Once upon a time, I had a friend named Dom. Dom was an interesting fellow. He played in a death metal band that advertised its show by saying, “Come for the music, stay for the violence.” At the show, they were known to throw fecal matter on the audience. Dom once told me a rollicking tale that ended with Dom being so drunk he had no idea that the guys he was drinking with had put a bag of crack in his pocket until they were pulling it out and giving it to the prostitute.

So, you can imagine my surprise that the Governor of Indiana is taking a page from the philosophy of Dom. When confronted with unpleasant truths, Dom advised, “deny, deny, deny. I don’t care if they catch you on video tape; you say, ‘I don’t know what this is; I didn’t do it.'” Deny, deny, deny.

Presuming he’s not simply delusional, that’s what the governor continues to do, today

in the pages of the New York Times.

he disputed claims that he had openly favored Central time during his campaign for governor. “It’s a fiction,” he said. “I was a first-time candidate and I committed the sin of straight answers.” What he meant back then, he said, was that he could “see an argument” for Central time.

That’s what he said today. Let’s see what he’s said in the past:

WRTV6: Daniels Wants Most Of Indiana On Central Time Move Would Benefit Businesses INDIANAPOLIS — Mitch Daniels said Monday he wants to move most of Indiana to the Central time zone and have it observe daylight-saving time statewide. Daniels’ statement was part of a series of economic development initiatives he announced. He said the time change would put Indiana within two hours of everyone in the continental United States and make it easier for companies inside and outside the state to do business.

WTHR13: Daniels wants to move most of state to central time zone Kevin Rader/Political Reporter. Indianapolis- Mitch Daniels introduced his plan to help Indiana reach its economic potential. . . . Daniels favors adopting Daylight Saving Time and putting most of the state in the Central Time Zone. “With Central Time you are only one hour off your customer in Boston and two hours off your customer in L.A. It’s a way to take advantage of our central location.”

WISH-TV 8: Daniels Wants to Move Most of State to Central Time Zone

Daniels sees DST as an economic development issue. It was just one of several planks in an economic development plan released by Daniels Monday. Mitch Daniels is trying to address just those kinds of problems with his proposal that Indiana adopt central time and central daylight time. Daniels says it makes more sense to be aligned with Chicago than New York City and thinks jobs would come here as a result.

Daniels: Central time zone By Deanna Wrenn, The Associated Press INDIANAPOLIS — Moving most of Indiana to daylight-saving time in the Central time zone and providing more tax breaks for growing businesses will jump-start Indiana’s economy, Mitch Daniels said. Indiana’s current economic development policy is allowing jobs to disappear and has not helped new companies flourish, he said. Moving as much of the state as possible to Central time and daylight-saving time would reduce confusion both within Indiana and for out-of-state companies wanting to do business here, Daniels argues. Switching to Central time would mean the least amount of change for the most residents, he said.

The Tribune Star: Terre Haute: Daniels restores Indiana to daylight-saving time By Stephanie Salter Tribune-Star During the campaign season, both he and his opponent, Joe Kernan, preferred the Central time zone, with Daniels mentioning a two-hour difference between both coasts as a positive.

That was before Daniels began taking the deny, deny, deny approach. That approach seems to have started at the beginning of November when he came out with the following:

Daniels said moving Indiana to daylight-saving time “was the only (position) I advocated in the campaign and in the legislature. Choice of time zones, I think, is the definitively local issue.”

Asked if he hadn’t advocated Central time in his campaign, Daniels said: “Pardon me, but I did not.”

And, of course, today he says it’s a fiction.

Below, I’m pasting a copy of the outline of the comments I plan to make, time permitting, at today’s time zone hearing in Logansport. I haven’t edited it yet, and it might undergo some refinements, but in case anyone is interested, here they are. Also, once again, I’ll plug my submission to the USDOT from September. My apologies for the formatting.

