Environmentalists rip into GOP congressional votes

By Jerry Dean · News-Sentinel

In this mention

Environmental groups held a news conference in Knoxville to criticize voting records of Tennessee's Republican congressional delegation on environmental issues. Representatives from ten environmental organizations presented a League of Conservation Voters scorecard showing GOP members received low ratings on key environmental votes including EPA cuts, mining laws, and clean water protections. Democratic representatives generally scored higher on environmental voting records.

It's a sad day for Tennessee when we have no environmental heroes in the state's 11-member delegation
Stephen A. Smith

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Environmentalists rip into
GOP congressional votes
By Jerry Dean
News-Sentinel staff writer

Environmentalists this week blasted U.S. Reps. John J. Duncan Jr., Jimmy Quillen and others in Tennessee's GOP congressional delegation, alleging they'd made "sweetheart deals with House Speaker Newt Gingrich and with powerful corporate polluters."

At a news conference on Knoxville's waterfront, Dorothy Burnham, associate state director of Tennessee Citizen Action, said: "They've sent the citizens of Tennessee dead roses and dirty water."

Representatives from 10 environmental groups, gathered by the mouth of First Creek on Wednesday, lambasted voting records of Republicans Duncan, Quillen, U.S. Sens. Bill Frist and Fred Thompson, and U.S. Reps. Zach Wamp, Van Hilleary and Ed Bryant.

Michelle Neal and Stephen Smith, speaking for the Foundation for Global Sustainability, and Karen Peterson, executive director of Tennessee Citizens for Wilderness Planning, said Democrats in the 104th Congress fared little better on environmental issues.

Smith, noting signs warning citizens not to eat fish taken from Fort Loudoun Lake, said: "It's a sad day for Tennessee when we have no environmental heroes" in the state's 11-member delegation.

Critics produced a League of Conservation Voters' "scorecard" to illustrate negative voting on key environmental issues.

Smith, rumored as a prospective challenger to Duncan's re-election, called the 104th Congress "hostile" to environmental interests. He said Duncan regarded anyone expressing environmental concerns as "extremist."

Neal listed Duncan among House Republicans who received scores of "zero."

Frist scored "zero" as did Quillen and Bryant. Thompson scored 7 percent; Wamp and Hilleary, 8 percent each.

Democrats, Neal said, fared better. Rep. Bob Clement got a 62 percent rating, and Rep. Harold Ford received a 77 percent mark. Rep. John Tanner got 31 percent, and Rep. Bart Gordon got a 54 percent rating.

Senators' ratings were based on 14 key votes, including Environmental Protection Agency cuts, mining laws and sale of public lands, safe drinking water, and red wolf recovery legislation. House members were rated on a dozen votes — environmental safeguards, logging laws, renewable energy funding, EPA, Alaskan forestry and mining proposals, and Mojave Desert preservation efforts.

Neal said the scorecard shows Congress "voted against citizens' health and well being" in 1995. "There's strong public support," she said, "for environmental laws to ensure clean air and water.... Yet Congress voted to weaken those."