Difference between revisions of "Draft GPUS Platform Amendment Water"

Revision as of 23:25, 29 March 2010

Section title: Water

Section subtitle:

Our position: Greens safeguard water to ensure the well-being of future generations and restore ecological systems.

We face a worldwide water crisis. According to the United Nations, more than one billion people lack access to safe drinking water. If current trends persist, by 2025 as much as two-thirds of the world’s population will be living with a serious scarcity of water.

Water is a part of the commons. While respecting existing historical water rights, such as those in the West- “first in time, first in right”, we call for water administration that is accountable to stakeholders in a form that is directly responsible to all users.

The water crisis will not be solved through privatization. Water is not a commodity that should be privatized sold to the highest bidder.

GREEN SOLUTIONS

CONSERVATION

Conservation must be an essential part of any water policy. Water conservation also reduces energy consumption and pollution. Conservation needs to be utilized to reduce regional water consumptive use and not to redirect “saved” water for “new” users. The question of determining the public policy for conservation should include whether or not to make conservation measures mandatory, or voluntary and how revenues can be raised, through such measures as water severance taxes that are pro-rated based on amount of use to pay for water management infrastructure improvements.

Mandate water efficient appliances and fixtures be used in all new construction, and promote retrofitting of older buildings.

Promote native landscaping and other drought resistant/ climate-appropriate plants, in order to reduce the need for irrigation.

Promote drip irrigation systems where irrigation is necessary.

Eliminate storm water pollution of our water resources through education of our citizens, enforcement of our laws, and holistic watershed management. Promote storm water technologies that detain, treat, filtrate, and use storm waters near where it is collected.

Promote the appropriate reuse of the “gray” and “black” waters we produce. Use separation techniques, such as dual piping systems where pure water is used for drinking and washing, and reclaimed water is used for lawn watering and similar purposes.

Mandate pre-treatment of industrial wastes to eliminate the presence of metals, solvents, and other toxins in sewer water. This would reduce the cost of municipal treatment and encourage wastewater reuse.

Promote passive and natural systems, such as wetlands, for water and wastewater treatment where appropriate.

Eliminate water subsidies for corporate agribusiness. Higher water prices give agribusiness incentives to conserve.

Assist community organizations to monitor the use of local resources, and to oversee the enforcement of water quality regulations.

Preserve and restore the nation’s natural water features (streams, rivers, lakes, bays, wetlands and groundwater aquifers) that are vital to achieving sustainable use of water resources.

PUBLIC WATER, NOT PRIVATIZATION

Oppose the privatization of water.

We support the national sovereignty of all countries and their authority to control the extraction and development process of natural resources within their national boundaries by international corporations.

We oppose allowing major economic or political interests to make decisions that will impact others. We are opposed to the exploitation of another country’s natural resources, whether water, oil or gold without fair and just compensation and review of the extraction process by those impacted.

SAFE, CLEAN WATER FOR ALL

Urban planning decisions need to be based on a plan that integrates land use with water use. Political bodies, such as municipal water authorities, need to reflect more than the interests and concerns of real estate and development interests. We support growth of urban centers in the context of supply from renewable water sources. Depletion of the aquifers and groundwater mining undermines the long-term stability of the hydrology of regions.

Chemicals used in the fluoridation of America’s public drinking water supplies are toxic waste by-products. The majority of these toxic wastes come from the phosphate fertilizer industry. Fluoride accumulates in the human body through ingestion and inhalation. A growing body of research suggests that fluoride may be associated with arthritis, hip fractures, bone cancer, kidney damage, infertility, and brain disorders. For these reasons, the Green Party opposes the fluoridation of drinking water.

The EPA recognizes factory farms as sources of water pollution under its National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System permit program. The Green Party proposes to: • Mandate treatment of toxic wastes from existing factory farms. • Impose a moratorium on any new factory farms.

We uphold the water and land rights established under the Treaty of Guadelupe-Hidalgo and the sovereign claims of Native American nations, pueblos and tribes, as paramount to all other rights.

Do we mention desalination?

