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Journalist Arrested for Filming and Speaking at Public MLPA Initiative Meeting!
In the latest episode in Governor's Arnold Schwarzenegger's corrupt Marine Life Protection Act (MLPA) Initiative, an independent journalist said he was arrested by a Fish and Game warden on April 21 for exercizing his right to video a meeting of what MLPA proponents describe as an "open" and "transparent" process.
The MLPA process, privately funded by the shadowy Resource Legacy Foundation Foundation, has taken the "protection" out of the Marine Life Protection Act and made the process into the Marine Life Privatization Act Initiative.
The original legislation was designed to protect the ocean from pollution, development and other uses that impact the marine ecosystem - not just impose more fishing restrictions. The legislation states very clearly, "Coastal development, water pollution, and other human activities threaten the health of marine habitat and the biological diversity found in California's ocean waters."
However, Schwarzenegger has completely taken coastal development, water pollution and other human activities other than fishing and seaweed harvesting "off the table" in his MLPA process. Schwarzenegger has appointed to the Blue Ribbon Task Forces that design the marine protected areas corporate officials from the oil, marine development and real estate industries to make sure that the marine reserves don't conflict with their plans for exploitation and development of the California coast.
Schwarzenegger, an advocate of increased oil drilling off the California coast, very strategically appointed Catherie Reheis-Boyd, president of the Western States Petroleum Association, as chair of the South Coast MLPA Blue Ribbon Task Force for the South Coast and as a member of the North Central Coast and North Coast MLPA panels. Reheis-Boyd, an oil industry "superstar," is a strong supporter of new oil drilling off the California coast.
It should be no surprise that the Schwarzenegger administration, the worst ever for fish and the environment in California history, wants to suppress free speech by arresting an independent journalist for exercizing his right to document the proceedings of this widely-contested process.
"My wife Barbara and I invite you to join us in supporting David Gurney’s efforts to record MLPAI meetings for the public, and to politely but firmly advocate for our rights to speak at open, recorded meetings. We owe it to present and future Californians to record the truth about the Marine Life Protection Act Initiative process, and to document its public and private meetings," said John Stephens-Lewallen, North Coast environmental leader and sustainable seaweed harvester.
I agree. Why are the MLPA officials so afraid of what transpires in their meetings that they won't allow somebody to film them?
Here is the you tube link of the meeting:
The MLPA process, privately funded by the shadowy Resource Legacy Foundation Foundation, has taken the "protection" out of the Marine Life Protection Act and made the process into the Marine Life Privatization Act Initiative.
The original legislation was designed to protect the ocean from pollution, development and other uses that impact the marine ecosystem - not just impose more fishing restrictions. The legislation states very clearly, "Coastal development, water pollution, and other human activities threaten the health of marine habitat and the biological diversity found in California's ocean waters."
However, Schwarzenegger has completely taken coastal development, water pollution and other human activities other than fishing and seaweed harvesting "off the table" in his MLPA process. Schwarzenegger has appointed to the Blue Ribbon Task Forces that design the marine protected areas corporate officials from the oil, marine development and real estate industries to make sure that the marine reserves don't conflict with their plans for exploitation and development of the California coast.
Schwarzenegger, an advocate of increased oil drilling off the California coast, very strategically appointed Catherie Reheis-Boyd, president of the Western States Petroleum Association, as chair of the South Coast MLPA Blue Ribbon Task Force for the South Coast and as a member of the North Central Coast and North Coast MLPA panels. Reheis-Boyd, an oil industry "superstar," is a strong supporter of new oil drilling off the California coast.
It should be no surprise that the Schwarzenegger administration, the worst ever for fish and the environment in California history, wants to suppress free speech by arresting an independent journalist for exercizing his right to document the proceedings of this widely-contested process.
"My wife Barbara and I invite you to join us in supporting David Gurney’s efforts to record MLPAI meetings for the public, and to politely but firmly advocate for our rights to speak at open, recorded meetings. We owe it to present and future Californians to record the truth about the Marine Life Protection Act Initiative process, and to document its public and private meetings," said John Stephens-Lewallen, North Coast environmental leader and sustainable seaweed harvester.
I agree. Why are the MLPA officials so afraid of what transpires in their meetings that they won't allow somebody to film them?
Here is the you tube link of the meeting:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IWuCHrsmXcc
Journalist Arrested for Filming and Speaking at Public MLPAI Meeting
by John Lewallen
Contacts:
David Gurney (707)961-1339
Barbara and John Stephens-Lewallen (707)895-2996
--Fort Bragg, CA, April 20 and 21
Independent video journalist David Gurney has a powerful sense of duty: to create a video record of the Marine Life Protection Act Initiative (MLPAI), and to speak politely and in turn at public MLPA meetings.
