by Robert Bryce
Austin
got whacked
at the Lege. Hurricanes waged war in the Atlantic Ocean. And politicians
continued playing football with the Barton Springs Salamander. Yes, it was
quite a year for environmental stories, and most of those stories were bad
news. Here, then, are my nominees for the Top Ten local and state/national
environmental stories of 1995.
Top Ten Local Stories
1. The UT-Freeport mess. Human rights abuses and environmental problems atFreeport-McMoRan’s Grasberg mine in Irian Jaya, Indonesia have made the naming
of the new molecular biology building on the Forty Acres a major source of
controversy. Freeport claims it had nothing to do with the human rights
problems at the mine, and statements by Indonesian bishop H.F.M. Munninghoff
support their claim. But that hasn’t made the naming of the building after
Freeport CEO Jim Bob Moffett any more palatable to students and faculty on
campus.
2. OPIC cancels Freeport’s insurance. Citing pollution problems at the
company’s huge gold, silver, and copper mine in Irian Jaya, Indonesia, the
Overseas Private Investment Corporation, an arm of the federal government,
cancelled
$100 million in insurance coverage it held on the project.
Freeport announced it will fight the cancellation and has hired former CIA
director James Woolsey to represent them.
3. Texas Natural Heritage Program scuttled. While Texas Parks and Wildlife
Department officials claimed the program was just being reorganized, the Texas
Natural Heritage program, which evaluates endangered species on public and
private land around the state, was quietly dismantled at the behest of property
rights advocates.
4. Bradley takes a Wiz on Austin. Austin’s $90 million man, Gary Bradley,
convinced the Texas Legislature that he needed an independent fiefdom at Circle
C, free of any of Austin’s regulations. Austin Senator Gonzalo Barrientos
filibustered against the measure, calling the proposed deal “the land of Oz.”
Didn’t matter. The Senate approved the deal anyway. Bradley, the Wizard of the
lobby, proved that legislation doesn’t get any more special than this.
5. City gets spanked and sent to bed with no dinner. Austin spent hundreds of
thousands of dollars on lobbyists to protect the city’s interests at the
Legislature, and got crushed anyway. Measures allowing the deannexation of
large tracts, weakened water quality laws, and a host of other measures
stripped the city of many of its powers. Home rule? What’s that? If the
Austin-bashing continues during the next session, the Lege will probably pass a
bill requiring Austin’s mayor to say “Mother, may I…” before leaving the
dais.
6. The Barton Springs Salamander controversy continues. Politics isn’t supposed
to affect science. Tell that to the scientists who have researched the Barton
Springs Salamander, which should have been listed as an endangered species more
than a year ago. In November, the Save Our Springs Legal Defense Fund won a
small victory when a federal judge ruled that U.S. Interior Secretary Bruce
Babbitt had put it off long enough and had to decide whether to list the
amphibian. But the decision was promptly stayed and now Babbitt has several
more weeks to decide the salamander’s fate.
7. The state and the salamander. In a sequel to Dumb and Dumber, the
geniuses at the Texas Natural Resource Conservation Commission (TNRCC) wrote a
report saying there was no “direct, quantifiable relationship between water
quality conditions in Barton Creek and those of the [Barton] Springs.” The
TNRCC also opined that no additional measures were needed to protect the Barton
Springs Salamander. This was the same agency that just a few years ago said the
Edwards Aquifer was the aquifer most prone to pollution in the entire state. Go
figure.
8. TPWD’s Golf Course in Bastrop. “Endangered species? We don’t need no
stinking endangered species!” Okay, maybe Texas Parks & Wildlife Director
Andrew Sansom didn’t say those exact words, but when the bulldozers started
rolling through the habitat of the endangered Houston Toad in Bastrop State
Park, Sansom made clear that his sentiments do not lie with rare animals, but
with birdies, eagles, and bogies.
9. Scooter goes to press. The hardest-working man in the publishing business
finally got the first volume of his magnum opus, The Useful Wild Plants of
Texas and the Southwestern United States, into print. Scooter Cheatham, a
rangy red-headed working machine, began working on the project when Richard
Nixon was in short pants. Now, he has the first volume in print.
Felicidades.
