Air Canada Agrees to $4.5 Million Settlement Over Delayed U.S. Passenger Refunds


FILE PHOTO: Air Canada signage is pictured at Vancouver's international airport in Richmond, British Columbia, Canada, February 5, 2019. REUTERS/Ben Nelms

By David Shepardson

Nov. 22, 2021

WASHINGTON (Reuters) -Air Canada has agreed to a $4.5 million settlement to resolve a U.S. government investigation into claims thousands of air passenger refunds were delayed, the Transportation Department said.

The proposed settlement, which still must be approved by an administrative law judge, would resolve the U.S. Transportation Department investigation into what it said were "extreme delays in providing refunds to thousands of consumers for flights to or from the United States that the carrier canceled or significantly changed".

Of the $4.5 million settlement, $2.5 million would be credited to Air Canada for refunding passengers and $2 million would be paid to the U.S. Treasury.

In June, the department said it was seeking a $25.5 million fine from Air Canada over the carrier's failure to provide timely refunds.

Air Canada did not immediately comment, but said in a U.S. government filing it agreed to the settlement "to avoid protracted litigation, as it focuses together with all stakeholders on rebuilding itself and doing its part to support the recovery of the airline industry". Air Canada added it did not admit any violation as part of the agreement.

The department alleged in June Air Canada continued its no-refund policy in violation of U.S. law for more than a year.

Air Canada said in June it has been refunding non-refundable tickets as part of the Canadian government's financial package. The Transportation Department in June disclosed it was also "actively investigating the refund practices of other U.S. and foreign carriers flying to and from the United States" and said it would take "enforcement action" as appropriate. It reiterated those comments Monday.

In May, a trade group told U.S. lawmakers that 11 U.S. airlines issued $12.84 billion in cash refunds to customers in 2020 as the coronavirus pandemic upended the travel industry.

(Reporting by David Shepardson; additional reporting by Allison Lampert in Montreal; Editing by Alex Richardson)

Copyright 2021 Thomson Reuters.

Report: Racial Health Inequities Persist in U.S.

States Have Large Racial Disparities in Health Care Equity, Study Finds

‘We don’t really see health equity anywhere in the country,’ says the lead author of a new study from the Commonwealth Fund.

By Steven Ross Johnson
Nov. 18, 2021,

The report by the Commonwealth Fund found racial and ethnic inequities in every state for Black, Latino, American Indians and Alaskan Native residents.(GETTY STOCK IMAGES)

Racial and ethnic health inequities are pervasive throughout the U.S., according to a new analysis that found some of the widest disparities occur within states known for having high performing health care systems.

A new report released on Thursday by the Commonwealth Fund, a private foundation that aims to improve health care systems for the most vulnerable, assessed the performance of the health system in all 50 states and the District of Columbia on health care access, quality of care, and health outcomes for racial and ethnic minority residents.

The report evaluated state health system performance for Black, white and American Indian/Alaskan Native residents, as well as for Asian American, Native Hawaiian, Pacific Islander and Latino populations using 24 data indicators grouped into three areas: health outcomes, health care access, and quality and use of health care services. Racial and ethnic inequities were found in every state for Black, Latino, American Indians and Alaskan Native residents.

View All 13 Slides

“We don’t really see health equity anywhere in the country,” says study lead author, David Radley, a senior scientist for tracking health system performance for the Commonwealth Fund, adding the racial and ethnic health care gap is much wider than previously thought.

Health system performance for white residents scored above the national average in all but three states – Mississippi, Oklahoma and West Virginia. In those states that scored below average, health system performance was much lower for non-white residents compared to white residents.

Health care coverage, preventable deaths, and rates of health care utilization and preventive care services like breast cancer screenings were some of the factors used to calculate state health system performance scores.

Only six states had health systems that scored above the national average for all racial and ethnic groups studied – Oregon, Rhode Island, Hawaii, Massachusetts, Connecticut and New York. Yet large disparities were also found in those states, where health system performance for white residents was scored the best of any group except in Massachusetts, where it was slightly higher among Asian American, Native Hawaiian and Pacific Islander residents.

Some of the largest racial health disparities were found in states with health systems that have historically received high grades. In Minnesota, the health system ranked third in the country by the Commonwealth Fund in its most recent edition of its annual Scorecard on State Health System Performance released in 2020. Yet the state’s health system only scored in the 36th percentile out of 100 for Black residents, 24th for its Latino population, and in the 6th percentile for American Indian and Alaskan Native residents in the new equity report.

Similarly, Iowa ranked fourth in the U.S. for overall health system performance, according to the 2020 Commonwealth Fund state scorecard, yet scored well below the national average on performance for Latino and Black residents, according to the equity analysis.

“When you look at state averages, you’re really masking what’s going on beneath the surface,” Radley says. “It takes this deeper dive to see exactly where and for who the system is performing better and where the system is not performing as well.”

Speaking to reporters on Wednesday, Commonwealth Fund President Dr. David Blumenthal said people of color are having vastly different experiences than white residents within the same health system, which has led to a range of deep-seated inequities.

Blumenthal said health care disparities have only been exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic, which has disproportionately impacted people of color. Latino, Black, American Indian and Alaskan Native people are at least twice as likely as white people to die from COVID-19, with American Indian and Alaskan Native residents more than three times as likely to be hospitalized from the disease, according to an Oct. 8 research brief by the Kaiser Family Foundation.

Blumenthal said narrowing the ethnic and racial health gap will require health policies aimed at expanding health care access and addressing socioeconomic factors like poverty, food insecurity and housing instability that can negatively impact health outcomes.

“Health policies matter for peoples’ day-to-day lives,” Blumenthal said. “For generations, federal, state and local leaders have made policy choices that have produced worse health care outcomes for people of color.”

It’s complicated: Social media and well-being during COVID-19

Social media use associated with mixed outcomes when it comes to college students’ well-being during pandemic

New research from the lab of Renee J. Thompson shows social media use by college students increased during the first month of COVID-19 restrictions. The results were a mixed bag. (Photo: Shutterstock)

By Brandie Jefferson November 22, 2021


When students were told to stay home after COVID-19 began to spread stateside, it’s not surprising that their social media use increased — there wasn’t much else to do. But was it all doom scrolling and catastrophizing or was social media living up to its promise to keep people connected and strengthen our ties to one another?

Research from the lab of Renee J. Thompson, associate professor of psychological and brain sciences in Arts & Sciences at Washington University in St. Louis, suggests the answer depends on how you’re using it.

Thompson

The results were published online recently in the journal JIMR Formative Research.

“Social media use has mixed associations,” said first author Alison Tuck, a PhD student in Thompson’s lab. “Depending on whether you’re interested in social versus emotional well-being, we see different things.”

For the study, 176 college students participated in online surveys between April 14-24, 2020, just one month after the World Health Organization declared COVID-19 a pandemic.

To understand the basics of how social media use changed since before the arrival of COVID, participants were asked about their usage a month before spring break and the month or so after. This provided a clear line between “before COVID” and “during COVID” that was shared by all the participants; they all found out on the same day of their spring break that in-person classes would be canceled.

