Planners deny connection to UN Agenda 21 for “Sustainability” but US Government documents say otherwise.
It is no secret that the attempt to implement the UN’s Agenda 21 “sustainability” plan through backdoor, unelected “regional planning commissions” is in full swing in towns and cities in New Hampshire and all over the USA.
Agenda 21 is part of the UN’s agenda for the world — a planned society — an idea which they also peddle to our students in public schools. Agenda 21 is the management of our towns and cities resources and people under the guise of “sustainability” as the UN defined it at their “Earth Summit” — the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED), Rio de Janeiro, 3-14 June 1992 with oil magnate Maurice Strong as Secretary General.
In attempt to stop unelected leaders from non-governmental, foreign organizations from taking over their towns, brave residents took on the Rockingham Regional Planning Commission in Windham to stop the town from signing an agreement to participate in their organization — which would manage HUD grants for their region and therefore mandate the implementation of HUD requirements before the grant monies are paid.
Proponents admitted that it’s about more than just land: “Sinnott defended that master plans aren’t just about land, but rather everything from water, housing and commercial development.”
Therein lies the problem!
In particular, Windham is being asked to sign an agreement — “A Granite State Future”. If Windham signs the agreement, they will join one of NH’s 9 Regional Planning Commissions. The Agreement states that the Nashua Regional Planning Commission is the lead point of contact with HUD on behalf of the program, that would be implemented by a federal grant and managed at the federal level.
From the Patch report, Rockingham Planning Commission Executive Director Cliff Sinnott said that the “RPC has “no connection whatsoever” to the United Nations.”
Really? Sorry Mr. Sinnott… you are either unaware of what you are doing and on whose behalf, or you are complicit and lying.
Indeed Mr. Sinnott defended the plan stating that “master plans aren’t just about land, but rather everything from water, housing and commercial development.” And therein lies the problem.
A few years ago, a member of the Southern NH Planning Commission from Bedford, and a State Rep, attempted to file legislation that would allow the Commission to have jurisdiction over Bedford residents’ private wells. The bill was soundly defeated at the committee level. See HB 572 from 2005 filed by Rep Michael Scanlon.
HUD is “Housing and Urban Development”, an agency of the federal government that is offering grants to those willing to implement these plans through regional planning commissions such as the one that is soliciting towns to join in NH. It is taking it’s cue from the UN’s Agenda 21 and Millennium Development Goals.
Henry Lamb of www.sovereignty.net has written about the problem using Missouri – The county that struck back against U.N. – Exclusive: Henry Lamb lauds officials not willing to buy into ‘sustainable development’. as an example:
“Missouri has 19 Regional Planning Commissions. The staff of several of these bureaucracies would like to have HUD grants to help advance Planning 102 within their region. Despite the strong and growing push-back by well-informed citizens and elected officials, HUD has been very successful in spending tax dollars to implement policies that originate in the U.N.’s Agenda 21.”
Here is a portion of one letter of rejection:
“This Sustainable Development Program of HUD, DOT, and EPA is directly, and irrefutably connected with the United Nations Agenda 21. Both President Bill Clinton and most recently President Barack Obama have signed Executive Orders directing all agencies of the Federal Government to work with state and local community governments in a joint effort to “reinvent” government using the guidelines outlined in the United Nations Agenda 21. The tenets of Agenda 21 undermine private property rights and propose extreme environmental, social, economic and educational policies to be implemented worldwide by National, State and Local governing bodies through the use of Sustainable Development planning, programs and policies.”
From US State Dept documents we find:
“Good governance at all levels is critical to our ability to make good on our Agenda 21 commitments. While national governments will make the political commitments, we rely upon regional and local governments to implement new policies in the context of local situations, to enforce environmental regulations, to innovate and adapt solutions that will succeed in unique environmental, social, and political realities. Some of the most creative solutions to our sustainable development challenges are emerging in the U.S. from our state, regional and local governments. We should encourage communities to do integrated planning, to develop sustainability plans and a local Agenda 21.” and “We can identify and leverage solutions to improve access to water, sanitation, food, and energy that will help us to achieve the Millennium Development Goals.”
