The 6th Circuit Court of Appeals issued an Order of Stay preventing the implementation of the Waters of the United States regulation pending final judicial review.
In response, Governor Mike Pence issued the following statement:
“I am encouraged by the 6th Circuit’s decision to halt this federal overreach. There are significant issues with this rule that must be carefully addressed. The court’s Order of Stay ensures that Indiana will not be irreparably harmed by a rule that I believe will ultimately fail on its merits.
“The solutions to the challenges we face will most effectively emanate from our state capitals, not federal bureaucrats in Washington, D.C. In Indiana, we are growing our economy, creating jobs, and feeding the world by eliminating bureaucratic red tape and reducing the size of government. I believe that Hoosiers know best how to protect our waters, and this rule inhibits Indiana’s ability to manage its own affairs.â€
Background: The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers issued the Waters of United States regulation in an attempt to clarify and redefine the limits of federal jurisdiction over waterways under the Clean Water Act. In its Order, the 6th Circuit noted that, “the sheer breadth of the ripple effects caused by the Rule’s definitional changes counsels strongly in favor of maintaining the status quo for the time being.†In November of 2014, Governor Pence and Lt. Governor Sue Ellspermann sent letters to the EPA and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers urging them to withdraw the proposed rule that redefines “Waters of the United States†protected under the Clean Water Act. The letter in full can be found attached.
Governor Pence Letter to EPA 11.14.14
This Pence press release is about clean water regulation, and jurisdiction, right?
But lo and behold, THIS is why most people can’t stand politicians…including this line:
“In Indiana, we are growing our economy, creating jobs, and feeding the world by eliminating bureaucratic red tape and reducing the size of government.”
Ugh. Pence could give a damn about this issue. He has no interest in this. He Just. Wanted. To. Put. Out. A. Press. Release. To. Capture. Media. Attention.
Pence thinks he is not a Bureaucrat BUT he is a Bureaucrat. The State does not know how to control it’s water pollution. All Pence wants to do is let the polluters pollute more. If he thinks that the thousands of farms in Indiana don’t contribute significantly to our water pollution then maybe he should go live on a PIG farm for a while and see for himself the PIG waste that’s created and how it’s handled.
Evansville, IN is an example of how the State of IN handles it’s human waste. They just pump it into the Ohio River when ever it’s convenient instead of controlling the human waste properly.
Owensville, IN has too much Nitrate in their well water. This Nitrate comes from the excessive fertilizer that IN farmers in the area put on their fields to grow the crops. It drains down into the subsoil and into the ground water where it accumulates in the well waters. Hundreds of human are drinking water with excessive levels of nitrate dissolved in their drinking water. NOT A GOOD THING. And drilling another well may not help the situation. Once the ground water’s aquifer is contaminated it’s not really possible to get the pollution out of the ground water. That means they will have to figure out a way to filter the nitrates out of the ground water before drinking it. That’s a costly endeavor.
Pence and the GOP are really bad at controlling Pollution. The GOP is for letting Business run rampant in the streets with very little controls over what they do with their waste. That is not right. The GOP wants to get rid of the Pollution Police. So the pollutions can go full steam ahead and pollute the ground water at will. That is not good nor is it right.
NO one has the right to pollute others water supply or air. If the pollution is leaving your property then you have failed to control the pollution at the source and there should be penalties for doing that.
We need Pollution Police to protect us from polluters just as we need Policemen to catch speeders going down the Lloyd. We need Pollution Police to protect us from the people who would dump toxic waste into our drinking water IE RIVERS & STEAMS. Farmers should not be immune from their responsibility to control the pollution that they create on their farms.
Farmers in an effort to increase their profits and crop yields already are spraying dangerous pesticides on the very food that we all eat. They spray the crops and their top soil with pesticides, herbicides and fertilizers all of which combine to cause disease of humans and other animals down the road. These Pesticides kill insects that would eat the crops but they also do long term damage to the environment. DDT was a prime example of how a pesticide can do considerable damage to the environment. The American Bald Eagle nearly went extinct due to excessive use of DDT by many people. DDT molecules can still be found even up in the Northern Alaska as it was carried around the world and still persists in the environment today even after it was banned many years ago.
Pollution should be controlled now allowed to go full steam ahead and dumped into the environment willey Nilley.
Pence is just WRONG.
It’s time for the farmers to stop allowing animal waste to flow off their property into our public streams and ditches which flow to the Ohio River and Wabash River.
Governor Pence would have us GUT the EPA and the pollution laws that the US Congress Passed to protect us from water, air and land pollution. Pence get out of the way and let the Police do their job. This could easily be called Obstruction of Justice in other situations.
If IN had controlled it’s water pollution there would have never been a need to form the USEPA in the first place. IN has a horrible record of controlling it’s Air Pollution and it’s water pollution.
UNFUNDED MANDATE
From Wikipedia
In the United States, federal mandates are orders that induce “responsibility, action, procedure or anything else that is imposed by constitutional, administrative, executive, or judicial action” for state and local governments and/or the private sector.
An unfunded mandate is a statute or regulation that requires a state or local government to perform certain actions, with no money provided for fulfilling the requirements. Public individuals or organizations can also be required to fulfill public mandates.
As of 1992, 172 federal mandates obligated state or local governments to fund programs to some extent.Beginning with the Civil Rights Act of 1957 and the Civil Rights Act of 1964, as well as the Voting Rights Act of 1965, the United States federal government has designed laws that require state and local government spending to promote national goals.
During the 1970s, the national government promoted education, mental health, and environmental programs by implementing grant projects at a state and local level; the grants were so common that the federal assistance for these programs made up over a quarter of state and local budgets. The rise in federal mandates led to more mandate regulation.
During the Reagan Administration, Executive Order 12291 and the State and Local Cost Estimate Act of 1981 were passed, which implemented a careful examination of the true costs of federal unfunded mandates. More reform for federal mandates came in 1995 with the Unfunded Mandates Reform Act (UMRA), which promoted a Congressional focus on the costs imposed onto intergovernmental entities and the private sector because of federal mandates. Familiar examples of Federal Unfunded Mandates in the United States include the Americans with Disabilities Act and Medicaid.
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During my lifetime the “unfunded” federal mandates have grown to a point where it is clear that the states lack the financial ability to comply with the totality of the mandates.
Where we go from here is anyone’s guess, but if this country is to prosper and compete with the rest of the world a solution to these unfunded mandates must be found that allows for that to happen.
The Fed should provide funds to help the farmers keep our public waters safer if possible. And it’s possible. The Feds help the Cities in American build water pollution control facilities all the time. The farmers should be no different. Although the farms already receive a lot of money to help them produce their crops. They should also get help in figuring out the best way to control their pollution. Most farms these days are not the mom and pop farms of the past. They are many that are huge conglomerates.
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