The surveys asked participants how much time they spent on social media pre- and post-spring break as well as basic questions about how much they engaged with and enjoyed the sites they visited; how content affected them emotionally; and how much COVID-related content they were exposed to after.

The pandemic had only just hit U.S. universities, so students could easily report on changes in their use, Tuck said.

There were not many surprises in the basic ways that social media use changed during COVID.

“We did see a significant increase in time per day spent on social media,” Tuck said. Average time spent on social media increased from about two hours a day before COVID restrictions, to three or more hours a day after. At the same time, people reported getting less enjoyment from social media and reported more negative emotions from social media use during COVID than before.

And, Tuck said, there was a significant increase in problematic social media use, measured by how impulsive and uncontrollable people’s use of social media was and how much it interfered with their lives.

To better understand how changes in social media use were related to people’s social and emotional well-being, participants were asked about how socially supported they felt before and after COVID restrictions were in place, as well as about their levels of emotional well-being, as assessed by stress and anxiety. Tuck was able to look at the changes in people’s well-being and compare them to their changes in social media use.

These results were not particularly straightforward.

“There were some positives in terms of social well-being,” Tuck said. The more frequently people used social media and the more time they spent on it, the more socially supported they reported feeling.

Other findings of interest

Higher social media addiction and increased exposure to COVID-related content was associated with lower social and emotional well-being.
Those who were lonelier during COVID engaged with social media less and used it less habitually.

“But some of those same factors are also associated with higher stress and anxiety related to the pandemic,” she said.

The results, Tuck said, held some surprises, but the overall trend revealed a more negative association with emotional well-being as social media use increased.

“When a client comes to me, or when a friend says, ‘Hey, I’m concerned about my social media use,’ it doesn’t really seem like the right answer is to say ‘Stop social media,’” Tuck said. Nor is the answer to go overboard and immerse yourself in your feed.

The right answer, she said, may depend on a person’s goals.

“Many, though not all, components of social media use are positively correlated with feeling more socially supported. So if your goal is to feel more socially supported, at least during the pandemic, maybe social media use is good. On the other hand, if you’re concerned about your stress or your emotional well-being, we’re also seeing social media use associated with feeling more negative, more stressed.”

No matter a person’s goals, it’s apparent that social media use is ubiquitous, pandemic or no pandemic.

In the years that Tuck has been looking into how social media affects well-being, she said, “I’ve yet to have a survey respondent say that they don’t use it.”

Biden to keep Powell as Fed chair, Brainard gets vice chair

Federal Reserve Governors Jerome Powell, from left, Daniel Tarullo and Lael Brainard, talk before the start of a Federal Reserve System Board of Governors open meeting in Washington, Friday, June 3, 2016. President Joe Biden announced Monday, Nov. 22, 2021 that he’s nominating Powell for a second term as Federal Reserve chair, endorsing his stewardship of the economy through a brutal pandemic recession in which the Fed’s ultra-low rate policies helped bolster confidence and revitalize the job market. Biden also said he would nominate Brainard, the lone Democrat on the Fed’s Board of Governors and the preferred alternative to Powell for many progressives, as Vice Chair. 

(AP Photo/Manuel Balce Ceneta, File)

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Joe Biden announced Monday he’s nominating Jerome Powell for a second four-year term as Federal Reserve chair, endorsing Powell’s stewardship of the economy through a brutal pandemic recession in which the Fed’s ultra-low rate policies helped bolster confidence and revitalize the job market.

Biden also said he would nominate Lael Brainard, the lone Democrat on the Fed’s Board of Governors and the preferred alternative to Powell among many progressives, as vice chair.

A separate position of vice chair for supervision, a bank regulatory post, remains vacant, along with two other slots on the Fed’s board. Those positions will be filled in early December, Biden said.

His decision strikes a note of continuity and bipartisanship at a time when surging inflation is burdening households and raising risks to the economy’s recovery. In backing Powell, a Republican who was first elevated to his post by President Donald Trump, Biden brushed aside complaints from progressives that the Fed has weakened bank regulation and has been slow to take account of climate change in its supervision of banks.

“If we want to continue to build on the economic success of this year, we need stability and independence at the Federal Reserve — and I have full confidence after their trial by fire over the last 20 months that Chair Powell and Dr. Brainard will provide the strong leadership our country needs,” Biden said in a statement.

In a second term, to begin in February, Powell would face a difficult and high-risk balancing act: Inflation has reached a three-decade high, causing hardships for millions of families, clouding the recovery and undercutting the Fed’s mandate to keep prices stable. But with the economy still 4 million-plus jobs shy of its pre-pandemic level, the Fed has yet to meet its other mandate of maximizing employment.

Next year, the Fed is widely expected to begin raising its benchmark interest rate, with financial markets pricing in two increases. If the Fed moves too slowly to raise rates, inflation may accelerate further and force the central bank to take more draconian steps later to rein it in, potentially causing a recession. Yet if the Fed hikes rates too quickly, it could choke off hiring and the recovery.

If confirmed, Powell would remain one of the world’s most powerful economic officials. By either raising or lowering its short-term interest rate, the Fed seeks to either cool or stimulate growth and hiring, and to keep prices stable. Its efforts to direct the U.S. economy, the largest in the world, typically have global consequences.

The Fed’s benchmark rate, which has been pegged near zero since the pandemic hammered the economy in March 2020, influences a wide range of consumer and business borrowing costs, including for mortgages and credit cards. The Fed also oversees the nation’s largest banks.

Powell’s renomination must be approved by the Senate Banking Committee and then confirmed by the full Senate, which is widely expected.

He has won support from some liberal Democrats such as Sen. Sherrod Brown of Ohio, chair of the Banking Committee, and moderate Democrats such as Jon Tester of Montana. He was also endorsed Monday by Sen. Pat Toomey, R-Pennsylvania, the senior Republican on the Banking panel, and will likely receive widespread support from Republicans.

“I look forward to working with Powell to stand up to Wall Street and stand up for workers, so that they share in the prosperity they create,” Brown said.

Three Democratic senators, including Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, have said they will oppose Powell’s renomination. Warren called him a “dangerous man” because of his efforts to loosen bank regulations while Sens. Jeff Merkley of Oregon and Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island said he was insufficiently committed to using the Fed’s oversight of the financial system to combat climate change.

Biden and his staff have been consulting members of Congress on Powell’s appointment, a White House source said, insisting on anonymity to discuss private conversations in the administration. Biden recently met with Warren at the White House for her input, the source said, and the president talked with both Brainard and Powell on Friday.

Wall Street cheered the renomination, with stock prices rallying and measures of fear in the market easing immediately after the announcement. The S&P 500 is on pace to close at another record.

Powell, a 68-year-old lawyer by training, was nominated for the Fed’s Board of Governors in 2011 by President Barack Obama after a lucrative career in private equity and having served in a number of federal government roles.

Unlike his three immediate predecessors, Powell lacks a Ph.D. in economics. Yet he has earned generally high marks for managing perhaps the most important financial position in the world, especially in his response to the coronavirus-induced recession.

