Recovered from the Wayback Machine.
Governor Nixon just came out with an “agreement” supposedly between animal welfare people and the agricultural groups.
I’ll have more to say on these later.
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Deep analysis
update
As was pointed out to me tonight, there was a SB 795 passed last year, that removed the exemption for shelters from the fees collected.
So not only is the Missouri Legislature protecting the puppy mill industry, it is deliberately doing everything in its power to add additional financial burden on to animal shelters and rescues—the people actually having to clean up the mess the puppy mills leave.
I’ve never seen such assholes in my life—and you voted them into office, folks.
I’ve also had to file a complaint against the Department of Agriculture with the Attorney General tonight, because of what I perceive to be violation of Sunshine Laws.
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I’m writing up a deeper analysis of the impact on existing laws with Prop B as compared to SB 113. I know that the HSUS has done the same with a one page talking points comparison, but I want to take it deeper. I don’t know if it will make a difference in the long run, but I want to record facts: not hyperbole, not politician bullshit speak.
One error I had made in comments here and there is the fact that SB 113 would require license fees from the shelters. I’m assuming that the exemption of licensing fees for shelters/rescues that exists in ACFA would still apply with SB 113.
However, there is no exemption for pet stores and dog boarding companies, so I imagine they’ll be just peachy keen at having to pay more because of the commercial breeders. But then, they’re not farmers, so they don’t count.
Earlier, in Pride of Place and Puppy Mills I wrote:
I looked through the literature for the State and the Department of Agriculture—you know, the brag sheets. We export this much corn and soybeans, and we’re number seven for hogs, and so on. But you won’t find puppies among the listed exports, nor will you find any boasting on being the number one large scale commercial dog breeding state in the country.
This week, Missouri’s Department of Agriculture is celebrating National Agriculture Week with all sorts of festivities. Missouri’s agricultural products will be especially touted…except for one.
Nowhere in the festivities will Dr. Jon Hagler brag about Missouri’s position as the state with the most large scale commercial dog breeding operations. He won’t hold up a basket of puppies and suggest we take home a dozen. He’s not going to lead agritourists on tours of some of the larger operations.
What does this say about how we really view large scale commercial dog breeding?
Recovered from the Wayback Machine.
Though not related to Proposition B (“What? You mean the Missouri state legislature has been working on other legislation!?”), Show Me Progress points out that the House agricultural committee also held another “public meeting” on yet another travesty of a bill: HB 209.
What HB 209 does is limit the actions on the part of those who are neighbors to a CAFO (Concentrated Animal Feed Operations) if the CAFO creates a public nuisance.
When all other committee public meetings were canceled during the snow and ice storm, presumably so that people can attend the public meetings when the weather improves, the agricultural committee barreled through most of its meetings it knew would generate a great deal of interest from those who don’t necessarily agree with the committee’s views.
That the committee would do so may be allowable according to the rules, but it is hardly open, and frankly, not particularly ethical.
update
The St. Louis Post-Dispatch Political Fix has more on the non-public public meeting for HB 209.
Missouri’s Department of Natural Resources (MoDNR), has been the focus of contention for the last several years. One of the first acts the state’s last governor, Matt Blunt, did when he first came to office back in 2005 was fire most of the DNR’s upper management—including the director, Steve Mahood, who was greatly respected in the environmental community. Mahood eventually went on to a position with the Nature Conservancy.
In Mahood’s place, Blunt appointed Doyle Childers, a long time Republican Missouri State Senator. Childer’s appointment was not without controversy, primarily because of his business focus, and by his lack of natural resource management experience. The controversy around Childers was exacerbated by his own politically motivated actions as regards to two specific events related to the DNR: the Taum Sauk dam break, and the Boonville Bridge.
The Boonville Bridge is an old train bridge outside the town of Boonville that advocates wanted to restore and include as part of the Katy Trail. However, Union Pacific wanted the bridge condemned so it could recover the steel used in its construction. Childers, in his position at DNR, supported the Union Pacific. Governor Jay Nixon, in his role, then, as state Attorney General, filed a lawsuit to stop the Union Pacific, contending that the bridge was deeded to the Katy Trail effort. When I last checked this item, the appeals court had sided with the DNR, the case was headed to the State Supreme court, and bridge supporters were looking for compromises, such as letting the Union Pacific have the steel, but keeping the bridge.
The Boonville Bridge wasn’t the only time that Childers and Nixon clashed. Following the Ameren Taum Sauk dam break, which caused devastating damage to the state’s Johnson’s Shut-Ins state park, both Childers in the DNR and Nixon as state Attorney General fought over who had control over the litigation related to the event. Nixon, as Attorney General should have been the obvious choice, but Childers accused Nixon of taking campaign contributions from Ameren. Of course, we later found out that the money came to Nixon indirectly, from general Democratic campaign organizations; that the campaign contributions were part of Ameren’s stock donations it makes to all political parties. In addition, Matt Blunt and his father, both, also received campaign contributions from Ameren. Regardless, the Childers accusation ended up being one of this state’s uglier events in the last few years, and also formed part of the unsuccessful election campaign against Nixon.
No surprise, then, that when Jay Nixon won the election for Governor that Childers signaled that he would be resigning, taking one last parting shot in the process
Childers said he and Nixon have had an openly contentious relationship and that he would have been able to do more as the director of the DNR had he not been in continuous conflict with Nixon.
He said his time at the department was consumed by fights with Nixon. One confrontation was over a proposal to tear down the Katy Trail railroad bridge that crosses the Missouri River near Boonville, and another involved the cleanup of Johnson Shut-Ins State Park after a dam holding back the Taum Sauk Reservoir burst in Southeast Missouri.
