Forget the ‘fluff.’ Here is the ‘real stuff’ about Vern Buchanan’s environmental record | Opinion

U.S. Vern Buchanan’s recent media blitz in opposition to President Trump’s current assault on the Endangered Species Act sports an action shot of our county mascot, the manatee, one of the species about to be booted off the endangered list.

Although Buchanan portrays himself as an environmental advocate, a review of his voting record over the past four years reveals the truth. In what could be coined as “fluff,” he has a history of supporting environmental bills that either have no chance of passing, require no funding or contain no regulatory action. This allows him to tout his support for popular pro-environmental issues of concern to many of his coastal constituents in high visibility, low-risk ways. They are largely distractions from what actually needs to be done for the environment.

The real stuff is his consistently conservative, anti-environmental voting record.

Red tide and water

Buchanan has touted co-sponsorship of the Harmful Algal Bloom and Hypoxia Research and Control Amendments Act of 2017 as one of his major environmental accomplishments. What it actually did was relegate red tide and related hypoxia (oxygen deficiency) from monitoring and regulation under the Clean Water Act where the Obama administration had labored to place it, to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, where it is limited to research on mitigation techniques.

Under the Clean Water Act the EPA could have established acceptable levels of red tide toxin in coastal waters and moved toward regulating human accelerants of outbreaks such as nutrient runoff from farms and lawns, wastewater and septic tank leaks and phosphate mining discharges.

Buchanan has also voted against every attempt to control water pollution and warming of Gulf waters. He co-sponsored a bill to prevent Obama’s expansion of the definition “waters of the United States” to include more feeder streams and rivers to be covered under the Clean Water Act. Florida’s consistent failure to enforce the Clean Water Act is frequently cited by environmental scientists as a major cause of increasing levels of red tide and decreasing fish and marine mammal populations in Florida waters.

Buchanan has also voted to remove the need for an EPA permit to spray pesticides on navigable waters and to loosen regulations on applying pesticides to water.

Climate change

Buchanan’s fluff issue for climate change is his opposition to President Trump’s withdrawal from the Paris Climate Accord. By contrast, Buchanan has voted for all of the recent Republican-backed bills attempting to control the debate about climate change. A bill that prohibits federal agencies from considering the social cost of carbon in environmental reviews got his yea vote.

He also voted for a declaration that a carbon tax would be detrimental to the U.S. economy. Many economists believe that carbon pricing, a market-based method, is the best way to reduce fossil fuel usage and finance the transition to a sustainable energy economy. Buchanan has voted for every legislative attempt to prevent the EPA from regulating greenhouse gas emissions from power plants and for the repeal of Obama’s increased standards.

Oil and gas drilling

This is Buchanan’s most favorable environmental issue in Florida as he has consistently supported at least a moratorium on new off-shore drilling leases since shortly after the disastrous Deepwater Horizon spill in 2010. He also supported the newest legislation which permanently bans new leases for much of the Atlantic coast.

But this support does not translate to a true pro- environmental stance. He recently voted against a bill that prohibits exploration and drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge in Alaska. The opening of this wilderness preserve to drilling has been fought by environmentalists for decades.

Endangered species

Despite Buchanan’s opposition to Trump’s threatened decimation of the endangered species list, he has no endangered species legislation to his credit and has voted against land management bills that would expand protected habitats.

More recently he voted for expanding unlicensed hunting on federal lands. He has done nothing to address the main causes of extinction-habitat loss and climate change.

Protecting endangered species is a perfect “fluff” for Buchanan, it is a complex and therefore easily misrepresented issue of great concern to many Floridians.

Jane Sellick is vice president of the Manatee Democratic Environmental Caucus.