I. Process
A. Designed for ordinary time zone requests.
B. Indiana’s situation unique
1. Past 30 years – 7 months in central; 5 months in eastern.
2. DST act squeaked by – forced one or the other; question is which
3. Default is eastern through technicality.
a. 1961 – central;
b. 1961 – 1968 half central/half eastern;
c. 1968 – Desire for year round CDT. Instead got year round EST.
4. Result has been a process unnecessarily stacked in favor of Eastern.
a. Burden is on central time proponents.
b. Smaller the scope, tougher the burden.
c. Example – if burden on each household – couldn’t be met.
d. USDOT chosen to place the scope of review @ county level.
e. Proper level of review is state wide.
1. Time zone lines at the state line, less disruptive.
2. State wide change has been implemented in DST.
3. As a matter of geography/geometry – line is in Ohio.
C. USDOT has the authority & perhaps duty to conduct review @ state level.
1. 15 USC 261 provides the only real guidance on time zones.
a. Standard time of eastern zone based on mean solar time of the 75th degree of longitude; central zone on the 90th.
b. Convenience of commerce;
c. Junction points of common carriers.
2. First concern should be longitude – 15 degrees per zone. Adjust for convenience of commerce. Further away from appropriate zone; the greater the inconvience to commerce should be to justify change.
3. No requirement that a request c0me from state or local officials; Sec’y of Transportation has wide discretion.
4. Laundry list of convenience of commerce criteria appears to be internal policy of USDOT; not mandated by law or rule.
5. Indiana is a narrow state, 140 miles wide. Doesn’t have the same justification for dividing into separate time zones you find in Tennessee or KY.
6. County-by-county review confined to commerce criteria without substantial regard for Indiana’s longitude is not required by the law and not appropriate under the circumstances; urge USDOT to reconsider its approach.
II. Substance.
A. White County should be in central, but no strong justification under the criteria laid out by USDOT.
B. Most commerce goes through Lafayette, in eastern.
1. On the state level, some 61% of exports go to the central time zone or points west. Central time gives us more business hours in common with our trading partners.
2. Just over half of our border is with the central zone.
C. However, the standard non-commerce arguments apply.
1. We’re 225 miles west of where the time line ought to be, somewhere around Mansfield Ohio at 82.5 degree longitude.
2. No sunrise until 8:30 a.m. in mid-November.
3. Sunsets at around 10 p.m. in mid-July.
4. Noon – sun directly overhead won’t occur until 2 p.m. (post meridian) during some parts of the year.
5. Limited sunlight is an unfortunate fact of the northern hemisphere. Studies have shown earlier sunlight on average provides helps fend off Seasonal Affective Disorder more effectively than later sunlight.
6. Others will likely mention the standard arguments about kids waiting for school buses in the dark and television schedules.
III. Conclusion
A. Urge you to reconsider the nature of your review; standard procedure is not appropriate for Indiana’s unique situation. The current procedure pre-ordains the conclusion and the Secretary of Transportation has the authority, and I would argue, the duty to consider the bigger picture from a state wide perspective rather than from a county-by-county perspective.
B. Sympathies for the Dept. of Transportation and, particularly Ms. Petrie who has had to deal with the Indiana time question for at least 20 years. The latest battle was dropped unnecessarily in the laps of both the Department and county commissioners because of a lack of leadership in Indianapolis which is where the decision really should have been made.

The Associated Press reports on potential new time zone legislation for the next General Assembly. Representative Crooks, for one, predicts the battle will continue to rage. Proposed legislation includes repeal of the Daylight Saving Time act from last year, and a statewide time zone referendum. Currently, none of the bills are expected to gain traction, but that could change depending on satisfaction, or lack thereof, with action taken by the USDOT.

Here is the map of the current situation. Central Time counties in grey, counties slotted preliminarily for a change to central time in red, counties petitioning for central time but preliminarily denied in pin, counties petitioning for central time but withdrawing their petition in yellow, and eastern time zone counties in white:

I can’t imagine why there might be dissatisfaction over the patchwork time zone situation Governor Daniels’ lack of leadership got us into.

The USDOT set four public hearings this month, the first scheduled in
Logansport on Sunday, to gather more input. It said all counties were
still in the running and final decisions would be made in January.

Also check out this article in the Lafayette Journal & Courier on a Kankakee Valley High school student’s petition efforts to put the state on Central Time.

The South Bend Tribune reports that Governor Daniels is blaming St. Joseph County for the regional anxiety about time zones and urged St. Joseph County to drop its Central Time request “if it can’t get Elkhart and the other counties to join them.” Daniels, of course, makes no move to urge Elkhart County to consider Central Time.

