Threats to Our Communities & Our Water: SPP, Super-Corridors, NAFTA Adapted by Ruth Caplan, Sierra Club Water Privatization Task Force Based on slide.

Threats to Our Communities & Our Water:

SPP, Super-Corridors, NAFTA

Adapted by Ruth Caplan,

Sierra Club Water Privatization Task Force

Based on slide presentation by Janet Eaton, Sierra Club Canada

Threats to Our Water:Threats to Our Water:North American

Free Trade Agreement

NO WAY !

Threats to Our Communities and Water:

Topics Covered

1. What is the SPP?

2. NAFTA Super-Corridors

3. The push is on to sell water !!

4. Trade threats to water under NAFTA

5. How are citizens are building resistance

6. Resources for learning more and getting active

$$

Security & Prosperity Partnership of North America ( SPP)

Agreed to by US, Canada, Mexico

March 31st, 2005

Also known as “NAFTA Plus”

Security & Prosperity PartnershipWhat is it ?

What? SPP launched March 2005 Waco Texas

President Bush, President Fox, and Prime Minister Martin announced the Security and Prosperity Partnership (SPP) for North America on March 23, 2005 in Waco, Texas. Just a handshake so no need to consult Congress or Parliament.

“Through this partnership we will ensure that North America remains the most economically dynamic region of the world, a secure home for our people for this and future generations.”

Joint Statement by President Bush, President

Fox, and Prime Minister Martin www.spp.gov

Security & Prosperity Partnership What is it?

What is? Joint Statement by President Bush, President Fox, and

Prime Minister Martin, Waco Texas:

“The SPP builds upon, but is separate from, our long-standing trade and economic relationships.”

“This partnership has increased institutional contacts between the three governments to respond to a shared vision of a stronger, more secure and more prosperous region.”

Whose vision would that be?

Did they consult you and me?

www.spp.gov

Security & Prosperity PartnershipHow does it work?

? SPP Working Groups:

Creating a Corporatocracy

• 13 cross-border working groups made up of corporate leaders and senior government officials were established.

• 10 are on Prosperity (including Energy, Transportation, Food & Ag) and 3 on Security

• They report to the three top Ministers within their governments twice a year and meet in person each March.

• Public and NGO’s are not at the table

www.spp.gov/prosperity_working/index.asp?dName=prosperity_working

Security & Prosperity PartnershipHow is it Working?

What?

SPP Transportation Working Group

“Will improve the safety and efficiency of North America's transportation system by expanding market access, facilitating multimodal corridors , reducing congestion, and alleviating bottlenecks at the border that inhibit growth and threaten our quality of life (e.g., expand air services agreements, … and working with responsible jurisdictions, will develop mechanisms for enhanced road infrastructure planning, including an inventory of border transportation infrastructure in major corridors and public-private financing instruments for border projects.”1

“Multimodal corridors will include dedicated corridor for utilities and water pipelines.” 2

__________________________1 http://www.spp.gov/prosperity_working/index.asp?dName=prosperity_working

2 Texas Dept of Transportation http://www.keeptexasmoving.org/projects/www.spp.gov

NAFTA Super-Corridors

NAFTA SUPER-CORRIDORS MEXICO TO CANADA

Photo Credit: forthecause.US

NAFTA Super-Corridors –for cars, trucks, trains & water/oil pipelines

Continental Integration – North American Union

www.thenewamerican.com/artman/publish/printer_4218.shtml

Projected Super-Corridors will have Water Pipelines


www.forthecause.us/000ftc-newstopic-nafta-corridor.shtml

Water Pipelines

NAFTA Super-Corridor

Artist’s Rendition


• The SPP, with its Transportation Working Group, accelerates NAFTA Super-Corridors with their proposed water pipelines!

• National transportation bodies and cross border consortia like the North American Super Corridor

Coalition -- NASCO* -- are also fueling this process.

