Environment New Mexico Legislative Scorecard June 2008 Environment New Mexico Legislative Scorecard Environment New Mexico Legislative Scorecard Environment New Mexico Legislative Scorecard Environment New Mexico Written by: Ivan Frishberg Lauren Ketcham Rick Trilsch With contributions from: Anna Aurilio Emily Figdor Sean Garren Mike Gravitz Caroline Kory Christy Leavitt Ben Schreiber June 2008 Environment New Mexico Legislative Scorecard Acknowledgements The authors would like to thank the policy staff, field staff, citizen outreach staff, interns, volunteers and members of Environment New Mexico and Environment America for their ongoing work to protect and preserve the environment. Special thanks Paul Carlson, Silas Pugatch, and Erin Wingo for their help in producing this year’s Legislative Scorecard. Environment New Mexico, a statewide, citizen-based environmental advocacy organization, monitors the voting records of New Mexico’s state legislators and Congressional Delegation. Environment New Mexico PO Box 4073 Albuquerque, NM 8796 (505) 54-489 [email protected] www.EnvironmentNewMexico.org For additional copies of the Environment New Mexico Legislative Scorecard, or for more information about Environment New Mexico, please visit www.EnvironmentNewMexico.org. Copyright 2008 Environment New Mexico All photos under license from shutterstock.com. Cover photo: Shiprock, NM, Mike Norton; Page 4: California Coast, Sasha Buzko; Asheville, NC, Bonita R. Cheshier; Page 5: Susquehanna State Park, MD, Andrew Williams; Page 6: Shiprock, NM, Mike Norton; Page 7: Allegheny National For- est, PA, Jeffrey M. Frank; Page 10: Shenandoah National Park, Amygdala Imagery; Page 12: Wind Farm, Rafa Irusta; Page 13: Traffic, Natalia Bratslavsky; Page 14: Offshore Drilling Rig, Ingvar Tjostheim; Page 15: Sewer Pipe, Vankina; Page 16: Grand Canyon, Forbis; Page 17: Solar Panels, Adrian Matthiassen. Environment New Mexico Legislative Scorecard Table of Contents Overview ............................................. 4 Congress & The Environment ............ 5 Congressional Environmental Champions ......................................... 8 Congressional Natural Disasters ....... 9 State Congressional Averages ......... 0 U.S. Senate & U.S. House Votes ......... U.S. Senate Vote Descriptions ........... U.S. House Vote Descriptions ............ 5 N.M. State Senate Votes ................... 8 N.M. State House Votes ..................... 9 Environment New Mexico Legislative Scorecard 3 OVERVIEW Environment America is a federation of state- based, citizen-funded environmental advocacy organizations. Our presence in all 50 states and Washington D.C., hundreds of thousands of mem- bers, state-level organizations in 26 state capitals, and hundreds of professional staff , combine in- dependent research, practical ideas and tough- minded advocacy to overcome the opposition of powerful special interests and win real results for the environment. Environment America, the new home of U.S. PIRG’s environmental work, draws on 30 years of success in tackling environmental problems. Environment New Mexico, the new home of NMPIRG’s environmental work, is a state-wide, cit- izen-based environmental advocacy organization. With more than 6500 members and activists across New Mexico, Environment New Mexico works to protect New Mexico’s air, water and open spaces and to achieve real solutions to global warming. In 2007, the leaders of our state-based environmen- California Coastline tal organizations, like Environment New Mexico, joined forces to form Environment America. To- pollution that causes global warming, to winning gether, in Washington, D.C. and throughout the new protections for countless acres of wild places country we’re building on the progress our advo- and open spaces. With grassroots support and ac- cates and activists have made at the state and lo- tion across the nation, a team of professional re- cal levels—from passing laws that promote energy searchers, advocates and issue experts, a spirit of efficiency and solar and wind power, to cutting the cooperation, a willingness to take on whatever spe- cial interests might stand in the way of a clean and healthy environment and an orientation toward real results, Environment America is providing a powerful new force for progress on the environment in our country. Environment America, Environment New Mexico, and our federation of state environmental groups produce this regular report on key votes in Congress as one of our many tools to help citizens engage in and make an impact on environmental policy. The scorecard is distributed online to our entire membership and through our door-to-door canvass in cities and Asheville, North Carolina towns across the country. It is being 4 Environment