GOP-backed mining bill clears Wis. Senate panel
MADISON, Wis. (AP) — Wisconsin Republicans moved closer Wednesday to passing a sweeping overhaul of the state’s mining regulations, pushing the proposal through a pair of committees and setting up a vote before the Legislature’s budget panel.
The legislation is designed to help Gogebic Taconite open a massive iron mine in far northwestern Wisconsin. Republicans insist the bill will ease the company’s regulatory path and help it create hundreds of jobs. Democrats and environmentalists have painted the measure as a corporate give-away, insisting the bill weakens environmental protections and the company’s job creation promises are wildly exaggerated.
Republicans on the Senate and Assembly mining committees made identical revisions to the bill Wednesday they said were designed to allay fears about pollution. Democrats lamented the changes as insubstantial, but it didn’t matter. The GOP controls both the Senate and the Assembly, which means the party controls every committee. The Senate panel passed it on a 3-2 party line vote; the Assembly committee followed suit on a 10-6 party line vote.
“This bill balances the economy and the environment,” said Sen. Tom Tiffany, R-Hazelhurst, one of the bill’s chief sponsors and chairman of the Senate committee. “We can do this.”
The bill goes next to the Joint Finance Committee. That likely will be the measure’s last stop before it comes to the Senate and Assembly floors. Senate Majority Leader Scott Fitzgerald, R-Juneau, has said he wants to vote on the measure by early next month.
Feb 7, 2013 at 10:19 a.m.
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Curious is the amount of jobs they say will be created by this, is that by The GOP math again?
Feb 7, 2013 at 8:53 a.m.
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Fear mongering at its best
Feb 7, 2013 at 5:10 a.m.
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We have been mining in Wisconsin for hundreds of years. The laws on mining have taken all this time to develop, and are there for a reason. The Stewards that came before us had the insight to have regulations because they saw the land getting raped and polluted and decided to manage this resource the best way possible and protect the people the governed. Fast forward to today. A out of state mining company can donate piles of money to get a bunch of lemming Republicans and their ruler to elected. In return for these campaign donations these lemming Republican legislators have to take the new law that the mining company wrote for them and ram rod it through the system. This law written by the mining comapany that has the mining company's best interest(not the people) is written to ease long standing environmental standards that will pollute and who know s what it will do to the health of the people in the area for this generation and all their kids for generations. Then they have the audacity to dangle the transparent carrot that there might be 700-1000 jobs generated to try to fool the public into believing this is a good thing for everybody, while they put millions of dollars in profit into their Florida based pockets at our expense. When the jobs are long gone their watered down environmental standards will hurt us forever.
Feb 7, 2013 at 3:10 a.m.
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enter the left. Oh my goodness jobs might come to Wisconsin. We must stop this so we can complain somemore. Yada Yada squeek squeek squeek and install more fear
Feb 7, 2013 at midnight
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The real whole article in WSJ,
State Sen. Bob Jauch, D-Poplar, said the Republican bill will invite lawsuits and years-long delays in mining because it still includes broad exemptions from water laws that violate constitutional protections for the state's lakes, streams and wetlands.
Read more: http://host.madison.com/news/local/govt-...
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