Computer upgrade slows TCEQ action against YFZ
When investigators from the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality office in San Angelo visited the YFZ Ranch in July, they didn't know that a computer system upgrade would delay their report from reaching TCEQ headquarters in Austin for more than two months. But that's exactly what happened.
The delay is over now, according to Ricky Anderson, director of the TCEQ San Angelo office, who said that the report from his office will soon be in Austin and that officials in the agency's enforcement division would take over from there.
Anderson noted the computer system upgrade will make it easier for his office to stay in touch with Austin.
Anderson also confirmed for the Success that YFZ officials have filed an application for a wastewater permit with TCEQ officials in Austin. A check of the application status on the agency's website indicates that the application for a municipal wastewater discharge permit was received from YFZ Land L.L.C. on August 24, 2004 and that the permit is currently undergoing administrative review.
The Eldorado Success invites Warren Jeffs and/or other leaders of the FLDS church to comment on this or any other story surrounding the FLDS and the YFZ Ranch.
Nearly six months later, what have we actually learned about Warren Jeffs?
It's been nearly six months since Eldoradoans awoke to the news that a religious sect had acquired more than sixteen hundred acres of land just outside of town and that members of the group were already erecting large dormitory-style buildings on the property.
Since that day the people of Eldorado and Schleicher County have found themselves living in the eye of a media hurricane as dozens, if not hundreds, of print and broadcast journalists have made their way town, each of them looking for a different angle on a story that seems to change on a daily basis.
And, oh, what a story it has become, complete with religious devotion, official corruption, power grabs, political intrigue and, yes, even a little sex.
FLDS Church holds fast to the doctrine of Blood Atonement
To fully understand the teachings of Prophet Warren Jeffs and his Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (FLDS), one must first understand the teachings of the early Mormon Church, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (LDS), as handed down by the group's first Prophet, Joseph Smith, and how those teachings were carried forward and expanded upon by his successors, including church pioneers like Brigham Young.
First and foremost, FLDS devotees consider themselves to be true Mormons, meaning that it is they and not the mainline LDS Church who is the rightful heir of Joseph Smith's prophecy. By holding fast to traditional church doctrines like Plural Marriage and Blood Atonement, doctrines which were first promoted and then later forsaken by the LDS Church, FLDS faithful believe that they are Smith's living legacy and that it will be through them that God's earthly kingdom will be restored.
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Bleeding the Beast
The FLDS and its conflicting views about government
Newcomers to the story about the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (FLDS) and its Prophet Warren Jeffs often struggle to understand the complex twists and turns of the tale. Most of them quickly home in on the polygamy aspect of the story, however, especially polygamy as it exists inside the closed society of the FLDS, where the Prophet makes all decisions concerning who will marry whom, and where anyone who questions his absolute authority to do so are promptly excommunicated.
Actually, excommunication may be too harsh a word. Inside the FLDS, errant followers are asked to leave and repent from a distance, but few if any, are ever asked to return to the fold.
Eventually, almost everyone who manages to follow the story for more than a few paragraphs finds themselves asking how a man with multiple wives, and even more multiple children, can provide for such a large family. The answer, according to many who have left the church, is a policy called "Bleeding the Beast."
New FLDS compound discovered in Colorado
EXCLUSIVE FOR THE ELDORADO SUCCESS
BY JON KRAKAUER
 MANCOS, CO -- The Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (FLDS) has surreptitiously established a polygamous colony in the state of Colorado. Acting on behalf of the FLDS leadership, a 33-year-old Mormon Fundamentalist named David Steed Allred paid $1,394,000 for two 60-acre parcels of land six miles north of Mancos, a small community in Colorado's southwest corner. Allred, moreover, is presently maneuvering to purchase a third 60-acre parcel lying between the other properties, which would give the FLDS Church a private inholding of 180 contiguous acres entirely surrounded by publicly owned National Forest.
Source: Jeffs building Temple at YFZ Ranch
FLDS has never before built a temple
 Sources close to Prophet Warren Jeffs of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints tell the Success that the reclusive leader is planning to build a temple here in Schleicher County similar in size and scope to the one originally built by Mormon founder Joseph Smith in Nauvoo, Illinois.
"Warren has gone too far," one Utah man said on condition of anonymity. "He thinks he is God, so he has to have a temple."
Aerial photos of the YFZ Ranch show a massive foundation under construction just west of the already completed meeting hall. The footprint of the foundation roughly matches that of the original Nauvoo temple.
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