Still, this year’s spike in inflation has forced the Powell Fed to dial back its economic stimulus sooner than it had envisioned. At its latest meeting in early November, the central bank said it would start reducing this month its $120 billion monthly bond purchases and likely end them by mid-2022. Those purchases have been intended to keep longer-term borrowing costs low to spur borrowing and spending.

Powell has avoided much of the blame for inflation, at least on Capitol Hill, even though one of the Fed’s mandates is to maintain stable prices through its control of interest rates. Republicans in Congress have instead pointed to Biden’s economic policies as the main culprit. Most economists blame a surge in demand for goods like cars, furniture and appliances along with supply shortages for pushing up prices.

For months, Powell characterized inflation as “transitory,” but more recently, the Fed chair conceded that higher prices have persisted longer than he had expected. At a news conference this month, Powell acknowledged that high inflation could last into late summer 2022.

Brainard’s elevation to the Fed’s No. 2 position follows the key role she played in the Fed’s emergency response to the pandemic recession. She is part of a “troika” of top policymakers that includes Powell and Richard Clarida, whom she will replace as vice chair in February.

Brainard was also an architect of the Fed’s new policy framework, adopted in August 2020, under which it said it would no longer raise rates simply because the unemployment rate had fallen to a low level that could spur inflation. Instead, the Fed said it would await actual evidence that prices are rising. That reflects a view among some Fed officials that low unemployment and even rising wages no longer necessarily accelerate inflation.

Yet that new policy approach, which was crafted in an atmosphere of persistently low inflation, has come under heavy pressure.

Brainard also played a key role in the Fed’s re-definition of its maximum employment goal as “broad and inclusive.” That means it now takes into account such measures as the unemployment rate for African Americans, and not just for Americans as a whole, in its policy decisions.

She has also carved out a distinct role as an opponent of the Fed’s moves in the past four years to loosen banking regulations that had been tightened after the 2008 financial crisis. Since 2018, she has been the lone dissenter on 20 votes related to financial rules.

In March 2020, for example, she opposed a regulatory change that she said would reduce the amount of reserves large banks were required to hold to guard against losses.

Brainard also has taken a leading role in assessing how the Fed could more directly take account of climate change in its supervision of banks.

In a speech last month, Brainard said the Fed would likely provide guidance to the banks it supervises on how they can better assess the risks that climate change poses to their loan portfolios, though she did not provide a timeline. Many environmental groups say loans to oil and gas companies, as well as to commercial real estate developers, could default and cause large losses at banks, should environmental damage worsen or renewable energy provide a greater share of power generation.

“Climate change,” she said, “is projected to have profound effects on the economy and the financial system, and it is already inflicting damage.”

___

Associated Press Writer Josh Boak contributed.

Biden Lauds Republican Powell's 'Independence,' Including From Trump, in Nomination

U.S. Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell listens as President Joe Biden nominates him for a second four-year term in the Eisenhower Executive Office Building’s South Court Auditorium at the White House in Washington, U.S., November 22, 2021. 

REUTERS/Kevin Lamarque

By Jeff Mason and Steve Holland

Reuters
Nov. 22, 2021,

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. President Joe Biden cited unprecedented pressure that former President Donald Trump directed at Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell as one reason to renominate him on Monday.

Bucking critics in his own Democratic party, Biden said the Republican appointee's independence made him the best choice to lead the U.S. central bank with Lael Brainard, who had also been under consideration for the top job, as vice chair.

Biden laid out his reasoning for his decision during remarks to reporters that included multiple references to the chairman by the first name "Jay" that he is also known by.

"We need stability and independence at the Federal Reserve. Jay has proven the independence that I value in .. the Fed chair," Biden said. "In the last administration, he stood up to unprecedented political interference and, doing so, successfully maintained the integrity and credibility," of the Fed, Biden said.

Trump in tapping Powell for the post in 2017 became the first president since Democrat Jimmy Carter not to reappoint a Fed chief installed by his predecessor and then quickly soured on his choice.

Within months https://www.reuters.com/markets/us/powells-rollercoaster-ride-fed-enemy-economic-savior-2021-11-22 of Powell taking the helm in February 2018, Trump began regularly castigating him in public as Powell continued with a slate of interest rate increases begun under former chair Janet Yellen.

Trump believed Powell was not doing enough to boost the economy https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-fed-trump-reaction/trump-says-feds-powell-let-us-down-on-interest-rate-decision-idINKCN1UQ2PK and, along with it, Trump's political prospects, and explored firing him. The episode was seen as one of the most significant threats to the central bank's independence in a generation.

Biden's commitment to the Fed's independence is likely to be tested in the coming months.

Expectations are building in financial markets that the Fed will be forced to address high inflation with as many as three interest rate increases over the course of next year. These hikes could slow the pace of the economy and the job market's recovery, results that could hurt Biden politically.

Biden noted that Powell was confirmed to the position of Fed chair by 84 votes in the 100-member U.S. Senate in 2018.

"I believe that having Fed leadership with broad bipartisan support is important, especially now," with such a "politically divided" nation, Biden said.

"I believe we need to do everything we can to take the bitter partisanship of today's politics out of something as important as the independence and credibility of the Federal Reserve," he said.

(Reporting by Jeff Mason and Steve Holland; Editing by Chris Reese, Heather Timmons and Andrea Ricci)

Copyright 2021 Thomson Reuters.

Interpol to elect new leadership: UAE's al-Raisi nomination raises concerns about fair policing


Issued on: 22/11/2021 - 

Video by:FRANCE 24

Interior, justice and security ministers from Interpol's 194 member countries are gathered in Istanbul for its 89th annual General Assembly and are due to elect a new secretary general amid concerns it could fall under the sway of authoritarian governments. Human rights groups and lawmakers around the world have raised concerns that the world policing agency could jeopardise its neutrality, as representatives from China and the United Arab Emirates are bidding for top posts.

Florida clears Groveland Four of 1949 rape of white woman

Relatives of the Groveland Four, from left, Vivian Shepherd, niece of Sam Shepherd, Gerald Threat, nephew of Walter Irvin; Carol Greenlee, daughter of Charles Greenlee, gather at the just-unveiled monument. Photo / AP

22 Nov, 2021
AP

A judge on Monday officially exonerated four African American men of the false accusation that they raped a white woman seven decades ago, making partial and belated amends for one of the greatest miscarriages of justice of Florida's Jim Crow era.

At the request of the local prosecutor, Administrative Judge Heidi Davis dismissed the indictments of Ernest Thomas and Samuel Shepherd, who were fatally shot by law enforcement, and set aside the convictions and sentences of Charles Greenlee and Walter Irvin. The men known as the Groveland Four, who ranged from 16 to 26 at the time, were accused of raping a woman in the central Florida town of Groveland in 1949.

"We followed the evidence to see where it led us and it led us to this moment," said Bill Gladson, the local state attorney, following the hearing in the same Lake County courthouse where the original trials were held. Gladson, a Republican, moved last month to have the men officially exonerated.

