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Tues: Phrase of the day
posted at 2008-07-09 02:19 | Last modified 2008-07-09 10:40
Perspicacity gap: The void between common sense and what lawmakers decide to do, generally considered to be inversely proportional to the time left in any given session. (If you're a cynic, cf. obfuscation, fatigue, electability.)
A lawmaker I’ll leave nameless told me today, “Every session, I feel sure we’re doing some good here – right up until the final days, when I wonder what happened.”
Oddly enough, that’s JUST what we folks in the cheap seats were thinking.
Example 1: Hog heaven
It’s just another gut-and-amend, unless you’re an enviro: The Senate is set to vote Wednesday on H822, an unprepossessing tech corrections bill that’s been resurrected as a love letter to the swine farming industry.
I jest, sort of. The new bill would add some teeth to hog farm siting laws by adding civil penalties for violations. But that pales in comparison to what it gives farmers – namely, the option to sidestep community approval requirements and go directly to DENR to okay barn expansions.
Hog industry advocates say the legislation will allow them more flexibility to respond to changing world markets. The NC Pork Council’s Angie Whitener says producers want to change their practices to move birthing sows from stalls into pens because animal rights advocates say it’s healthier for the pigs. (Because really, when don't pork producers listen to animal rights folks?)
Before you get too verklempt, though, consider the source. Senate leaders okayed the move to gut a House bill, stick this language into it, push it through, and send it back. It got precisely one committee hearing, at which exactly one public advocate was permitted to comment (and only then because Wake Dem Janet Cowell requested it, I’m told). If this was such a popular idea, why the bum's rush?
Example 2: Watered down
The House Environment panel today approved H2499, a compromise “drought management’ measure that critics say does little to accomplish its nominal goal.
Governor Mike Easley and conservation groups had called for stringent statewide standards for water use reduction in extreme drought. The initial proposal also included incentives for farmers to report their water use, along with restrictions barring private well users from watering their lawns when public system users face similar bans.
Guess which of the above recommendations made it into the committee substitute? Yep, that’d be none.
- The League of Municipalities convinced committee members “one-size-fits-all” mandatory restrictions were a bad idea.
- The Farm Bureau leveraged its significant heft against (voluntary) water-use reporting by agricultural interests.
- And the property-rights folks won on the private well issue, thanks in no small part to an e-mail campaign warning property owners that city officials were about to start metering wells. (Which isn’t true, incidentally, but that’s another story in itself.)
In the end, pretty much everyone supported the compromise deal -- hardly surprising given that there’s little left in it anyone could object to. Committee leaders say they’re under pressure from the Governor’s office to get “something” done before they end the session. But at what point does “something” equal "nothing of substance"?
Sorry no budget trivia today as promised - too much non-trivial stuff going on. Maybe tomorrow...
(Correction: An earlier version of this post misspelled Whitener's name. Sorry, Angie!)
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