A Citizen's Guide to Indiana

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Tim Joyce’s rebuttal to Southwest Indiana Counties’ re-petition

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Tim Joyce has posted a lengthy rebuttal (pdf) to the re-petition submitted by the Southwest Indiana counties, paying particular attention to Knox County, on the subject of switching from the Central Time Zone to the Eastern Time Zone. The introductory paragraph:

I hope the following information will prove that the Knox County Commissioners with the help of the Law firm Ice Miller LLP and the other petitioning counties have chose to mislead the Federal Department of Transportation in their quest to change to Eastern Time. I do not understand why they were allowed to petition as a group as it is each county that should petition on their own. I will start by saying that all these counties do have one huge connection and that connection is Evansville, IN. Knox County by itself has very little in common with the other petitioning counties after that. I hope to show that a majority of our workers either come from or go to Central Time Zones even if you take away the other petitioning counties. Our Healthcare Industry, the number one industry in Knox County, has the biggest part of their patients coming from the Central time zone even if you take away the other petitioning counties. Knox County has more people working at just one of our local McDonalds then we have working at Crane Naval Base. Toyota is more of a driving force then the Crane Naval Base or any other industry in any of the petitioning counties. I believe that all the counties should be left on Central but Knox County has the greatest case to stay on Central and I hope to prove that.

A thought of my own on procedure: I don’t really think any of this stuff is correctly put on the old 2005 docket. In my mind, the rule making process stopped when USDOT adopted the rule shifting the time line. Now, you’ve got a new petition from that group of Southwestern Indiana counties. The USDOT should first decide whether a joint petition of this kind is acceptable in the first place. If it is, they should then decide whether the petition makes a case sufficient to begin the rule making process once again. If it does, then and only then should USDOT open a docket with their Notice of Proposed Rule Making after having let citizens know what they have in mind.

I don’t know if following that procedure helps or hurts Central Time proponents. But I don’t think lumping the re-petition in with the old rule making docket is appropriate. I could just be talking out of my hat though; I certainly haven’t done any research on the subject.

Dems run against Daniels, DST & the Toll Road

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Amy Hillenberg has an article in the Reporter Times entitled “House Democrat Strategy Targets Daniels”. (Hmm, the same story ran in the South Bend Tribune and elsewhere under Mike Smith’s name.) The story takes a look at Rep. Dave Crooks campaign strategy. His first ad features woman complaining about Gov. Daniels and how he was able to pass Daylight Saving Time and privatize Indiana’s Toll Road:

“Mitch Daniels is going around changing our clocks, and he let foreign companies take over our highways,” a woman says in the ad. It looks past the election, saying that’s when “we got rid of a bunch of boys who were just rubber stamps for ol’ Mitch.”

The “boys” refers to Republicans who control the House, 52-48. All but a handful helped Daniels win passage of statewide daylight-saving time. And it took 51 of the 52 to pass a bill letting Daniels lease the Indiana Toll Road to a private, foreign venture. No House Democrat voted for it.

Hoosiers oppose Daylight Saving Time 49% to 44% and oppose the Toll Road privatization 55% to 39%. These issues have affected at least one voter, according to the story:

[Daniels] has certainly turned off Dale Shake of Washington, Ind., who said he was a lifelong Republican who voted for Daniels in 2004. He said he received a poll call that asked him to rate the governor’s performance between one and five.

“I came back and said, ‘Do you have anything below that one?”’ said Shake, 65. He said he was upset about the northern Indiana toll road lease – even though he lives in Daviess County in southwest Indiana – and the time switch.

He said he had known and liked Crooks’ Republican opponent, Ron Arnold, for years. But because of Daniels, he’s going to vote for Crooks.

More press

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Call me vain, but I’m always a little tickled when I make it into the Journal Gazette’s Best of the Blogs editorial segment. They highlight this September 16, 2006 post, quoting the following:

The Associated Press has a story telling of a poll indicating that privatizing the Toll Road and adopting Daylight Saving Time are unpopular with Hoosiers.  …

I sort of hold these issues to a double standard. I think the popularity, or lack thereof, with respect to DST is more significant than the lack of support for Toll Road privatization. DST seems like the kind of issue perfectly suited to a straight up popularity contest. How we synchronize our clock to the sun is basically a lifestyle choice with few complex policy questions involved. …

The lack of public support for the Toll Road would concern me less if it were good public policy. But, it’s not. That’s just my opinion, of course, but I have my reasons. I’ve read the lease and thought it through a bit. At the end of the day, I think it’s bad public policy to increase taxes solely on the motorists of northern Indiana to pay for roads in the rest of the state. I could still be wrong, obviously, but we have no idea how much information the poll respondents had on this issue and, therefore, no idea how informed their opinions are.

Kreg Battles Blog

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I just came across the blog of Kreg Battles, the Democrat opposing Troy “I’ll never vote for it” Woodruff to represent Indiana’s 64th House District. His official website is here. Woodruff and hopefully his defeat are of special interest to me given his position as a legislator who promised his constituents that he would never vote for Daylight Saving Time only to turn around and become the legislator who gave DST its one vote margin of passage.

