ReViva Collective

http://unidoscontraelmuro.blogspot.com/

Unidos Contra El Muro United Against the Wall

A day and night full of creative thrills…including ART, FILM, THEATRE, Live MUSIC, FIRE Dancing, SCULPTURE Garden, Literary Readings, and FOOD.

This is a GREEN Event with info and demonstrations on natural building techniques, solar power, composting, organic gardening, recycling/re-using, water conservation, and much more.

Dear Reviva,

I miss you. Dearly. Incredibly.
Can we get  back together? This separation has been great and refreshing. It’s made me realize how much I need you. It’s also made me realize that we make each other better. You plus me = FIREWORKS
What do you think? I think we can make it work. I know we can. What about once a month, we get together?

Wednesday, March 11th @ 7 in the Rio Grande Room in the Holland
I would love to see you. And bring something pa’ comer.

We’ve got gardens, skate parks, and Mr.Smyke to chat about.
I miss you ReViva! Please come back!

Love, love, love, love,
Alpine

(sorry for the tardiness on this: thought I had posted it.)

Written by Terri Hall
Wednesday, 07 January 2009
IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Trans Texas Corridor renamed, not dead

TURF supporters demand ACTION, not rhetoric
TURF reaction to TxDOT announcement:

The announcement by TxDOT Executive Director Amadeo Saenz at the Texas Transportation Forum that the “Trans Texas Corridor, as it was originally envisioned, is no more,” is just another in a series of comments to lead opponents into believing the Trans Texas Corridor is indeed dead. TURF believes this is a deliberate move to dupe opponents into complacency, and we expect iron-clad action before we begin celebrating victory.

It’s clear from the TxDOT Director’s speech, that it’s only a name change and the Trans Texas Corridor is, in reality, going underground.

This fact is evident in just about every news source across the state:

“‘Amadeo told folks at the forum that the Trans-Texas Corridor, as it was originally envisioned, is no more,’ Amacker (Saenz spokesperson) said. ‘Instead, what we’ve got is a series of smaller projects.’

Those ’smaller projects’ will apparently include the 300-plus miles of what has been called TTC-35 from San Antonio to the Oklahoma border and the I-69 project from the Rio Grande Valley to Texarkana. But they will not be called the Trans-Texas Corridor.” — Austin American Statesman

______________________________

AUSTIN – The Texas Department of Transportation announced this morning that it has officially killed the Trans Texas Corridor, saying that despite the project’s visionary aspects, “it is clearly not the choice of Texans.”

http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/dn/latestnews/stories/010609dnmetttc.43c00ac6.html

U.S. Customs and Border Protection is currently building a planned 56.7 miles of border fence along the Rio Grande between El Paso, Texas, and Arroyo Diablo near McNary in Hudspeth County, Texas. Details on the project are available at the Border Fence Environmental Planning page for the U.S. Border Patrol’s El Paso Sector.

For approximately 1.25 miles, the fence will be immediately west of the west boundary of Rio Bosque Wetlands Park:

http://research.utep.edu/Default.aspx?tabid=54582

Press Release Newswire
December 23, 2008

Santa Ana, Calif. (PRWEB) December 23, 2008 — Sukut Construction, Inc. has broken ground on a $11.2 million project to help build a strategic section of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security’s Mexican border fence in the rugged foothills of Otay Mesa.

The project calls for construction of 5.2 miles of border fence and an adjacent access road. Sukut has been subcontracted by Granite Construction for the site development and road construction.

The section of border fence will be constructed at the Otay Mesa illegal border crossing in the foothills above the Tijuana River. The site is south of the city of Dulzura and eight miles from the nearest major road, Highway 94. The remoteness of the location and the steep, rocky terrain make this a popular illegal border crossing, and contribute to the complexity of the job.

“Sukut is California’s largest mass excavation company with the equipment and knowledge to successfully complete this type of job,” said Sukut Construction, Inc. CEO/President Michael Crawford.

Sukut will begin by widening the 2.5 miles of existing dirt road used by the U.S. Border Patrol to make the route safe for heavy equipment, constructing a 32-foot-wide and 5.2-mile border fence access road. The location’s steep grade will require switchback roadway with a maximum grade of 15 percent at the steepest points.

Sukut will use extensive drilling and blasting to clear 530,000 cubic yards of rock in the foothills and employ geo-grid slope stabilization to prevent any rock slides across the Mexican border just three feet away. The project is expected to be completed in the summer of 2009.

Sukut Construction, Inc. is California’s largest mass excavation and grading contractor, moving 150 million cubic yards of earth per year. Founded almost 40 years ago and headquartered in Santa Ana, California, with offices in Los Angeles, Riverside and Oceanside, California, the company is nationally recognized for its work on residential, commercial, industrial and retail development mass grading; public works; highway, roads and infrastructure construction; flood and storm water pipe and structures; golf courses and resorts; landfill construction and environmental cleanups; and emergency landslide repair and stabilization.

Information is available on the company’s website at http://www.sukut.com/ or by calling Sukut headquarters at (888)-SUKUT01 or (888) 785-8801.

