After Weakening Mercury Plan, MPCA Lies About Enviro Group Input

[hatrack]

The head of the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency (MPCA) on Monday defended the agency's decision to give industries and utilities a chance to review and comment on a proposal to control mercury emissions prior to making the draft plan public in December. "The purpose of our meeting with industry leaders was to give them a heads up on changes they will need to make in their operations," said MPCA Commissioner Sheryl Corrigan in a posting on the agency's website.

Corrigan took issue with a Star Tribune story on Sunday that reported the agency last fall weakened the draft plan for mercury smokestack emissions from power plants, mining companies and other sources. Mercury is a potent toxin that accumulates in fish tissue and can damage the nervous systems of people who eat the fish. The story cited internal agency e-mails and other evidence from environmentalists who said they were shut out of the process for seven weeks as the MPCA consulted with industry about the draft plan. The story quoted an assistant commissioner who said the MPCA talked to industry ahead of others. The paper also reported that the agency eliminated specific target dates for mercury reductions.

Corrigan said that MPCA staff members met with environmentalists several times between April 29, 2004, and May 10, 2005. "Despite criticisms by a few environmental group representatives quoted in the story, there has been ample opportunity for input by environmental organizations and the general public," Corrigan wrote. She also charged that the Minnesota Center for Environmental Advocacy, a critic cited in the Sunday article, did not attend environmental stakeholder meetings to which it was invited.

"That's a flat-out lie," said Kris Sigford, the center's water policy director. Sigford said that the center and other environmental groups met with the MPCA in the spring and summer of 2004 for briefings on scientific aspects of mercury pollution, but they were shut out as soon as the agency began formulating possible goals and deadlines for mercury reductions. She said two meetings cited by Corrigan in her website statement were canceled by MPCA officials. Others were scheduled later in the process after the MPCA had rewritten and weakened the plan considerably, she added. "MPCA is feeling backed into a corner, and they're trying to defend themselves with some inaccurate statements," Sigford said.

EDIT

http://www.startribune.com/stories/1405/5537958.html

[rodeodance]

1. "That's a flat-out lie," said Kris Sigford, --these words need to said

more often. I so am sick and tired of these lies and the people in power to tell them!!!!!

[back2basics909]

2. Every time...

.. you read about Mercury they ALWAYS make it out as if it would only effect people who eat Fish... which is flat out wrong. I think many people just think, well i will just stay away from Fish.