| Topic: |
Politics > Politics-USA |
| User: |
"Harry Hope" |
| Date: |
29 Jan 2005 01:47:31 PM |
| Object: |
Bush's former EPA chief says GOP sabotaged security efforts |
From The Star-Ledger, 1/28/05:
http://www.nj.com/search/index.ssf?/base/news-8/1106925338161590.xml?starledger?nnj
Whitman: GOP foiled security efforts
Book says legislators helped lobbyists defeat rules for chemical
plants
BY ALEXANDER LANE
Star-Ledger Staff
Industry lobbyists worked with key Republican lawmakers to sabotage
new security regulations for chemical plants after the 9/11 attacks,
Christie Whitman alleges in her new book.
Many chemical plants -- including dozens in New Jersey -- could
release toxic clouds that could kill tens or even hundreds of
thousands of people in the case of an attack or a major malfunction.
Their security became a prime concern of experts after 9/11, but
proposed regulations requiring safety measures failed to pass in
Congress.
In her new book, "It's My Party Too," former New Jersey Gov. Whitman
-- who was head of the Environmental Protection Agency as the debate
raged in Congress and the Bush administration -- placed the blame
squarely at the feet of chemical-industry lobbyists and congressional
Republicans.
Whitman wrote that she and Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge
crafted rules requiring the 15,000 most high-risk plants to "take
reasonable steps to address those vulnerabilities, and report to the
EPA that they had complied."
"Although both Tom and I agreed such legislation was necessary, strong
congressional opposition -- led by some Republicans on the Senate
Environment and Public Works Committee and the House Energy and
Commerce Committee -- to giving EPA even this modest additional
statutory authority made it difficult to secure administration
support," Whitman wrote, singling out Sen. James Inhofe (R-Okla.) and
Rep. Billy Tauzin (R-La.) for blame.
She said she grew so frustrated she formally asked the White House to
"relieve EPA of its lead responsibility for reducing the vulnerability
of the chemical sector to attack."
"The American Chemistry Council (a chemical-industry lobbying group)
fought hard against my efforts," Whitman wrote.
"I sometimes wonder whether those companies spend more money trying to
defeat new regulations than they would by simply complying with them."
There are still no federal regulations requiring chemical facilities
to gird against attack.
_________________________________________________________
Now *that's* un-American.
Harry
.
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