Obama delists 12 endangered species, adds
hundreds more
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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 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. 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 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.
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.
