Wednesday, December 10, 2003
Fewer polluters being punished
The Bush administration is catching and punishing far fewer polluters than the two previous administrations, according to an analysis of 15 years of environmental-enforcement records.
Civil enforcement of pollution laws peaked when the President's father was in office from 1989-93 and has fallen ever since, but it has plummeted since George W. Bush took office three years ago. That is according to records of 17 different categories of enforcement activity obtained through the Freedom of Information Act.
Violation notices against polluters are the most important enforcement tool, experts say, and they have had the biggest drop under the current President Bush. The monthly average of violation notices since January 2001 has dropped 58 percent compared with the Clinton administration's monthly average.
Those pollution citations dropped 12 percent from 2001 to 2002 and an additional 35 percent from 2002 through the first 10 months of 2003.
Punishing polluters - by fines or referrals for prosecution - has dropped as well, but not as dramatically. Administrative fines since January 2001 are down 28 percent, when adjusted for inflation, from Clinton administration levels. Civil penalties average 6 percent less, when adjusted for inflation. And the number of cases referred to the Justice Department for prosecution is down 5 percent.
Story.
posted by chris at 2:09 PM
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