The men's families said maybe this case will spark a reexamination of other convictions of Black men and women from the Jim Crow era so those falsely convicted can have their names cleared.


"We are blessed. I hope that this is a start because lot of people didn't get this opportunity. A lot of families didn't get this opportunity. Maybe they will," said Aaron Newson, Thomas' nephew. He broke into tears as he spoke. "This country needs to come together."

Thomas was killed by a posse that shot him more than 400 times shortly after the rape accusation. The local sheriff, Willis McCall, fatally shot Shepherd and wounded Irvin in 1951 as he drove them to a second trial after the U.S. Supreme Court overturned their original convictions, saying no evidence had been presented. The sheriff claimed the men tried to escape, but Irvin said McCall and his deputy shot them in cold blood.

Gilbert King, who won the Pulitzer Prize for his 2012 book about the case, Devil in the Grove: Thurgood Marshall, the Groveland Boys, and the Dawn of a New America, attended the hearing with Thurgood Marshall Jr., the son of the late U.S. Supreme Court justice.

Thurgood Marshall Sr., then with the NAACP, represented Irvin during his second trial, but an all-white jury again convicted him and he was sentenced to death. Irvin narrowly escaped execution in 1954 and Gov. LeRoy Collins commuted his sentence to life with parole. Greenlee, also sentenced to life, was paroled in 1962 and died in 2012. Irvin died in 1969, one year after he was paroled.

King said having the men exonerated in the same building where the trials were held was "of significant importance because upstairs there was a courtroom where 72 years ago [an] abomination of justice took place". He praised Gladson for pursuing justice.

"He could have easily kicked this case down the road and let someone else deal with it," King said. "Even when it got frustrating and he felt there was no path toward this day, he dug in harder."

Marshall Jr. said that, perhaps more than any other case, the Groveland Four "haunted" his father.

"But he believed better days were ahead," Marshall Jr. said.

The Florida Legislature in 2017 formally apologised to the men's families. Gov. Ron DeSantis and the state's three-member Cabinet granted posthumous pardons more than two years ago. In 2018, then-Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi directed the state Department of Law Enforcement to review the case. Earlier this year, the agency referred its findings to Gladson for his review.

Gladson and an investigator interviewed the grandson of Jesse Hunter, the now-deceased prosecutor of two of the Groveland Four defendants. According to the grandson, Broward Hunter, his grandfather and a judge in the case knew there was no rape.

The grandson also suggested to Gladson, based on letters he found in his grandfather's office in 1971, that Willis may have shot Shepherd and Irvin because of the sheriff's involvement in an illegal gambling operation. Shepherd was believed to be involved with the gambling operation too, and Willis might have seen a rape case as a "a way to get some people that were on his s--- list," Hunter told the prosecutor and investigator.

Gladson also said that James Yates, a deputy who served as a primary witness, likely fabricated evidence, including shoe casts.

The prosecutor also had Irvin's pants sent to a crime lab in September to test for semen, something that was never done at Irvin's trial, even though jurors were given the impression that the pants were stained. The results showed no evidence of semen, the motion said.

"The significance of this finding cannot be overstated," Gladson said in his motion.


- AP

In Kenosha and beyond, guns become more common on US streets
By MORGAN LEE 

1 of 5

A protester carrying a rifle leaves the the Kenosha County Courthouse after speaking with Kenosha County Sheriffs Department officers, Wednesday, Nov. 17, 2021 in Kenosha, Wis., during the Kyle Rittenhouse murder trial. Rittenhouse is accused of killing two people and wounding a third during a protest over police brutality in Kenosha, last year. (AP Photo/Paul Sancya)

As Kyle Rittenhouse was acquitted in two killings that he said were self-defense, armed civilians patrolled the streets near the Wisconsin courthouse with guns in plain view.

In Georgia, testimony in the trial of Ahmaud Arbery’s killers showed that armed patrols were commonplace in the neighborhood where Arbery, a 25-year-old Black man, was chased down by three white men and shot.

The two proceedings sent startling new signals about the boundaries of self-defense as more guns emerge from homes amid political and racial tensions and the advance of laws that ease permitting requirements and expand the allowable use of force.

Across much of the nation, it has become increasingly acceptable for Americans to walk the streets with firearms, either carried openly or legally concealed. In places that still forbid such behavior, prohibitions on possessing guns in public could soon change if the U.S. Supreme Court strikes down a New York law.

The new status quo for firearms outside the home was on prominent display last week in Kenosha, Wisconsin. Local resident Erick Jordan carried a rifle and holstered handgun near the courthouse where Rittenhouse was tried for killing two men and wounding a third with an AR-15-style semiautomatic rifle during a protest last year.

“I got a job to do — protect these people. That’s it,” said Jordan, referring to speakers at a news conference that was held in the hours after the verdict.

Speakers included an uncle of Jacob Blake, the Black man who was paralyzed in a shooting by a white police officer that touched off tumultuous protests across the city in the summer of 2020.

“This is my town, my people,” Jordan said. “We don’t agree on a lot of things, but we fight, we argue, we agree to disagree and go home safe, alive.”

“That’s real self-defense.”

The comments were a counter punch to political figures on the right who welcomed the Rittenhouse verdict and condemned his prosecution.

Mark McCloskey, who pleaded guilty in June to misdemeanor charges stemming from when he and his wife waved a rifle and a handgun at Black Lives Matter protesters outside their St. Louis home in 2020, said the verdict shows that people have a right to defend themselves from a “mob.” He currently is a Republican candidate for U.S. Senate in Missouri.

The verdict arrived as many states are expanding self-defense laws and loosening the rules for carrying guns in public. Both gun sales and gun violence have been on the rise.

At the same time, six more states this year removed requirements to get a permit to carry guns in public, the largest number in any single year, according to the Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence. In all, 30 states have enacted “stand your ground” laws, which remove a requirement to retreat from confrontations before using deadly force.

Wisconsin has a tougher standard for claiming self-defense, and Rittenhouse was able to show the jury that he reasonably believed his life was in danger and that the amount of force he used was appropriate.

Ryan Busse, a former firearms-industry executive who now supports moderate gun control as an author and consultant, said the case reinforced the normalization of military-style weapons on city and suburban streets.

“Reasonable gun owners are freaked out by this,” he said. “How is it that we see this and people are just like, ‘There’s a guy with an AR-15.’ That happens in third-world countries.”

He highlighted that a lesser charge against Rittenhouse as a minor in possession of a dangerous weapon was dropped before the verdict.

“There’s a facet of Wisconsin law that allows kids to take their hunting rifle out with their dad or uncle,” Busse said. “Well he’s not hunting. ... The old gun culture is being used to cover up for this new, dangerous firearms culture.”

Gun-rights advocates seeking greater access to weapons and robust self-defense provisions argue that armed confrontations will remain rare.

Republicans including former President Donald Trump have been quick to applaud the verdict. They stand by Rittenhouse as a patriot who took a stand against lawlessness and exercised his Second Amendment rights.

