Great Salt Lake Death Warrant – Sabbatical Progress Report

[johnkarls]

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---------------------------- Original Message -----------------------------
From: ReadingLiberally-SaltLake@johnkarls.com
To: ReadingLiberallyEmailList@johnkarls.com
Bcc: The Approximately 150 Recipients of Our Weekly E-mail
Subject: Great Salt Lake Death Warrant – Sabbatical Progress Report
Date: Sat, July 21, 2018
Attachments:

RL-e614-DirectorLetter-NationalAudubon-With7-1-2018TwoLineIdentifierForFirstUnitarian.pdf

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RESTORATION-RL-e614-DirectorLetter-NationalAudubonSociety.pdf

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RL-e425- Last-Ditch Appeal To National Audubon Society CEO - 5 pages + 7 enclosures = 30 pages total.pdf

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RESTORATION-RL-e425- Last-Ditch Appeal To National Audubon Society CEO - 5 pages + 7 enclosures = 30 pages total.pdf

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RL-e615-LetterFromNationalAudubonGeneralCounsel.pdf

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RL-e614-e616-PostingOnReadingLiberally-SaltLake.orgEntitledNationalAudubonExecutingGreatSaltLake'sDeathWarrant.docx

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Dear Friends,

Last Saturday’s e-mail to our approximately 150 members proposed an Ad Hoc Meeting during my sabbatical to write another book, this one on “The National Audubon Society Executes Great Salt Lake Death Warrant.”

Although the Ad Hoc Meeting Proposal was to read and discuss Prof. Alan Dershowitz’ “The Case Against Impeaching Trump,” there were a zillion replies to the e-mail inquiring how the “Great Salt Lake Death Warrant” project was progressing.

The inquiry is best answered by the following two e-mails which should be self-explanatory and should enable the curious to “drill down” to their hearts’ content (or not).

Background information =

(1) The first e-mail was addressed to Chris Peterson, a member of the Board of Directors of the Utah Rivers Council, and relates to a Utah Rivers Council “field trip” last Saturday to the Bear River at Camp Fife, a Boy Scouts of America facility in Collinston UT which is an approximately 105-minute drive north of downtown SLC.

(2) The second e-mail was addressed to Eric Peterson, an award-winning “watch dog” journalist and Executive Director of The Utah Investigative Journalism Project, and relates to his presentation at the 7/1/2018 First Unitarian Summer Forum.

(3) Cc addressees of the second e-mail were U/U Political Science Prof. Tim Chambless, a long-time member of the First Unitarian Board and the organizer of the Summer Forums, and his son Ross Chambless who was pinch-hitting for his father who was in NYC on 7/1/2018 and who (Ross, that is) is the “Communications Specialist” for the Utah House of Representatives Democrat Minority and a long-time independent radio journalist on environment, education and science topics.

(4) Both e-mails had the same 5 attachments that are attached hereto. All 5 attachments are also part of the first two postings of the 6th section http://www.ReadingLiberally-SaltLake.org entitled “6/14/2018: National Audubon Society Executes Great Salt Lake Death Warrant” except the fifth which is currently available at sltrib.com/news/environment/2018/04/04/utah-water-officials-want-to-own-a-piece-of-bear-lake-but-they-say-they-arent-interested-in-development-yet/.

Your friend,

John K.

PS -- To un-subscribe, please press "reply" and type "deletion requested."

NB: Please do NOT block our e-mail because you are too embarrassed to request a deletion -- 10 of our approximately 150 regular e-mail recipients use Comcast.net which has an algorithm blocking all e-mails from a website for which a certain percentage of recipients have requested blockage AND 3 of our regular meeting attendees who use Comcast.net now can NOT receive our weekly e-mails.


---------------------------- Original Message -----------------------------
From: ReadingLiberally-SaltLake@johnkarls.com
To: Chris Peterson
Subject: Your Request For My Contact Info at the Utah Rivers Council Meeting Last Sat
Date: Mon, July 16, 2018 11:24 pm MDT
Attachments:
[Attached to this e-mail were the same 5 attachments of the immediately-preceding e-mail which are available there as embedded files available for download.]
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Dear Chris,

It was a pleasure to meet you following the conclusion of the Utah Rivers Council Meeting last Saturday.

