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Great Lakes
Article:
Wetlands policy bogged
down
Environmentalists, developers square
off
By MARTIN DeAGOSTINO
Southbend Tribune Staff Writer
Posted 09/10/2002
INDIANAPOLIS -- Lawmakers and others have started the
hard work of crafting a state wetlands policy that could
replace the swamp of laws and rules that now govern them.
It's a divisive issue. Indiana has lost about 85 percent
of its original wetlands areas, and much of the remaining
acreage is coveted on one side by
developers, industry and farmers, and on the other by
conservationists.
Pro-economic development forces tried to push laws favorable
to them through the Indiana General Assembly this year,
while environmentalists backed new regulations proposed
by the state Department of Environmental Management.
Lawmakers did not resolve the struggle but took two steps
to assert their role in setting policy.
First, they forbade a state rule-making agency from adopting
IDEM's proposed regulations until at least next year.
Second, they directed a state advisory board to recommend
new legislation for consideration next year.
That board, the Environmental Quality Service Council,
launched work last week by appointing three work groups
to tackle different wetlands issues -- wetlands categories,
incentives for restoration and statutory authority.
According to participants, the larger topic -- wetlands
-- is probably too broad for the EQSC to cover thoroughly
in the allotted time. "But I think we can probably get
into the framework of it," said Sen. Beverly Gard, R-Greenfield.
Gard leads the work group on statutory authority, which
tried for two hours Friday to define key terms. The group
also wrestled briefly with a more fundamental question:
Should Indiana change current policies that rely on a
nexus of federal and state laws and administrative regulations?
Gard answered yes, based on the General Assembly's directive
to the EQSC and on two court decisions -- one federal
and one state -- that have pushed the issue.
But she said the work groups can only succeed if they
address broad principles of regulation, not every detail.
"I'm a little overwhelmed how we're going to get done
in the next six weeks," she said.
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