New Mexico Legislative Scorecard distributed to more than one million households. search votes and basic information on their elected officials as well as look at past reports. For more The 2008 scorecard looks at the key environmen- information visit: www.environmentnewmexico. tal votes taken between March 2007 and February org. 2008. Through our online tools citizens can re- CONGRESS & THE ENVIRONMENT Introduction ed in December 2007. For more than three decades, Americans have The 2006 midterm elections provided new leaders shown overwhelming support for clean air, clean in the Congress. While that has resulted in some water and protecting open space. More recently, significant changes, there are unfortunately many the American people have shown a strong desire to storylines in Washington that have not changed. combat global warming and to create a new ener- Much of the agenda is still established by a Presi- gy future that is based on increased efficiency and dent and administration that has great power over more reliance on clean renewable, homegrown en- the policies that protect our environment. ergy sources. Americans came together to advance An Assault on the these goals through a Environment framework of federal laws such as the Clean Air Act, The assault on the environ- the Clean Water Act and ment from President Bush the Endangered Species and his appointees contin- Act. In addition, and on a ues unabated. In the past regular basis, we come to- 18 months the administra- gether at the state level to tion has been increasingly provide critical leadership focused on weakening in setting the standards bedrock environmental for how the environment protections and the envi- should be protected with ronmental progress of the local examples that become states. models for federal action. For example, in Febru- All too often, the American ary 2008, Environmental public has demonstrated a Protection Agency (EPA) greater appetite for strong Administrator Steven environmental protections Johnson, ignoring a unani- than our elected officials mous recommendation have delivered. Powerful Susquehanna State Park, Maryland of the EPA’s professional interests frequently exert staff, denied California’s their resources and dis- request for a waiver under the Clean Air Act to proportionate influence to roll back or block key adopt greenhouse gas emission standards for cars. environmental protections. For example, the auto This decision has blocked California and 13 other industry successfully blocked increased miles per states that have adopted these standards from re- gallon standards for thirty years until citizen pres- quiring automakers to cut global warming pollu- sure and national security concerns led to a forty tion from automobiles. California and more than percent increase in the standards which was enact- a dozen other states have filed suit against the EPA Environment New Mexico Legislative Scorecard 5 for failing to heed science and the law in denying California’s request. The Bush Administration has also attacked bedrock clean water and toxics laws. In June 2007, the Bush administration issued a second policy that elimi- nates longstanding Clean Water Act protections for many U.S. waterways, putting thousands of miles of streams and millions of acres of wetlands in danger of unlimited pollution and development. The waters at risk from this policy are the source waters for America’s rivers, lakes and bays. These waters filter pollution, sustain water supplies, con- trol flood waters and provide habitat for fish and other wildlife. In December 2006, the Bush administration final- ized a rule to rollback the Toxics Release Inventory program, the basic right-to-know program that provides the public with toxic pollution informa- tion every year. Under the Bush administration changes, polluters can release ten times more toxic chemicals into the air, water and land before they would be required to report it and can withhold in- formation on the most dangerous toxic chemicals. Shiprock, New Mexico history, with more than 95 percent of them in favor Finally, the Bush Administration continues to try to of complete protection for all of these last wild na- repeal the rule that protects a third of our national tional forests. forests from logging and road-building. In 2007, the Bush administration filed an appeal to the 9th A Change in Direction Circuit Court of Appeals decision that allowed the 2001 Roadless Rule to stand as the law of the land. The new members and leadership of the 110th Con- If successful, the administration’s appeal would gress have changed the direction of environmen- give industries, such as timber and mining, access tal policy in measurable ways. The most notable to a third of the national