* NASCO- North American Super- Corridor Coalition:

Mission is to develop the world’s first international, integrated and secure, multi-modal transportation system, along the International Mid-Continent Trade Corridor, to improve both trade competitiveness and the quality of life in North America. www.nascocorridor.com/pages/about/about.htm

NASCO Super-Corridor with connecting routes

NASCO: North America’s Super Corridor Coalition

NASCO’s stated mission is to develop the world’s first international, integrated and secure multi-modal corridor system to support international trade. Originally the I-35 Corridor Coalition, focus is on interstates 35/29/94

“From almost immediately after” NAFTA took effect, “NASCO has sought out and backed Corridor-related initiatives to enhance border security, safety and the operational efficiency of the existing transportation infrastructure.”

www.nascocorridor.com

NASCO: Promoting “endless more”

“the US in general, and our Corridor through its heartland in particular, face daunting challenges in adapting to absorb the coming tsunami of burgeoning cargo freight tonnage.”

www.nascocorridor.com

NAFTA Super-Corridors Trans -Texas Corridor not just a highway


The Trans-Texas Corridor (TTC) is a proposed multi-use, statewide network of transportation routes in Texas …As envisioned, each route will include:

• separate lanes for passenger vehicles and large trucks ( six automobile lanes, four truck lanes)

• freight railways ( two lines)

• high-speed commuter railways

• infrastructure for utilities including water lines, oil and gas pipelines, and transmission lines for electricity, broadband and other telecommunications services (on the outer edge)

TxDOT (Texas Department of Transportation) will oversee planning, construction and ongoing maintenance, although private vendors will be responsible for much of the daily operations and collect the tolls. _________________________________________

www.keeptexasmoving.org/projects/

Recommended Routes

Trans-Texas Corridor

NAFTA Super-Corridors Trans-Texas Corridor Water Threats


Water is one of fourteen major concerns of the Corridor Watch Group. Here is what they say about water:

Potential threats to Texas’ water created by the Trans Texas Corridor are very serious.

Water pipelines are in the plan.

The Trans-Texas Corridor Plan acknowledges … that water pipelines will facilitate the transfer of "water over long distances."

It appears that water wells placed on the Trans-Texas Corridor (state land) are not presently subject to any local control or regulation. HB-3588 (legislation) allows TxDOT to lease land along the Corridor for any commercial or industrial purpose, could that include water mining? If so, such enterprises apparently will not be subject to regulation by ground water conservation districts.

________________________________________________

www.corridorwatch.org/ttc/cw-i-water.htm

NAFTA Super-Corridors Trans-Texas Corridor Other Threats


Confiscation of land by eminent domain

-- 584,000 acres of farm and ranch land

Loss of business in hundreds of communities

Environmental issues – air & water contamination, loss of habitat & ecosystems fragmentation

Costs

– Misplaced transportation spending

-- Toll income to foreign Spanish Cintra Corporation!

Corridor Watch Issues & Concerns

Trans Texas Corridor Part of a Larger Scheme


It’s not just Texas. It’s part of the Super-Corridor network going through Kansas City to Canada and Mexico

NAFTA Super-Corridors Trans Texas Corridor: Other Threats


Monthly Review: NAFTA Corridor Threats

"The human and environmental costs of the Texas leg of the I-35 NAFTA corridor cannot be kept secret indefinitely. The final toll of the damage caused by the NAFTA corridor system, which will entail more lost jobs, the increased use of fossil fuels, and continuing dependence on imported oil, will also include mass consumption of prime farmlands, displaced populations, disrupted communities, and widespread environmental damage." ___________________________________________

“The NAFTA Corridors: Offshoring U.S. Transportation Jobs to Mexico,” Richard D. Vogel /www.monthlyreview.org/0206vogel.htm

NAFTA Super-Corridors Labor Threats

“Undeniably, both the U.S. and Mexican labor movements have suffered serious setbacks under NAFTA. But the offshoring of U.S. production and transportation jobs and the wholesale exploitation of Mexican workers are just one facet of global capital’s assault on international labor and must be considered in that context ….