The primary purpose of this e-mail is to confirm my contact info which you requested at the conclusion of the meeting, since I did not have a business card and was reduced to scribbling the contact info on the back of one of your cards.

I can be reached at this e-mail address.

And the website for my 12.5-year-old 150-member Public Policy Study Group is ReadingLiberally-SaltLake.org.

BTW, as several of your fellow URC Directors were gathering around me at the conclusion of the meeting, you called out your name several times as if I should recognize it.

Which made me think in retrospect that you may be the brother of Eric Peterson to whom the following e-mail was sent following his 7/1/2018 presentation at the First Unitarian Church Summer Forum.

*****
The National Audubon Society Executes Great Salt Lake Death Warrant

The e-mail to Eric had 5 attachments, the first of which was a sample of the 4-page 6/14/2018 letter that went to the Directors of The National Audubon Society on the subject of The National Audubon Society Executes Great Salt Lake Death Warrant.

If you don’t have a lot of time to read the other four attachments or the plethora of information concerning the Great Salt Lake Death Warrant on our website, this 4-page 6/14/2018 letter provides the basic information.

*****
The Role of The URC and How I Became Aware of The URC

With so many of your fellow URC Directors asking questions at the same time you were asking for my contact information, I do not know whether you or your colleagues asked various substantive questions, one of which was how I became aware of The URC.

First, our 150 members are some of the most politically-active people in the Salt Lake area. [Even though we are a public-policy study group that takes effective action, rather than being a partisan political group.]

Accordingly, many of our members (including Yours Truly) attended the 9/21/2016 meeting of Gov. Herbert’s “Water Strategy Team” described at the bottom of the first page of our 10/31/2016 letter to each of the 3 members of the Mormon Presidency and each of the 12 Apostles of the Mormon Church.

[That letter is Attachment A to the second attachment to this e-mail labeled “Last Ditch Appeal to National Audubon CEO.”]

Near the top of the second page of that letter are four bullet points, the third of which states: “U/Utah Economics Prof. Gabriel Lozada stated in a presentation in the U/Utah Law School’s Moot Court Room on 9/21/2016 that growing hay accounts for 65% of total Utah water usage, which is 1.5 million acre-feet/year or enough to cover all of Salt Lake County in 2.98 feet of water/year.”

At the end of Prof. Lozada’s presentation following which I chatted with him for several minutes, there were URC representatives in the hallway outside trying to induce attendees to sign up for URC’s newsletter.

I signed up.

So that is how I became aware of The URC.

*****
My Astonishment Over The URC’s “Legislative Advocacy Session” Actions

Attachment B to the second attachment to this e-mail labeled “Last Ditch Appeal to National Audubon CEO” is a transcript of the 1/23/2017 announcement of the Deputy Director of the State of Utah Division of Water Resources that the Bear River Pipeline Project is NOT needed until 2035 or 2040, IF EVER, because as farmland is converted to residential use, growing alfalfa hay for export to China (65% of total Utah water usage per Prof. Lozada, remember) is so wasteful of water that water usage ACTUALLY DECLINES.

[You will see from the materials that this statement was issued a mere 3 days after our website threatened litigation against the U.S. Government for a Writ of Mandamus -- which is a court order to a Governmental unit to “do its duty” -- which would call a halt to the Bear River Pipeline. The timing caused us to remark that the timing of the announcement would NOT seem to imply that the State of Utah Division of Water Resources had a “sudden epiphany on the Road to Damascus”!!!]

Enclosure C to the second attachment to this e-mail is our 3/16/2017 HAND DELIVERED letter to Gov. Herbert imploring him to veto S.B. 113 which comprised Great Salt Lake’s “Death Warrant.”

On 3/25/2017, Gov. Herbert signed Great Salt Lake’s Death Warrant.

HOWEVER, the attachments to this e-mail do NOT mention that I participated in The URC’s 2/16/2017 “legislative advocacy session.”

