The Lafayette Journal & Courier offers us a time zone exhaustion editorial:
The issues of daylight savings time and what time
zone Indiana should be in have been discussed, dissected and cross
examined. Is there really anything more to say?
If only this weariness had set in during the 30 years when opponents of the system that served us for those decades offered DST legislation year after year. Pretty convenient that it sets in the year after Daylight Saving Time squeaked through.
In any event, it is not so much about saying more about the subject. It’s about giving the citizens of Indiana a vote on the subject. Keep in mind that the DST legislation was passed on the strength of Rep. Troy Woodruff’s vote after he promised to “never” vote for Daylight Saving Time and a fragmented time zone with the majority of the state being on Eastern Daylight Time signed into law by a Governor who said on the campaign trail that he favored statewide Central Daylight Time.
Now, it’s a stretch to conclude that voters voted for candidates based on their opposition to DST or preference for Central Time, particularly, but certainly we cannot conclude that the result we have is the “will of the people” when elected representatives acted contrary to their stated positions. At least Rep. Crooks proposal, which the Journal & Courier finds so exhausting, would allow the people to have their say.
I think it really is getting time to move on with this issue…..including this blog….although you do a great job covering many topics, I think it’s time to move on….we are all getting weary of the whining on this…..yes, there are flaws in the new system, and yes, you can be critical of the gov’s handling of this, but the old system was a joke, and I for one, have some faith that Hoosiers can adjust (and actually learn to change their clocks). Move on.
Just doing what little I can to help the issue remain on people’s minds when it’s time to vote in April and November and to document the record so that if people want to research the issue, they have a repository of information.
There is no one stopping those who “want to move on” from doing so. This mantra seems to come from the proponents of DST, who after 35 years of complaining and losing are now temporarily on top. If only they would leave the field to us who want to undo the mess they have brought down on the state.
If CT is ever going to be instituted on a statewide basis then issue must be kept alive.I don’t personally care if it is or isn’t,but I know to get things done in a democracy there must be CONSTANT PRESSURE and there must be a leader who can twist arms and use party unity as a reason to vote together( as Gov Daniels did with CDT).So I dont think the issue will be put to rest.
A new govenor would have to choose CT as a priority goal as Daniels did with DST.
However, I personally cannot see any compeling reason to advance discussion on statewide CT time .USDOT shot down the natural placement argument using latitude and measuring distance from 75W and 90W.Also they said they had no control what time schools started in the morning.These were the 2 main reasons to advocate CT over ET. And I cannot come up with any other reasons for STATEWIDE CT,except that some people just like earlier sunrises.
If no one wants to talk time in Indiana I beg to be ignored.
I suspect if the State of Indiana came to the DOT with a petition to put the entire state in either the Central or Eastern time zone, regardless of the purported reasons for the petition, the DOT would grant the petition in a heartbeat.
The DOT shot down (or at least ignored) the geographic argument as a reason to split counties within the state, but I think it would be so glad to have our state on one time zone, it would not look too deeply into the reasons supporting the petition. Indiana is 140 miles wide, it’s a little silly to have a state this narrow on two time zones. (Or three, if we have Martin or Pulaski County going renegade and illegally observing their own time zone like the southeastern counties have done for the past 30+ years.)
I think exhaustion is the right word FOR NOW. NOTHING will change in the next few months, there is no reason to waste energy and yell at the wall.
I think it is great to keep news on blogs like this, but efforts to make change right now are useless. We JUST had a change, that is what seperates this from the 30 years there was debate with no change.
Now that we have had a change, let’s all try it out. See what DST and new time zones are like. Then, when DST is over and election draws near, it will be time again to make a case for Central. There will be more credibilty to saying “I’ve tried it, and I still don’t like it” rather than “I don’t need to try it to know I hate it!”. While the latter may be true, it is less convincing.
I’d suggest that when election time rolls around, the focus should not be on whether Eastern, Central, Daylight, or Standard Time is better or worse. It should be on the process used to get to the current result and on how the process and the result differs from promises made on the campaign trail and from the process you would expect if you truly cared about determining and implementing the will of the people.
I have one disagreement.NW Indiana( Chicago commuting area) will always be CT and those counties near Cincinnati and Louisville will always be ET. From DOT’s point of view THATS unity.