Discord over the right to carry guns in public places spilled over into state legislatures in the aftermath of a 2020 plot to storm the Michigan Capitol, the Jan. 6 insurrection at the U.S. Capitol and other threats. States including Michigan and New Mexico this year banned guns at their capitols, while Montana and Utah shored up concealed-carry rights.

At the Supreme Court, justices are weighing the biggest guns case in more than a decade, a dispute over whether New York’s gun permitting law violates the Second Amendment right to “keep and bear arms.”

Defenders of the law say that striking it down would lead to more guns on the streets of cities, including New York and Los Angeles.

During oral arguments this month, justices also appeared to worry that a broad ruling might threaten gun restrictions on subways and at bars, stadiums and other gathering places.

New York’s law has been in place since 1913. It says that to carry a concealed handgun in public for self-defense, an applicant has to demonstrate an actual need for the weapon.

___

This story has been edited to correct that Jacob Blake was paralyzed, not killed, in a shooting by a police officer.

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Find AP’s full coverage on the trial of Kyle Rittenhouse at: https://apnews.com/hub/kyle-rittenhouse

Father and 16-year-old daughter duo carry AR-15s march alongside anti-Rittenhouse protesters in Kenosha as dozens carry posters decrying 'the whole system is guilty' after teen's acquittal

Erick Jordan, 50, and his daughter Jade, 16, armed with AR-15s, joined protestors outside Kenosha courthouse

The pair were among multiple furious demonstrators visibly armed at the rally against the Rittenhouse verdict

Erick said that he and his daughter had brought weapons to the demonstration to protect the protestors

By SAM BAKER FOR MAILONLINE
PUBLISHED: 22 November 2021 

A father-daughter duo armed with AR-15s joined the crowds of protestors yesterday marching outside the Kenosha County Courthouse against the Kyle Rittenhouse decision.

Dozens of people took to the streets in Wisconsin to protest against the decision to acquit Rittenhouse, 18, on all charges, two counts of homicide, one count of attempted homicide for wounding a third man, and two counts of recklessly endangering safety, after he killed two white men and injured a third last August during BLM protests - arguing he did so in self-defense.

The verdict was delivered at the Kenosha courthouse on Friday following four days of deliberations by the jury - with Rittenhouse seen shake as he fought back tears.

The demonstration was just one of multiple to take place across the US over the weekend, with the police in Portland being forced to declare a riot after about 200 protestors turned destructive, while looting broke out in Chicago and hundreds gathered outside the Barclays Center in Brooklyn, New York City, to demonstrate.

And in response to the verdict - which has divided the nation - angry demonstrators, some visibly armed with guns took to the streets in Kenosha on Sunday outside the County Courthouse to express their own fury.

Joining the crowds were Erick Jordan, 50, and his daughter Jade, 16, who said they were patrolling the demonstration, of around 75 people, with weapons to protect the protestors.

A father-daughter duo armed with AR-15s joined the crowds of protestors yesterday marching outside the Kenosha County Courthouse against the Kyle Rittenhouse decision

Erick Jordan, 50, (left) and his 16-year-old daughter Jade (right) joined the crowds outside Kenosha courthouse armed with AR-15s

In response to the Kyle Rittenhouse verdict - which has divided the nation - angry demonstrators, some visibly armed with guns took to the streets in Kenosha on Sunday outside the County Courthouse to express their own fury. Erick Jordan, 50, (left) and his 16-year-old daughter Jade (right) joined the crowds outside Kenosha courthouse armed with AR-15s

The pair said that they had arrived at the demonstration yesterday armed with weapons so that they could protect those protesting the acquittal of Kyle Rittenhouse


Equipped with radios, gloves, backpacks and their weapons, Erick and Jade joined a number of other protestors who flashed weapons at the rally in Kenosha

Protesters pack up after days of demonstrations following Rittenhouse trial

Speaking to the NY Post, Jordan said: 'We just do security for different groups. We’re doing a favor for them.'

He went on to explain that he and his daughter had been invited by those who had organised the march - which saw some people carrying signs which read 'the whole system is guilty' and 'cops and fascists give license to kill in the USA!'.

The 50-year-old said that he had trained daughter Jade to use firearms from the age of four, but that he had only allowed her to touch a weapon when she reached 14.

The pair said that they had been protecting a restaurant and two parking lots in the area on the night that the Rittenhouse shootings took place.

And commenting on the incident, Jade said she 'probably wouldn't have fired my weapon'.


Erick said that he and his daughter had been invited by organisers of the rally to join with the group to act as protection


Many people held up banners as crowds gathered outside the Kenosha courthouse to protest against the Rittenhouse acquittal

Justin Blake(pictured in the red coat), the uncle of Jacob Blake - who was shot in August 2020, sparking widespread protests in the US and led to Rittenhouse shooting three people - is seen leading protestors in Kenosha yesterday

The streets of downtown Kenosha were filled with demonstrators carrying banners in protest at the Rittenhouse acquittal after having gathered at the Civic Center Park near the County Courthouse yesterday

Jacob Blake's uncle Justin led the march against Rittenhouse's acquittal after his nephew was paralyzed in a shooting by a white police officer which sparked protests in the summer of 2020. The protesters walked the route that Rittenhouse took on the night of the BLM protests which saw him shoot three men, killing two of them. Pictured: Jacob Blake's uncle Justin (centre), left of his uncle is Kariann Stewart the fiancé of Joseph Rosenbaum who was killed by Rittenhouse.

The march retraced the steps of Kyle Rittenhouse himself on the night of August 2020 when he shot and killed two people.

Jacob Blake's uncle Justin marched with Kariann Stewart, the fiancé of Joseph Rosenbaum.

Rosenbaum was one of the two killed by Rittenhouse in August last year.

Kariann Stewart, Rosenbaum's fiancé (centre), marched with Jacob Blake's uncle (right) after Rittenhouse was acquitted of her fiancés murder

But the Jordans weren't the only armed civilians patrolled the streets near the Wisconsin courthouse with guns in plain view.

Across much of the nation, it has become increasingly acceptable for Americans to walk the streets with firearms, either carried openly or legally concealed. In places that still forbid such behavior, prohibitions on possessing guns in public could soon change if the U.S. Supreme Court strikes down a New York law.

The new status quo for firearms outside the home was on prominent display last week in Kenosha, Wisconsin. Local resident Erick Jordan carried a rifle and holstered handgun near the courthouse where Rittenhouse was tried for killing two men and wounding a third with an AR-15-style semiautomatic rifle during a protest last year.

'I got a job to do - protect these people. That´s it,' said Jordan, referring to speakers at a news conference that was held in the hours after the verdict.

Speakers included an uncle of Jacob Blake, the Black man who was paralyzed in a shooting by a white police officer that touched off tumultuous protests across the city in the summer of 2020.

Jade, 16, stands armed in the middle of the Kenosha protest against Rittenhouse's acquittal

'This is my town, my people,' Jordan said. 'We don´t agree on a lot of things, but we fight, we argue, we agree to disagree and go home safe, alive.'

