Environment

Waste To Energy

   The idea has merit, the implementation from the last board of Commissioners does not. It was stupid to discuss a private-public partnership with a corporation that wanted to saddle the counties of Carroll and Frederick with the debt and cost of the facility while they make of with the profits. Who is the moron that actually entertained this notion ? Then when the deal fell through, Rothschild paid them a million dollars in hush money and made out like he 'saved' us from a 3 million dollar debt agreed to in a Memorandum of Understanding. A MoU is not a contract and the clause that we are legally bound to a separate contract yet to be negotiated is 'illusory' at best and outright fraud at worst. We owed them nothing for a plan that was never going to work anyway.

Sea Level Rise

   Someone asked this last election and wanted to know what plans we would have to prepare for it. My answer, Swim. Seriously, there is nothing Carroll County can do for Sea Levels rising. We would be at the mercy of Maryland's plan for the Chesapeake. And since we are near Baltimore and Washington DC; there would be a fight amongst State, Federal and City officials over what to do and how and who will pay for it.

   End result; nothing will be done, you'll drown and we all will pay for it.

Renewable Energy

   Best. Idea. Ever. Doesn't matter if you believe in Climate Change or not (you should). Using solar panels and wind turbines (the vertical axis kind) to supplement or replace the electrical grid will be a cost savings and a redundancy plan for emergencies. It is a great plan for the future and for disasters. The problem is that no one supports it under the guise of denying that humans are changing the environment. Who cares, it's a stupid argument and has nothing to do with reducing dependency on a private corporation that continues to pollute the earth and rip you off.

   I would have solar panels on the roofs of every building owned by the county. All combined with wind turbines and maybe hydroelectric on the water treatment plants we could be self-sufficient and not rely on the likes of BGE. Vertical axis wind turbines are better than the normal kind you see. The horizontal type must remain in constant motion or gravity will bend the axis and prevent operation. Electricity is spent when there is no wind to turn the turbine. Also you have to turn the horizontal-type to face the wind, vertical-types work no matter which direction the wind blows.

Hybrid / Electric Vehicles

   I support green technology and would favor using hybrid vehicles in county owned fleets. Maintenance and vehicle costs are starting to come down and are not as expensive as they once were. Hybrid gas/electric vehicles can easily cut fuel costs in half and save money over the life span of the vehicle. The problem is in support of such vehicles and the rising fuel costs which are offsetting the savings. I would support a program to let employees charge their vehicles at their place of business and use the quick charge devices for the consumers and clients of those businesses. A worker will be there for 8 hours or more and not need the quicker charging system. It is the consumer that would spend not as much time there and need the faster charge.

   Some businesses are hesitant to allow their employees to charge vehicles with fears over cost and safety. The cost is negligible and a straw argument. As for safety that is the responsibility of manufacturers of such devices and have shown to be safe.

Reclamation

   Similar to recycling, this is the process of reusing an object or breaking down a broken object into its usable components. How many appliances are thrown out and filling up our landfills ? What happens to all the electronics thrown out ? Often these devices are sent out to private companies to be stripped and recycled but why can't we reuse any components to repair or build new appliances ? We live in a society where everything is thrown away and we can't open any consumer electronics because they are sealed or closed with proprietary hardware. There is an expectation that you are not allowed to open or inspect your own property. And as a result, such devices cannot be repaired or maintained, except by so-called 'authorized' personnel. Sorry, no longer. You may open any thing you own and it is your property. If a business knows how, they can repair an appliance without being 'authorized' by the manufacturer to do so. If there is any merit to it, we should have a program that reclaims material and parts from appliance, construction waste and other sources.

   This is something that can be further applied to our landfills as a whole. Why not recycle all the material buried in Carroll County. The raw materials can be processed and made into the form used by manufacturers to create new products. For instance, why not recycle the aluminum found in cans and similar products into the rolled sheets used by manufacturers. The County can keep the proceeds from the sale and not let some private corporation run off with them.

   The Waste!Carroll group once wanted a recovery facility for this purpose but now their president would rather let a private company use automated machines to 'mine' our landfill and keep the profits. When I suggested the idea of the County running the program and keeping the profits, he felt the County shouldn't get into the aluminum industry. This is the same guy who didn't want a private corporation to keep the profits form the Waste to Energy plant but is okay with a company keeping the profits from mining our trash.

Fracking / Hydraulic Fracturing

   Ban it. This process is literally a biblical plague; warts, rivers set on fire, earthquakes, mass fish kills. Is this mineral extraction or the Book of Revelations ? I am pretty sure fish kills and burning rivers were two of the plagues set upon Egypt. Why are we polluting our aquifers and groundwater with chemicals so corrosive, cancer-causing and toxic that the companies bribed Congress to keep them secret ?

   The biggest problem is that the damage is done. Our watershed is already tainted by the drilling done in Pennsylvania. Meanwhile Maryland blames our farmland for the Chesapeake Bay pollution and imposes that stupid Rain Tax. There is no good fix, aquifers cannot be cleaned up and these toxins will be in our water for centuries. You can't switch to bottle water, that is extracted by corporations from the same tainted groundwater or from public treatment systems. We are stuck with the result of never having clean water again. It is only just the most important vital substance we need.

Chemical Dumping

   Not sure what brought this up last election cycle. I don't recall any specific story or issue of chemicals being dump in Carroll County. But this goes along with the Fracking and Waste to Energy issues. I wouldn't allow anything toxic, radioactive or dangerous to be buried or burned in Carroll County.

