Hooray loopholes
The Nature Conservancy has gone whacko linking itself as closely as it has with Fortune500 companies. Board members of the nonprofit that are the heads of the companies paying multi-million dollar fines for violation of environmental rules. Who are they trying to fool. This has to be some form of corporate incest. The practice of purchasing land in order to conserve it seems like a noble mission. But using your own protected land to carry out a drilling experiment that is to prove land can be drilled without harming endangered species occupying that land and then having the experiment fail isn't justifiable. Why did the federal government allow this action when there are endangered species on the land.
And why not exploit the federal government even more while you're at it. There are so many loopholes with the IRS that we should even be surprised there is a story here. Because the source happens to be one of the largest nonprofit organizations we hear about it. But what about all of the nobody individuals that take advantage of IRS loopholes. Are news stories written about them so the public can learn what these loopholes are and take a stand against them.
Yes it does seem a bit odd to purchase land in order to conserve it and then sell it and allow many things to happen to it that can damage the land, the restrictions on the land do seem like they will do a good job conserving most of the land for many years. It was mentioned that the sold land is not marked for public access, but where did the Nature Conservancy say they are buying land in order to preserve for the public to access it. The land is being sold to Nature Conservancy trustees or board members past or present and if you are that involved in the organization you should support the organization’s goals. So give the benefit of the doubt to the land buyers that will preserve the land, minus how much is being used by the home built on it.
The Nature Conservancy's incestuous relations are awkward, but without them would the organization have gained as much power in order to purchase all the land they are preserving. And you can't fault the organization for selling a piece of preserved land to a trustee, because the trustee should be wanting to conserve the land. At fault is the loophole being exploited in order to receive the tax break.
And why not exploit the federal government even more while you're at it. There are so many loopholes with the IRS that we should even be surprised there is a story here. Because the source happens to be one of the largest nonprofit organizations we hear about it. But what about all of the nobody individuals that take advantage of IRS loopholes. Are news stories written about them so the public can learn what these loopholes are and take a stand against them.
Yes it does seem a bit odd to purchase land in order to conserve it and then sell it and allow many things to happen to it that can damage the land, the restrictions on the land do seem like they will do a good job conserving most of the land for many years. It was mentioned that the sold land is not marked for public access, but where did the Nature Conservancy say they are buying land in order to preserve for the public to access it. The land is being sold to Nature Conservancy trustees or board members past or present and if you are that involved in the organization you should support the organization’s goals. So give the benefit of the doubt to the land buyers that will preserve the land, minus how much is being used by the home built on it.
The Nature Conservancy's incestuous relations are awkward, but without them would the organization have gained as much power in order to purchase all the land they are preserving. And you can't fault the organization for selling a piece of preserved land to a trustee, because the trustee should be wanting to conserve the land. At fault is the loophole being exploited in order to receive the tax break.
posted by austin @ 6:15 PM
2 Comments:
At 4:56 PM, October 23, 2006,
Paul Jonas said…
Like most people, I cannot hide my mixed emotions. Mixed in that I am in shock that this can occur, but unsurprised that it does.
Knock Knock "MISSION DRIFT"... unless of course the conservancy's ultimate mission has always been tripped up on the financial bottom line.
Austin makes some interesting points about the governments lack of regulation of non-profit which I think make a marked contrast to much of our discussion last week and how non-profits are over regulated when it comes to religious charities, orgs, etc.
Jack Abramoff used a charitable christian organization to funnel millions of dollars. It's just sad to see that the greediest people use their excellent abilities for making money to extents that extol and destroy people, organizations, and extinct animals along the way.
At 11:27 PM, October 23, 2006,
Evelyn said…
The Nature Conservancy is one of the richest environmental groups in the world. The titan of green groups, the Nature Conservancy sits on nearly a billion dollars in assets and is awash in cash, thanks to a tidal wave of corporate donations, much of it from notorious polluters such as Arco, Archer-Daniels-Midland, British Petroleum, DuPont, Shell and Freeport-McMoRan (SourceWatch). Who is the Nature Conservancy trying to fool with its practices and partnerships? Activists, donors, corporations, who? I think that the board is hurting the image of this organization. Perhaps the consequences are not as evident right not but they will be in the future if they do not engage in better environmental and more ethically practices?
I had a totally different idea of the Nature Conservancy. The articles make me wonder if the people that really care about this organization at least know about the internal management of the Nature Conservancy (I don’t think so). I am taking about highly educated graduate students here at UF (ecology, forestry, biology, etc) that apparently don’t know what is going on… Many of them donate their time and energy to this organization and seemed to be proud to be working for it.
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