“The preparation for this massive offshoring has been in progress for more than a decade—the ongoing privatization of the Mexican economy and the ground transportation rules of NAFTA are facilitating the plan to divert jobs to the south.”

_________________________________________________

“The NAFTA Corridors: Offshoring U.S. Transportation Jobs to Mexico.” Richard D. Vogel www.monthlyreview.org/0206vogel.htm

Kansas Inland Port:Nub of Super-Corridors

“Located in the heart of America at the hub of the transcontinental and NAFTA trade corridors, Kansas City is a center of choice for warehousing, manufacturing and distribution. Business has prospered due in large part to the region's abundant, multi-modal transportation network.”

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Kansas Inland PortKansas Inland Port

Canamex: NAFTA Super-Corridor


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CANAMEX Trade Corridor was established by Congress the year after NAFTA was approved.

“The CANAMEX Trade Corridor, as defined by Congress in the 1995 National Highway Systems Designation Act, is a High Priority Corridor.”

www.canamex.org


Canamex lists as accomplishments:

2Q 2002 • Construction on the I-10/I-19 interchange in Tucson, a key project for the CANAMEX Corridor, began in June.

4Q 2002 • The Governor's CANAMEX Task Force reports attracting over $86 million in federal funds for the Hoover Dam Bypass project.

www.canamex.org/accomplishments.asp

I-5 Corridor in California: Another NAFTA Super-Corridor

“The Shasta Valley Enterprise Zone, located in the scenic valleys of Northern California...[is] a state-designated economic development area....”

Shasta Business Park promotes itself....

“We Have All Of The Great Connections. Trucking and the I-5 Corridor Located along Interstate 5, the largest truck corridor in the United States, the Shasta Valley Enterprise Zone is uniquely positioned to offer companies access to direct routes to Canada and Mexico (NAFTA Treaty Nations), and all international sea and airports in between.”

www.shastabusinesspark.com/enterprisezone.html

I-5 Corridor in CaliforniaMoving Water

“Crystal Geyser Spring Water Bottling Company has purchased 30 acres of land in the Shasta Business Park to construct what will become the largest spring water bottling plant in the World. The water from Mt. Shasta is the purest of all water. From carbon dating, its age of over 8,100 years and the filtration processes it has gone through makes it the very best. This same water is available to the residents of this integrated community.”

www.shastabusinesspark.com/enterprisezone.html

How Does the SPP Threaten Our Water ?

?

“Bulk Water exports will take place from Canada – Manitoba, Newfoundland, Quebec, and British Columbia – in two to five years.”

Paul Michael Wihbey GWEST, Sept 22, 2006, Global Business Forum Banff

WATER EXPORT

Security & Prosperity Partnership Water is on the Table !


The Minutes of a 2004 meeting of the Task Force on the Future of North America which drafted the SPP was leaked by the Council of Canadians. It says:

“No item - not Canadian water, not Mexican oil, not American anti-dumping laws - is ‘off the table;' rather contentious or intractable issues will simply require more time to ripen politically.”

_______________________________ Leaked report of the Task Force on the Future of North America,

2004. Council of Canadians Website www.canadians.org/browse_categories.htm?COC_token=23@@36cbd3e6423c06caef59921ad88ba514&step=2&catid=374&iscat=1

No item – not even Canadian water is off the

SPP table !

Security & Prosperity Partnership Water and Oil are on the Table !


The leaked report goes on to say:

“Mexican oil and Canadian water - are invested with greater emotion than are those same natural resources in other countries. ...Consequently, policy recommendations on these issues are best considered long term goals.”

Water a long term goal of the SPP !

The Push to Sell Canada’s Water

Blue Gold!!!

Money Week, which provides analysis of the week's financial news, with practical investment advice says:

“There are countries that have an over-abundance of water – and here there are opportunities for sale to other countries. Canada, for example, has the same amount of water as China, but just 2.3% of its population. Brazil has far less need of its water than many of its neighbours. As the value of water rises, countries like these will start to export their spare reserves to those more in need – and willing to pay. Pipelines will spring up, connecting states and countries. Tankers will transport water across the sea as often as they do oil. Water will be on the move. And those who can transfer it will be there to benefit.”

