Sen. Hatch (R-UT) has sponsored S. 1783, which would replace Sec. 1977(b)(2)(A) of the Omnibus Public Land Management Act of 2009 -- which currently mandates the Secretary of the Interior to, "in consultation with appropriate Federal agencies, State, tribal, and local governmental entities (including the County and St. George City, Utah), and the public, identify one or more alternatives for a northern transportation route in the County" -- with text mandating the Secretary to "ensure that the travel management plan — (i) designates a northern transportation route in the County that follows the route depicted on the map entitled ‘Washington Parkway’; and (ii) provides that the designation and construction of the route is not subject to additional restrictions or requirements from the United States Fish and Wildlife Service." You'd be suspicious of any bill that would reduce public involvement in governmental decision-making by now, I hope, but you'd be more suspicious if you knew that this "Washington Parkway" would run straight through the Red Cliffs Desert Reserve, home to many threatened and endangered species. Is Utah that small, that we can't come up with an alternative route? Hence CREDO helps you tell your Congressfolk to reject Mr. Hatch's attempt to work around the democratic process and ram a highway through a protected area.
Meanwhile, if you've missed previous opportunities to tell your Congressfolk to support H.R. 3065/S. 1779, the Financial Services Conflict of Interest Act, then Public Citizen still helps you do that. The bill would slow the "revolving door" between Wall Street banking corporations and government regulatory jobs by banning "golden parachute" pay packages for executives who take said regulatory jobs, by forcing regulators and their senior staff to recuse themselves from regulatory matters concerning a corporation that had employed them within the last two years, and by keeping regulators from taking lobbying jobs for two full years after they leave their federal agencies. Sen. Warren (D-MA) has said that "any Presidential candidate should be able to cheer for" this bill, and indeed, three Democratic Presidential candidates (Messrs. Clinton, Sanders, and O'Malley) have embraced it, while Republican Jeb Bush has embraced the principle of slowing the "revolving door," though not necessarily this bill. Of course he's a Bush and therefore can't be trusted to keep promises like this, but I'm sure plenty of rank-and-file Republican citizens want to fight corruption, too, and for the moment, he helps give them a voice. I just hope they use that voice with their Congressfolk.
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