BTW, even though I had signed up for The URC’s newsletter following Prof. Lozada’s presentation on 9/21/2016 as noted above, I had NOT received any newsletters and only found out about The URC's 2/16/2017 “legislative advocacy session” because Great Salt Lake Yacht Club Commodore Janet Robins forwarded on 2/15/2017 to her e-mail list The URC’s 2/15/2017 e-mail (sent from Darin Mann’s URC e-mail address) requesting everyone under the sun to participate.

[I am NOT a member of the Great Salt Lake Yacht Club and have never sailed on GSL. But I had attended some GSLYC events and signed up for their e-mail newsletter in order to “keep a pulse” on what was happening to GSL.]

Please imagine how ecstatic I was upon arrival at The Utah Capitol armed with 200 copies of the announcement of the Deputy Director of the State of Utah Division of Water Resources described above that the Bear River Pipeline is NOT needed until 2035 or 2040 IF EVER.

I even passed out more than a dozen to random people roaming the halls of the State Capitol before the beginning of The URC session!!! [All of them were visibly impressed, though none were legislators.]

The URC’s “orientation session” before our meeting with legislators provided, inter alia, examples of objections that could be raised with our respective legislators.

Each of us was encouraged to focus on only one of the examples, and then we were paired off with other participants in order to “role play” our conversations with our legislators.

I WAS APPALLED THAT (1) not only was the announcement of the State of Utah Division of Water Resources NOT on the list of examples of objections, (2) but Zachary Frankel, after admitting in front of the group that he was familiar with the announcement, REFUSED to let me hand out my 200 copies of the announcement to the other participants so that they could raise the announcement as an objection!!!

[Editorial Note: Zachary Frankel was/is the Executive Director of The Utah Rivers Council.]

*****
My Astonishment Over The URC’s Refusal To Undertake Litigation

The first attachment to this e-mail (our 6/14/2018 letter to the Directors of The National Audubon Society) documents how we appear to have been responsible for The National Audubon Society appearing on the scene 13 months ago with a glossy fund-raising brochure promising litigation to save Great Salt Lake.

[And our charging that the National Audubon CEO and in-house General Counsel refused to accept more than $20 million in contributions that I had raised to finance such litigation.]

What the materials attached to this e-mail do NOT mention is that during The URC’s 2/16/2017 “legislative advocacy session,” Zachary Frankel and I had a lengthy private conversation in which he claimed that he had a close friend who was an environmental attorney in an undisclosed large Washington DC law firm who had promised to handle any litigation for The URC on a pro bono basis.

But in e-mail correspondence over the ensuing period of several weeks, Zachary Frankel kept “playing dumb” in refusing to understand our legal analysis.

Attachment D to the second attachment to this e-mail labeled “Last Ditch Appeal to National Audubon CEO” is our 4/5/2017 letter to each of the three members of the Mormon Presidency and the 12 Mormon Apostles.

It said in its third paragraph on p. 4 “…on 3/25/2017 I met in the San Francisco Office of one of the world’s largest national/international law firms with friends who agreed to sue the EPA and The U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service for a Writ of Mandamus on a pro bono basis.”

Obviously, I had been forced by Zachary Frankel’s “studied ignorance” to look elsewhere for pro bono litigators.

[And I succeeded in recruiting 3 of the world’s best!!! Though they immediately turned the litigation into a lucrative project by recruiting several of their firm’s environmentally-conscious individual clients to underwrite it.]

*****
My Attendance At Your Meeting Last Saturday

As you can see from our website (and as mentioned to you and your colleagues last Saturday), I am currently taking a sabbatical from Reading Liberally to write a book entitled “The National Audubon Society Executes Great Salt Lake Death Warrant.”

HOWEVER, please imagine my surprise since I had heard nothing from The URC for 15 months, to receive a 6/21/2018 e-mail from Zachary Frankel inviting me to your meeting this past Saturday!!!

BTW, I was eager to attend (1) NOT ONLY to try to ascertain why The URC had insisted on such ineffectual action to halt the Bear River Pipeline, (2) BUT ALSO to tour the Bear River Migratory Bird Refuge which our legal analysis 15 months ago had opined made it a “slam dunk” to obtain a Writ of Mandamus against the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service which administers the BRMBR on behalf of its many-decades legal-title holder, The U.S. Government.

URC Policy No. 1

You might recall that I politely waited until the end of the Q&A period before asking my first question.

