it was put together,” Riddle said. Now, all of a sudden, the town wants to treat it like they were giving us permission. That was never the case.”

 

Nanny of the Week: Is the minimum wage a nanny state policy? - Devin Jerran, who works at a pizza shop in Seattle, is losing his job because of new rules from the city government. But this isn’t a story about Seattle banning gluten or cheese. The city council didn’t outlaw pizza because it’s worried kids might like pizza and it could become a gateway food to other food that isn’t organic or farm-raised. But it might as well be. Instead, Seattle’s city government passed a law that effectively prevents Jerran from earning the amount of money his employer is willing to pay him. As a result, he and his coworkers are losing their jobs, according to a report from Q13 Fox in Seattle. That city recently adopted a $15 per hour minimum wage, the highest for any American city. We don’t often think about minimum wage laws as being part of the government overreach that is detailed each week in this column. But how do you identify when government has strayed from its rightful place to become a “nanny?"

 

Freedom’s just another word for mandatory dues, union says - What sounds like a riff on a George Orwell story is actually the heart of an argument by one of America’s most powerful labor unions. American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees recently equated forced dues with freedom in defense of an AFSCME video portraying nonmembers as deadbeats. “Imagine you and some friends go out to eat. Everyone eats, but when the bill comes, one guy won’t pay his fair share because he didn’t pick the restaurant,” AFSCME explained in an April 20 Facebook post.

 

Labor unions take forced fees from 550,000 nonmembers - To keep their jobs, 554,799 American workers were forced last year to pay union agency fees. In the 25 states without right-to-work laws, unions can take mandatory “fair share” or “agency” fees from workers who decline union membership. Those fees often amount to hundreds of dollars per year. Unions can’t spend agency fees directly on politics, but taking fees from nonmembers frees unions to spend more from members’ dues on political activism for “progressive,” big-government policies. Agency fees inflate union membership, as well — workers who want to opt out must consider they’ll have to pay the union regardless of whether they join.

 

Voices of charter schools go unheard by California Democrats - The three largest California teachers unions have voiced their strong support for bills that would toughen regulations covering the state’s charter schools. Those who remain unconvinced seem to have been forgotten by the sponsors of the anti-charter legislation. In an interview with Watchdog Arena about the four new bills that threaten California charter schools, Myrna Castrejon, the California Charter Schools Association’s senior vice president for government affairs, said, “[W]e were not briefed on the intent of the four legislators who filed CTA [California Teachers Association]-sponsored legislation in advance. But of course, we have had numerous conversations with them and policy committee members and staff about why their bills would hurt our charters, in some cases mortally.”

 

12 big car companies are trying to make working on your own car illegal - Going outside on a warm Saturday afternoon and working on your car is as American as apple pie, for now at least. The Auto Alliance, a special interest group representing 12 big automobile companies from Ford to Toyota, is pushing an interpretation of a law called the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) that would put this do-it-yourself tradition in danger. These 12 car companies are lobbying hard to make working on the electrical and computer components of your own car illegal. General Motors has told the Copyright Office that proponents of copyright reform mistakenly “conflate ownership of a vehicle with ownership of the underlying computer software in a vehicle.”

 

How net neutrality will regulate the Internet ecosystem- While much has been written about the potential ramifications of net neutrality’s Title II regulatory effects on investments in Internet infrastructure and broadband deployment, Roslyn Layton’s recent piece with Tech Policy Daily takes a look at how changes to the Internet landscape in the post-net neutrality era might not be changed merely by the addition of new fees and taxes on Internet service. Sweeping regulatory measures could also be applied to the areas of privacy, advertising, and oversight of data security. Given the $1 trillion Internet economy, which has been the primary driver of American economic growth over the past two decades, the potential for FCC rules to unduly burden innovators and entrepreneurs, especially as it relates to advertising and data collection, is a worrisome prospect:

 

Despite minority student success, charter school segregation narrative continues - At the recent Education Writers Association national seminar in Chicago, a small breakout session asked the following question: Is school choice a tool for opportunity and equity, or further segregation? Following the latest negative spin on charter schools around the country, it seems most education journalists decidedly choose the latter. “If you’re an education writer and aren’t covering segregation in schools, I’d ask you why,” said Nikole Hannah-Jones, winner of the EWA award for best education reporting, in her acceptance speech. Her comments echo the controversial study released by Duke University researchers in conjunction with the National Bureau of Economic Research earlier this month, which claims charter schools in North Carolina are further segregating public schools and leaving minority students behind.

