Barbara Hollingsworth: Maryland becoming the East Coast California
By: Barbara Hollingsworth
Examiner Columnist
October 6, 2009
Gov. Martin O'Malley and the Maryland legislature seem dead set on turning their state into the East Coast version of California - the once happy and prosperous jurisdiction on the West Coast that's now on the verge of chaos and bankruptcy.
One of California's many suicidal impulses was a landmark law it passed in 2006 giving unprecedented authority to the California Air Resources Board to implement regulations aimed at reducing emissions at the state level, including a provision mandating a 40 percent increase in fuel efficiency for new cars by 2016 that is currently being challenged in the U.S. Court of Appeals by the Chamber of Commerce and the National Automobile Dealers Association.
Maryland is now heading down the same dead end. Despite the worse recession in a generation, the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Act of 2009 mandates a draconian 25 percent reduction in 2006 greenhouse gas levels by 2020. The legislation was largely the handiwork of a strange coalition of global warming activists and union officials, according to Maryland Commons, a now defunct Web site.
In fact, Brad Heavner, state director of Environment Maryland, bragged during an interview with Maryland Commons that his group was the "lead policy/lobbying group" in getting the legislation written and passed after a previous attempt in 2007 failed. "Right after the session in 2007, Gov. O'Malley created the Maryland Commission on Climate Change, we believe in response to this legislation," Heavner said.
Jim Strong, subdistrict director of the United Steelworkers, added that "when you put everyone at the table, and everybody listens, good things can happen."Except everyone was not at the table. As Paul Chesser of the Heartland Institute noted in a 2008 Examiner op-ed, the commission was the brainchild of the Center for Climate Strategy, "an activist group of climate alarmists" funded by the Rockefeller Foundation.
The CCS convinced states to set up supposedly blue-ribbon panels to give the aura of legitimacy to their radical environmental agenda. The one in Maryland was made up of "a handful of 'experts' like the state's school superintendent and transportation secretary." There were no dissenting voices to point out the damage such stringent environmental regulations would do to Maryland's economy.
The final plan on how to implement the new law is due by 2012. On Sept. 11, Red Maryland blogger Mark Newgent submitted a Public Information Act request to find out whether Environment Maryland and United Steelworkers officials were also involved in writing the regulations.
"I asked for any documents regarding the implementation of the GHG law, including correspondence with the local Maryland steelworkers union and Environment Maryland to see if the administration was outsourcing public policy to these two groups," Newgent said.
In response, Newgent got a bill for $1,353.55 for 44 hours of staff time the Maryland Department of the Environment supposedly needs to search for the records, including 36 cents per printed page - even though he requested the results on a CD-ROM.
When I called to ask why it would take the department an entire workweek and cost more than $1,000 to provide this information to the public, an MDE spokesman claimed it was "a very extensive request." That, of course, doesn't explain how MDE calculated its cost estimate.
Newgent is worried that the same environmental cabal that wrote the legislation will also write the regulations without any meaningful public input. By the time it finally gets to the public hearing stage, he says, the business-strangling new rules will be a rubber-stamped fait accompli.
In response to a similar PIA inquiry two years ago, MDE tried to charge Newgent $1,381.40 for just four hours of staff time, so its productivity is 11 times better than it was in 2007. Unfortunately, that will be the only productivity gains in Maryland for a long, long time as it follows California lemminglike over the cliff.
Barbara F. Hollingworth is The Examiner's local opinion editor.
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