And here I thought he said he wasn’t going to offer an opinion about which time zones were appropriate until after the hearings. But, then, he says a lot of things.

Governor Daniels lays it on thicker:

“I think the burden of proof is on the St. Joe elected officials who brought all this up with their request to shift to the Central zone,” he said.

Cindy Bodle, president of the St. Joseph County Board of Commissioners, has the appropriate response:

“We’ve done exactly what the process required us to do, since we didn’t have any direct leadership from the state,” she said.

Bodle said the county facilitated meetings among regional elected officials, held a public hearing and consulted with area school districts and mayors. Then it submitted a petition to the DOT in the format and the hasty time frame that DOT established.

For all those reasons, she said, it would be “a slap in the face to the process” if the county followed Daniels’ advice and dropped its petition before the Nov. 21 hearing.

“This isn’t something that I wanted to deal with or anyone else locally wanted to deal with,” she said. “This was handed to us by state leadership.”

. . .

Asked what she’d like from Daniels, Bodle said it may be too late for him to exercise leadership that could have come earlier. As for his statement that the appropriate time for him to comment is after the hearings, Bodle laughed.

“Then why is he commenting now,” she said. “Why is he faulting us for following the process?”

Governor Daniels started this. He left local government twisting in the wind. Now he wants to step in and tell local government what to do. Too little, too late, Governor. And his faux befuddlement on the benefits of Central Time is also galling, considering his prior statement that “it makes more sense to be aligned with Chicago than New York City and thinks jobs would come here as a result.”

In an article entitled, Daniels wants some more time, we learn that Governor Daniels will put his finger to the wind before weighing in on the time zone debate. He says he’ll wait until after the USDOT hearings before providing his opinions on where the time line should be. Then again, Governor Daniels says lots of things.

With all due respect, Governor, your opportunity to be useful in this debate has passed. Please keep quiet now. Figuring out which way the crowd is moving before running to the front of the line does not constitute leadership.

The Marshall County Commissioners submitted an additional petition (pdf) to the USDOT which takes a far more reasonable approach than Elkhart County has done. The Marshall County Commissioners have no illusions that Marshall County should dictate time policy for St. Joseph policy and they recognize that their economy depends a great deal on St. Joseph County. So, they say to the USDOT, central or eastern: not nearly as important to us as being on the same time as St. Joseph. So just give us whatever they’re having.

Procedurally, it’s easier for Marshall County because it requested Central Time in the first place. But if Elkhart County took the same approach, I’m sure it would not fall on deaf ears. As it is, what I hear out of Elkhart County is. We want eastern time, and make St. Joseph do what we want to do.

————

With respect to the upcoming hearings, Jim Bognar refers me to this page which contains the following:

TRANSPORTATION DEPARTMENT
NOTICES
Standard time zone boundaries:
Indiana; public hearings, 05-22518,
[RIN 2105-AD53; Filed 11/8/05 at 11:45am]
Publication Date: 11/14/05

So, the notice of public hearings will be published in the Federal Register the day after the public hearing in Logansport. The Logansport hearing will be on Sunday, November 13, 2005 at the McHale Performing Arts Center at Logansport Community High School from 2:30 to 6:30 p.m. Unless something unexpected comes up, I intend to go to that hearing. The street address is 1 Berry Lane Logansport, IN (Map.)

Update: A copy of the notice of public hearings appears at the time zone docket here (pdf).

Jennifer Whitson for the Evansville Courier Press reports that the Dubois County Commissioners voted Monday to keep up their fight for a switch to Central by sending more supporting data to the feds. In fact, reviewing the USDOT docket, here is the additional submission by Dubois County. (pdf).

Also, a nice dissection (pdf) of Chamber of Commerce propaganda (pdf) by Thomas Heller of Columbus, Indiana.

Also, Congressman Mark Souder (pdf) has written to the USDOT to request that St. Joseph County’s petition be rejected. I think it’s important to note (which the Congressman does not do in his letter) that Rep. Souder does not represent St. Joseph County, but rather represents Elkhart County and points east — it’s a bit ironic that the 2nd and 3rd Congressional Districts divide on almost the exact line that the time zone line would have followed if all of the petitioning counties were granted their requests. ((Map).