“It made for more complications,” Childers said. “The Boonville bridge, well, we beat him three times in court on that. It took up a lot of our time and effort. After that, Johnson Shut-Ins took a huge amount of time.”
He said it’s “no secret” that he and Nixon had been at odds.
“He’s a good politician — an excellent politician — but I do not have a lot of respect for him as an individual,” Childers said.
Of course, it was a given that Nixon would fire Childers, but Nixon also replaced many of the upper management in the DNR, as well as all DNR ombudsmen. The question on everyone’s mind at that point was: who Nixon would pick to be the new director of the DNR? The farmers had their own idea as to a good candidate, as did the environmental groups.
On January 12th, we had our answer: Mark Templeton. The response was a resounding, “Who?”, as people and organizations scrambled to find what they could about this surprising choice.
What is known, based on the resume provided by Governor Nixon’s office, and what can be deduced from online searches is that Mark N. Templeton is a 39 year old former Missouri citizen, who attended both Harvard and Yale before getting a degree in law. According to the bio at the DNR
A native of Olivette, Mo., Mr. Templeton developed environmental and sustainability strategies during his tenure with McKinsey & Company, a global management consultancy headquartered in New York. From 2001 to 2005, Mr. Templeton worked with clients to explore new, “green” markets for products and services and develop next-generation jobs in the environmental and energy sectors. While at McKinsey, Mr. Templeton advised major organizations in the public, private and non-profit sectors, including the United Nations Development Programme’s Commission on the Private Sector and Development. In 2005, Mr. Templeton left McKinsey to become associate dean and chief operating office of Yale Law School, his alma mater.
As associate dean and chief operating officer at Yale Law, Mr. Templeton managed more than 200 administrative personnel and an annual budget of $105 million. Among other duties, Mr. Templeton was responsible for approving departmental budgets, monitoring accounts and negotiating with other academic and administrative units.
Prior to joining McKinsey, Mr. Templeton was special assistant and senior adviser to the Assistant Secretary of State for Democracy, Human Rights and Labor and an adviser to the U.S. Delegation to the U.N. Commission on Human Rights. He worked as office director of the Human Rights Documentation Center in Bangkok, Thailand, from 1999 to 2000 and as a research associate with the South Asia Human Rights Documentation Center in New Delhi in 1997.
Mr. Templeton, 39, earned his bachelor’s degree, magna cum laude, from Harvard College in 1994 and his juris doctorate from Yale Law in 1999. He graduated from Horton Watkins High School.
Mr. Templeton and his wife, Kathy Dull, also a Missouri native, have two young children, Paisley and Graham.
An impressive background, but one that left everyone scratching their heads in wonderment as to Templeton’s qualification to running a department related to natural resources. Contrary to conservative opinion, Templeton is just as much an unknown the environmentalists as he is to the farmers.
What we have been able to find, primarily through determined Google searches, is that Mark N. Templeton is not Mark Templeton, the CEO or Citrix Systems. “Our” Mark Templeton has a law degree and is a member of the California Bar. His work with “green” jobs took place with McKinsey & Company, and since McKinsey is infamous for not divulging information about its clients, we may never know who Templeton worked with.
Before the McKinsey consulting gig, Templeton worked for the State Department, as well advising the US delegation to the UN. After his tenure at McKinsey, Templeton took a job as Chief Operating Officer at Yale University.
One other piece of information about our new Director of Missouri’s DNR that was not part of the public resume provided by Governor Nixon or the DNR, is that Mark Templeton is an original founder, and former director, of a company named Cobra Legal Solutions—a firm that specializes in outsourcing legal work for American corporations to India. Templeton is still listed as original founder and early investor, but the reference to his position as Acting Executive Directory has since been removed from the web site.
I have a request into the DNR about Templeton’s current financial association with Cobra Legal Solutions, and the communications department responded with a note that they would check with him this week, since his first day at work at the DNR was Monday. When I have more information, I’ll provide an update.
Why was Mark Templeton picked to be the new Director of the Department of Natural Resources? It’s obvious that he does not bring with him any background in management of natural resources, or the environment, or even science, in general. According to Governor Nixon, Templeton’s focus within the DNR will be more on alternative energy and jobs, than day to day DNR management (Joplin Globe):
Said Nixon: “Finding new energy solutions and protecting our natural resources are the keys to Missouri’s environmental and economic future. Here in Missouri, we’re perfectly positioned to harness multiple new forms of energy, including wind, solar, nuclear, hydroelectric and biofuels. These energy solutions will lessen our dependence on foreign oil, create next-generation jobs and help turn this economy around.
“Mark Templeton has helped governmental, business and nonprofit groups find the links between environmental stewardship, alternative energy and sound business practices, and he will bring that cutting-edge thinking to our Department of Natural Resources.”
Sometimes the best way to end acrimonious and persistent contention is to surprise all of the players. In this regard, Nixon’s appointment of Mark Templeton is already a success. Whether Templeton will continue to enjoy success in his new role, though, is anyone’s guess.
Hearings to confirm Mark Templeton’s appointment as Director of DNR began on Wednesday. Unfortunately, there’s no public record of this session that I can find.
Mark Templeton was confirmed to the position at the DNR. I must admit to being somewhat surprised at the level of disinterest about Templeton’s involvement with Cobra Legal Solutions, particularly since the only reason he seems to have been hired was to generate jobs.
Mark Templeton’s name has been removed from the Cobra Legal Systems web site, as founder and investor. Surprising, because whatever his association with the group, he’s still an original founder, and investor.