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Our Access To Noaa/nws Weather To Be Banned?

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RickI

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Location
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I just don't log dives
ACCESS TO FEDERAL WEATHER INFO TO BE BANNED!!!?

NOAA_Main_Page_1.thumb.jpg

Get ready to kiss this goodbye ... IF Senator Richard Santorum,
(R-PA) has his way and his bill becomes law.

Santorum proposed and is trying to hammer through Senate Bill 786,
“National Weather Service Duties Act of 2005” with the goal
of ending your access to a tremendous quantity and variety of competently prepared, free Federal information forever.


TEXT OF THE BILL HERE


PROPOSED BILL WOULD CHANGE NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE
USATODAY
"Proposed bill would change National Weather Service
WASHINGTON (AP) — Sen. Rick Santorum (R-Pa.) is pushing a bill that some fear would restrict what information the National Weather Service (NWS) provides to the public. The bill has drawn criticism from those who say it unfairly favors private weather providers, and would endanger the public by preventing the dissemination of certain weather data.

Under the proposed legislation, the NWS would be allowed to offer particular types of services only if the private sector does not offer them " CONTINUED HERE



*** WANT TO TRY TO PRESERVE YOUR RIGHT TO ACCESS FEDERAL WEATHER INFORMATION? SOME IDEAS FOLLOW ...

1. Sign online petitions.

PETITION #1, JUST CLICK HERE

PETITION #2, JUST CLICK HERE

2. Send letters to your State senators
(IT’S VIRTUALLY AUTOMATIC REQUIRING VERY LITTLE INPUT AND IS FAST!)
JUST CLICK HERE


NOTE: Email is fine but a real letter can be even more impacting. Why not print out the letters this application generates and not only mail them to your State senators but also to Senator Santorum? He needs to know that he has a lot more to worry about than a few special commercial interests.

3. Send a copy of your letters to Santorum at:

Senator Rick Santorum
511 Dirksen Senate Office Building?
Washington, DC 20510?
Main #: 202-224-6324
senator@santorum.senate.gov



*** I M P O R T A N T ***

If you know others that might be impacted by this bill, e.g. farmers, nurserymen, commercial and recreational pilots, commercial and recreational boaters, golfers, golf courses, fishing boats, baseball parks, skiers, homeowners and business owners, investors, developers, bankers and anyone else influenced by weather and forecasts, NOT JUST IN THE USA BUT WORLDWIDE (NOAA currently provides MANY valuable international weather resources), DO ALL OF US A FAVOR AND PASS THIS LINK ON.


If you have other ideas and suggestions, please let us know here. This is an important cause that effects important interests of millions of people. Make your views heard where they can do the most good.


FOR MORE INFORMATION ABOUT ALL OF THIS:

CLICK FOR FULL SIZED IMAGES

CLICK FOR THUMBNAIL IMAGES
 
Since the bill requires that the information be made available quickly, how is it restricted?

I think it is a dumb bill, but I do not see how it means what is being claimed.
 
Link didn't work

This is an automatically generated Delivery Status Notification.

Delivery to the following recipients failed.

senator@santorum.senate.gov
 
This seems to be pushing the TOS IMO
 
Since the bill requires that the information be made available quickly, how is it restricted?

I think it is a dumb bill, but I do not see how it means what is being claimed.


Quoting the bill; " (b) COMPETITION WITH PRIVATE SECTOR- The Secretary of Commerce shall not provide, or assist other entities in providing, a product or service (other than a product or service described in subsection (a)(1)) that is or could be provided by the private sector unless--"

It is intended to remove weather radar, satellite imagery, marine forecasts, and apparently direct communication of the NWS with the public outside of warnings. Read over some of the analysis, it seems to have gained the attention and concern of quite a few people. A big part of the concern deals with how vaguely worded the bill seems to be. More (including the text of the bill as the old link has stopped working at: http://fksa.org/viewtopic.php?t=712



Link didn't work

This is an automatically generated Delivery Status Notification.

Delivery to the following recipients failed.

senator@santorum.senate.gov


That is the only link that I can find online for the Senator. As an alternative, you could cut and paste your message into a field on his website at: http://santorum.senate.gov/public/i...on.ContactForm&CFID=17368290&CFTOKEN=95649343


This seems to be pushing the TOS IMO

TOS?