'That´s real self-defense.'

The comments were a counter punch to political figures on the right who welcomed the Rittenhouse verdict and condemned his prosecution.

Mark McCloskey, who pleaded guilty in June to misdemeanor charges stemming from when he and his wife waved a rifle and a handgun at Black Lives Matter protesters outside their St. Louis home in 2020, said the verdict shows that people have a right to defend themselves from a 'mob.' He currently is a Republican candidate for U.S. Senate in Missouri.

The verdict arrived as many states are expanding self-defense laws and loosening the rules for carrying guns in public. Both gun sales and gun violence have been on the rise.

At the same time, six more states this year removed requirements to get a permit to carry guns in public, the largest number in any single year, according to the Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence. In all, 30 states have enacted 'stand your ground' laws, which remove a requirement to retreat from confrontations before using deadly force.

Erick Jordan, Justin Blake, Jacob Blake's uncle and Erick's daughter Jade Jordan, 16, take a photo together at a rally on Sunday in Civic Center Park, Kenosha

As many as 75 people were estimated to have gathered outside the Kenosha courthouse yesterday, with some giving speeches and waving banners in the air

Jade (left) said that she 'probably wouldn't have fired my weapon' if she had been in the same situation as Kyle Rittenhouse

The Jordans weren't the only members of the public who arrived at the rally with weapons though, with this man also seen with a rifle slung over his shoulder

The armed man was approached by members of Kenosha County Sheriffs Department outside the Kneosha courthouse yetserday

Protestors continue to hold demonstrations in Kenosha

Wisconsin has a tougher standard for claiming self-defense, and Rittenhouse was able to show the jury that he reasonably believed his life was in danger and that the amount of force he used was appropriate.

Ryan Busse, a former firearms-industry executive who now supports moderate gun control as an author and consultant, said the case reinforced the normalization of military-style weapons on city and suburban streets.

'Reasonable gun owners are freaked out by this,' he said. 'How is it that we see this and people are just like, `There's a guy with an AR-15. That happens in third-world countries.'

He highlighted that a lesser charge against Rittenhouse as a minor in possession of a dangerous weapon was dropped before the verdict.

'There´s a facet of Wisconsin law that allows kids to take their hunting rifle out with their dad or uncle,' Busse said. 'Well he´s not hunting. ... The old gun culture is being used to cover up for this new, dangerous firearms culture.'

Gun-rights advocates seeking greater access to weapons and robust self-defense provisions argue that armed confrontations will remain rare.

Kyle Rittenhouse (pictured entering the Kenosha courthouse on November 19 to receive the verdict), was acquitted on all charges after admitting to shooting dead two men and injuring a third in what he claimed was 'self-defense'

Pictured: Protesters are seen arguing outside the Kenosha County Courthouse on Friday November 19 after Kyle Rittenhouse was acquitted of all charges after pleading self-defense in the deadly Kenosha shootings that became a flashpoint in the nation's debate over guns, vigilantism and racial injustice

Republicans including former President Donald Trump have been quick to applaud the verdict. They stand by Rittenhouse as a patriot who took a stand against lawlessness and exercised his Second Amendment rights.

Discord over the right to carry guns in public places spilled over into state legislatures in the aftermath of a 2020 plot to storm the Michigan Capitol, the January 6 insurrection at the U.S. Capitol and other threats. States including Michigan and New Mexico this year banned guns at their capitols, while Montana and Utah shored up concealed-carry rights.

At the Supreme Court, justices are weighing the biggest guns case in more than a decade, a dispute over whether New York´s gun permitting law violates the Second Amendment right to 'keep and bear arms.'

Defenders of the law say that striking it down would lead to more guns on the streets of cities, including New York and Los Angeles.

During oral arguments this month, justices also appeared to worry that a broad ruling might threaten gun restrictions on subways and at bars, stadiums and other gathering places.

New York´s law has been in place since 1913. It says that to carry a concealed handgun in public for self-defense, an applicant has to demonstrate an actual need for the weapon.

Dems confident on methane fee as budget bill moves to Senate

A flare to burn methane from oil production is seen on a well pad near Watford City, North Dakota, Aug. 26, 2021. A huge social and environmental policy bill passed by House Democrats includes a plan to impose a fee on emissions of methane, a powerful pollutant that leaks from oil and gas wells and contributes to global warming. (AP Photo/Matthew Brown, File)

WASHINGTON (AP) — A Democratic plan to impose a fee on methane emissions from oil and gas wells has cleared a key hurdle, but it faces strong opposition from the oil and gas industry and criticism by centrist Sen. Joe Manchin.

The proposed fee on methane — a powerful pollutant that contributes to global warming — was included in a huge social and environmental policy bill passed by House Democrats last Friday.

As the bill moves to the Senate, attention again will focus on Manchin, a West Virginia moderate who has already forced fellow Democrats to abandon one of their biggest climate proposals: a clean-electricity program that would boost wind and solar power while phasing out coal- and gas-fired power plants.

Manchin, whose state is a leading producer of coal and natural gas, has said he worries a methane tax could be used to drive energy companies out of business. He said before the House vote that he wants to make sure the fee is structured to incentivize innovation and not just “punish” energy companies “for the sake of punishing” them.

A spokeswoman for Manchin declined to comment after the House vote, but Democrats in the House and Senate said they are confident the fee will remain in the Senate bill, despite a 50-50 split in the chamber that gives every Democrat veto power. Republicans unanimously oppose the bill.

Language approved by the House represents a compromise that would slap a rising fee on excess emissions at oil and gas facilities, reaching $1,500 per ton in 2025, along with $775 million in subsidies for companies that take steps to reduce emissions.

Rep. Frank Pallone, D-N.J., who chairs the House Energy and Commerce Committee, said he and other Democrats have been working with senators on the methane fee, including Manchin, who chairs the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee.

“We have this very important provision with regard to methane emissions that was worked on with the senators and was also worked on with House members over the last few weeks,″ Pallone said at a news conference Friday. “So I believe this is pretty much it. I mean, there may be some additional changes, but ... in terms of the actual substantive authorizing language, I think we’re pretty solid at this point.″

While the Senate may make minor revisions over the next few weeks, “nothing major, in my opinion,″ will be changed or taken out, Pallone said.

Delaware Sen. Tom Carper, a Democrat who chairs the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, also is optimistic that the methane fee — formally known as the Methane Emissions Reduction Program — will be included in the final bill.

“Instead of punishing industry, our program incentivizes good behavior, phases in over time, and ramps up (fees) over time as well,″ Carper said in a statement. “It’s good for the planet and good for job creation — a win-win in my book.”

The proposed methane tax comes as President Joe Biden launches a wide-ranging plan to reduce methane emissions, which pack a stronger short-term punch on climate than even carbon dioxide.

Biden pledged at a U.N. climate summit in Glasgow, Scotland, earlier this month to work with the European Union and dozens of other nations to reduce global methane emissions by 30% by 2030.

