Burnt Orange Report

What is Joe Barton's Priority?

By Byron LaMasters

Is it protecting the citizens of Ellis County from smog and pollution? Or is it protecting the corporate polluters that generate smog who give money to Barton's campaign?

You know that it's an easy question to answer when the Dallas Morning News (one of the most conservative newspapers of any major city in the nation) decides to take on a powerful Republican such as U.S. Rep Joe Barton (R-Ennis). That's what they did on Saturday. I'd recommend reading the article as a great example of the lengths that Republicans in Congress will go to in order to protect big corporations and polluters who are trying to get around the law and EPA regulations at the expense of the health of children and other citizens in their communities:

.S. Rep. Joe Barton's push to exempt Ellis County from the toughest smog rules could directly benefit two corporations linked to Barton campaign donations – corporations now seeking state permits to boost allowed emissions of smog-causing pollution.

Mr. Barton's effort, if successful, would help cement makers Holcim (U.S.) Inc. and Texas Industries Inc. avoid stricter permit requirements and possibly much higher pollution-control costs that would come if Ellis County is designated a smog-violation area, documents and interviews show.

Mr. Barton, R-Ennis, has been working for at least five months to block that listing, saying it is not scientifically justified or economically sensible. The Environmental Protection Agency, which has backed including Ellis County and its heavy industries, is to decide on nationwide listings by April 15.

The EPA's final ruling will determine whether Holcim and TXI must meet the lesser environmental requirements that now apply in Ellis County or the tougher ones that would come with a smog-violator designation, according to a technical review prepared by the EPA.

The ruling would affect any Ellis County industry that seeks an air-pollution permit in the future.

Although most of Ellis County is rural, it is North Texas' center of heavy industry, accounting for about 40 percent of the region's industrial emissions. Altogether, 94 percent of Ellis County's industrial emissions come from a half-dozen cement, manufacturing, energy or waste-disposal corporations whose political action committees have contributed to Mr. Barton's campaigns, a Dallas Morning News comparison of Texas environmental records and federal campaign files shows.

Their donations to Mr. Barton since the 1998 election cycle total $74,500, according to Federal Election Commission reports. That includes $26,500 in either PAC or individual donations from TXI executives and $6,500 from Holcim's PAC.

Mr. Barton also got $27,500 during that period from cement industry PACs to which Holcim's or TXI's political committees donated.

Joe Barton takes the polluters money, and then he goes to work for them. Morris Meyer, Joe Barton's Democratic opponent put it the best:

Morris Meyer, Mr. Barton's Democratic challenger in the 6th Congressional District, said the incumbent's effort to exempt Ellis County from the toughest smog rules threatens the health of his own constituents and others in North Texas.

"It's a fact that people are dying because our air is an issue," Mr. Meyer said. "Barton will craft this as an economic issue. And it is an economic issue. We are losing jobs. People are losing their lives or their livelihoods.

"I believe that we need to shine the light of day on this problem. Barton believes in closed-door legislation on matters that affect the health of people."

Joe Barton is not only out of the mainstream on this issue in local politics, he is out of the mainstream of the Republican Party. Both Texas government and the federal government are controlled by the Republican Party, and state and federal officials have said that Ellis County belongs on the "nonattainment list" (the EPA classification of an area that is a "smog violation area"). Still, Joe Barton, and his congressional office have done everything in their power to challenge the findings of state and federal officials:

State and federal officials agreed that Ellis County belonged on the nonattainment list partly because the county's big industries emit large amounts of smog-causing emissions and partly because the county's own air quality is teetering between clean and dirty as defined by federal law.

Mr. Barton did not agree. At least as far back as Oct. 27, his aides were asking state officials for information justifying local and state clean-air decisions, and sometimes challenging those decisions and questioning details behind them, copies of e-mails and other state environmental commission documents show. The permits for Holcim and TXI weren't planned to coincide with a federal decision on Ellis County – each permit goes back years earlier – but it turned out that way.

It's time that the 6th district have a new congressman who will fight for clean air and other issues that we care about. Learn more about the Democratic candidate for district 6, Morris Meyer, here. Better yet, donate to his campaign here.

Posted by Byron LaMasters at March 22, 2004 02:15 PM | TrackBack