The smell test
Published April 24, 2014
Editorial by Greensboro News-Record, April 24, 2014.
Tracing the trail of a truck hauling trash isn’t so hard if it leaks. Although it could turn one’s stomach.
The Solid Waste Management Reform Act of 2013, whose primary sponsor was Republican Trudy Wade of Greensboro, passed the Senate by a 29-16 vote June 24. Three Republicans voted against it; no Democrats supported it.
It included provisions making it easier to build new landfills and loosening regulations requiring that trucks transport solid waste in “leak-proof” containers. Under the new standard, they would only have to be “leak-resistant.”
The House refused to vote on Wade’s bill. Yet, in the final days of the legislative session a month later, representatives found some of its controversial proposals tucked into the conference report of a House bill containing sweeping regulatory reforms.
There was no time to take them out.
“This bill is going to pass,” Rep. Chuck McGrady, R-Henderson, said during the floor debate. “It’s been greased.”
“It’s full of poison pills from the Senate and petty political paybacks,” Rep. Joe Sam Queen, D-Haywood, complained. “Coal ash, landfills and the loss of our Mountain Resource Commission.”
And leaking garbage trucks.
Nevertheless, it passed 63-34. McGrady and one other Republican voted against it. Fifteen Republicans skipped the vote rather than support it.
Another month passed before Republican Gov. Pat McCrory signed the bill. But he added two executive orders that amounted to declarations that he would not enforce two parts of it: one allowing more clear-cutting of vegetation in front of billboards; and the other easing the leak-proof standard for garbage trucks.
McCrory’s order said the weaker standard conflicted with other laws and posed public health concerns. He directed state law-enforcement agencies to continue writing citations if officers detected liquids seeping from trucks hauling solid waste.
This was a bold move for the governor, who rarely challenged his fellow Republicans in the legislature — not when they tried to wrest control of Charlotte’s airport from the city he had led as mayor; not when they pushed him to break his promise that he wouldn’t sign any anti-abortion bills.
This time, he boldly used his executive authority to stop a detrimental relaxation of a public health law.
That’s how the matter stood — until now. Now, a few weeks before the legislature returns to session, lawmakers are fanning a simmering resentment. The governor in effect exercised a line-item veto to overturn the garbage truck provision, members of an environmental review committee said recently. Even McGrady spoke in favor of “protecting our prerogatives.”
There’s always been conflict in North Carolina between executive and legislative power, regardless of the political parties involved. This is one of those cases. But it’s the wrong fight for legislators to pick.
They did not want to pass the leaky garbage trucks measure in the light of day last year, and they will not fare well with the public if they renew a battle with the governor in a spotlight of publicity now. If they do anything, they should repeal that provision and eliminate the conflict themselves.
For his part, the governor should stand firm. He stopped the leaky trucks in their tracks with a well-timed road block, and he must keep it there. If he does, he’ll come out smelling like roses. Legislators, on the other hand ...
