The follow is state Senator Doug Berger’s comments to the Department of Homeland Security regarding the placement of the NBAF and the draft Environmental Impact Statement. If you have not submitted your comments you have until August 25th to do so.
Dear Homeland Security,
I am the state Senator who represents Butner in the North Carolina General Assembly. I am writing to express my opposition to Butner being selected as the site for the NBAF project. Last September 2007, I joined a bi-partisan group of legislators in giving support to the NBAF being located in North Carolina. Since that time, I submitted a list of questions at one of the public meetings conducted by Homelamd Security. Many of these questions were not answered or were not answered to my satisfaction by the draft Environmental Impact Statement. It is clear from this process that a site will be selected and that such issues as whether the facility will be manned by public or private security will not be determined prior to site selection. I made it clear from the outset I would withdraw my support for this project if the security for this facility was privatized as has been the case at Plum Island.
In order for the NBAF project to successfully locate in an area, there must be trust between the local community and the federal government. Local law enforcement officials and emergency medical services officials must work closely with community members to develop plans for the safe movement of the samples of diseases that will be transported in and out of the facility. This local coordination must also take place in order for a meaningful evacuation plan to safely transport the developmentally disabled and the mentally ill at area institutions to be developed as well. Homeland Security’s prior history as well as its lack of responsiveness to both opponents and proponents of the NBAF during the selection process has so eroded public confidence that there is absolutely no trust between the local community and Homeland Security.
The critical point at which I began to seriously consider withdrawing my support for the NBAF and joining the opposition took place after the May 2008 Congressional GAO report was issued that challenged the research Homeland Security had put forward as evidence that research of hoof and mouth disease could be done safely on the mainland. After this report was released, our state Commissioner of Agriculture was unwilling to address the findings in the report even though he is charged with protecting North Carolina’s food supply. The questions raised by the GAO report and the community’s legitimate lack of trust of Homeland Security has led me to join the opposition to the NBAF being located here on the mainland in North Carolina.
The NBAF project no longer enjoys the support from elected officials that it had at the beginning of the site selection process. This evaporation of support is in direct response to the arrogant display of power and indifference by Homeland Security. Homeland Security has been unresponsive to questions posed by the City of Raleigh concerning the NBAF’s impact on its key local water supply. Homeland Security has been unresponsive to the environmental questions posed by both the Durham County Commissioners and the Durham City Council. Each of these urban political bodies have joined their rural counterparts in Butner, Stem, Creedmoor, and Granville County in opposing or withdrwaing support for the NBAF. Many elected leaders including myself gave ample opportunity for Homeland Security to be completely responsive to our constituencies and yet that did not occur.
Recent revelations that Mississippi is a finalist in the selection process has made it clear that the selection of the site will be based on politics. In closing I will make this promise to you. I will do everything within my power as co-chairperson of the Health and Human Services Subcommittee on Appropriations in the North Carolina Senate to oppose any legislation that involves state dollars for the funding of the infrastructure needed for the NBAF site. Do not select Butner as the site for the location of the NBAF.
Please include these comments for review by Homeland Security in preparation
for its final draft of the EIS.
Sincerely yours,
Senator Doug Berger
Posted by Mike Wilburt on August 23, 2008 at 5:04 pm
Typical Doug Berger….
Jumping off blindly in support of a project without (by his own admission) having answers to his questions is the zenith of political grandstanding and hypocrisy. But other politicians who were politically powerful had already made the error of jumping onboard the NBAF bandwagon. So Dougie jumped too. He felt that snuggling-up to powerful politicians was more important than doing the right thing.
It’s just like so much of what he supports in the NC Senate. Millions and millions of tax dollars thrown into programs with no evidence of effectiveness. Then he reports to us with his self-engrandizing “Greetings from Raleigh” newsletters that rarely, if ever, tout accomplishments of the programs he spent millions to support…he just bags about how much he voted to spend. He truly thinks that’s meaningful. No wonder he was ranked one of the least effective members of the NC senate twice in two terms.
Now it is an election year and his read of the political tea leaves and political breezes tell him he will lose votes if he doesn’t flip-flop on the NBAF. His opponent, Chuck Stires saw the issue early as problem for Granville County and the region. He stood in opposition to every elected official in the area and many across the state. Doug Berger was blinded by the potential political advantage he could gain. That is shameful.
Re-electing a man who has proven he cannot be trusted to take a stand when necessary would be sheer stupidity on our part. Chuck Stires is a conservative whose stance on some issues may differ from many who visit this blog. But he is a man of his word who is driven by principle, not politics.