WolfeNotes.com

Bureaucrat —-> Whistleblower —-> Activist —-> Critic —-> Nomad

Wandering The Weird Scenes Inside The Gold Mine

• A Note To Readers – Why I Write

Prequel – I read that credibility and membership in the ruling class new elite are based on education and credentials from elite universities (Ivy League or Public Ivies), so here ya go!:)

• SUNY Binghamton (1983), Bachelor’s Environmental Science and Public Policy
• Cornell University, Graduate School (1983-1985) Master Of Regional Planning (completed all but thesis requirement)

I also understand that the institutionalist gatekeepers are impressed by membership in the club – so does my 13 years of experience in State government work for you? 7 years at the brand name Sierra Club? I year at the corporate Pew Foundation? Weird scenes inside the goldmine, for sure.

SourceWatch bio (incomplete)

[Intro Note: This site generates no revenue. There are no sponsors and no ads and no members and no fees and no financial contributions. Period. We independently write about issues – at great personal cost – to distribute information and stimulate debate and hold the bastards accountable. And to try to keep sane. As they say, we’ve paid the price . We’re the real deal and back it up with receipts! (citing independent text and government documents.] We’re loyal only to facts and our best estimate of the truth, not even to our readers (who we respect but would never pander to).

Update: 1/26/19 – We’re on the Skoolie bus: – update – and we just named her!

[Update: 6/4/22 – I was able to locate an archive of 10 years of my NJ PEER work which I thought was lost – 2005 – 2016. Hit this link to check that out, there’s some good and still relevant and useful work there.]

[Update: 5/23/22 – aside from Christie Whitman’s EPA US Senate Confirmation testimony (see page 120 – 132) (and PEER press releases and quotes in NY Times stories), this is the first time I’ve been published nationally. 

Sorry Dr. Hook, I’d have bought 5 copies for my mother, but mom died 20 years ago and CP no longer publishes a print edition!

 

[Update 11/7/17 –  Proud to be considered by the NJ League of Humane Voters as:

“Bill Wolfe, New Jersey’s premier environmental blogger.”

[Update 10/18/12 – See “A Reactionary Clearcut” – Interview published in the Philadelphia Review of Books

[Update: 1/12/12 – see the Morris Daily Record’s “I Believe” series, where I wrote:

“Positive change requires countervailing pressure from well-informed citizens”:

[Update: Of interest: see the Fracking Resource Guide

Mr. Wolfe knows when environmental officials are telling the truth. He is not about to give up his environmental activist’s passion to correct our regulatory agencies and politicians.

Read what they say about Mr. Wolfe:

• “Mr. Wolfe raised some very interesting points in his presentation to the committee this morning,” Wallace said (former NJ Supreme Court Justice John E. Wallace, Jr., Chairman of the Joint Legislative Committee on Ethical Standards – Press Of Atlantic City 11/18/14)

• “I’m not afraid to listen to Bill Wolfe when he has a good idea,” [Senate Environment  Committee Chairman] Smith said. Wolfe says he would like the Legislature to take a stronger stance with a bill to require action by the DEP. ~~~  Kirk Moore of the Asbury Park Press story on 9/27/10

• “Kudos to Bill Wolfe. We heard all kinds of testimony over these three meetings. But the one that stuck in my mind is [Bill’s testimony] that there’s no guarantee that they’ll be no deterioration in the State’s water quality standards if there’s development in the first 150 feet of buffer of C1 streams. That’s the critical missing legislative intent item for me.   ~~~ Bob Smith, Senate Environmental Committee Chairman (6/16/16 – vote to pass SCR 66 

• “Don’t talk to him [Wolfe], he’s the enemy” ~~~ Tom Gilbert, Keep it Green Coalition (Summer 2014)

• “DEP spokesman Larry Ragonese declined to comment Tuesday, saying the agency does not respond to Wolfe as “a disgruntled employee.” (Asbury Park Press 7/15/14)

• [DEP spokesman Larry] Ragonese called Wolfe “completely ridiculous and irresponsible” for his comments. (about Bulls Island) Hunterdon County Democrat (3/15/12) – get the facts on that story here and see just who was “ridiculous and irresponsible’.