 

Oil, Maduro anda mango: The toss heard ’round Venezuela - At the recent Education Writers Associationnational seminar in Chicago, a small breakout session asked the following question: Is school choice a tool for opportunity and equity, or further segregation? Following the latest negative spin on charter schools around the country, it seems most education journalists decidedly choose the latter. “If you’re an education writer and aren’t covering segregation in schools, I’d ask you why,” said Nikole Hannah-Jones, winner of the EWA award for best education reporting, in her acceptance speech. Her comments echo the controversial study released by Duke University researchers in conjunction with the National Bureau of Economic Research earlier this month, which claims charter schools in North Carolina are further segregating public schools and leaving minority students behind. The Washington Post says this is proof white parents are using charter schools to “secede” from the traditional public system. But the figures show otherwise.

 

Delaware’s health insurance exchange is unaffordable, young people included -- We are well passed the fifth year anniversary of the day President Obama signed the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, which was supposed to give every American affordable and accessible health care, especially to those people who had pre-existing conditions and were either forced to pay extremely high premiums for insurance or were denied coverage. However the ACA only works, assuming your goal is not a government-payer health care system, if those of us who don’t have health insurance buy into the system to help ensure less healthy individuals can keep their premiums down. (Editor’s Note:I think those who have been paying for health insurance for years will find this a little more than interesting.)

 

Ohio Obamacare expansion costs $3 billion in first 15 months - SO FAR, NOT SO GREAT: Ohio Gov. Kasich’s Obamacare Medicaid expansion has already cost taxpayers more than $3 billion - Americans’ tax burden is already $3 billion heavier because of Ohio Gov. John Kasich’s expansion of Medicaid under Obamacare. By putting more able-bodied, working-age childless adults on Medicaid than Kasich projected, Obamacare expansion is reducing incentives to work and threatening traditional Medicaid recipients’ access to care faster and at greater cost than anticipated. After Kasich expanded Medicaid unilaterally, a state panel approved $2.56 billion in Obamacare spending for the expansion’s first 18 months. The money was meant to last until July, but it ran out in February. Kasich’s Obamacare expansion cost $323 million in March — 84 percent greater than estimates

 

Ohio Gov. John Kasich is Hillary’s primary threat - Sen. Bernie Sanders won’t beat Hillary Clinton in the Democratic Party’s presidential primary. But could Ohio Gov. John Kasich? One pesky detail: Kasich is a Republican. If Sanders — a self-described democratic socialist elected to the Senate as an independent— can seek the Democratic nomination for president, why not Kasich? “My party is my vehicle, not my master,” Kasich likes to say. Kasich is the master of an Ohio Republican Party without a platform. Nationally, he could use a new set of wheels. Although Kasich’s mantra that “economic growth is not an end unto itself” is meant to sound centrist, it sums up a campaign built around Obamacare’s Medicaid expansion.

 

Ohio Gov. John Kasich’s Obamacare Roadshow rolls on - Part 8 of 8 in the series Kasich's Obamacare Roadshow - Is Ohio Gov. John Kasich running a Republican presidential campaign or an Obamacare promotional tour? It’s difficult to tell, because Kasich is still pitching billions in Obamacare Medicaid expansion spending — for working-age adults who aren’t disabled and don’t have kids — as common sense conservatism. “While traveling to other states, the governor spends a lot of time being Obamacare’s chief lobbyist,”Tarren Bragdon, president and CEO of the free-market Foundation for Government Accountability, told Watchdog.org. Montana lawmakers enacted Obamacare’s Medicaid expansion after Kasich slammed Republican critics during a January campaign stop, and Kasich repeated many of the same talking points in Georgia on Tuesday. (RELATED: Obama wishes more Republicans were like Ohio’s Kasich)

 

Attempt to force Obamacare expansion on states backfires- Trying to force Obamacare expansion onto Florida by cutting funding for an existing Medicaid program has backfired on President Obama. Florida Gov. Rick Scott, a Republican, is suing Obama’s Department of Health and Human Services over plans to stop funding the state’s Low Income Pool program, which compensates hospitals for seeing uninsured patients. Almost immediately, Republican Texas Gov. Greg Abbott and Republican Kansas Gov. Sam Brownback announced they would join the suit against HHS. Christie Herrera, senior fellow at Florida’s free-market Foundation for Government Accountability, told Watchdog.org the Obama administration has “awakened a sleeping giant.” “They’ve raised the ire of all these other states that are in Florida’s exact position, and that’s why you’ve seen Kansas and Texas filing amicus briefs in the lawsuit,” Herrera said during a phone interview.