Grey Water (Sink Tax)

   Sorry but what has Frazier been smoking, and why hasn't he been sharing it with the rest of us.

   I seriously do not understand where he is getting these ridiculous ideas from. We now need to separate our grey water (non-potable waste water) from our normal waste into our septic tanks ? Huh ? Where is he getting this crap.

   For those not familiar, Grey Water is the dirty water left over from a process that cannot be used for drinking or cooking. It is often murky and dark in color, hence its name. This water can come from showers, dishwashers, clothes washers, workshops, rinsing off your back porch or wherever around the house. It is more of a problem in cities around industrial sites where oils, paints and toxins can be mixed in. But for some reason Frazier thinks we should focus on the rural homes and their septic systems ?

   We had this same crap (pun intended) with the Flush Tax a few years back that was supposedly to pay for the runoff into the bay from processing septic tanks. Why does everyone assume the rural population is making things worse for some other group. What purpose does it serve to "capture" the grey water of rural citizens ?

   To "capture" in this context means to take it out of the process in question. That means removing grey water from whatever process is using it. But in the rural areas, the only process using grey water is the Water Cycle itself. Frazier and the State of Maryland needs a refresher course on their 7th grade Earth Sciences. If we remove water from septic systems, that water cannot be used to refill aquifers. Does he not know how the Water Table works ? When septic tanks fill, the solid waste collects in the bottom and is broken down by bacteria; the liquid floats on top and is drained into the ground systems. This waste is filtered by limestone and other minerals in the soil till it fills the aquifer below the surface. This is how the Water Table has worked for 4.5 billion years, does Frazier thinks he know better than the universe itself ?

   It's the urban areas that need these "captures" not the rural areas. The urban blight of our country uses a closed system of water use in the first place and need a separation of solid and fluid waste. Some solid waste is clogging treatment plants and there is insufficient freshwater to source for supply to urban populations. Westminster has already stated that they are heading to drought levels in a few years and that was when I ran 4 years ago. Lehigh takes most of the grey water in the county for their industrial use.

   There is a process invented by Japanese scientist that is organic and uses a gluten from rice to remove pollutants from water and is the only process in Asia (well Japan at least) that is certified to be potable after treatment. Most places in the world doesn't even have standards to determine how to reclaim water let alone determine if that water is potable (can be cooked or consumed). We need to give Lehigh the boot and keep our water and treat it for consumption again. Pretty soon we won't have any water left, will drown in water that cannot be consumed (see my notes on fracking). That is if Lehigh or Nestle (read what they did in California) doesn't drain all our freshwater first.

Agricultural Preservation

   Our farms are gone, dead and forgotten. There is really no farmland worth protecting left to discuss. Most of largest farms are being chopped up and should in lots to housing developers. I have seen at least three in my own area since the last election cycle, including one with one of those damned traffic circles. What are we preserving ?

   When someone says Ag Preservation, what do they mean ? I personally think of the family farm and local farmer who is growing crops and selling at our local markets or from his farm. But these days the only farms left are the commercial ones or the families hooked into contracts with the commercial operators and forced into debt to keep up with the more successful partners (which they are contractually obligated to do).

Farming Regulations

   There are commercial farms that want to be treated like a small family farm while the family farms being defrauded by their contracts with the commercial operators. We shouldn't give these businesses free reign to wreck our environment and then hide their pollution behind so-called "Right to Farm" and "Safe Food" Acts. Informing the public of corrupt practices and polluting farms is now classified as a form of terrorism by commercial firms that have bribed our law-makers.

   What I want to do is make sure that our private and family farms are protected from predatory commercial farms and that our environment and public are protect from poor practices and polluting chemicals or treatments.

Worst Case Scenario

   See below.

Disaster Preparedness

   At the time last election there were several bad snowstorms and due to climate change (yes, it's real), we have experienced ice and cold temps without precipitation. We were mostly unprepared for ice without snow, downed power lines and fallen trees but nothing to plow. All the equipment prepared was for plowing streets and not clearing trees and lines from roads.

   There has been some improvement and we anticipate the weather better but there is still a problem with the cold and shelters. And with the climate change, we are having moods swings from hotter than normal to colder than normal in a manner of weeks now and not months. With wide swings from 60 degrees one day to 15 the next, there will be rapid heating and freezing of materials. This will accelerate the deterioration of our already crumbling infrastructure. Preparedness is no longer just treating roads for snow and ice, we need to start addressing the issue of living like the Arctic if just for a month or two.

   That isn't a joke, there are parts of the country now as cold as Antarctica, in summer, during our winter. The Midwest and western states in the north are now experiencing below freezing temperatures around -20 degrees. Having worked with temperatures around -40 degrees, I can tell you right now; it is no fun.

   In a more recent winter storm, a large portion of the County lost power. Myself, I had to endure three days without; power, water, light, heat, phone service (which Verizon had to fix twice), internet or cell service. If it wasn't for my Amateur Radio, I would have had no communication with the outside world.

   Now the failure here wasn't the County. Carroll County itself was prepared and even though there was no snow, the roads were prepped and crew were out. It was the private sector that failed and failed pretty bad. They knew of the coming weather and what areas were affected, yet repairs and service took to long to be completed. BGE and other utilities need to be on the ball when these situations occur.

Amateur Radio

Shameless plug.