• “Let me first state that I agree with environmental activist Bill Wolfe when he argues that the state Department of Environmental Protection should drop its plans to cut down all those graceful old sycamores at Bull’s Island Recreation Area.” ~~~ Star Ledger columnist Paul Mulshine

The D&R Canal Commission opposed and voted to block the DEP clear cut plan on Bulls Island. So it was DEP’s clearcut plan the was “ridiculous and irresponsible” !!!!

• “I resent Bill Wolfe saying it because he doesn’t know what we do.” ~~~ Pinelands Commission Executive Director Nancy Wittenberg (7/13) (listen on tape)

* In case it is not obvious, I intentionally posted the criticism from Gilbert, DEP press hacks, and Wittenberg because I am proud of it, the same way FDR was proud of the hatred of the economic royalists:

“They are unanimous in their hate for me–and I welcome their hatred.”  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D9yoZHs6PsU

Founding PEER

Trenton —Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER), a national alliance of state and federal agency resource professionals working to ensure environmental ethics and governmental accountability, today opened a New Jersey field office near Trenton. Heading the New Jersey PEER operation is Bill Wolfe, former policy advisor to the Commissioner of the state Department of Environmental Protection (DEP).

On Gov. Whitman:

Bill Wolfe was fired as a staffer with the state Department of Environmental Protection when he raised questions about the Whitman administration’s alleged efforts to bury a report on mercury contamination in fish. Now he is director of a watchdog group called Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility.

“Whitman leaving EPA to be a nuke lobbyist is not a legal or ethical conflict of interest. But it is a perfect example of the revolving-door abuses that go on in D.C. and Trenton. Corporations use Whitman and lots of former government employees for access and influence peddling. It may be unprecedented at that level,” he said. [Press Of Atlantic City, September 26, 2010]

Source watch: Reporting on the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection’s (D.E.P.’s) weak record with regard to the cleanup of contaminated sites in the state, the New York Times mentioned Whitman’s not-so-green record as governor: [10]

During the administration of Gov. Christie Whitman, the staff of the environmental agency was cut 20 percent, and hours were reduced to 35 from 40 a week, said Bill Wolfe, a former department official who today is director of New Jersey Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility, a nonprofit watchdog group. The agency’s site remediation program, which is responsible for overseeing cleanups, dropped to 500 employees from 600 in 1996, even as the department’s responsibilities were expanded to include the regulation of solid and hazardous waste.

“The D.E.P. never recovered,” Mr. Wolfe said.

Wolfe On DEP Commissioner Bradley Campbell

The NY Times reported (6/26/05)

These Days, a Commissioner Is Under Siege

TRENTON – BRADLEY M. CAMPBELL is either Solomonic or politically hopeless. In a brewing political fight over sprawl, Mr. Campbell, the state’s commissioner of environmental protection, is vilified by builders and environmental advocates alike. And the man he works for, Acting Gov. Richard J. Codey, is not exactly rushing to his side.

Mr. Campbell puzzled just about everybody recently when he said he was suspending work on a new law, known by its Trenton shorthand as “fast track,” that expedites approvals for development projects.

The law — agreed to by Gov. James E. McGreevey last summer and scheduled to take effect next month — had led to a divorce between environmental groups and the Democrats, including Mr. Campbell, whom they had welcomed so warmly in 2002.

“The guy talks out of three sides of his mouth,” said Bill Wolfe, an aide to Mr. Campbell for two years who is now organizing a campaign against the fast-track law. …

“He had the same demeanor as McGreevey,” Mr. Wolfe said. “He tried to please everybody. He always wanted it both ways.”

Two recent developments underscore Mr. Wolfe’s argument.

Leaving PEER

• “We are proud but sad to announce that the Pew Charitable Trusts has hired New Jersey PEER Director Bill Wolfe to work on mid-Atlantic fishery issues. Bill has been a one-man wrecking crew in the Garden State and we will miss him just as much as some state political leaders will breathe a sigh of relief. ~~~ Jeff Ruch, Director, PEER (Sept. 2008)

I only lasted a year at PEW. I made a ton of money (had 2 kids in college), but it was not a good fit (Pew was far too corporate).

Objectives Of This Blog

This site will focus on important stories that are being ignored or misrepresented by the media. I’ll do traditional muckraking to hold the bad guys accountable; expose the lies and self serving spin of government officials and politicians; and explore how the failures of government, media, AND well meaning environmental organizations contribute to the problems we face. I’ll also have some fun posting landscape photo’s I shoot.

