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SUPERFUND UNDERMINED
Date: 031029
From: http://www.nytimes.com/
Opinion, NY Times, October 28,
The industry-financed trust fund that helps underwrite one of the
country's most valued environmental programs, the Superfund, will soon
run out of money. It will be a milestone of sorts, and a sad one.
Unless Congress renews the fund, which pays for cleaning up toxic
waste dumps, taxpayers will have to foot the bill instead of the
companies that caused the messes in the first place. An important
principle will have gone down the drain, and public health may suffer
as a result.
Superfund was enacted under President Jimmy Carter in 1980 to clean
up thousands of contaminated waste sites. The program's core principle
was that polluters should pay. The program enforced that principle in
two ways. First, in cases where the company responsible for a mess
could be clearly identified, that company paid to clean it up. Of the
800 or so cleanups since the program began, about two- thirds have
been paid for by the companies responsible, at an overall cost of
about $20 billion. A majority of the sites awaiting cleanup will also
be dealt with in this fashion.
There is, however, a second category: sites whose ownership has
changed many times over the years, or whose owners have gone bankrupt.
For these sites, Superfund's architects created an "orphan" fund, to
be financed by excise taxes on the oil and chemical industries and by
a tiny environmental income tax levied on most other corporations.
These taxes expired in 1995, when Congressional Republicans refused to
renew them. President Bush has not asked for their reinstatement, the
first president not to do so. The orphan fund is down to its last few
million dollars and is likely to run dry next year. It will then be
entirely dependent on general revenues.
The administration says it does not matter who pays to clean up the
orphan sites. But it does. Instead of having a steady source of
guaranteed income, the fund will have to compete with every other
program at a time when federal dollars are increasingly scarce. And
because polluting industries no longer have to contribute, the orphan
fund loses whatever value it has had as a deterrent to bad behavior by
industry and as an incentive to develop more benign chemicals and
manufacturing processes.
There is little chance that the administration will ask Congress to
restore the special taxes, which have averaged about $1.5 billion a
year spread across many companies. Congress will thus have to press
forward on its own.
A small group of senators, including Hillary Clinton of New York and
Jon Corzine and Frank Lautenberg of New Jersey, have joined James
Jeffords of Vermont in offering a bill that would reinstate the fees.
They deserve broad support. Without the fund, Americans will be asked
to pay twice for the mistakes of others - with their taxes, and their
health.
Date: 031029
From: http://www.nytimes.com/
Opinion, NY Times, October 28,
The industry-financed trust fund that helps underwrite one of the
country's most valued environmental programs, the Superfund, will soon
run out of money. It will be a milestone of sorts, and a sad one.
Unless Congress renews the fund, which pays for cleaning up toxic
waste dumps, taxpayers will have to foot the bill instead of the
companies that caused the messes in the first place. An important
principle will have gone down the drain, and public health may suffer
as a result.
Superfund was enacted under President Jimmy Carter in 1980 to clean
up thousands of contaminated waste sites. The program's core principle
was that polluters should pay. The program enforced that principle in
two ways. First, in cases where the company responsible for a mess
could be clearly identified, that company paid to clean it up. Of the
800 or so cleanups since the program began, about two- thirds have
been paid for by the companies responsible, at an overall cost of
about $20 billion. A majority of the sites awaiting cleanup will also
be dealt with in this fashion.
There is, however, a second category: sites whose ownership has
changed many times over the years, or whose owners have gone bankrupt.
For these sites, Superfund's architects created an "orphan" fund, to
be financed by excise taxes on the oil and chemical industries and by
a tiny environmental income tax levied on most other corporations.
These taxes expired in 1995, when Congressional Republicans refused to
renew them. President Bush has not asked for their reinstatement, the
first president not to do so. The orphan fund is down to its last few
million dollars and is likely to run dry next year. It will then be
entirely dependent on general revenues.
The administration says it does not matter who pays to clean up the
orphan sites. But it does. Instead of having a steady source of
guaranteed income, the fund will have to compete with every other
program at a time when federal dollars are increasingly scarce. And
because polluting industries no longer have to contribute, the orphan
fund loses whatever value it has had as a deterrent to bad behavior by
industry and as an incentive to develop more benign chemicals and
manufacturing processes.
There is little chance that the administration will ask Congress to
restore the special taxes, which have averaged about $1.5 billion a
year spread across many companies. Congress will thus have to press
forward on its own.
A small group of senators, including Hillary Clinton of New York and
Jon Corzine and Frank Lautenberg of New Jersey, have joined James
Jeffords of Vermont in offering a bill that would reinstate the fees.
They deserve broad support. Without the fund, Americans will be asked
to pay twice for the mistakes of others - with their taxes, and their
health.