Friday, August 21, 2009
Editorial: Repeal Bush's mine regulation
The Obama administration must follow the rules when it does, though.
From the RoundTable blog
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Cool your jets, President Obama. We know there is a lot of damage to repair from your predecessor's eight years, but that does not mean you should ignore the rules to rush through a change. You have plenty of time to take care of things like the Bush administration's regulation that allows coal companies to fill valleys and pollute waterways.
For 25 years, the rules said coal miners were not allowed to dump polluted leftovers too close to streams and rivers. The federal government had decided that keeping waterways clean was important both for the environment and for the people who rely on the water.
The rules weren't enforced, though. Mammoth mountaintop removal operations buried hundreds of miles of streams.
Environmentalists tried to use this rule to stop the practice, so the Bush administration worked to rewrite it. His team proposed new regulations, accepted public input and then did what it wanted. At least they followed the rules. Obama's team wants to repeal that regulation, so it asked a federal court for permission. Last week, the court declined to give it.
The court explained that if Obama wants to change regulations, he may; he just needs to go through the public process again. There are rules for enacting -- and repealing -- federal regulations, even ones as odious as this.
Interior Secretary Ken Salazar had said the Bush mining regulation "doesn't pass the smell test." That may be, but it is not a legal standard with which we are familiar.
Make no mistake; the Bush regulation is terrible. Waterways need protection, and if it would be another hindrance to mountaintop-removal mining, so much the better.
The administration just needs to follow the rules. Publish the regulations, let the public comment, listen to that input and then act.