The centerpiece of U.S. actions is a long-awaited rule by the Environmental Protection Agency to tighten methane regulations for the oil and gas sector. The proposed rule would for the first time target reductions from existing oil and gas wells nationwide, rather than focus only on new wells as previous regulations have done.

The new U.S. rule, along with the global pledge, should “make a huge difference,″ not only in fighting climate change, but in improving health and reducing asthma and other respiratory problems, Biden said.

Once finalized, the proposed requirements should reduce methane emissions from U.S. drilling operations and equipment by approximately 75% by 2030, compared with 2005 levels, the White House said.

The oil and natural gas industry, the nation’s largest industrial source of methane emissions, supports methane regulation but opposes the congressional fee as an unnecessary tax that could drive up energy costs and result in the loss of thousands of jobs.

“This is a tax on American natural gas that makes us less competitive,″ said Frank Macchiarola, senior vice president of the American Petroleum Institute, the industry’s top lobbying group.

“At a time of rising energy costs, it’s a flawed policy to raise costs on energy producers,″ he said, adding that he is hopeful the Senate will eliminate the fee.

“Sen. Manchin is a supporter of American energy, so it makes sense for him to take a close look” at the methane fee, Macchiarola said.

Environmental groups call methane reduction the fastest and most cost-effective action to slow the rate of global warming. Current rules for methane emissions from U.S. oil and gas wells only apply to sources that were built or modified after 2015, leaving more than 90% of the nation’s nearly 900,000 well sites unregulated. Many of those sites are smaller, low-producing wells.

A group of Texas Democrats in the House initially opposed the methane fee, but ended up supporting the compromise. Only one Democrat, Maine Rep. Jared Golden, opposed the House legislation.

“No bill is perfect,″ said Rep. Henry Cuellar, D-Texas, who voted for the measure despite misgivings over methane. The House bill would improve access to affordable child care and pre-kindergarten, boost Medicaid coverage and provide billions of dollars to combat the climate crisis, he said.

Even so, Cuellar said he would continue lobbying the Senate to strip the methane fee from the legislation.

Train the Police to Keep the Peace, Not Turn a Profit


OPINION
NEW YORK TIMES
THE EDITORIAL BOARD

Nov. 20, 2021

Credit...Christopher Anderson/Magnum Photos

By The Editorial Board
The editorial board is a group of Opinion journalists whose views are informed by expertise, research, debate and certain longstanding values. It is separate from the newsroom.


Some police departments across the country have embraced the corrupting and unjust practice of raising revenue for their municipalities by pushing officers to write as many traffic tickets as possible.

Policing for profit encourages unfair enforcement of the law. It also increases the likelihood that motorists stopped for infractions largely unrelated to public safety will be killed or injured during encounters with officers who are trained to view traffic stops as moments of mortal peril.

The situation cries out for departments to change how officers are trained. Ultimately, these departments need to stand down from practices that bring many more people than necessary into contact with the law under circumstances that too often lead to what one district attorney refers to as “anticipatory killings” by police officers.

The New York Times lays out these and other issues in an alarming investigation of the culture that too often transforms traffic stops for common violations into unnecessary beatings, car chases or shootings.

The Times investigation found that over the past five years, police officers have killed more than 400 drivers who were not brandishing guns or knives or who were not being pursued for dangerous crimes.

Many of these motorists ended up dead in stops that began with standard violations like having broken taillights or running a red light. Over and over again, prosecutors convinced the courts that the killings were legally justified because the officers felt that their lives were endangered.

Only five officers were convicted of crimes in connection with these deaths — but local governments ended up paying at least $125 million to settle about 40 wrongful-death suits and other claims.

The Times investigation found in a number of encounters that officers often seemed to exaggerate the threat to their lives. Worse still, officers commonly manufactured dangerous situations by stationing themselves in front of fleeing cars or reaching inside of vehicles. They then fired their guns in what they later described as self-defense.

African American motorists were overrepresented among those killed. A criminologist told The Times that the act of exaggerating the danger of stops compounded racial bias: “Police think ‘vehicle stops are dangerous’ and ‘Black people are dangerous,’ and the combination is volatile,” he said.

Officers are sometimes killed during traffic stops, but statistically speaking, the odds of that actually happening are low. Traffic stops are far and away the most common point of contact between people and the law. Given that there are tens of millions of such stops each year, studies have found that an officer’s chances of being killed during one are less than 1 in 3.6 million.

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Nevertheless, police academies tend to show trainees gory videos and worst-case scenarios, while depicting the traffic stop as the most dangerous encounter an officer can engage in.

As one police official told The Times: “All you’ve heard are horror stories about what could happen. It is very difficult to try to train that out of somebody.” A culture of gross exaggeration creates an atmosphere in which outrageous police conduct leading up to a civilian death is judged acceptable.

For example, The Times investigation found that more than three-quarters of the unarmed motorists who died were killed while attempting to flee. Dashboard and body-camera footage showed officers “shooting at cars driving away, or threatening deadly force in their first words to motorists, or surrounding sleeping drivers with a ring of gun barrels — then shooting them when, startled awake, they tried to take off.”

The federal government worsens this problem by spending more than $600 million a year to subsidize the writing of tickets. At least 20 states have responded to this policy by evaluating police officers based on how many stops they make per hour.

Communities that are dependent on traffic-ticket revenue sometimes maintain larger police departments than are really necessary only for the purpose of raking in money. The Times investigation found more than 730 municipalities that rely on fees and fines for at least 10 percent of their revenue.

The town of Henderson, La., with a population of about 2,000, got nearly 90 percent of its general revenue from fines and fees in 2019. Oliver, Ga., home to about 380 people, gets more than half its budget from fines. A state investigation found that last year the town’s police force had written more than $40,000 worth of tickets outside its legal jurisdiction.

Departments that trawl poor communities in particular for ticket revenue — and whose officers sometimes manufacture infractions — undermine trust in the law. Policing for profit also subjects motorists to unfair scrutiny and potentially dangerous encounters with officers during traffic stops. States and municipalities need to move away from this practice.

Dams may help against climate change, but harm fish, freshwater ecosystems


Conservation groups are pushing for four dams on Maine's Kennebec River, including the Lockwood Dam in Waterville, to be removed to make way for spawning salmon and other migratory fish. Photo by J.Monkman/NRCM

BANGOR, Maine, Nov. 18 (UPI) -- The debate over what hydroelectric dams contribute to the environment -- either as useful tools in the fight against climate change or an impediment to migratory fish and freshwater ecosystem health -- is heating up in Maine as officials decide the future of one power-generating embankment.

The proposed relicensing of a major dam on Maine's Kennebec River has officials and fishers, among others, once again wrestling with difficult questions about the environment and the future of the region's natural resources.

To remain in good legal standing, Brookfield Renewable Partners needs new state and federal licenses for its Shawmut Dam in Farfield.

Earlier this year, the company withdrew its relicensing applications with Maine's Department of Environmental Protection and the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission after state regulators warned Brookfield that its water quality certificate was going to be denied.

According to Maine regulators, the dam, as it is being operated, is not sufficiently salmon friendly.

