Just Say No to NBAF
By: BJ Lawson
Regrettably, our incumbent representative David Price is lobbying our Department of Homeland Security, in conjunction with the U.S. Department of Agriculture, to locate the proposed National Bio- & Agro-Defense Facility (NBAF) in Butner, North Carolina. The proposed facility would bring a Biosafety Level 4 (BSL-4) laboratory to our backyard to study diseases including:
- Foot and Mouth Disease (FMD)
- Classical Swine Fever (CSF)
- African Swine Fever (ASF)
- Rift Valley Fever (RVF)
- Contagious Bovine Pleuropneumonia (CBPP)
- Japanese Encephalitis (JE) virus
- Nipah Virus
- Hendra Virus
This list is not inclusive, and may change based upon Homeland Security’s “continued threat assessments and risk assessment”.
Rep. Price has a twenty-two year history of bringing home the bacon to North Carolina, but this is one federal gravy train that we should avoid at all costs. The proposed facility will replace the current Plum Island Animal Disease Center, located off the northeastern tip of Long Island. Plum Island is on an island for a reason: by current law, Foot and Mouth Disease (FMD) cannot be studied on the mainland United States. While we in the United States have been free of FMD since 1929 (other than an accidental outbreak on Plum Island in 1978), it has devastated the livestock industry overseas, especially in the U.K.
There are a number of special interests who are joining Rep. Price is supporting this effort. This Consortium includes representatives from our local academic communities and industry. While they are clearly well-meaning and interested in economic growth, they have differing opinions concerning what is in the best interest of our region. The Consortium’s Web site has a FAQ page supporting the laboratory, but their support falls short on several counts.
The first concerns are transparency and accountability. While we already have several BSL-2 and BSL-3 laboratories in our District, these labs are associated with industry, our universities, and our state’s Division of Public Health. As such, there are certain levels of transparency and accountability associated with their activities. The Department of Homeland Security is a completely different animal, pardon the pun, and over the course of the past five years has proven itself to be highly politicized, corrupt, wasteful, and secretive. The transparency and accountability that we can demand of our existing facilities would be completely absent at NBAF.
The next concern is simply common sense. Why change the law to allow FMD to be studied on the mainland United States? Why locate such a facility, with no transparency and little accountability, within fifty miles of two million people? Why allow “pretreated and decontaminated” waste from this facility to flow into Falls Lake, Raleigh’s already precious water supply? Are jobs and prestige from this federal gravy train really worth the risk to our citizens and environment?
Fortunately, there is growing grassroots awareness that the answer is no. Not in our backyard, certainly. A growing grassroots organization has been spreading the word through its Web site www.nobio.org and letting citizens know how to push back. There are a number of events this week, but the most important is Thursday evening’s DHS/NBAF Hearing at South Granville High School, Creedmoor, from 7 - 10pm. Concerned citizens should attend — this laboratory’s proposed location is on the border of Granville and Durham counties, and waste disposal or accidents will affect all of us.
Finally, I had the opportunity to meet with local activists from the Granville Nonviolent Action Team (GNAT) this past weekend. I was interviewed by John Monroe, who received this form letter (quoted below) in response to his concerns from David Price:
“NBAF, which will be managed by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) in cooperation with U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), will conduct research focused on zoonotic and foreign animal diseases.”
“Much of the federal research on these kinds of diseases is currently conducted by DHS and USDA at the Plum Island Animal Disease Center in New York.”
“I understand that there are concerns about the security of NBAF, in terms of the potential for dangerous pathogens to spread beyond the facility, and that these concerns are based in part on questions on the security of the Plum Island facility in the past.”
“Through my subcommittee post, I intent to exercise such oversight in order to achieve a safe and sustainable outcome for both our national security interests and the welfare of the community where the facility is eventually sited, hopefully in North Carolina.”
Here is a YouTube video of our discussion:
As a citizen, physician, and father, I strongly oppose NBAF in our backyard. Join me in opposing David Price, and opposing NBAF. As your Congressman, I will work for the people of the Fourth District by seeking to make our federal government smaller, not larger. I will work to preserve private property rights, and not encourage unaccountable environmental hazards in our backyards.
February 19th, 2008 at 3:34 pm
Dr. Lawson,
For the record, I see your only connection to Granville County is the time you spent in our State owned facilities. If I were in your shoes and my dsitrict already contained a large part of the industry in the area, I would have the same opinion. Doesn’t seem worth it to you.
Granville County, on the other hand, has very little and we continue to lose industry rather than gain. So, as long as we are talking about things that are outside of our control, I would vote for Mr. Price.
I would anticipate you doing very well in Chapel Hill.
Good Day
February 19th, 2008 at 4:36 pm
BJ,
I applaud you for fighting this bio-disease lab from ever coming to the state of North Carolina. It is very interesting to me why the federal government outlawed the study of Foot and Mouth disease on the mainland United States, but are now content with the opposite. I believe they should keep the lab on Plum Island, so that if there was a failure of some kind, it would be isolated from the mainland. This bio-disease lab should be no where near areas of high population.
February 19th, 2008 at 5:06 pm
Mr. James — I wholeheartedly agree that we need real economic growth, especially in the areas of North Carolina outside the RTP “bubble”. Here’s my question for you: Should we be dependent on a bankrupt federal government building a potentially dangerous BSL-4 laboratory for economic growth in Granville County?