Also, The Northern Indiana Commuter Transportation District (pdf) endorses the inclusion of St. Joseph County into the Central Time Zone. Along side the “convenience of commerce” factor specified by statute is a factor requiring the Sec’y of Transportation to have regard for “the existing junction points and division points of common carriers engaged in interstate or foreign commerce”. I wonder if the NICTD qualifies for such consideration.

Also, frequent contributor Paul O’Malley has made a submission (pdf). That particular comment limits itself to the effects of the proposed line in relation to school corporation boundaries and to suggest a different route for the time line, adding Pulaski and Marshall counties to the Central Time Zone, with a view to minimizing the number of school corporations split. I’m a sucker for maps, and he puts some good ones in there. Paul has another submission which addresses and urges the USDOT to reconsider its preliminary decision to deny Dubois County’s request. As always, he’s good with the maps and the numbers.

Jim Burdsall, another reader and frequent commenter, has a substantial submission of his own (pdf) with arguments to put all of Indiana on Central Time, relying on geography and the history of the time zone process in Indiana. In particular, he finds it objectionable that counties find themselves in the position of having to observe Eastern Daylight Time because they agreed to a compromise in the 60s whereby they were placed in the Eastern Time Zone with the understanding that they would not be obliged to observe Central Time. Had they not gone along with that compromise, Central Time would now be the default with counties having to fight to get into Eastern Time if they so desired.

There are a lot of submissions to that docket. 1,645 submissions it looks like. It’s tough to pick out the submissions with substance from the large volume of submissions that just express an opinion without really providing much in the way of justification.

———-
Bill Starr points out that Central Time is better for those Hoosier golfers who prefer to golf in the morning.

I found a site called Global Standard Time which opposes Daylight Saving Time but which also is of the opinion that St. Joseph County is trying to “bully” Elkhart County into Central Time.

Ansplog urges the Governor to take matters in hand and get the entire state on one time zone. Ansplog prefers Central Time, as do I, but I understand that point is debatable. What I don’t think is debatable is that putting time lines at state borders is really the only thing that makes sense — particularly in a state like Indiana that is longest north-to-south. Indiana is something like 140 miles wide. There is just no need to break it in half.

The South Bend Tribune has an article entitled Elkhart County jilted. It describes what it describes as a “rambling discourse” written by Elkhart Commissioner Mike Yoder. I don’t know if it was a letter to St. Joseph County or what version the discourse took, but I give him points for style.

“Of course we should have seen it coming,” Yoder wrote in a rambling discourse. “They’ve been giving pretty clear signals their interest was wandering toward the west. Some guy named Chicago has been on their mind a lot lately, and apparently there is also someone else named Kenosha.”

The latter reference was to St. Joseph County Commissioner Steve Ross’ contention that St. Joseph County is at the eastern end of an economic corridor that includes Chicago and extends all the way to Kenosha, Wis.

“So we tried to remind them of their responsibility to the family,” Yoder said. “They have our airport, our passenger rail service and our TV stations.

“But no, they said they were not leaving the neighborhood, just wanting to hook up with someone else. They will still be here, just in a different time zone. … And then the truth came out, we were just a trailer factory guy and their interests have changed.

“I suppose we should have given up at that point, after all, how can a trailer factory guy compete with an uptown, Armani suit guy like Chicago?”

It seems a little offbeat for something like that to be coming from a County Commissioner, but I guess that’s why local politics tend to be more fun than state or national. Seemingly lost in Commissioner Yoder’s hand-wringing is a true assessment of what is more important to Elkhart County: being in synch with St. Joseph County or being in synch with Indianapolis, and other counties that surround Elkhart. We know Elkhart’s preference would be to be in synch with everyone, including St. Joseph County. But that’s not Elkhart County’s choice to make. Elkhart relies on St. Joseph much more than the reverse. Just like in any relationship, romantic, economic, or otherwise, the one that needs it least has the most power over it. That puts Elkhart County in a position where it has to make a choice: St. Joseph County and the West, or other area counties and the East.

St. Joseph Commissioner Steve Ross had a realistic assessment of the situation:

Ross was blunt in his rejection of Yoder’s call for a delay and firm in his support of the move to Central time.