_____________________________________________Merryn Sommerset Webb. Money Week. May 12, 2006 How to profit from the world's water crisis www.moneyweek.com/file/17125/look-to-a-very-liquid-investment.html

The Push to Sell Canada’s Water !

October 2005 –The Walrus -- Elizabeth May responds

“The fact that climate change will result in persistent droughts on our prairies and reduced water levels in the Great Lakes is a good argument against engineering water transfers south of the border. We are fighting for an Annex agreement to the Great Lakes Charter that will prevent diversions, with climate change cited as a reason. Adapting to climate change will certainly mean keeping our water wthin natural watersheds and basins. All the more reason that we cannot risk diversions or mega-dams, and why we must reduce fossil-fuel emissions.”

--- Elizabeth May, at the time, Sierra Club of Canada Director, now leader of the Green Party of Canada

Water Warning - Get Ready for Floods, Dams and Selling our Water to the US by Chris Wood.

• Water was not excluded from NAFTA. This means water transported commercially across the US/Canada border would probably not survive a NAFTA corporate challenge if any government tries to limit the quantity being exported.

• The revised Great Lakes Compact is intended to stop large withdrawals from the Great Lakes Watershed, but also has loopholes which allow the siphoning off of water for sale by the bottled water industry.

• Canada has much fresh water eyed by entrepreneurs and investors for export to lucrative US market as well as global markets.

North AmericanFree Trade Agreement

Threats to Our Communities and Water:

NAFTA Increases the Threat

Threats to Our Communities and Water: NAFTA Increases the Threat

Such exports set a dangerous precedent for treating water as a commodity which means the price is set by the market place. This impacts all communities. As the water managers of Aurora CO and Southern NV Water Authority say to the reporter in the 10/21/07 NYT Magazine cover story “The Perfect Drought”:

"Mulroy and Binney each told me they think a true free-market water exchange would create too many winners and losers. 'What you would have is affluent communities being able to buy the lifeblood right out from under those that are less well heeled,' Mulroy said."

North AmericanFree Trade Agreement

SPP and NAFTA Super-Corridors States Fight Back!

? States say No Way to SPP &


• 19 states introduced resolutions in 2007 calling on the U.S. to get out of the SPP

• Resolutions passed both Houses in Idaho, Montana, and Oklahoma and were sent to the U.S. Congress

• Texas sent bill to Governor requiring the attorney general to produce a report on how NAFTA/SPP/NACC/WTO/GATS would effect state law

SPP and NAFTA Super-Corridors States Fight Back!

? Idaho says No Way to SPP &


“THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED by the members of the First Regular Session of the Fifty-ninth Idaho Legislature, the House of Representatives and the Senate concurring therein, that we emphatically urge and petition the Congress of the United States and particularly the congressional delegation representing the state of Idaho to use all efforts, energies and diligence to withdraw the United States from any further participation in the Security and Prosperity Partnership of North America or any other bilateral or multilateral activity that seeks to advance, authorize, fund or in any way promote the creation of any structure to create any form of North American Union.”

Security & Prosperity PartnershipMontebello Canada August 2007

WhatWhile heads of state met at Montebello to discuss next steps for the SPP, protestors turned out to make their voices heard.

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Security & Prosperity PartnershipEnergy Workers Respond to SPP

Can

On August 18, 2007 energy workers from Mexico, the United States, Canada and Quebec together with the Four North American networks fighting NAFTA and the Security and Prosperity Partnership (SPP) met in Montreal. They issued a Solidarity saying in part:

“We share the concerns of civil society movements that the SPP is a new and powerful instrument created by government and corporate elites to shape the destinies of our nations without democratic participation or oversight. We reject the security agenda of the SPP which links NAFTA and trade to the limiting of civil liberties, mass surveillance, racial profiling and the failed and disastrous military and foreign policies of George W. Bush. We challenge the neo-liberal assumptions of prosperity which have led to increasing disparities of wealth and power in each of our countries.”