My first question referenced Zachary’s statistics that only 6% of total Utah water usage is residential and 85% is agricultural (the U/U stats used in all of our correspondence are 6% and 82%), and then referenced the U/U statistic set forth above that 65% of total Utah water usage is for growing alfalfa hay, and then asked Zachary why all of the URC strategies he and his staff had just described were confined to trying to conserve water ONLY FROM THE 6% RESIDENTIAL SECTOR.

I immediately noted that the problem posed by the refusal to address the 85% agricultural usage WAS COMPOUNDED by the explanation during the presentation that the estimated $5 BILLION of Bear River Pipeline Project cost is loaded 100% on residential water users, which makes farmers “free riders”!!!

I WAS APPALLED to hear Zachary’s explanation that The URC has “partnered” with the farmers, pursuant to which partnership The URC has agreed to concentrate solely on conservation within the 6% residential usage!!!

URC Policy No. 2

My next question was whether the governmental policy to load 100% of the cost of the BRP on residential water users (thereby permitting the farmers to be “free riders”) was a result of lobbying by farmers or a result of the application of the common-law doctrine of “prior appropriation” which Utah follows.

I immediately noted that even if permitting famers to be “free riders” was a result of Utah “prior appropriation” law, that is still Utah law that might have been changed by effective lobbying and education by The URC.

Zachary then provided a lengthy “non-answer” -- the gist of which was that he didn’t know.

Which is not surprising because the issue is irrelevant under The URC’s “partnering” with farmers.

URC Policy No. 3

My last question (for which I had to plead to be permitted to ask by asserting that it was a “short answer” question) was what had happened to the 1/23/2017 announcement of the State of Utah Division of Water Resources that the Bear River Pipeline is NOT needed until 2035 or 2040 IF EVER because as agricultural land is converted to residential, water usage ACTUALLY DECLINES because growing alfalfa hay is so wasteful of water -- whether the State of Utah Division of Water Resources had withdrawn its opinion or whether everyone had just ignored it.

Zachary admitted that everyone had just ignored it!!!

[Which should constitute a confession that The URC had NEVER permitted the most powerful argument to be used -- for example, by Zachary’s refusal to permit me to pass out my 200 copies of that announcement at The URC’s 2/16/2017 “legislative advocacy session”!!! INCLUDING A CONFESSION that ever since 2/16/2017, The URC has not used the most powerful argument!!! Even though that argument could have been used despite The URC’s “partnering” with the farmers because what happens to farmland when it sold to developers would not seem to affect adversely the interests of farmers!!!]

URC Policy No. 4

Although I did not pose a question or comment, I WAS APPALLED that The URC’s literature and website only says the Bear River Pipeline Project will lower the level of Great Salt Lake 2-4 feet!!!

Our analysis is that it will be GSL’s coup de grâce!!!

After all, as our materials have reported, the average “normal” depth of GSL is only 10 feet according to the plaques at GSL State Park.

And GSL was already more than 5 feet below normal on a permanent basis as a result of other state policies.

INDEED, the website of GSL State Park reports currently that the level of GSL is 6.1 FEET BELOW NORMAL AND DROPPING.

You should consider inviting the Utah State Auditors to review The URC’s bland 2-4 feet statistic to ascertain whether it understates the BRP Project’s impact in terms of 2-4 feet (we believe that it does because it is like a U.S. Congressional Budget Office revenue estimate which is notorious for being “static” rather than “dynamic”).

And whether, since the average “normal” depth is only 10 feet, then more than 5 feet below “normal” on a permanent basis with the current level of 6.1 FEET BELOW NORMAL AND DROPPING -- PLUS ANOTHER 4 FOOT DROP ACCORDING TO THE URC’S “STATIC” ESTIMATE -- means that there will soon be nothing more than a few isolated puddles!!!

*****
Conclusions

I apologized to you and your fellow URC Directors that I did not order the box lunch because I never eat lunch for dietary reasons.

True.

But a secondary reason for not ordering lunch was that I did not intend to stay after the end of the presentation.

Because I had only been interested in trying to ascertain why The URC engages in considerable fund-raising based on the claim that it opposes the BRP project.