David Gurney was forcibly removed by a Fish and Game Warden from the MLPA North Coast Regional Stakeholders Group public meeting in his home town, Fort Bragg, California. Immediately handcuffed, Gurney, 57, was hauled away in a Fish and Game pickup truck and charged with "Disrupting an Assembly and Unable To Follow Commands.”
“I began filming at the opening of the meeting on Tuesday,” Gurney recalls. “The presenter put up a slide in his PowerPoint presentation that said no video taping, audio taping or pictures would be allowed. At that point, Ken Wiseman, Executive Director of the MLPAI, yelled out, ‘Would Mr. Gurney step out, because he is videotaping right now!’ The presenter stopped the meeting and asked me to turn off the camera. I said that as far as I knew, his request would be a violation of the Brown Act, which specifically permits unobtrusive recording of public meetings.
“Then Ken Wiseman came in front of me and threatened that if I didn’t turn off the camera I would be forcibly removed from the meeting. So I shut the camera off.”
Director Wiseman has said that California state open meeting laws, including the Brown Act and the Bagley-Keene Open Meetings Act, do not apply to the MLPAI process of setting up Marine Protected Areas, because the process is “advisory” to the state government. And yet the state is supplying scientists, advisors and armed Fish and Game Wardens as security guards for public MLPAI meetings. Many feel the blurring of the lines between private and public interests has opened the floodgates for corruption, and illegal private influence of the democratic process is running rampant in the MLPAI.
California’s open meeting laws guarantee that citizens and members of the press have a right to keep track of what goes on in public process, and will not be harassed at public meetings. Yet the Marine Life Protection Act Initiative, funded by the Resources Legacy Fund Foundation, often has secret, unrecorded meetings, changes the rules of their process at whim, and abides by the laws of their own choosing.
David Gurney soon saw that something fishy was happening at the unrecorded April 20 and 21 meeting of the North Coast Regional Stakeholders Group (RSG).
“Suddenly, after telling me to shut down the camera, the MLPAI team announced that the 34-member RSG was being divided into two groups, to make two separate plans for Marine Protected Areas. The staff read off names of RSG members to be put in either the “Ruby” or the “Sapphire” sub-group of the North Coast Regional Stakeholders Group. Some RSG members objected to this, because the RSG had voted 12-6 against dividing the group in this way, at their previous meeting in Crescent City.”
The MLPAI team abhors unity. The Marine Life Protection Act of 1999 mandates a single process, directed by California state agencies with thorough legislative oversight, to make Marine Protected Areas to enhance California’s fisheries. The privatized process run by the Resources Legacy Fund Foundation, 555 Capitol Mall, Sacramento, is a sophisticated human management experiment based on divide-and-rule, with no legislative oversight, and motives quite different from the intention of the 1999 Act.
“I quickly did a quick cover shot of each room, to reflect how the RSG had been divided,” David Gurney recalled. “I was being watched, and as I filmed, I was immediately told to stop filming, to which I agreed.”
Gurney spoke for a minute during a lull on the first day of the RSG meeting. “I said I felt the proceedings were being conducted illegally, and that I had not given up my First Amendment right to freedom of speech by coming to their meeting as a member of the public.”
Witnesses agree with Gurney’s account that “I kept my mouth shut the rest of the two days, until about three o’clock Wednesday. After another member of the public had spoken, I raised my hand and was acknowledged by the facilitator. I asked a very quick question about the MLPAI addressing issues of ocean industrialization, an important topic."
“While my question was being answered, I was very surprised to be approached by a DFG Warden, who began to physically grab me, although I was cooperating with his request to escort me out of the room. I was outraged to have been forcibly escorted out of the meeting, and am distressed about being arrested and falsely accused of disrupting the meeting for attempting to establish a historical record of the MLPAI, and for asking a legitimate and well-intentioned question."
My wife Barbara and I invite you to join us in supporting David Gurney’s efforts to record MLPAI meetings for the public, and to politely but firmly advocate for our rights to speak at open, recorded meetings. We owe it to present and future Californians to record the truth about the Marine Life Protection Act Initiative process, and to document its public and private meetings.
David Gurney will assert his innocence, and the rights we all have to journalistic freedom.
