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Public Letter to the Wisconsin Board of Commissioners of Public Land

Terms and use of text: Text can be used to email the Wisconsin Board of Comissioners of Public Land. It must be kept in entirety or taken by paragraph. It must keep the same tone and if not, it must be quoted. Hate speech of any kind cannot be incorporated into this text.
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 As a resident I want to express that I am disappointed that the Board of Commissioners of Public Land has decided to ban work and discussion on climate change.

First and foremost, I am disappointed that the board is justifying it's actions as banning 'political' activity. Which rests on the assumption that the topic of climate change is political. The topic of climate change is no more political than the theory of relativity, or gravity. It should be delegated to the realm of fact, and current phenomena. It would be insidious to ban the discussion of upcoming major storms or wildfires, or worse yet, the farmers almanac for crop plantings, and yet climate change rests in the same field; a scientific understanding of weather patterns based on meteorology, sediment layers, and atmospheric concentrations of gases. To me it is absurd that such discussion should be banned.

The government should not censor discussion or work because of some skirmish between co-workers and their intellectual leanings. And Matt Adamcyzk, I am most disappointed in you that you would involve government in such affairs. It is one thing to talk privately about these matters, it is another to make it an utter political and governmental affair. To add an unnecessary layer of bureaucracy to say that Nelson and all other employees must "forward' all emails concerning climate change "so we can all look at it" is unnecessarily burdensome and wasteful. The fact that Nelson had to justify going to a timber conference that had a discussion about climate change shows a severe breach of the role of government in scientific affairs.

The fact is, banning discussion and work about climate change is  detrimental, not only to the Board of Commissioners of Public Land, but of the state and nation more broadly. It is not the first time that political feelings about climate change have attempted to trump the 97 percent scientific consensus on the matter. Climate change is a fact, whether your gut feeling supports it or not. Banning discussion about climate change, as the legislature tried to do earlier last year, is detrimental to our ability to cope and adapt to changing realities. For god sakes, our seed planting regions have shifted, is it so unforeseeable to you that the changing ecologies of timber and harvest will inevitably be affected as well? We know climate change will affect wildfire and drought, because precipitation will become more variable (meaning less of the consistent light rain, and more extreme rain followed by long drought). This means more propensity for wildfire, tree infestation by invasive beetles and pests, and lowered water tables. This will no doubt affect the Board of Commissioners of Public Land. As an Alumni and resident of this state, I think it is fickle and immature to handle our state's future investments based on outright obstinance in the face of scientific consensus on the matter. Climate change will affect our public lands, and it will affect the Board of Commissioners of Public Land. It is not a political matter but a somber reality. A reality the Board of Commissioners of Public Land would be privy to read up on, and even actively engage in learning about changing timber ecologies and climate change at conferences like Nelson tried to do. I am sorely disappointed that our Board of Commissioners has valued political obstinance over mature realism in handling our state's investments.

The Board of Commissioners with this vote is making a precedent that everyday discussion topics or scientific understandings can be censured in work environments because they are 'political'. This sets a precedent that we do not want to follow. I ask the Board of Commissioners to overturn the most recent vote against work or discussion of climate change. It is not the governments affair to micro-manage the intellectual leanings of it's employees, and it never should be.







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