Updated 05/28/2010 02:14 PM
Perry asks Obama to halt expected EPA actions
Gov. Rick Perry is asking President Barack Obama to prevent federal environmental regulators from taking over the Texas air quality program.
On Wednesday, Environmental Protection Agency Regional Director Al Armendariz announced regulators were preparing to completely take over the Texas air quality program if the state fails to comply with the Clean Air Act. The EPA said the Texas permitting program makes regulating pollution impossible.
Perry sent a letter to Obama on Friday, saying the Texas program for permitting pollutants released by petrochemical plants has helped improve air quality.
"Texas' air quality permitting program is achieving significantly cleaner air while encouraging jobs and economic growth at the same time. The facts prove that penalizing Texas will undermine those significant environmental and economic successes and harm America’s leading producer of domestic energy, refined products and chemicals," Gov. Perry said.
Perry's letter said the EPA's action will replace a successful program with a "less effective Washington-based, bureaucratic-led command and control mandate."
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Texas continues to make significant progress reducing emissions and improving air quality for the citizens of our state. Based on the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality's statement that the EPA will require Flint Hill's refinery in Corpus Christi to submit a new air permit application, "is at odds with past EPA decisions and directions concerning the refinery," I can only conclude the EPA's action is politically driven by the increasingly partisan Obama administration in trying to mess with Texas, and could ultimately cost our state thousands of jobs while putting at risk the scientifically proven gains we've made in air quality.