But then restricts itself with self-imposed policies that ensure that the BRP project will be implemented.

I am sorry if the foregoing comes as a surprise to you!!!

But like the Directors of The National Audubon Society, you probably should have been more attentive to what your organization was actually doing.

In other words, it gives me no pleasure to provide this information.

And in my judgment, the situation is NOT salvageable.

Unless the Directors of The National Audubon Society quickly decide collectively (or individually since 3 of them are members of prestigious law firms and could take individual action) to institute litigation against the Mormon Church to force it to call a halt to the BRP project.

Sincerely,

John Karls


---------------------------- Original Message -----------------------------
From: ReadingLiberally-SaltLake@johnkarls.com
To: Eric Peterson
Bcc: Ross Chambless; Prof. Tim Chambless
Subject: My Handouts To You This Morning Re National Audubon Society Executing Great Salt Lake’s Death Warrant
Date: Sun, July 1, 2018 5:58 pm MDT
Attachments:
[Attached to this e-mail were the same 5 attachments of the second-immediately-preceding e-mail which are available there as embedded files available for download.]
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Dear Mr. Peterson,

It was a pleasure to meet you this morning at First Unitarian.

And, since you mentioned in your presentation that one of your protégés specializes on Utah water issues, to provide you with a copy of Attachment 1 (a sample of our 6/14/2018 letter to the members of the National Audubon Board of Directors) and Attachment 2 (our 6-page 4/24/2018 letter to the National Audubon CEO plus 24 pages comprising 7 enclosures thereto).

The primary purpose of this e-mail is to provide you with two Adobe.pdf files comprising the two attachments to facilitate your forwarding them to your protégé.

In addition, Attachment 3 is the 6/15/2018 letter from the National Audubon General Counsel reacting to our 6/14/2018 letter to her Directors.

Attachment 4 includes our editorial comments about the General Counsel’s letter posted in the first item in the sixth section of http://www.ReadingLiberally-SaltLake.org entitled “6/14/18: Nat’l Audubon Executes Great Salt Lake Death Warrant” and embedded in which Attachments 1-3 are downloadable Adobe.pdf files.

Attachment 5 is a Salt Lake Tribune article about the application of the Utah Division of Water Resources and its Idaho counterpart for approval by the Utah Division of Water Rights to give them “control of 400,000 acre-feet of water in Bear Lake -- more than four times the amount of water in Utah’s controversial Lake Powell pipeline proposal.”

This article was NOT mentioned anywhere in Attachments 1-4.

Minor reasons for not mentioning it are (1) that the article is unclear whether the “400,000 acre-feet” is the total amount of water in Bear Lake or whether it is only the additional amount to be stored there, and (2) that the article’s quoted reference to “Utah’s controversial Lake Powell pipeline proposal” should probably have been a reference to Utah’s Bear River Pipeline Project.

The major reason is that we did NOT want to confuse the issue which is otherwise fairly clear cut, by introducing an additional State of Utah action whose description in the S.L. Tribune is muddled and whose impact in the overall imbroglio, even if clear, would be minor and cumulative.

HOWEVER, it is recognized by us that this action could be motivated by a desire to knock out immediately one of the three law suits for which we have been proselytizing, viz., a lawsuit against the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service for a Writ of Mandamus ordering the Service to enforce the U.S. Government’s riparian water rights to ALL of the water currently flowing through the Bear River (and, if the Service has failed to register those rights heretofore, to do so forthwith).

FYI, the U.S. Government has for many decades been the owner of the Bear River Migratory Bird Refuge which comprises the first 118-square miles of Great Salt Lake and its shoreline just outside the mouth of the Bear River. The U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service administers the BRMBR for the U.S. Government.

These materials should be self-explanatory.

However, if you or your protégé has any comments or questions, please don’t hesitate to contact us.

Sincerely,

John Karls

PS for Ross Chambless -- it was also a pleasure to meet you this morning; as you probably realized from the foregoing, I only had a copy of Attachment 1 left to give you.