“We’re called the Midwest, not the Mideast,” said Ross, who maintained that the growth in U.S. commerce is toward the South and West, while the Northeast “is a stable but not a developing economy.”

Ross also rejected Yoder’s Friday claim that Elkhart County could surpass St. Joseph County both in population and its economy within five years.

“We are a much bigger economy,” Ross said. “If he wants to believe Elkhart will overtake us in five years, he can. It’s not going to happen.”

Ross also said he found Yoder’s comments to be arrogant.

“If he wants to think Elkhart is the dog and we’re the tail, he’s welcome to that belief,” Ross said, adding that “much wiser people” believe it is St. Joseph County that is the regional powerhouse.

I think there are plausible (but ultimately insufficient) arguments for St. Joseph to be in the Eastern Time Zone, but Elkhart County’s assertion that St. Joseph County is somehow beholden to follow its lead is not one of them.

Incidentally, if anyone can forward Commissioner’s Yoder’s “rambling discourse” or give me a pointer to it, I’d love to read the whole thing.

According to the Associated Press, the USDOT announced the dates and times of four public hearings it will conduct to gather public input on requests from counties wanting to switch to the Central Time Zone.

The public hearings will be held on Nov. 13 in Logansport, Nov. 14 in Terre Haute, Nov. 16 in Jasper and Nov. 21 in South Bend.
The one in Logansport will be from 2:30 p.m. to 6:30 p.m. at the McHale Performing Arts Center at Logansport Community High School. The one in Terre Haute is scheduled from 5 p.m. to 10 p.m. at the Hulman Center at Indiana State University. The one in Jasper is set from 6 p.m. to 10 p.m. at the Jasper Arts Center, and the one in South Bend is set from 5 p.m. to 10 p.m. at the Student Activity Center on the South Bend campus of Indiana University.

Yesterday’s South Bend Tribune has a couple of time zone articles. One is entitled, Counties remain split on time zones which says that after some talks between Elkhart and St. Joseph counties, neither of their governing bodies are prepared to give in to the other’s vision of which time zone is appropriate for the area.

This exchange between Elkhart’s Mike Yoder and St. Joseph’s Steve Ross captures the essence of the meeting:

Ross said that while it may be advantageous for the four counties to remain in one time zone, Yoder had presented reasons for Elkhart and St. Joseph counties to go their separate ways.

“Your (economic) corridor goes east, our corridor goes west,” said Ross, reiterating his belief that St. Joseph County is at the eastern end of an economic corridor that passes through Chicago on its way to Kenosha, Wis.

“As time goes on, our interests may be different from yours,” Ross said in response to Yoder. “Your arguments are so eloquent, perhaps we do have to think about that divorce.”

“If you want a divorce, fine,” Yoder said. “I’m just glad there’s no alimony payments.”

Yoder also discounted contentions that St. Joseph County is and will be the region’s economic driver.

The commissioner predicted that in four years Elkhart County will surpass St. Joseph County, both economically and in terms of population.

Elkhart’s commissioners apparently think it is going to be a bigger county than St. Joseph and thinks that its economic interests are to the east. St. Joseph’s commissioners pretty much think the opposite.

The other article is entitled Daniels: Elkhart, St. Joe time should match. Once again, Governor Daniels provides no leadership on this issue. He says that he thinks Elkhart and St. Joseph should be on the same time. Neat. Which one? And why didn’t you say so *before* we got into this mess?

Addressing reporters after his speech, Daniels said he will likely express his views on a specific time zone for the region after the federal hearing.

He acknowledged that many people want to hear his voice now, but he said the hearing should come first.

“That’s the last part of the input process,” he said, “but I think it’s the most important one, so I think it makes sense to wait. Let’s hear everyone with a viewpoint, not just the politicians and those who’ve been heard from already.”

House Minority Leader B. Patrick Bauer, D-South Bend, said Daniels’ words rang hollow.

Bauer, who attended the speech and spoke briefly to Daniels afterward, said the governor campaigned for Central time, supported legislation that favored Eastern time, and then punted by endorsing a federally defined process that asked each county to express its own opinion.

Daniels won’t stop waffling until after the DOT hearings? That’s just ridiculous. His idea of leadership, apparently, is to see which way the mob is drifting before running to the head of the pack.