~ Objectives of the UN Conference on Sustainable Development:
https://web.archive.org/web/20120104225327/http://www.state.gov/e/oes/rls/remarks/2011/157993.htm (paragraph 5)
Further…
~ Sustainable Development for the Next Twenty Years–United States Views on Rio+20: https://web.archive.org/web/20120113090731/http://www.state.gov/e/oes/sus/releases/176863.htm
~ High Level Dialogue on the Institutional Framework for Sustainable Development: https://web.archive.org/web/20120104230147/http://www.state.gov/e/oes/rls/remarks/2011/176361.htm (pay particular attention to paragraphs 1-4-5-6-11)
The RPC is apparently so committed to the UN’s Agenda 21 initiative, to help implement it they have hired a company that specializes in propaganda, Action Media, to convince the public.
Action Media company, from their website, makes no bones about being activists for ‘social change’. They are experts in the Delphi Technique.
Just look at the list of their clients… and peruse some of their PDF Library on the art of persuasion using the old “create the crisis/provide the solution” recipe.
If “sustainability through regional planning” is so good for the residents of Windham or any town in NH, why do these planning commissions need to hire a PR company that is an expert at the Delphi Technique to convince people to join?
More about HUD’s role in the planned society of the future: Retooling HUD Report
Page 10
In the report entitled New Strategies for a Metropolitan America: Extending HUD’s Urban and Regional Mission, Harold Wolman and his team make a compelling case that HUD lead the federal government to embrace regional approaches to a host of important metropolitan issues including the link between housing and labor, transportation systems, pollution and environmental concerns, and general economic prosperity. This report by many of the nation’s leading thinkers on regionalism sets forth concrete steps for HUD to engage local governments, other federal agencies, and local stakeholders in regional efforts. The report recommends several specified internal fixes which will allow HUD to publicly affirm the centrality of regional approaches. Among other innovative programmatic changes, the repor trecommends that HUD: propose new legislation that would create a “Regional Challenge Grant,” a multi-year competitive grant program for proposals designed to have a regionally significant impact; propose legislation that would modify CDBG (and possibly the Home Investment Partnerships Program [HOME]) to provide incentives for regional activity and, at the same time, to encourage and strengthen regional governance processes; and submit legislation to provide general operating funds (“glue money”) for a designated multi-purpose planning agency in metropolitan areas.
Page 119
Recommendation 1.4: HUD should change the title of the Assistant Secretary for Community Development to the “Assistant Secretary for Urban, Regional and Community Development” and authorize the Assistant Secretary to coordinate HUD programs that encourage regional activities and effective regional governance including those we recommend in this report.
Page 122.
Recommendation 3: HUD should engage in activities to encourage and enhance effective regional governance in metropolitan areas.
Page 123
Indeed, HUD’s current efforts, particularly in housing but in other programs as well, will become more effective if placed in a regional context. The need for a regional approach is increasingly recognized – and was an explicit and consistent part of President Obama’s campaign. HUD is perfectly positioned to fulfill this campaign promise and to increase the efficacy of federal support for urban and metropolitan economic growth.
See recommendation page 125 and read page 126 carefully…
Recommendation 2: HUD programs should support, through incentives and other means, regional activity that helps to build stronger communities and is consistent with and advances important national objectives.
It should structure its programs, where appropriate, to pursue those objectives.
Look at page 129 – It talks about how HUD originally formed the regional planning agencies.
Recommendation 3 talks about “Regional Governance” (makes indirect mention that there is no cohesion in local governments) and specifies that there should be one main contact.