As a nation, if we feel dependent on the federal government for economic growth, then we have already lost. We must question that assumption, and realize that true economic growth comes from a reducing the size of the federal government so that good people like yourself have access to private investment capital to create your own business, and create your own jobs.
How about this — let’s pass on NBAF, and:
- I’ll help reduce the size of the federal government so we can meet its needs with a modest uniform consumption tax
- I’ll help repeal the 16th Amendment and eliminate the income tax so you need no more paperwork to hire employees and create jobs
- You can help make Granville County the most attractive place to create and grow a business in North Carolina, not through selective corporate welfare, but through uniformly low cost and administrative burdens and competitively-priced services
- We’ll work together to support great state legislators who can eliminate corporate welfare in North Carolina, and make North Carolina a great place to create and grow businesses
Again, the key question is thus: “Can the federal government help us any more?” The answer is no, it cannot. It has no more money, and printing/borrowing more only makes our problems worse. We need to stop sending so much wealth to Washington so we can better help ourselves and create our own jobs.
If we follow the steps outlined above, we’ll all be more than pleased with the results.
BJ
February 19th, 2008 at 6:22 pm
How can we afford the NBAF when we are hemorrhaging $18 million per hour overseas? [source: Nina Hachigian, senior VP Center for American Progress] Indeed, we should seek sustainable, organic growth.
February 22nd, 2008 at 8:04 pm
[...] Just Say No to NBAF [...]
February 25th, 2008 at 2:25 am
Mr. James, I’m a Granville County resident and I oppose NBAF, as do many other residents of the County. I’ve been to two NBAF meetings now, one with the opponents of NBAF and the other the public meeting at South Granville High School where residents could ask questions about the faculty to members of Homeland Security, among others. The opposition to the faculty I witnessed at both of these meetings was both massive and passionate. In fact, I’ll go out on a limb and say that based on what I’ve seen — from those meetings and elsewhere — the majority of Granville residents who are aware of NBAF oppose it. Will it create jobs? Sure. Will it be economically beneficial? In a manner of speaking (more on that below*). Is it worth it? Absolutely not.
It’s not worth it because the faculty will put people and animals at risk with deadly viruses. It’s not worth it because accidents happen. It’s not worth it because Plum Island, a similar faculty which this faculty would essentially replace, has connections to the emergence of Lyme Disease. It’s not worth it because hoof-and-mouth disease in England has been traced to an outbreak from a government and pharmaceutical lab there. It’s not worth it because of the high volume of water which will be required for this faculty to operate, especially in light of our current water shortages (which will, in all likelihood), only get worse.
I could go on and on. The benefits simply do not outweigh the drawbacks and risks.
*On the issue of the supposed economic benefits these are questionable because this Biolab is part of a larger problem: run away government spending in Washington. Let’s remember the federal government, which is broke, will be paying for this lab. It will be doing this at a time of a record deficit and runaway debt. Now, what happens when we just spend more money on something like this that we don’t have? Our economy suffers. We increase our deficit and go further into debt. Then, in order to pay for it, we either have to borrow the money (usually from China) or simply print it. This further weakens our dollar, which is already extremely weak and getting weaker by the day, and makes the dollar have less purchasing power. Thus, inflation occurs and prices rise.
Now that’s not exactly beneficial to the economy, is it?
That’s why I really question the “economic benefits” of this pork project. Plus, think about how property values will go down because of this thing moving into the neighborhood.
I hope you’ll consider that and the issues I have brought up as a whole. In the end, the ‘benefits’ simply don’t outweigh the drawbacks and risk and Granville will be better off without NBAF.
March 13th, 2008 at 10:42 pm
[...] fight against the National Bio & Agro-Defense Facility (NBAF) continues to march forward and gather steam. In the last few weeks I have had the pleasure of [...]
May 18th, 2008 at 12:29 am
Mr. Rod James- the facility is being moved from Plum Island (a Level 3 facility) because the New Yorkers refuse to allow it to become a Level 4 facility dealing with diseases affecting humans (no one is mentioning that, but Congress has tried for 10 years to get that facility to deal with anthrax and other diseases that are fatal to humans, not just animals. That is what Level 4 is about. These diseases have no cure.)
Plum Island has had security problems before, and DHS has been very secretive about those.
Keep in mind that the anthrax used to kill 5 people a few years ago came from a similarly secure, Level 4 US military facility. If, God forbid, a similar incident happened at the NBAF in North Carolina, would the jobs this lab may create be worth the loss of life? Currently, no animal leaves Plum Island alive. If every animal in the county or in North Carolina had to be slaughtered due to a security breach, what would that cost to the county’s industry? How would the city be affected in the future after it had an anthrax release on its hands? That would be the end of all new industry there.
Garland made some good points earlier about property values going down as well. This facility doesn’t look like an economically good option no matter how you view it.
June 11th, 2008 at 2:24 pm
[...] Here is BJ Lawson’s view: As a citizen, physician, and father, I strongly oppose NBAF in our backyard. Join me in opposing David Price, and opposing NBAF. As your Congressman, I will work for the people of the Fourth District by seeking to make our federal government smaller, not larger. I will work to preserve private property rights, and not encourage unaccountable environmental hazards in our backyards. [...]