 

Hawaii’s health care collapse a bad omen for state Obamacare exchanges - Hawaii dumped its Obamacare exchange after state lawmakers refused to pump an additional $28 million into what they saw as a failed experiment. Which of the other beleaguered state exchanges could be next to fail?

 

The state just cost itself more money - Earlier this week, Governor Markell and the General Assembly caved to complaints from state employees who were upset about being asked to pay more for their health care premiums while they have not received much in the way of salary increases. Governor Markell had asked roughly 120,000 current and retired state employees to pay about $1,000 per year more in deductibles, and pay more for specialist visits, hospital stays, and prescription drugs, while eliminating solid gold oldies like erectile dysfunction pills, which were costing taxpayers $2.7 million per year. As expected, many current and retired state employees were unhappy at having their healthcare premiums go up, especially when many are not receiving wage increases. They voiced their displeasure very, very loudly, and the lawmakers backed off. In fact, not only did they back off, but according to news reports, they are expected to increase the state budget by $21 million to cover the rising healthcare costs for state workers.

 

Road repair costs to skyrocket under Vermont complete streets law - A one-mile road repair estimated at $263,910 could rise as high as $629,561 if lanes are added for cyclists and pedestrians, according to an analysis from the City of Rutland Department of Public Works. In the “complete streets” estimate for Dorr Drive, the standard approach to reclaiming and paving the two-lane, 25-foot-wide road between River Street and the city line would cost $263,910. But since the passage of Act 34 in 2011, all municipal road projects must consider use by cyclists and pedestrians. That means Dorr Drive may need to be widened to provide bike lanes on each side of the road.

 

Report: Majority of tax law violators at IRS don’t get fired - Yes, some Internal Revenue Service employees don’t pay their taxes. But nearly two-thirds of IRS employees who were willfully tax noncompliant between 2004 and 2013 and were supposed to have lost their jobs received a reprieve from the IRS commissioner, according to a newly released report from the IRS’ auditor. Some of those employees received performance awards and promotions within a year after being disciplined, the report notes. The Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration’s review found 1,580 employees willfully tax noncompliant. Their infractions involved a range of violations. A new audit shows 61 percent of IRS employees who violated tax laws had their terminations reduced to lesser disciplinary actions by the IRS commissioner. IRS employees who commit certain acts of misconduct, including willful violations of tax law, are supposed to be fired, according to the IRS Restructuring and Reform Act of 1998.

 

Russian, Spanish-language ads fueling driver’s license fraud in Vermont- Foreign-language ads are helping out-of-state illegal immigrants fraudulently obtain Vermont driver privilege cards, the chief inspector of the Vermont DMV has revealed. “We found two ads out of state … saying you can come here and get a driver’s license,” Capt. Drew Bloom, chief inspector of the DMV, told Vermont Watchdog. “One of them was in Spanish and the other was in Russian,” he said. The revelation comes days after DMV Commissioner Robert Ide said his department’s investigation into driver’s license fraud extended to foreign countries and even other continents. In the first of two print ads obtained by Watchdog.org (photo at top), a message in Russian translates as follows:

 

Proposed tax increases in Kansas could prove costly - With a $411 million budget gap looming on July 1st, Kansas politicians have been trying to figure out how to tax their way out of the problem. Governor Sam Brownback originally proposed a dramatic increase of the state’s tax rate on alcohol and cigarettes—so-called “sin goods”— but now, more than 100 days into what was supposed to be a 90-day legislative session, the Legislature is considering raising a whole host of taxes when they should be focusing on how to cut spending instead. On May 5th, the Kansas Senate Tax Panel rejected Gov. Brownback’s proposal to raise the state’s tax rate on alcohol and cigarettes. Ten days later, the Kansas House rejected a bill that would’ve raised the state sales tax from 6.15 percent to 6.85 percent, and on June 1st the Legislature rejected a smaller increase of the sales tax to 6.5 percent.

 

Pressure mounting against Pennsylvania’s civil asset forfeiture law - Retired Maj. Neill Franklin oversaw more than a dozen drug task forces that used civil asset forfeiture laws to seize millions in property. But by the late 1990s even Franklin, who worked for the Maryland State Police, began to think something was wrong with the system. Franklin was reviewing paperwork from a case on the Eastern Shore. Police had seized a man’s car, and it was suspected the car was used in drug deals. But the owner was never charged with a crime. The man wanted the car back so he could get to work, and police agreed to return it —as long he paid storage and administrative fees of a couple hundred dollars, says Franklin. It cost nothing to park the car on a police lot.