Walking down Bruin Walk this week, there was yet another set of
signs in the grass. But unlike previous Undergraduate Students
Association Council election signs or the Halloween
“graveyard,” this California Public Interest Research
Group display had a positive message: People can be a force for
positive change.
Unfortunately, though, people don’t seem to be coming
through when it comes to the concerns raised by the environmentally
conscious CALPIRG. Still, the group’s efforts are commendable
since it is becoming harder and harder to find real support for the
environment, on either a local or national level.
When Republicans take charge of the Senate, the Environment and
Public Works Committee will change more than any other. The
incoming chairman is Senator James Inhofe (R-Okla.), who once
called environmental agencies “Gestapo bureaucracies.”
The League of Conservation Voters has given him a zero, the worst
score, every time they ranked him in the past ten years.
Inhofe is replacing Senator Jim Jeffords, a Republican turned
Independent, who had a special affinity for environmental issues
and was willing to make compromises to pass meaningful
legislation.
Inhofe seems to favor economic gains over environmentally
conscious decisions, and environmentalists are concerned that this
will lead him to undermine important environmental laws such as the
Clean Air Act, the Clean Water Act, and the National Environmental
Policy Act. He sees provisions in these laws, like reducing coal
emissions, as economic burdens, not positive steps that help
preserve the environment.
Inhofe has not put together a concrete list of his priorities
for the committee, but a spokeswoman said he wants to “ensure
that everything we do is based on sound science and cost-benefit
analysis.”
It seems anti-environment politicians are always tossing around
the term “sound science,” as if the evidence presented
to them is somehow intentionally faulty. Although one must always
approach scientific fact with a degree of skepticism, starting with
the attitude that the data is going to be wrong can only lead to
false conclusions.
And while cost-benefit analyses are important, they should not
be the basis for environmental decisions. Making the case that an
environmental policy is detrimental to the economy is easy because
it generally will be ““ at first. The benefit comes later, and
oftentimes cannot be measured monetarily.
Policies have already begun changing, even though Inhofe has not
yet taken control in the Senate. A ban the Clinton administration
placed on snowmobiles in Yellowstone and Grand Teton National
Parks, which was to take effect in March 2003, has now been
reversed by the Bush administration.
The new plan will allow a set number of snowmobiles to enter the
park. Steve Bosak, from the National Parks Conservation
Association, said of the decision: “If they can go in and
meddle with a decision that was founded on years of scientific
research and based on laws that defend our parks ““ and was
well supported by the majority of the American public ““
who’s to say they won’t favor a special interest that
will mess up another park?”
And who’s to say they won’t favor another special
interest that will mess up the ozone? And the forests? And the air?
And the ocean?
The park issue is one that hits close to home for many people.
When park rangers have to wear respirators, work in kiosks that
have fresh air pumped in and some even have to wear hearing
protection, as they do in Yellowstone, there is something very
wrong.
It is much easier to be pro-environment in a situation like
Yellowstone than it is in one that is more amorphous, which most
are. More environmental issues need to be addressed in a concrete
fashion, though, in order to make the public, and thus the
politicians, more supportive.
The best place to start learning to love the environment is with
local activism. The CALPIRG campaign is a great example of a
positive message and a positive direction for a cause that too
often finds itself without either.