For Immediate Release, May 17, 2021
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Agreement Sets Swift Timeline for Federal Government’s Decisions on Tiehm’s Buckwheat Protection
LAS VEGAS,
Nev. The Center for Biological Diversity and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service reached an agreement today that requires the agency to decide by May 31 whether Nevada’s rare Tiehm’s buckwheat warrants protection under the Endangered Species Act. The agreement is the result of litigation by the Center and a recentruling by a federal judge that the Service must make a determination on protections for the imperiled plant.
The agreement requires the Service to issue three decisions within less than a year. It first must issue a 12-month finding of whether Tiehm’s buckwheat is warranted or not warranted for protection by May 31. If listing is warranted, a proposed rule must be offered no later than Sept. 30. Finally, the latest a proposed critical habitat rule could be published would be May 2, 2022.
For Immediate Release, April 21, 2021
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Legal Victory Compels Federal Government to Decide on Tiehm’s Buckwheat Protections
Judge Calls Nevada Wildflower’s Situation ‘Emergency’ Warranting Swift Action
RENO,
Nev. As a result of litigation by the Center for Biological Diversity, a federal judge ruled today that the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service must decide whether or not to protect Nevada’s rare Tiehm’s buckwheat under the Endangered Species Act.
The Center brought a lawsuit after the Service failed to meet legally required deadlines to respond to the organization’s 2019 Endangered Species Act petition to protect the wildflower. Tiehm’s buckwheat is threatened by an open-pit lithium mine proposed by an Australian mining company, Ioneer Corp. The mine would destroy most of the global habitat for the species, putting it on a path to extinction.
Mills addresses Phippsburg board bucking mask mandate, announces stronger mask requirements
Gov. Janet Mills said she wasn t aware Phippsburg selectmen have been bucking the mask mandate and warned: “If I were running any kind of facility, whether it’s a town office or a private business, I would not want to take the risk.”
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PHIPPSBURG Gov. Janet Mills addressed Phippsburg Selectmen’s decision to “strongly encourage” rather than require face masks in municipal buildings to reduce the risk of spreading COVID-19.
In her Friday briefing alongside Maine Center for Disease Control and Prevention Director Dr. Nirav Shah, Mills said she wasn’t aware Phippsburg selectmen have been bucking her mask mandate. However, Mills said she’s “happy to reach out to those people and talk to them about what the rules are, why they’re there and how they should enforce them.”
After push from Maine Attorney General, Phippsburg board adopts Mills’ mask mandate
In a letter to the Phippsburg Select Board, Attorney General Aaron Frey wrote Gov. Mills’ executive order makes the board “legally obligated to require the use of face coverings in all municipal buildings.”
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The Phippsburg Board of Selectmen voted Wednesday to follow Gov. Janet Mills’ mandate requiring people to wear a face mask in municipal buildings.
Kathleen O’Brien / The Times Record
PHIPPSBURG After weeks of bucking Janet Mills’ mask mandate, Phippsburg Selectmen on Wednesday voted unanimously to comply with the governor’s executive order requiring people to wear face masks in all public buildings. The board’s decision was influenced by warnings from Maine’s Attorney General Frey and Jessica Maher, Phippsburg’s town attorney.
Letter to the editor: Phippsburg selectman views mandate as suggestion
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Phippsburg Selectman Chris Mixon opposes the enforcement of mask mandates and finds the issue not to be one of public safety, but “freedom.” His notion that the enforcement of requirements, or laws, is a matter of using “my rights to take rights away from people” is curious, as it suggests that Mixon believes laws are essentially suggestions, and that enforcement breaches his definition of freedom.
This sounds like a radical version of anarchism. How surprising to find these 19th-century political philosophies alive and well in Phippsburg. Either that, or Mixon has taken the “select” part of his title and decided to run with it, cherry-picking which laws he personally finds worth enforcing and which can be interpreted as suggestions. Not as much an anarchist, as a micro-czarist.