Ackerman’s civil disobedience sprang from a desire to defend the Rio Bosque Wetlands Park, a protected natural area on the Rio Grande in El Paso, Texas. Rio Bosque is situated along a stretch of the old, winding river channel in which the Rio Grande flowed before it was straightened and channelized in the 1930s. The park’s wetlands were created in 1997, and, through years of volunteer work, the native wetland habitat was painstakingly restored. Ten years later, it’s one of the few places where one can imagine what the El Paso area must have been like when the river wound freely through the mountains and desert and had ample flow to support rich wetlands and big cottonwood trees. Judy Ackerman is one of the many volunteers who made this vision possible.

But the border wall threatens this rebirth of nature. Its path will cut off Rio Bosque from the river, preventing the movement of species and severely limiting the park’s value as habitat. For Ackerman and the other longtime Rio Bosque volunteers who know that the river and the wetlands are intimately and inextricably connected, the border wall is a knife through the heart.

For the simple, nonviolent action of standing her ground on the border wall construction site, Ackerman has been charged with violating the law, but the border wall itself has been placed above all of our nation’s laws. The Real ID Act gives the Secretary of Homeland Security the power to waive any federal, state, or local law that might slow down construction of the wall. No one else, not even the president, has this sweeping power. On April 1, 2008, DHS Secretary Michael Chertoff “waived in their entirety” 36 federal laws all along the southern border, including the Clean Water Act, the Endangered Species Act, and the National Environmental Policy Act. There is only one reason to waive these laws: Chertoff knows that the border wall cannot be built without violating them. His waiver is an implicit admission that constructing the border wall means breaking the law.

After her arrest, law enforcement officers brought Ackerman before a judge to be arraigned. But under the Real ID Act, neither she nor anyone else may use the courts to challenge the border wall, regardless of the damage it causes or the danger it represents. Chertoff’s waiver swept aside our legal right to demand in court that the government obey its own laws. The only jurisdiction the courts have is to determine whether or not the Real ID Act waiver provision is constitutional. El Paso County and nine other plaintiffs have claimed that it is not and are asking the Supreme Court to hear their case. In the meantime, the border wall continues to be built, devastating our border communities and natural areas, flouting our nation’s laws, and undermining our constitutionally-guaranteed right to equal protection under the law.

Some would go so far as to say that these are among the freedoms we should willingly give up in exchange for security. But this trade-off is a false one based on the twin myths that our borders are broken and that border walls will protect us.

Our borders are not broken. Well before the new walls started going up there, the El Paso Border Patrol Sector was reporting a decrease in the apprehensions of illegal crossers. From 2005 to 2007, apprehensions in the El Paso sector fell by 38 percent. Even more telling, this year El Paso has been named the nation’s third-safest city among cities with populations of 500,000 or more, and it has consistently ranked in the top 3 safest large cities for a decade.

Border walls do not make the United States safer, nor do they stop undocumented immigration or smuggling. A 2007 report by the Congressional Research Service found that existing walls in San Diego “did not have a discernible impact on the influx of unauthorized aliens coming across the border.” In fact, during the same period that El Paso experienced a 38 percent drop in illegal crossings, San Diego had a 20 percent increase in crossings despite the presence of a triple-layered border wall there.

Those who say we must give up our freedom for security are in reality asking us to sacrifice one of the founding principles of our republic, the rule of law, for nothing but a false sense of security.
Judy Ackerman trespassed, disrupted border wall construction, and stood her ground. For this she was duly arrested and charged with a crime. But on the same ground where Ackerman made her stand, The Department of Homeland Security is willfully and destructively ignoring the law. One man has decided which laws apply and which do not and has single-handedly dismissed our right to sue for protection under the law. Ackerman’s trespassing charge is a misdemeanor. But the border wall construction that restarted soon after her arrest is a much more serious crime, and Chertoff’s waiver of laws is a flagrant violation of the principles upon which our nation was founded.

Posted By NO BORDER WALL to No Border Wall at 12/19/2008 03:19:00 PM

EL PASO - A lone protester at the Rio Bosque Wetlands Park temporarily halted construction of the border fence Wednesday, setting up a standoff with the Border Patrol.

Bill Addington, another activist at the site in the Lower Valley, identified the protester as Judy Ackerman of Northeast El Paso.

“There’s a group of us of about 25 out here, but she’s the only one on the construction site itself,” Addington, who also served as Ackerman’s spokesman. “We believe the Border Patrol is going to seek an arrest warrant to have her removed.”

El Paso Border Patrol spokesman Doug Mosier said it was likely an arrest warrant will be sought through the U.S. attorney’s office and federal courts. Ackerman was a founding member of Friends of the Rio Bosque and a member of the Sierra Club.

Conservationists have argued the 15-foot, steel-mesh border fence, will upset the park’s ecological balance.

Department of Homeland Security officials said the federal government is constructing the fence along 670 miles of the U.S.-Mexico border to deter illegal immigration and drug smuggling.

Diana Washington Valdez may be reached at dvaldez@elpasotimes.com; 546-6140.