Federal protections for the iconic fish, which first was listed as endangered in 2000, stipulate that 96% of salmon that approach each dam on the lower Kennebec must pass safely upstream within 48 hours, but state regulators told Brookfield they'll accept no less than a 99% success rate.

With the hawmut Dam's licenses in jeopardy, conservationists and environmental groups have seized the opportunity to push for the removal of four dams on the Lower Kennebec River, which they claim are keeping Atlantic salmon from reaching spawning grounds farther upstream.

"If they do get it relicensed, that means that you have to wait another 30, 40, 50 years before trying to take the dams out again, and by then it might be too late," Greg LaBonte, an avid fly fisher and founder of Maine Fly Guys, told UPI.

LaBonte, who said he typically is a strong supporter of all types of fish conservation efforts, remains unconvinced by the dam removal plans, but appreciates the urgency of advocacy groups like Trout Unlimited and the Atlantic Salmon Federation.

"It's now or wait half a century, and I get that," he said. "It's a tough call."

Small salmon migrations

Atlantic salmon once were plentiful in all of Maine's major rivers, from the Saco to the St. Croix, returning by the thousands each year to spawn.

From 1912 to 1990, the first Atlantic Salmon caught in Maine's Penobscot River each season was delivered to the president of the United States.

The Penobscot still welcomes a few hundred returning salmon each year, but elsewhere on Maine's waterways, salmon runs rarely exceed a half-dozen fish. Most of those that return are not wild fish, but instead hatchery raised fish released into Maine rivers as juveniles, or smolts.

Environmental groups insist those numbers would be higher if not for the human-built barriers that prevent the natural movement of water, nutrients and fish.

It's not just the height of the dams that thwart salmon, which typically are powerful swimmers and adept leapers. Its also the nature of the water that accumulates above and below.

"The impoundments are really bad, too, because they're often filled with invasive species and are difficult to navigate because they don't have any obvious flows or riffles to guide the fish upstream," Landis Hudson, executive director of the nonprofit Maine Rivers, told UPI.

Impoundments also are one of the reasons why Hudson doesn't think Brookfield's dams, which generate hydroelectricity, should be viewed as a green energy solution. Impoundments on the Kennebec, which flows into the rapidly warming Gulf of Maine, elevate water temperatures.

"Main stem dams like we see on the Kennebec speed up the negative ecological impacts of climate change," Hudson said.

Some dams, including the Lockwood Dam in Waterville, are equipped with fish ladders that allow fish to bypass the dam, but finding the narrow passages isn't always easy.

Last spring, several fish had to be rescued after they became stranded in pools below the dam. Researchers suspect many spawning fish languish for weeks searching for a detour.

"If these fertile female salmon are hanging out below Lockwood so long that by the time they move past it, they are about to keel over, how can we expect these fish to recover, ladder or not?" Hudson asked rhetorically.

Ambivalence toward removal

As of November, only 15 salmon made it to Lockwood Dam's fish ladder, according to the Maine Department of Natural Resources.

It's those modest numbers that inspire LaBonte's ambivalence toward the dam removal plans.

Like others, he worries that the dam's removal would imperil Sappi North America, a paper mill in Skowhegan that relies on water withdrawal from the impoundment behind Shawmut.

If the dam were removed, Brookfield claims the mill would have to curtail operations, putting the livelihoods of several hundred Mainers in jeopardy.

"I could live with that if there was a guarantee that when you take the dams out, the anadromous fish were going to really bounce back," LaBonte said. But he's skeptical.

Salmon aren't the only species dams are impeding, however. They're just the most iconic.

"People rally around salmon for the same reasons they rally around a polar bear or moose," LaBonte said. "These are species that people get intrigue from for no other reason than being curious or romantic about the animal."

That's important for groups that may cultivate a more sophisticated appreciation for ecological health, but that rely on casual nature lovers for funding.

"When you're trying to fundraise or get social backing, it's hard to get that when you're talking about things that aren't well understood or covered in the media," LaBonte said. "If they were to say river herring or shad, people aren't going to get as excited about that because they don't have any relationship with those species."

Much more than salmon

Those less romantic species are where the benefits of dam removal shine through -- and evidence can be found just a few dozen miles downstream from Lockwood Dam.

"The Lower Kennebec and its tributaries, including the Sebasticook River, is probably one of the largest success stories for migratory fish on the Atlantic seaboard, with the return of a run of both alewives and shad -- previously stopped by the Edwards Dam in August that came out in 1999 -- in the millions," Jeff Reardon, Maine Brook Trout Project director at Trout Unlimited and a veteran of dam removal projects, told UPI.

In addition to alewives and shad, eels and herring all now return to the Kennebec in great numbers each year. The recovery quickly garnered the attention of riparian predators.

"The Sebasticook now hosts one of the largest concentrations of eagles on the East Coast," Reardon said. "Every tree on the river bank has one or more eagles in it for miles and miles."

Most of Maine's rivers are quite nutrient poor, so the influx of biomass and nutrients from the ocean are a boon for not just eagles, but also for ospreys, ducks and more.

With the removal of the four dams, beginning with Lockwood, Reardon and others estimate that success will spread upstream.

LaBonte said it might also allow pike, an invasive species and voracious predator, to travel farther upstream and access the salmon nurseries in the Sandy River.

But Reardon, whose organization occasionally supports dams and other barriers to stem the movement of invasive species, says pike prefer slower water -- the found above and below dams.

With the dams gone, fewer stretches of the Kennebec where pike can proliferate will exist. Besides, Reardon said, pike already are present in lakes connected to the Sandy River and Upper Kennebec.

"The explosion of pike that we've seen elsewhere, we wouldn't expect to see in this situation," Reardon said.

A plethora of problems

Reardon and Hudson acknowledged that all dam removal efforts warrant problem solving, whether it's mitigating invasive species, updating wastewater management systems or accommodating businesses that rely on impoundments.

"There have been several other large, complicated dam removal projects in Maine, and each of those projects involved changes to infrastructure that were complicated and in some cases expensive, but people did come together to figure out how to fix them," Hudson said.

Reardon said he has been involved directly in efforts to design and build new water intake infrastructure for mills affected by dam removals.

"That's a problem that's solvable, it's just a question of engineering," he said.

The threat of losing even a modest economic engine in Central Maine moved the state's governor, Democrat Janet Mills, to publicly guarantee the protection of the Sappi mill. Mills has floated the idea of a "nature-like fishway," a newer technology more conducive to fish migration than traditional ladders.

LaBonte also suspects a compromise somewhere short of total dam removal is the most logical solution. He said it also might be time to abandon the dreams of salmon returning to the Kennebec in great numbers.

LaBonte cites a former mentor, Rory Saunders, Downeast Coastal Salmon Recovery Coordinator with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, who said, "Salmon aren't dying from any one cause. They're dying from a death by a thousand cuts."

"Dams are just one part of the problem. Salmon have many, many more, mostly out in the ocean," LaBonte said. "If you took just a small portion of the salmon recovery funding and used it for habitat restoration for striped bass and brook trout, we might be better off."