Ironically, I began the blog as a response to the Star Ledger’s termination of my “NJ Voices” column. Ledger editor did that in retaliation for a column on proposed amendment to FOIA to block release of Abu Ghraib torture photos.

Education and Experience

I have been involved in New Jersey environmental policy circles for more than 25 years. Most recently, in 2005, I founded and directed the New Jersey Chapter of Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER), a national non-profit alliance of local, state and federal scientists, law enforcement officers, land managers and other professionals dedicated to upholding environmental laws and values: www.peer.org

Prior to founding NJ PEER, I served 13 years as a planner and policy analyst for the state Department of Environmental Protection (1985-1995; 2002-2004), for six years as policy director of Sierra Club’s New Jersey Chapter (1996-2002); and at Pew Environment Group as the Mid Atlantic States Manager of Pew’s “end overfishing campaign”. I received a bachelor’s degree in environmental science and public policy from Harpur College at SUNY Binghamton (1983), and attended Cornell University’s graduate program in city and regional planning (1983-1985 – 2 years of coursework completed, all but Masters thesis approval).

While at DEP from 2002-2004, I led the team that expanded the Category One Program and developed the 300 foot wide Category One Buffers initiative on over 2,000 miles of NJ waterways. This was based on a new integrated ecological assessment method for water-body anti-degradation designation under the Clean Water Act. I worked closely with Commissioner Brad Campbell to enforce the phosphorus surface water quality standard. I also staffed Governor McGreevey’s Highlands Task Force and wrote the DEP and environmental provisions of the Highlands Act. Shortly after leaving DEP, I was a consultant to the Highlands Coalition and led the negotiating team for the DEP Highlands Regulations (reverse revolving door!).

While at DEP from 1985-1995, I: managed NJ’s RCRA Corrective Action program; co-researched & co-authored the Statewide Landfill Closure Plan; managed over $200 million in grants/loans to local recycling and material and energy resource recovery projects; staffed Governor Florio’s “Solid Waste Assessment Taskforce” which imposed a moratorium on incinerators, established a new source reduction, toxics use reduction, and lifecycle assessment driven materials management policy, and set the highest recycling rate in the country. In 1995, I was forced out of DEP as a whistelblower for exposing Governor Whitman’s efforts to suppress science regarding health risks of high levels of mercury in freshwater fish.

With Sierra Club, I worked with volunteers to kill the $240 million Mercer County garbage incinerator, block the Trenton/Hopewell sewer line; led the public campaign and authored the 1996 ballot question to amend the NJ Constitution to dedicate 4% of Corporate Business Tax proceeds (appx. $100 million/year) to environmental programs; authored the 1997 Watershed Management Act that established and funded NJ’s watershed management planning program; provided testimony to the US Senate (@p. 120 – 132) in opposition to Christie Whitman as EPA Administrator;  and served on numerous Legislative and DEP regulatory stakeholder groups.

You can read more at SourceWatch page.

All photographs are mine (unless noted) and may be used on a non-profit basis with attribution.

You may contact me at:  Bill_Wolfe@comcast.net

[End note: I get tired of updating the dead links on this page because the Christie DEP has attempted to erase the past. Those bastards personify Orwell’s “down the memory hole” Ministry of Truth.]

[Update: 9/11/19 – I just came cross this old legislative exchange and thought it important:

ASSEMBLYWOMAN GREENSTEIN: Thank you.
And I do want to say, Bill, that I appreciate the information
that you provide, and I think there’s a lot of good information there.

MR. WOLFE: I’d like to be a resource. I can work with the
OLS staff, and I’d love to.

ASSEMBLYWOMAN GREENSTEIN: Actually, I think we
had a question.

ASSEMBLYMAN GORDON: No, not a
question. I just wanted to thank you for your comments. I think you’ve
raised some really important issues. I, for one, would hope that this
Committee undertakes a comprehensive review of these programs. We
appreciate your input and we look forward to working with you. (

My testimony was invited. See the legislative hearing transcript at page 75 – link below:
http://www.njleg.state.nj.us/legislativepub/pubhear/ajuaen060106.pdf

Both Assemblywoman Greenstein and Assemblyman Gordon went on to become leading NJ Senators. Gordon is now a BPU Commissioner]