I don’t think it is settled as to just what NW Indiana is. That it includes Newton, Lake, Porter and LaPorte seems strong. Starke has moving economically in the direction of NW Indiana for the last 15 years and its switch to Central should confirm Jasper County’s NW orientation. A segment of Pulaski County seems to have gotten into a snit when it turned out that the Culver (Marshall County based, extending into four counties) schools would be operating on a different time than Pulaski County, but if you look at the County’s commuter figures I think they could be headed for an intra county fight. (As a side bar I understand that the Culver School board actually wrote the Starke County Commissioners suggesting that they follow Pulaski County’s lead and refuse to observe the new time line.) Before I will be convinced that the issue has passed I will have to be convinced that it has no legs in St. Joseph County. All it takes is one of the state’s major population centers and the issue is back in full force and St. Joseph County has plenty of reasons, and more reasons every day as Porter and southern Lake County grow, to look to its immediate west.
On older maps( dating back as far as 1880’s) time zone lines were drawn through counties, so that towns could decide which time to adopt. I have a 1957 map of Indiana that disappeared the next year where the time line cut through some counties.That would solve problems such as Hudson lake/Rolling Praire/New Carlisle schools being separated as well as Culver school districts and perhaps Crane Naval Warfare Center and even Remington and Wolcott being separated. Just meander the line one way or the other so that certain specific entities are united.That could be fine tuning after the basic map is drawn.Interestingly enough this 1957 map of Indiana was evidently in effect for only a short time, and the time line went back to the IN/OH border in 1958 until it was moved in the 60’s similar to the 1957 line, except it strictly followed county lines.
There is a facet of this issue that has never been openly discussed, dissected or cross examined. Why doesn’t every morning newspaper in the state support central time? It seems to me extending their deadline an hour would be very beneficial for a paper and it’s customers. The recent tragic misreporting of the West Virginia mine disaster is a case in point. An extra hour to check out and verify the initial false report that the miners had been found alive might have saved the papers much embarrassment. I am sure all the sport reporters would like an extra hour to file their stories about the West Coast games that ended late. I can’t think of a single reason for any of the state’s morning newspapers to want Eastern Time. Can anyone?
Newspapers have been notorious over the years for tracking the Chamber of Commerce party line on time issues and on DST in general. It seems that pleasing the people who pay the advertising dollars is more important than accuracy (or getting in those west coast baseball scores). As an aside, possibly the best (or most egregious) example in the State of tracking the C-of-C Party line on EDT has been the Fort Wayne News-Sentinel. Its editorial page seems to consist of little more than sneering at positions its Editorial Chief Leo Morris dislikes.
There is no doubt that some businesses (read golf courses, some retailing, particularly garden supply business) get a boost from manipulating our daily routines by playing with our clocks (the pro daylight saving position)and pushing us into daily routines more and more out of sync with the position of the sun (pro-Eastern time). The newspapers have concluded they get more advertising when time games are being played and from groups which benefit from ever “later” sunsets than those that are hurt by this game. If we were to have much chance at altering the editorial policies of newspapers (as influenced by their pocket book) we would need a careful look at which businesses are hurt (beyond drive-in movie theaters) by the time situation. Anecdotal evidence suggests better quality restaurants and the arts are among the groups which suffer. (In other words, guys substitute a round of pasture pool at the cost of taking their wife out for dinner and a musical.) Then we would have to convince the newspapers that their long term revenues will fall if some of these businesses fail. All this would have to be down in the face of the first reaction of any consumer oriented business whose business volume slips. That is, to increase advertising outlays to remind people that they still exist. In other words, changing the newspapers means changing a policy, and a position, they have tended to back for 80 years.
Some might take this as a cue to boycott the newspapers, but I do not advocate such a tack. Our communities, in my view, are in bad enough a state of dissolution as it is without undercutting one of the few institutions that bind communities together. (I could go further down this line and how I think the change to “class basketball” for the state tourney killed another of Indiana’s endearing, but community building, idiosyncrasies or on how the governor has contributed to the problem by turning region against region and county against county across the state, but I’ll leave that to another day.)
Our best bet in my view? Building up and supporting alternative news and editorial sources, such as this blog. I have a sense that this blog has provided the meat for many a letter to the editor from a person who knew how they felt, but didn’t know exactly how to say it. I certainly saw echos of things first said here appearing in other places, such as the DOT docket. This approach keeps up the relentless onslaught of letters to the editor, and an onslaught which doesn’t always come from the same people.
By the way, the story behind the newspapers is nicely summarized (and better put than I can manage) in the book “Spring Forward: The Annual Madness of Daylight Saving Time” by Michael Downing.
The DST issue is probably never going to go away in Indiana. I also see no reason for telling people to drop it, move on, etc. As Doug says, a good argument can be made that DST was not the will of the people last year. It was the will of the governor and the people who wer strong-armed into voting for the DST bill.