PPS for Eric Peterson -- I didn’t want to “rain on your parade” during the Q&A period this morning by asking why --

(1) 990finder.foundationcenter.org/990results.aspx?990_type=&fn=utah+investigative+journalism+project&st=UT&zp=&ei=&fy=&action=Search indicates that the Utah Investigative Project did not file the required IRS Form 990 for the first two years of its existence;

(2) secure.utah.gov/bes/nameSearchResults.html?pageNo=0 indicates that for its third fiscal year, The Utah Investigative Journalism Project has been delinquent in re-registering since 5/14/2018; and

(3) I was unable to locate an IRS Determination Letter confirming your tax-exempt status.

As a person who has practiced tax law for 51 years (and taught tax law for NYU Law School), I will be the first to admit that obtaining an IRS Determination Letter confirming your tax-exempt status is NOT required.

However, most large donors will require you to provide a copy of such a letter.

And for donors of any size, if the IRS challenges the tax-exempt status of their donations to you, the IRS does NOT waive penalties in the absence of a Determination Letter.

I hope you will interpret this PPS as merely the action of a Good Samaritan who wishes your organization well.

BTW, you may not recall that one of the questions in the Q&A period requested your reaction to affording the readers of your newsletter the opportunity, after reading an article, to make a donation of which 50% would go to your organization and 50% would go to the article’s author. Although you should consult Utah tax counsel (my 51 years of legal practice were in NYC & London so I am not admitted to practice law in Utah), you should anticipate advice that the 50% going to the author would still be taxable income to the author but would NOT be a tax-deductible contribution for the donor since it is NOT going to your organization. [You could, however, probably get a favorable opinion of Utah counsel that merely announcing in your newsletter that your organization has a practice that 50% of such donations go to the author BUT THROUGH your organization, would pass muster.]

[Pat]

.
---------------------------- Original Message -----------------------------
Subject: Re NRDC & Meeting Report
From: john@johnkarls.com
Date: Wed, September 26, 2018 2:42 pm MDT
To: Jay Hansen
Cc: The Other Attendees of Our 9/19/2018 Meeting
Attachment:
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Dear Jay,

Thank you very much for your endorsement of the Meeting Report.

And for your e-mail (two items down) inquiring whether NRDC “would be interested in taking up what the AS has declined to do.”

*****
First, the National Audubon Society has NOT declined to undertake litigation to save Great Salt Lake.

Instead, it produced more than a year ago a GLOSSY FUND-RAISING brochure in which it PROMISED (vs. declined) to undertake the litigation.

*****
Secondly, it is probably too late to save Great Salt Lake anymore, even with litigation.

*****
THIRDLY, AND MOST IMPORTANTLY, I personally have not yet “thrown in the towel” on the National Audubon Society and/or the three of its directors who are partners in three of the world’s leading law firms.

In this regard, it appears fairly obvious from the behavior of The National Audubon CEO and General Counsel ever since the letter that was sent to each of their directors on 6/14/2018 (which has been absolute silence from our perspective ever since the National Audubon General Counsel’s 6/15/2018 letter reacting to our 6/14/2018 letter to her Directors), that the CEO and General Counsel must have entered into an agreement with the proponents of the Bear River Pipeline Project NOT to oppose it!!!

How else can you explain the refusal of the CEO and General Counsel for 3.5 months not to relent!!!

HOWEVER, from a legal viewpoint the CEO and General Counsel have engaged in criminal fraud by raising contributions based on a promise to save Great Salt Lake with litigation with no intent to do so!!!

MOREOVER, from a legal viewpoint the CEO and General Counsel have apparently entered into a contract with the pipeline proponents in which the CEO and General Counsel purport to bind The National Audubon Society to the criminal fraud!!!

Law School 101 teaches that contracts in which a party agrees to commit a crime ARE NOT ENFORCEABLE!!!

ACCORDINGLY, the three of the National Audubon directors who are partners in three of the world’s leading law firms can easily make this point (and presumably have) in the decision of the Board of Directors whether to reverse the decisions of their staff.

IN ADDITION, as we have noted in numerous places, if the Board of Directors does NOT reverse the decisions of their staff and have the National Audubon Society defend Great Salt Lake with litigation as it committed to do in its Glossy Fund-Raising Brochure, then each Director will face the moral choice of whether to resign.