Do we mention water taxation? We propose a two-tier severance tax for regions that will provide funding for bio-regions while assuring a conservation measure that will reduce water consumptive use. Large water users need to begin to be appropriately charged for withdrawals that lower the water table.

1. We need strong national and international laws promote conservation, reclaim polluted water systems, develop water-supply restrictions, ban toxic and pesticide dumping, control or ban corporate farming, and bring the rule of law to transnational corporations that pollute water systems. Mining and depleting the present underground aquifers must be severely restricted. We encourage the use of wetlands, improving the utilization of updated technologies in treating water for pharmaceuticals and preventing the introduction of nucleotides, mixed waste, nuclear waste and perchlorate into the surface and ground water. We encourage local municipal support for transitioning local economies away from high-tech industry, military bases and national laboratories that withdraw disproportionate amounts of water and pollute public waterways. We support the highest federal standards for the public water supply and federal funding support for water quality including for the local implementation of the highest possible standard regarding arsenic levels of surface and groundwater.

We demand that the U.S. government pass strong laws with effective enforcement mechanisms to assure a safe and adequate supply of water for its citizens and all life within its borders.

3. New forms of international, bioregional, and community organizations, watershed/ecosystem-based, must be created to monitor and equitably distribute the fresh water necessary for all life on our planet. Decisions about water must be based on an ecosystems approach.

(Version 1) These decisions can be reached and considered appropriate when stakeholders themselves participate in the planning. Such planning processes, that are open and inclusive, need to be given the authority of their respective states to establish plans, using the science available, and the demonstrated values held by stakeholders. We support duly-elected regional water authority boards that represent stakeholders and have stakeholders represented on an advisory board. (Version 2) These decisions can be reached and considered appropriate when stakeholders themselves participate in the planning. Such planning processes, that are open and inclusive, need to be given the authority of their respective states to establish plans, using the science available, and the demonstrated values held by stakeholders.

We support the establishment of small, local water management associations to give local people control over the administration and management of their water. Water can only be managed in a sustainable fashion at the local level. The creation of such institutions would promote democracy and give people the opportunity to acknowledge and accept the responsibility all of us have to manage our water.

Cycles of intense drought and flooding have demonstrated the need to reorient our priorities in order to achieve a truly sustainable water policy. Over-development and poor planning have resulted in increasing rain-impermeable areas, which compounds the severity and frequency of flooding and pollution in regions downstream. We must begin to understand and apply a holistic watershed approach to managing our water resources. The principle of bioregionalism (living within the means of a region’s natural resources) should give direction to future water policies. We recognize the disproportional political influences of the timber, real estate and development industries, and work to support family farms, open space, and preservation of the old growth forests.

FROM SEPT 2009 WATER PAPER FORM THE GPUS ECOACTION COMMITTEE

Clean and available water is a critical priority which government can and must secure for all people. The threats to our waters are many, from depleted aquifers, to the pollution of surface waters, to the degradation of oceanic waters that have been treated as international waste dumps. There is no time, and no water, to waste

Greens and Green Party Organizations should:

Work together with our neighbors in making decisions on water issues that recognize the stake that future generations have in those decisions; (Future Focus)

Support the rights of indigenous peoples and other nations to maintain clean, affordable water resources; (Personal and Global Responsibility, Social Justice)

Assure that elected officials who make decisions on water use, pricing and quality represent the community of varied users, water specialists and the environment; (Grassroots Democracy)

Acknowledge the diversity of plant and animal life dependent on long-enduring ecosystems and to recognize the necessity of water systems to all life; (Respect for Diversity)

Prevent the usurpation of public rights through privatization of the water resource by multi-national corporations; (Decentralization)

Prioritize affordable drinking water over industrial uses, recognizing that access to water is basic human right; and to consider the impact of all water policy decisions on poor people, impoverished neighborhoods, rural communities and family farmers; (Social Justice)

Prioritize affordable drinking water over industrial uses, recognizing that access to water is a basic human right; and to consider the impact of all water policy decisions on poor people, impoverished neighborhoods, rural communities and family farmers; (Social Justice)

Support local municipal growth policies in the context of existing water supplies, and to maintain a working relationship between urban economic development and local rural agriculture. (Community-based Economics and Economic Justice)