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About Oregon daily emerald. (Eugene, Or.) 1920-2012 | View Entire Issue (Nov. 5, 2002)
Nation & world briefing Bush’s EPA hits polluters with fewer, smaller fines Seth Borenstein Knight Ridder Newspapers (KRT) WASHINGTON — Polluters have paid 64 percent less in fines for breaking federal environmental rules under the Bush administration than they did in the final two years of the Clinton administration, ac cording to federal records analyzed by Knight Ridder. The Bush administration is forc ing fewer polluters to pay fines, and the penalties are much smaller than they were under Clinton, according to records obtained hv a former top environmental-enforcement official under President Bush. “There’s a tremendous problem with environmental policy in general and enforcement in particular in this administration,” said Sylvia Lowrance, who was the Environmen tal Protection Agency’s acting assis tant administrator in charge of en forcement from January 20, 2001, to May 2002. A 28-year civil servant, she retired in August. “The dam don’t lie.” Lowrance’s deputy, EPA civil-en forcement chief Eric Schaeffer, who resigned last February to protest what he charged was weak enforce ment, compiled four years’ worth of EPA non-Superfund civil-enforce ment settlements through Oct. 1,'all published in the Federal Register. A Knight Ridder analysis found that during the first 20 months of the Bush administration, civil penalties averaged S3.8 million per month. During the last 28 months of the Clinton administration, civil penal ties for the same types of violations averaged $10.6 million a month. In addition, Bush’s EPA is requir ing violators to pay much less for environmental projects, such as restoring wetlands, that they are or dered to undertake as part of their settlements. The value of such ex tra projects plummeted 77 percent during the first 20 months of the Bush administration. Their value averaged S2.6 million per month, versus SI 1.6 million per month during the last 28 months of the Clinton administration. During the Clinton administration the average civil penalty was SI.36 million, versus S605,455 under the Bush administration, a drop of near ly 56 percent. The EPA says it does not have fig ures for 2002, hut spokesman Joe Martyak said polluter penalties in fis cal 2001 totaled nearly twice as much as those paid in 2000 under Clinton. Schaeffers accounting showed that three-quarters of the 2001 settlement fines were agreed upon before Bush took office, but Martyak said polluter penalties were rising under Bush. The EPA’s current enforcement chief, John Suarez, vows to be vigilant. “I feel the pressure is out there for us to go do good enforcement cases,” Suarez said in an interview. “We will continue to enforce. We must con tinue to enforce.” Current EPA officials said it was unfair to compare the first months of an administration to Clinton’s sec ond-term EPA, which had many years of experience. Because Bush’s first choice as EPA enforcement chief had to withdraw under pres sure on Capitol Hill, Suarez did not take over until August. Before that he was New Jersey’s gambling-en forcement chief. During her confirmation hearings in January 2001, EPA Administrator Christie Whitman promised an EPA •that collaborates more with busi ness, but added: “We will work to promote effective compliance with environmental standards without weakening our vigorous enforce ment of tough laws and regulations.” Former EPA enforcer Schaeffer, now director of the Rockefeller Fam ily Fund’s Environmental Integrity Project, said, “They’ve obviously taken the pressure off (polluters), es pecially on the clean-air cases.” © 2002, Knight Ridder/Tribune Information Services. 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