Shelley Sheehy wrote: What do people know about the holdup on the energy bill caused by Grassley's demand that the Townsend rainforest project near Coralville be included? I read this in the Post last week. Didn't local residents express real opposition to this project? ============================================== The following message was posted on another Iowa listserve Sunday and is copied here by Jane Clark. On the front page of Saturday's Des Moines Register was a story headlined "Pork for Iowa" (see web address below) http://desmoinesregister.com/news/stories/c4789004/22710629.html The story reported that Senator Charles Grassley of Iowa is seeking special government financing, as part of a new energy bill in Congress, for a tropical rainforest and learning center in Coralville (better known to some of you as the "Iowa Environmental Project", promoted by the Iowa Child Institute). I would encourage you to contact Senator Grassley (using the web address below) and ask him to not fund this project. Let him know that good examples of Iowa's real "rainforest" (its prairies, forests and wetlands) are being lost every year because of a lack of funds. Iowa needs to protect these areas, part of its natural heritage, not build a copy of a plant community from another part of the world. Suggest to Senator Grassley that Iowa needs more projects like the addition to the Effigy Mounds National Monument in northeast Iowa, which he supported with federal funds. chuck underscore (_) grassley with an @ after grassley, then grassley.senate.gov. (I am writing this out because computers insist on underlining the entire e-mail address, which hides the _ between chuck and grassley. [log in to unmask] The proposed "Iowa Environmental Project" has a tenative budget of $225 million. That could purchase a lot of prairie, forest and wetlands. Remind Senator Grassley that Iowa's public and private conservation agencies do not have anywhere near enough funds to protect the best examples of Iowa's plant communities, its natural heritage. It probably would not hurt to e-mail Senator Tom Harkin of Iowa either: The proposed "Iowa Environmental Project" has a tenative budget of $225 million. That could purchase a lot of prairie, forest and wetlands. Remind Senator Grassley that Iowa's public and private conservation agencies do not have anywhere near enough funds to protect the best examples of Iowa's plant communities, its natural heritage. - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - To get off the IOWA-TOPICS list, send any message to: [log in to unmask]