Can

Solidarity Statement continues:

“These and other elements of the SPP-corporate energy agenda are unsustainable and sacrifice the needs of workers and communities in each country to the profits of energy corporations. This is an agenda that fails to address the need for each country to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, including a new round of far reaching goals after 2012.”


Can

Solidarity Statement conclusion:

Energy policies will shape our world in the 21 century. These policies will lead either to democratic, sustainable development or to global environmental disaster and new wars of aggression. Energy workers, their unions and social partners in Mexico, Canada and the United States will act together for democratic, sustainable national development of our energy resources.

Digby Neck--Is This Our Future?

Digby Neck & Islands Present Economy:

• Tradition of community economic development

• Sustainable

• Small Scale, localized

• Community based

• Participatory

• Eco -tourism

• Retirement area

• Small scale fishing

• Marine research

• Learning , discovery

• Intermediate technology emphasis

In Stark Opposition ~> Basalt Assault

Digby Neck & Islands Clayton Concrete mega quarry is tied to global economy

• Industrialization of unique bioregion

• Undemocratic imposition on local community by foreign corporation

• Derails local sustainable development by introducing large scale, unsustainable industry

• Cumulative impacts as more industries attracted by deep sea port

• Part of SPP grand plan!!!Industrial aspects of a quarry

Digby Neck – Model Economy vs the SPP Basalt Assault

Citizens have said No Way

Sierra Club has fought with them

Key government panel just rejected quarry as unsustainable!

Community by community we must see the big picture and reject the SPP!!

Sierra Club www.Sierraclub.org/CAC/water

Alliance for Democracy www.thealliancefordemocracy.org

Food and Water Watch www.foodandwaterwatch.org

Michigan Citizens for Water Conservation Michigan Citizens for Water Conservation www.www.savemiwatersavemiwater.org.org

Defending Water for Life in Maine http://defendingwaterinmaine.org

Save Our Groundwater (NH) Save Our Groundwater (NH) www.www.saveourgroundwatersaveourgroundwater.org.org

McCloud Watershed Council www.mccloudwatershedcouncil.org

Concerned Citizens Coalition of Stockton (CA) Concerned Citizens Coalition of Stockton (CA) www.www.cccoscccos.org.org

Felton Flow Felton Flow www.www.feltonflowfeltonflow.org.org

Resources to Resist Water Privatization and Commodification

Resources to Resist the SPP/Super-Corridors

Stay tuned to these websites to learn more and take action:

Texas Corridor Watch www.corridorwatch.org/ttc/index.htm

Council of Canadians www.canadians.org/

Common Frontiers www.commonfrontiers.ca/

Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives www.policyalternatives.ca

Judicial Watch www.judicialwatch.org

Conservative websites in the U.S. are also sounding the alarm about threats from the SPP and NAFTA Super-Corridors, e.g., World Net www.worldnet

Phyllis Spivey www.newswithviews.com/Spivey/phyllis3.htm Steven Yates www.newswithviews.com/Yates/steven.htm

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End Notes

Continental Integration –orth American Union

This power point was researched and created by Janet M Eaton, PhD, independent researcher and educator, and the Sierra Club of Canada’s International Liaison to the Corporate Accountability Committee and Water Privatization Task Force.

It was revised and updated October 2007 for presentation in Tucson AZ by Ruth Caplan, Chair of the Sierra Club’s Water Privatization Task Force and Coordinator of the Alliance for Democracy’s Defending Water for Life campaign.

Threats to Our Communities & Our Water: SPP, Super-Corridors, NAFTA Adapted by Ruth Caplan, Sierra Club Water Privatization Task Force Based on slide.

Documents

prosperity partnership

spp transportation

slide presentation

president fox

waco texas president

water pipelines

multimodal corridors

trade threats