AND EACH OF THE THREE DIRECTORS WHO ARE PARTNERS IN THREE OF THE WORLD’S LEADING LAW FIRMS will have the additional moral choice whether to make amends by undertaking the litigation, jointly or severally, with the help of many environmentally-minded attorneys who might rally to the cause on a pro bono basis.

*****
Fourthly, I do not have the stomach to try to interest yet another environmental group in undertaking the litigation that the National Audubon Society promised to undertake in its fund-raising literature.

[Indeed, I took the sabbatical from Reading Liberally-Salt Lake because with the amount of time required to write the book about this imbroglio, there isn’t even sufficient time to continue facilitating Reading Liberally’s activities at the normal level.]

And as already mentioned, such litigation may already be too late.

In addition, our letters to the top 15 officials who govern The Mormon Church (10/31/2016 and 4/5/2017, copies of which are available for download in numerous places on www.ReadingLiberally-SaltLake.org but most recently as Enclosure A and Enclosure D to our 4/24/2018 letter to David Yarnold, The National Audubon CEO), which explained in depth the situation, had copied --

in addition to the editors of The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal, The Chicago Tribune, The San Francisco Chronicle and The Los Angeles Times --

(1) The Hon. Erik Solheim – The United Nations Environment Programme Executive Director and Under-Secretary-General of The United Nations;
(2) Mr. George Fenwick – President of The American Bird Conservancy;
(3) Ms. Lynn de Freitas – Executive Director of The Friends of Great Salt Lake;
(4) Mr. David Yarnold – CEO of The National Audubon Society;
(5) Mr. Gary Knell – President and CEO of The National Geographic Society;
(6) Mr. Mark Tersek – President of The Nature Conservancy;
(7) Mr. Michael Brune – Executive Director of The Sierra Club;
(8) Ms. Jaime Berman Matyas – President and CEO of The Student Conservation Association; and
(9) Ms. Kathleen Rest – Executive Director of The Union of Concerned Scientists.

*****
These were the nine organizations that I thought would be most likely to “answer the call.”

And the fact that only The National Audubon Society’s David Yarnold “answered the call” shows that the odds of trying to enlist the help of yet one more such organization are 11% at best.

And perhaps virtually zero since, as you may recall, we do NOT know whether the National Audubon Society entered the fray because of David Yarnold’s having received copies of quite a bit of our correspondence on Great Salt Lake.

Or whether the National Audubon Society entered the fray as a result of my meeting on 3/25/2017 with friends who are environmental partners in the San Francisco Office of one of the world’s largest national/international law firms and who agreed to sue on a pro bono basis the EPA and the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service for the Writs of Mandamus that our Working Group had researched were appropriate. As reported on p. 4 of our 4/5/2017 letter to the top 15 officials of the Mormon Church, the San Francisco attorneys converted the whole undertaking into a lucrative project by contacting many of the firm’s environmentally-oriented clients who were eager to “foot the bill” for lawsuits in Federal District Court in Washington DC or NYC for the Writs of Mandamus and for a lawsuit in the same venue against the Mormon Church for attempted fraud. We recognized that it was entirely possible that the San Francisco environmental attorneys and their clients had caused The National Audubon Society to join the fray.

*****
The Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC)

I am sorry that I did not add the NRDC to the list of 9 environmental organizations that received copies of our correspondence 2016-2017.

After all, they have been in existence since 1970 and have an annual budget about the size of The National Audubon Society.

HOWEVER, The National Audubon Society (as well as The American Bird Conservancy and The Friends of Great Salt Lake, both of which were also on our list of 9 organizations) ALL HAVE A MUCH MORE LASER FOCUS on Great Salt Lake and/or birds.

MOREOVER, when I Googled “NRDC” the first hit was --

“Nrdc.org | NRDC Official Site | Help Protect the Planet‎
“act.nrdc.org/Donate‎
“Join NRDC's fight to defend our Earth from Trump & his polluter allies. Donate today and help us safeguard the air, water, and lands we treasure.”

So good luck trying to get them to shift their focus from President Trump to Great Salt Lake!!!

However, because you have “freedom of speech” there, of course, is no objection to your trying to get them to join the fray.