Toll Road, DST unpopular

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The Associated Press has a story telling of a poll indicating that privatizing the Toll Road and adopting Daylight Saving Time are unpopular with Hoosiers.

DST was supported by only 44% of Hoosiers and opposed by 49% while the Toll Road privatization had only 39% support among Hoosiers with 55% disapproval.

I sort of hold these issues to a double standard. I think the popularity, or lack thereof, with respect to DST is more significant than the lack of support for Toll Road privatization. DST seems like the kind of issue perfectly suited to a straight up popularity contest. How we synchronize our clock to the sun is basically a lifestyle choice with few complex policy questions involved. The most important aspect of the choice is pleasing the greatest number of Hoosiers. A statewide referendum would be, in my opinion, an appropriate way of deciding how to deal with the DST issue.

The lack of public support for the Toll Road would concern me less if it were good public policy. But, it’s not. That’s just my opinion, of course, but I have my reasons. I’ve read the lease and thought it through a bit. At the end of the day, I think it’s bad public policy to increase taxes solely on the motorists of northern Indiana to pay for roads in the rest of the state. I could still be wrong, obviously, but we have no idea how much information the poll respondents had on this issue and, therefore, no idea how informed their opinions are.

A little more national attention for Indiana

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The Washington Post has an article on the vulnerability of GOP districts across the nation. Unsurprisingly, Indiana gets a mention:

Even more worrisome to the Republicans is Indiana, where three House incumbents — Reps. Chris Chocola, John N. Hostettler and Michael E. Sodrel — could fall to Democratic challengers. There, Bush’s weaknesses have been compounded by the problems of freshman Gov. Mitchell E. Daniels Jr. (R), who is in hot water over his decisions to switch some counties to new time zones and to lease the Indiana Toll Road to a foreign consortium.

I would be at least a little amused if Troy “I’ll never vote for it” Woodruff’s switch in time has the effect of changing the balance of power in the U.S. House of Representatives. Woodruff and Daniels get another mention in an Indy Star article on the Indiana campaigns. Daniels seems to be a political pariah, raising money for the candidates but otherwise staying out of view. Woodruff is a top target for the Democrats.

Recent time zone docket entries

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I originally checked into the Time Zone Docket to check out a referral to a submission by Rocky Byrd but couldn’t help but laugh at the document entitled “Dubious County Visitors Center”. The folks down in Dubois County just get no respect.

Anyway, Mr. Byrd has made a couple of submissions on the subject of the recent petition of southwestern Indiana counties to change back to Eastern Time. The first is a concise letter pointing out the magnitude of Governor Daniels flip-flop on these counties. The second is a longer paper (12 pages) that dissects the petition itself and points out errors therein. In particular, he notes that the influence of Evansville in the region is routinely omitted. According to Mr. Byrd, there appears to be a lot of bootstrapping going on in the petition, meaning that in several instances the petition suggests that commerce or aspects of community life are done interacting with areas that will be in the Eastern Time Zone if the petition is granted. Of course, this is just a fancy way of saying that those areas are in the Central Time Zone right now. Anyway, it’s worth a read.

Time Debate Keeps Ticking

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Associated Press journalist, Mike Smith has a good recap of the time zone process that has taken place to date. He quotes retired Indiana University economist Morton Marcus as Marcus dubs the counties seeking to switchback to Eastern Time the “seesaw six.”

Smith leaves out a number of details, but in the limited space available to a print journalist, it would be impossible not to. Still, I thought the summary was well done. Smith also offers this observation about Troy “I’ll Never Vote For It” Woodruff and the upcoming elections:

Many already were upset with state Rep. Troy Woodruff, R-Vincennes, for casting the needed 51st vote for the daylight time bill’s passage after promising constituents he would never support daylight time. This latest chapter is sure to remind voters of that in November, when House Democrats try to regain control of the narrowly divided chamber.

. . .
House Democrats hope people are angry about the time changes and will take it out at the polls. All but a handful of House Democrats voted against the bill that led to the changes. There could be more changes if the federal government grants the reversal requests. And more counties might seek switches in the future, keeping the saga alive.

Pulaski County’s Amended Petition on USDOT docket

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Pulaski County’s amended petition to be moved from the Central Time Zone into the Eastern Time Zone is on the USDOT’s time zone docket. The document is dated June 27, 2006 but didn’t get filed with the US Dept. of Transportation until August 18. It is 238 pages long.

In February, Pulaski County had submitted a  petition that met with a frosty response from the Department of Transportation. In the following excerpt to the USDOT’s response, “new petition” refers to the February petition. The initial petition was a petition to move from eastern to central.

The new petition follows the Department’s final rule by only a few weeks arid before the County had any experience with the new time zone changes that it solicited. Furthermore, the new petition conflicts with the County’s original petition and other information submitted to the docket in a rulemaking proceeding on time zone boundary changes in Indiana. The County Commissioners now have represented that they did not provide accurate information in their original petition. The new petition does not provide detailed information in support of its position or the sources for the information submitted.

So, I guess the June/August petition is the new, new petition (pdf – long). I don’t think I’ll have time to read the petition today. Hopefully our devoted commenters can provide some insight.