If you like what is currently available, please sign the petitions and send the letters. No response registers your feelings as well in our political system. It basically says, go ahead and do what you plan if you feel so compelled. We won't try to stop you at this time.
 
Senator Bill Nelson is all over this. He states that the people of Florida need all the hurricane information they can get for safety and planning. It should not be contolled by private companies.
 
RickI:
Quoting the bill; " (b) COMPETITION WITH PRIVATE SECTOR- The Secretary of Commerce shall not provide, or assist other entities in providing, a product or service (other than a product or service described in subsection (a)(1)) that is or could be provided by the private sector unless--"

It is intended to remove weather radar, satellite imagery, marine forecasts, and apparently direct communication of the NWS with the public outside of warnings. Read over some of the analysis, it seems to have gained the attention and concern of quite a few people. A big part of the concern deals with how vaguely worded the bill seems to be. More (including the text of the bill as the old link has stopped working at: http://fksa.org/viewtopic.php?t=712
That is an interesting edit on your part.

Here is a better representation of the text:

(b) Competition With Private Sector.--The Secretary of Commerce
shall not provide, or assist other entities in providing, a product or
service (other than a product or service described in subsection
(a)(1)) that is or could be provided by the private sector unless--
(1) the Secretary determines that the private sector is
unwilling or unable to provide such product or service; or
(2) the United States Government is obligated to provide
such product or service under international aviation agreements
to provide meteorological services and exchange meteorological
information.
(c) Issuance of Data, Forecasts, and Warnings.--
(1) In general.--All data, information, guidance,
forecasts, and warnings received, collected, created, or
prepared by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration
or the National Weather Service shall, to the maximum extent
practicable, be issued in real time, and without delay for
internal use, in a manner that ensures that all members of the
public have the opportunity for simultaneous and equal access
to such data, information, guidance, forecasts, and warnings.
(2) Mode of issuance.--Data, information, guidance,
forecasts, and warnings shall be issued under paragraph (1)
through a set of data portals designed for volume access by
commercial providers of products or services and by such other
mechanisms as the Secretary of Commerce considers appropriate
for purposes of that paragraph.


I stand by my statement that it is dumb bill.

I also stand by my statement that it does not do what you are claiming since it does require that "In general.--All data, information, guidance,
forecasts, and warnings received, collected, created, or
prepared by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration
or the National Weather Service shall, to the maximum extent
practicable, be issued in real time, and without delay for
internal use, in a manner that ensures that all members of the
public have the opportunity for simultaneous and equal access
to such data, information, guidance, forecasts, and warnings."


I wonder what the real agenda is here since neither side is making much sense.
 
(1) In general.--All data, information, guidance,
forecasts, and warnings received, collected, created, or
prepared by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration
or the National Weather Service shall, to the maximum extent
practicable, be issued in real time, and without delay for
internal use,
in a manner that ensures that all members of the
public have the opportunity for simultaneous and equal access
to such data, information, guidance, forecasts, and warnings.
(2) Mode of issuance.--Data, information, guidance,
forecasts, and warnings shall be issued under paragraph (1)
through a set of data portals designed for volume access by
commercial providers
of products or services and by such other
mechanisms as the Secretary of Commerce considers appropriate
for purposes of that paragraph.

The following site competes with accuweather, weather.com, etc.. I believe the intent to stop the direct access of the public to this information via NWS websites. We instead will have to access a version of the same data generated by commercial services.

http://www.srh.noaa.gov/mfl/

http://www.srh.noaa.gov/shmrn.php?mz=amz650

I don't have the same level of confidence in the capacity and accuracy of commercial vendors to provide this information as compared to the NWS from past experience.

This part of the problems seems clear enough to me. Perhaps I am missing something? We are giving up something to allow ourselves the opportunity to pay for the similar content provided by the private sector perhaps of lessor quality.
 
Rick sounds right to me. My totally non-lawyer take is that the NOAA would no longer maitain the public web site, but instead simply provide the data to commercial providers.
 
https://www.shearwater.com/products/peregrine/

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