For my part, as explained above, saving Great Salt Lake is probably no longer possible but, if it is, my judgment is that at this late date it could only occur if the Board of Directors of The National Audubon Society reverses the decision of its staff or, alternatively, the three National Audubon directors who are partners in three of the world’s most prestigious law firms step forward to undertake the necessary litigation, either jointly or severally, with or without the help of other environmentally-minded attorneys who would join the effort on a pro bono basis.

Your friend,

John K.


---------------------------- Original Message -----------------------------
Subject: RE: Heads Up on Posted Report of Wed’s Meeting On Which_You_Are_Invited_To_Post_Comments
From: Jay Hansen
Date: Wed, September 26, 2018 8:41 am MDT
To: john@johnkarls.com
Cc: The Other Attendees of Our 9/19/2018 Meeting
Attachment:
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Thanks for your excellent summary. It was a good read.

Best regards,
Jay Hansen


---------------------------- Original Message -----------------------------
Subject: RE: Heads Up on Posted Report of Wed’s Meeting On Which_You_Are_Invited_To_Post_Comments
From: Jay Hansen
Date: Mon, September 24, 2018 8:08 am MDT
To: john@johnkarls.com
Cc: The Other Attendees of Our 9/19/2018 Meeting
Attachment:
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I wonder if the NRDC would be interested in taking up what the AS has declined to do?? They seem to have the scrappy attitude that might be more suited to the task. Sorry I don’t recall if you have already attempted to enlist them.

Best regards,
Jay Hansen


---------------------------- Original Message -----------------------------
Subject: Heads Up on Posted Report of Wed’s Meeting On Which_You_Are_Invited_To_Post_Comments
From: john@johnkarls.com
Date: Sun, September 23, 2018 11:35 am MDT
To: The Attendees of Our 9/19/2018 Meeting
Cc:
Attachment: RL-e922-MeetingReport-ArneDuncanHowSchoolsWork
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Dear [The Attendees of Our 9/19/2018 Meeting],

Although we do not normally prepare meeting reports, we do when there is a wave of inquiries about what happened (which was the case re our meeting last Wed).

In doing so, our regular modus vivendi is for me to prepare a report based on my notes, following the posting of which on www.ReadingLiberally-SaltLake.org all of the other attendees are invited to post whatever comments they deem appropriate.

Attached is the meeting report I posted on our bulletin board about 10 hours ago.

If you think something additional deserves to be posted, please don’t give a second thought to whether my feelings should be spared!!!

Thank you again for your participation.

Your friend,

John K.

PS –

Toward the end of the meeting you (Marcia) asked whether there was any up-date about my sabbatical to write a book on Great Salt Lake. And I mentioned that there was a recent report that had been posted on the bulletin board.

I forgot that it had also been sent out in a weekly e-mail to everyone on 7/21/2018.

I am guessing that you were asking whether there were any additional developments since 7/21/2018.

However, if you missed the 7/21/2018 weekly e-mail, the report was posted in the sixth section of www.ReadingLiberally-SaltLake.org entitled “Another John Karls Sabbatical To Write Another Book” in the first posting entitled “Great Salt Lake Death Warrant – Sabbatical Progress Report.”

[BTW the Report for Our Meeting last Wed is the third posting in that section.]

But if you were asking whether there were any additional developments since 7/21/2018, the answer is negative because, as noted several places, we anticipated that the events of the last chapter have yet to occur – whether the National Audubon Board of Directors will reverse the corruption of the National Audubon CEO and General Counsel. And, if not, whether any of the directors will resign AND WHETHER ANY OF THE THREE DIRECTORS WHO ARE PARTNERS IN LARGE LAW FIRMS WILL THEMSELVES INSTITUTE THE LITIGATION THAT NATIONAL AUDUBON CORRUPTLY PROMISED IN THEIR GLOSSY FUND-RAISING BROCHURE WITH NO INTENT OF ACTUALLY DOING SO.

[johnkarls]

.
The purpose of this “Reply” is to place the posting entitled “Great Salt Lake Death Warrant – Sabbatical Progress Report” (since this section of this bulletin board is about “Another John Karls Sabbatical To Write Another Book”) ahead of the other postings (most of which relate to Ad Hoc Meetings that have occurred during the Sabbatical).