GREEN BEAT$ "GREEN:"

MDE, LEGISLATORS

GIVE DEVELOPERS A

FREE PASS ON NEW

WATER RUNOFF RULES

Once again, the environmental hypocrisy of our elected officials has been laid bare in Annapolis. After extensive lobbying by developers and their puppet legislators in the General Assembly, the Maryland "Department of the Environment" has issued "emergency" rules that obliterate the water runoff restrictions passed in 2007.

These restrictions were not only for the benefit of streams, rivers and the Chesapeake Bay, which are partially polluted by soil and chemical runoff from construction projects, but also could have slowed the destruction of strip malls across the county and state.

Apparently, your developer-beholden delegates and senators didn't realize that the new guidelines would be especially costly for developers who want to wipe out neighborhood shopping centers and replace them with mixed-use condo/retail projects. Aside from the traffic impact of doing this without improving nearby roads and highways, these projects are designed to turn neighborhood amenity centers into regional destinations.

The new rules would likely have slowed this "infill" development, strongly promoted by Dr. Yes and Rollin Stanley.

Several of the biggest environmental hypocrites in Annapolis were preparing bills to postpone changes indefinitely.

But then an even bigger hypocrite stepped in: MDE.

Yes, the same MDE that stonewalls me every time I inquire about environmental incidents that residents were never told about. The same MDE that has O'Malley campaign interns working the phones, and don't even know how to transfer your call to another department. "Dude, is it OK if just tell you the number, and, um, you just, like, call it yourself?"

Same MDE!

The "compromise" is that developers can now pollute away until 2017 anywhere, and indefinitely in "smart growth" areas. AKA, infill projects at your neighborhood shopping center.

This means that already-polluted Little Falls, Seneca, and Ten Mile Creeks will be getting a fresh flush of filthy runoff from new projects. And your legislator is laughing all the way to the bank.

It's outrageous.

"We're pleased," said MDE spokeswoman Dawn Stoltzfus.

"Environmentalists" are "satisfied," according to the Baltimore Sun.

"1000 Friends of Maryland" (or is that 1000 Developers of Maryland?) and the Chesapeake Bay Foundation say it's a mighty fine piece of work by MDE.

Wonder what they'd have said if these rules were issued by a Republican administration?

And that's hypocrisy for you.

This reminds me of the time Attorney General Doug Gansler responded to questions I raised on this blog re: his lack of action against polluters, by commissioning an article in the Washington Post. When the reporter asked "environmentalists" for comment, they all said they had no problem with Gansler, and thought he was doing a great job. Not busting polluters = a great job? Hypocrisy.

Even the Sun printed an Orwellian headline above the fold: "Tougher MD Pollution Rules Survive." Doublespeak 101.

Dying fish are encouraged to call the MDE from polluted waters.

"Glub glub."

"Um, dude, can I like, give you the number, and then you can, um, call it yourself?"