I don’t know much about the Fort Wayne News-Sentinel, but my local paper’s editorial page has been advocating DST for as long as I can remember, despite the fact that most people here like being on EST/CDT for seven months. Every year they’d find two people–one from Ohio and one from Indiana–who couldn’t add and subtract one. Those people would complain about how “difficult” and “confusing” it was to do business, shop, or keep appointments across the state line. Nevermind that there were thousands of people who adjusted just fine every year when Ohio went on DST and we didn’t. None of those people were ever interviewed or asked for their opinions.
The newspaper would also run editorials with the standard reasons for going on DST:
1. DST is better for the economy than Standard Time. (No proof offered)
2. Crime goes down under DST (Can’t criminals stay up later or wait until the dark hours of the morn to commit crimes?)
3. DST is the standard for international business. (Why is *Standard* Time not the standard? Furthermore, most of Indiana was on GMT -5 hours year round. All of the state except for a few “rogue” counties was on GMT
-5 hours for seven months each year. How is that confusing for international business?)
4. DST saves energy. (Does it? What about the energy used in the morning when people have to get ready for work and school in the dark? Maybe there is some energy saving, but how much?)
Those were just a few of the reasons we were subjected to year after year. If I’m not mistaken they appear to be straight from a Chamber of Commerce talking points memo. :)
First, know that I think DST should be removed from the whole US. However:
1. I have had to reschedule WAY to many meetings / conf calls / video calls over the years because someone out of state didn’t know that our time difference changed. Eveyone else they delt with was always 2 hours fast or 3 slow or whatever. We were one of the few that were 2 hours but then 1, etc… I can add and subtract 1 just fine, and those others could do it to. It is just very easy to forget to do that when making a meeting 1 month ahead of time when the time changes.
2. Sure, they can, but they’re lazy. If they weren’t, why be a criminal? Know to many lazy people that get up eary? :)
3. I agree, standard SHOULD be standard, but it is not. DST is in practice in most places we do business with, so the time difference is always constant.
4. Lighting is one factor. Many people only spend 1-2 hours before work getting ready, but 4-5 between the time they get home and bedtime. I think some assumption is also made that people go inside when the sun goes down, so less TV, Computer, etc. NIST has studied and proven this.
Again, DST SHOULD die. Move the clocks back year round if the energy savings are worth it (That’s why Indiana is on Eastern to begin with!). But changing the clocks is plain silly.
Jason made some interesting observations. My contact with Indiana has always been ‘in and out’ There is lots of contact between Chicago area and South Bend because of ND, much of it due to sports.Chicago is a very catholic city, also. When I lived in Chicago and we’d set the clocks back ,people would call radio stations to find out the ‘new’ starting time of the Notre Dame football game.Also suddenly the train schedule was different.I wouldnt be surprised if I learned that half the season ticket holders at Notre Dame lived in Chicago. 7 months of EST and 5 months of CDT may make sense if you NEVER leave Indiana,but it causes unnecessary confusion otherwise. Best thing Gov. Daniels did was get DST passed: that was visionary. .That was his goal and he got it done. The fact he didnt have a clue about time zones greatly detracts from that accomplishment.
Also,for someone living in Chicago, ‘Greater Chicago’ extended to about Chesterton/Indiana or Dunes State Park.And then there was this substantial contact with South Bend.
I would say the time zone issue is greatly solved already.Even the minority of people who used to be confused,should be able to remember that South Bend will ALWAYS Be an hour ahead now.I point out I am not a permenanent resident of Indiana( and no longer live in Chicago) .Thats an important fact so as to put views in perspective.
I’m sorry that you’ve had trouble with Indiana not being on DST. I speak as someone who lives in a county that borders Ohio. Maybe we are more aware of when DST begins and ends because it affects our lives daily for several months. Perhaps that is not the case for people in other parts of the state.
As for the daylight at night. The sun goes down around 8:00 in June/July. Plus, summer twilight is longer than winter and fall twilight. Thus, it does not really get dark until almost 9:00. If someone gets off work at 5:00 or 6:00, how many more hours of daylight are needed to shop, golf, work in the garden, etc. during the summer? I’m not be running around or working in my garden until 9:30 or 10:00 anyway, no matter how light it might be. I doubt that I’m in the minority on that.
I was being a little facetious about the criminals. But really, can’t they just stay up until 10 or 11 and start their crime sprees later?
And Lou, I leave Indiana pretty regularly. We shop in Ohio, do business in Ohio, etc. Many people I know do business on both sides of the state line with no problem. They leave Indiana quite frequently. I can’t speak for everyone in every part of Indiana that borders a time zone, but those of us in my neck of the woods who bordered a time zone seven months each year adjusted pretty well to the Ohio time change, despite what the local rag printed in its editorials.
The above post should be clarified to add, “During EST summers, the sun goes down…” and “I’m not going to be running around or working in my garden until 9:30 or 10:00 under EDT, no matter how light it might be.”