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Thursday, October 14, 2004

Environment - Recent stories

"Hog-farm trespass conviction upheld" is the headline to this story today in the Muncie Star-Press. The report is apparently about a Not for Publication decision of the Court of Appeals, as I have not seen it. Some quotes from the story:

MUNCIE - The Indiana Court of Appeals this week affirmed a jury's conviction of an environmental/animal rights advocate for trespassing at the Seldom Rest confined hog feeding operation.

Ball State University history professor Abel Alves and his wife Carol Blakney were seen observing and photographing the farm at 10:22 a.m. on Oct. 12, 2002, by Bobby Adams. He is a friend of prominent pork producers William and Kaye Whitehead, the farm's owners.

"While there was no evidence Alves had opened or climbed over the gate and walked past the "No Trespassing" sign, the jury could have reasonably inferred that at least part of his body entered the air space above the Whiteheads' property," wrote appellate Judge Melissa May of Evansville. "As a result, there was sufficient evidence to sustain his conviction of trespass." * * *

Deputy prosecutor Judi Calhoun called the ruling a "no-brainer" and a victory for all farmers and other private property owners. Had the conviction been overturned, farmers would have been forced to post "No Trespassing Signs" every six inches along the perimeter of their land, she said. * * *

Blakney's appeal remains pending. "Frankly, this ruling is scary to me," Blakney said. "If someone doesn't like your politics, you can be brought up on criminal charges and prosecuted for stopping along a public road to take a picture of a barn. The public should be outraged. Property rights are paramount over caring about your community." * * *

There appears to be no case law created by judicial rulings in Indiana addressing the point on a person's property at which a no-trespassing sign takes effect, the appeals court said. Indiana law defines trespassing as knowingly entering the property of another person after having been "denied entry." Entry can be denied by means of "posting ... a notice at the main entrance in a manner that is either prescribed by law or likely to come to the attention of the public."

Two months before the trespassing, Blakney had filed a complaint against Seldom Rest with the Indiana Department of Environmental Management. That resulted in IDEM accusing the Whiteheads of housing 150 hogs in an unpermitted structure and allowing manure from that structure to run into a ditch. The Whiteheads corrected the alleged violations.

The Star Press left a message Wednesday afternoon on the answering machine of Kaye Whitehead, chairman of the Delaware County Republican Party, inviting her to comment.

"U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Region 5 recently completed its cleanup of the American Chemical Service Inc. Superfund site in Griffith, Ind." is the title to this EPA release and announcement of an open-house at the site:
U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Region 5 recently completed its cleanup of the American Chemical Service Inc. Superfund site in Griffith, Ind.

An open house, including guided tours of the project by EPA and Indiana Department of Environmental Management officials, is scheduled for 3 to 5 p.m., Wednesday, Oct. 20, at the Griffith Town Hall, 111 North Broad St. Shuttle buses will take people to the site beginning at 3 p.m.

The final phase of cleanup began in early 2001, with a projected end date of mid-2005. However, a recent inspection of the site by EPA and IDEM showed there is no need for additional work. ACS recycled chemicals from 1958 to 1975, when it stopped using two disposal areas on the property and covered them. These chemicals contaminated the ground water underneath the plant.

The Porter County greenspace ordinance proposal, written up before here, was approved last evening. The Gary Post-Tribune reports:

VALPARAISO — The Porter County Plan Commission voted 5-4 to pass on an amended version of a controversial green space ordinance to the Porter County Commissioners, who must decide to act on it or accept the earlier version most admitted had serious flaws.

The compromise ordinance will require developers to protect environmental features on parcels they wish to develop — specifically dunes, flood plains, forest area, prairie, watercourses and wetlands. It puts a cap of 40 percent to be preserved as open space while only requiring a set-aside of 10 percent of land that has been agricultural field as open space.

“I am very disappointed that the Plan Commission would pass something that was fatally flawed,” said Gary Green, owner of Wagner Homes. “My clients want to live in trees and along streams.” Wagner Homes has developed many of the upscale developments in Porter County.

Green predicted that the ordinance will result in prime farm land becoming more desirable for development. He also predicted that property owners surrounding municipalities will be “screaming for annexation.”

Environmentalist Herb Read said he was happy. “It is a compromise of a compromise of a compromise,” he said. “We agreed to lower the percentage ( of set-aside open space) for cornfields to get a higher percent for environmental features.”

The Munster Times reports, in a story headlined "Hundreds show for vote approving green space":
VALPARAISO -- A crowd of hundreds cast an informal vote Wednesday night for a rule requiring builders to set aside open space in their developments. And the Porter County Plan Commission agreed.

Plan commission member Bob Harper sent out 7,000 letters with his case for the ordinance and the staff report, and almost every member of the audience was clutching the green, blue, yellow and pink sheets of dense language. * * *

Even opponents of the ordinance, which requires between 10 and 40 percent of open space in developments depending on features like slopes and wetlands, said they support the idea, but the rule needs more work. The commission passed the ordinance by a 5 to 4 vote and promised to improve it.

Posted by Marcia Oddi on October 14, 2004 09:01 AM
Posted to Environmental Issues