The Post-Tribune, while offering the opinion that Mitch Daniels has been a decent governor for Indiana, finds his environmental record to be very bad, noting that Gov. Daniels has done the following:
Since Daniels came into office, under the direction of Easterly and his boss, Indiana has:
* Closed the IDEM office of enforcement.
* Weakened enforcement rules, making it necessary to demonstrate environmental degradation before the state takes action.
* Ended contracts with local air pollution monitors, including some in Hammond and Gary.
* Removed nearly all references about global warming in the state’s educational material for kids.
* Appointed a coal industry attorney as IDEM’s lead counsel.
* Fast-tracked the BP Whiting expansion permit, weakening it in the process and potentially endangering the much-needed capital project.
Daniels, who generally has been a good governor for Indiana, has failed so miserably on environmental issues one could conclude that his actions are intentional.
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I read this article to my husband. He thinks Gov Mitch is very smart and does nothing without intention. Sometimes the intentions may be realized even beyond his dreams – for instance, engineering the property tax issue in order to take over the school budgets to have more control over public schools — then getting to put their budgets on hold even further because of decreased sales tax revenue as a result of the recession…what luck.
Really? Intentional? Really? I believe it is all a coincidence.
I agree with Mary that Daniels does nothing without intention. I don’t understand how anyone can criticize his environmental record and then give him a free pass on everything else. What Daniels has done to IDEM, he has done and is doing to every state agency. I hope and pray that his reign as governor will be his last political office.