10. Water battles. The boom is going full blast and cities around Austin are
running out of water, which of course makes the Colorado River an attractive
target for everyone within 100 miles. San Antonio has talked about getting
water from the Colorado and Guadalupe Rivers. Meanwhile, Leander and cities to
the north of Austin are desperately trying to find the water they need to fuel
their growth. This problem will only get worse as more people move into the
area. My prediction: cisterns will come back in style. Top Ten State and National Stories 1. Global warming. In September, a group of 2,500 of the world’s leading
scientists agreed that, yes, the globe is getting warmer and we’d better do
something about it soon. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change said
that warming will cause “widespread economic, social, and environmental
dislocation over the next century.” A dire prediction. Now what?
2. Natural disasters. Hurricanes went from A to Z and then started over again.
The Worldwatch Institute has predicted that global warming could bankrupt the
insurance industry through an ongoing cycle of natural disasters. This year
made it seem like a real possibility.
3. The Erskines vs. Midland. In a hotbed of Republicanism, Midge and Woody
Erskine are fighting for their property rights. Most land disputes are about
people wanting to develop their land. The Erskines, who own a 4.4-acre tract in
north central Midland, are fighting for the right to keep their land in its
natural state. Last month, they lost a federal lawsuit against the city. They
are appealing the decision.
4. The property rights rebellion. During the session, it was called SB 14; now
it’s the law and it dramatically weakens the ability of state and local
governments to enforce codes and pass laws. The property rights advocates, led
by Austin’s own state GOP Rep. Susan Combs, also were able to add a provision
to the bill that weakens Austin’s ability to pass stringent water quality rules
in the Barton Springs Zone.
5. The Boll Weevil. It used to be a moniker for conservative southern
Democrats. But now that Texas has launched a massive effort to eradicate the
tiny cotton pest, the boll weevil has become a symbol of hubris. The first
attempt to get rid of the weevil in the Rio Grande Valley and the San Angelo
area, through massive applications of the pesticide malathion, resulted in twin
disasters, with a total loss to the state of some $300 million. Nevertheless,
Texas Ag Commissioner Rick Perry still supports the program, which will expand
to another half million acres next year. Be glad you aren’t a cotton farmer.
6. Carbon Dos. It’s not a sexy border story like drug running or train bandits,
but the pollution continues to belch out of two coal-fired power plants near
Piedras Negras, Coahuila, and it has caused visibility at Big Bend National
Park to be reduced by almost half. Workers in the park are complaining of
respiratory problems and park visitation has dropped dramatically. Fixing the
problem will cost several hundred million dollars and neither the U.S. nor
Mexico has the money or the nerve to make this an important issue.
7. The BECC finally gets started, almost stops. The Congressional budget wars
almost killed all the funding for the Border Environmental Cooperation
Commission, which finally got its act together. The BECC will start funding
several water quality improvement projects over the next year or so.
8. Electric deregulation. This year, the Texas Legislature opened the door for
complete deregulation of the Texas electric market. Electric generators can now
sell power to each other on the wholesale market. Next, we may be able to
select our power company just like we choose long distance carriers.
Theoretically, this will mean that the most efficient generators will dominate
the market. It could also mean that energy conservation programs will go out
the window as suppliers focus on selling energy and only selling energy.
9. Wind power finally comes to Texas. The LCRA and the City of Austin began
getting power from a 35-megawatt wind power plant in Culberson County a few
months ago. The wind turbines at the site, manufactured by Kenetech, will
likely be the first of several hundred such wind generators in Texas as
Kenetech will soon begin assembling the turbines at a plant in Waco.
10. The Tailpipe Revolution. In January, the Legislature suspended auto
emissions testing programs in the state, much to the dismay of Tejas Testing,
which later sued the state for
$170 million for breach of contract. Last
month, Gov. Bush announced a new plan to make emissions testing easier for
people in Dallas-Fort Worth, Houston, Beaumont-Port Arthur, and El Paso. Austin
doesn’t have to follow federal clean air mandates yet, but air quality in the
city is deteriorating and it is likely that over the next few years, Austin,
too, will be forced to deal with federal air quality laws.
This article appears in January 5 • 1996 and January 5 • 1996 (Cover).