Recommendation 3.1: HUD submit legislation to provide general operating funds (“glue money”) for a designated multi-purpose planning agency in metropolitan areas. The funds would be available, by application,to only one organization in each metropolitan area. The organization would be designated by the region in its application and could be an existing organization or a new one. The recipient agency should be required to establish links with the other regional planning bodies in its jurisdiction, produce a regional land-use and growth management plan suitable as the foundation for other single-function planning, and help to coordinate the tracking of progress toward achieving performance goals and targets established by regional plans. The legislation should also provide additional funding if this agency were also the locus for other regional planning unctions such as transportation, pollution control, infrastructure, energy management, environmental conservation and climate change, the sustainability of national defense installations, and jobs-housing balance. In addition it should require any HUD regional planning activity, such as those related to its Consolidated Plans, to be the responsibility of this agency.
Recommendation 3.2: HUD should provide funds for the designated regional organization to produce, or contract for the production of a periodic “State of the Region Report.”
ICLEI has already been in effect in some cities in NH. ICLEI is a UN NGO organization that helped write Agenda 21 for the 1992 Earth Summit and then set, as its mission, to bring Agenda 21 policy to every city in the world. It does this by meeting with local officials, signing contracts with them to set standards for energy and water use, building and development codes, farming policy, etc.
From their website: “ICLEI was founded in 1990 as the ‘International Council for Local Environmental Initiatives’. The Council was established when more than 200 local governments from 43 countries convened at our inaugural conference, the World Congress of Local Governments for a Sustainable Future, at the United Nations in New York.”
Related links: Sustainability program covers more than you might think
LETTER: The Sustainable Communities Initiative – Is This For Windham?
by Ken Eyring
On April 23, 2012, the Board of Selectmen met to discuss whether or not the town of Windham should partake in a program called “The Sustainable Communities Initiative”. The program is funded by HUD, and was presented as a long term land use planning program, that includes an agreement that our Board of Selectmen is being asked to sign. The agreement is titled: “Partnership Agreement, NH Regional Planning Program – A Granite State Future”.
At the meeting, I was glad to see Windham residents share their thoughts. Some Windham residents spoke in favor of the proposal. Others noted the agreement contains some language that is vague in some places, and in others… suggests the full scope of the program goes way beyond land planning. The broad nature of the agreement included items that led to several Windham residents, including myself, to ask for clarification.
Some of the items for clarification included the definition of a “Regional Equity Team that is comprised of representatives of underserved and marginalized populations”. This led to other questions; What is a Regional Equity Team? What function will this team perform? Who are the “underserved and marginalized populations?” What is the purpose of the Regional Equity Team and how will it influence the drafting of the land use plan?
Other questions were asked to define the “Equity Planning Interests” (who are they), and for some details as to what are the “Transportation Land Use Roundtable” and “Livability Principles” — both of which are to be used and incorporated into the plan.
Some of the people that spoke at the meeting raised concern that the planning of our town was being moved away from local control where the current decision makers are elected officials who are directly accountable to the town’s residents – and given to a regional commission that was comprised of unelected bureaucrats who may or may not always have our town’s best interests at heart. This concern was raised by a clause in the “Decision Making Process” section of the Agreement that states “Any disputes regarding administration or grant resources are resolved by the Executive Committee.”
This led to questions as to who is on the Executive Committee, and how they will govern the direction of the planning. It is also important to recognize that the Executive Committee is another hierarchical level removed from the Regional Planning Committee, which makes it two levels of unelected bureaucrats removed from our town — with each level having no direct accountability to Windham.
I believe that these were all common sense questions that were being asked by concerned citizens – to make sure the decision of whether or not to enter into the agreement is to our town’s benefit or not.
Between Monday night and Tuesday morning (as I wrote this letter), I am dismayed to hear that there are people in Windham that are already demonizing those that simply stood up and asked questions.
We all live in, and want the best for our town. I realize that everyone will not agree on everything all of the time… and it is why I encourage people to express their thoughts. I believe that it is healthy for all of us to participate in open and honest discussions regarding the direction and management of our town. I am disappointed that some people consider the act of encouraging representative government and the sharing of ideas to be a radical concept.
The decision of the Board of Selectmen as to whether or not to participate in the Sustainable Communities Initiative is one that will have a major impact on our town for decades to come — and we should all have a voice in that.