You can view David Gurney’s You Tube glimpses of the April 20 and 21 RSG meeting at:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IWuCHrsmXcc
Journalist Arrested for Filming and Speaking at Public MLPAI Meeting
by John Lewallen
Contacts:
David Gurney (707)961-1339
Barbara and John Stephens-Lewallen (707)895-2996
--Fort Bragg, CA, April 20 and 21
Independent video journalist David Gurney has a powerful sense of duty: to create a video record of the Marine Life Protection Act Initiative (MLPAI), and to speak politely and in turn at public MLPA meetings.
David Gurney was forcibly removed by a Fish and Game Warden from the MLPA North Coast Regional Stakeholders Group public meeting in his home town, Fort Bragg, California. Immediately handcuffed, Gurney, 57, was hauled away in a Fish and Game pickup truck and charged with "Disrupting an Assembly and Unable To Follow Commands.”
“I began filming at the opening of the meeting on Tuesday,” Gurney recalls. “The presenter put up a slide in his PowerPoint presentation that said no video taping, audio taping or pictures would be allowed. At that point, Ken Wiseman, Executive Director of the MLPAI, yelled out, ‘Would Mr. Gurney step out, because he is videotaping right now!’ The presenter stopped the meeting and asked me to turn off the camera. I said that as far as I knew, his request would be a violation of the Brown Act, which specifically permits unobtrusive recording of public meetings.
“Then Ken Wiseman came in front of me and threatened that if I didn’t turn off the camera I would be forcibly removed from the meeting. So I shut the camera off.”
Director Wiseman has said that California state open meeting laws, including the Brown Act and the Bagley-Keene Open Meetings Act, do not apply to the MLPAI process of setting up Marine Protected Areas, because the process is “advisory” to the state government. And yet the state is supplying scientists, advisors and armed Fish and Game Wardens as security guards for public MLPAI meetings. Many feel the blurring of the lines between private and public interests has opened the floodgates for corruption, and illegal private influence of the democratic process is running rampant in the MLPAI.
California’s open meeting laws guarantee that citizens and members of the press have a right to keep track of what goes on in public process, and will not be harassed at public meetings. Yet the Marine Life Protection Act Initiative, funded by the Resources Legacy Fund Foundation, often has secret, unrecorded meetings, changes the rules of their process at whim, and abides by the laws of their own choosing.
David Gurney soon saw that something fishy was happening at the unrecorded April 20 and 21 meeting of the North Coast Regional Stakeholders Group (RSG).
“Suddenly, after telling me to shut down the camera, the MLPAI team announced that the 34-member RSG was being divided into two groups, to make two separate plans for Marine Protected Areas. The staff read off names of RSG members to be put in either the “Ruby” or the “Sapphire” sub-group of the North Coast Regional Stakeholders Group. Some RSG members objected to this, because the RSG had voted 12-6 against dividing the group in this way, at their previous meeting in Crescent City.”
The MLPAI team abhors unity. The Marine Life Protection Act of 1999 mandates a single process, directed by California state agencies with thorough legislative oversight, to make Marine Protected Areas to enhance California’s fisheries. The privatized process run by the Resources Legacy Fund Foundation, 555 Capitol Mall, Sacramento, is a sophisticated human management experiment based on divide-and-rule, with no legislative oversight, and motives quite different from the intention of the 1999 Act.
“I quickly did a quick cover shot of each room, to reflect how the RSG had been divided,” David Gurney recalled. “I was being watched, and as I filmed, I was immediately told to stop filming, to which I agreed.”
Gurney spoke for a minute during a lull on the first day of the RSG meeting. “I said I felt the proceedings were being conducted illegally, and that I had not given up my First Amendment right to freedom of speech by coming to their meeting as a member of the public.”
Witnesses agree with Gurney’s account that “I kept my mouth shut the rest of the two days, until about three o’clock Wednesday. After another member of the public had spoken, I raised my hand and was acknowledged by the facilitator. I asked a very quick question about the MLPAI addressing issues of ocean industrialization, an important topic."
“While my question was being answered, I was very surprised to be approached by a DFG Warden, who began to physically grab me, although I was cooperating with his request to escort me out of the room. I was outraged to have been forcibly escorted out of the meeting, and am distressed about being arrested and falsely accused of disrupting the meeting for attempting to establish a historical record of the MLPAI, and for asking a legitimate and well-intentioned question."
My wife Barbara and I invite you to join us in supporting David Gurney’s efforts to record MLPAI meetings for the public, and to politely but firmly advocate for our rights to speak at open, recorded meetings. We owe it to present and future Californians to record the truth about the Marine Life Protection Act Initiative process, and to document its public and private meetings.
David Gurney will assert his innocence, and the rights we all have to journalistic freedom.
You can view David Gurney’s You Tube glimpses of the April 20 and 21 RSG meeting at:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IWuCHrsmXcc
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