Leavitt's EPA legacy? Utah opinions vary

Former Utah Gov. Mike Leavitt has headed the Environmental Protection Agency for such a brief time he hasn't made many bitter enemies or worshipful admirers. Still, his performance at EPA does have detractors and supporters in Utah.

In September 2003, before the congressional hearing on his nomination to become EPA administrator, a group of 16 environmental groups raised questions about his record as governor. In a letter to the Senate, they charged the Utahn was on track to be part of a "stridently anti-environmental, anti-public health agenda."

They accused him of numerous environmental misdeeds as governor, from ignoring science that did not support his positions to lax enforcement of environmental laws. Special condemnation came for his striking deals with the Bush administration that the groups said damaged wilderness values on public land. The groups called these "back-room" and secret agreements.

Today, environmentalists are not thrilled by Leavitt's actions at the EPA, while at least some industry representatives are supportive. But neither side is loud in its reactions.

"We certainly wish Gov. Leavitt well in any future post," said Lawson LeGate, the Sierra Club's senior southwest regional representative, based in Salt Lake City. "As head of EPA, he unfortunately carried out the Bush administration plan to delay and weaken enforcement of environmental regulations."

An example of this, he said, was the government's "so-called Clear Skies Initiative."

According to the EPA, the initiative is a proposal to protect human health while providing regulatory certainty to industry. It is intended to "dramatically reduce" power plant releases of sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxides and mercury "by setting a national cap on each pollutant," according to an EPA Web site.

But the plan is "actually a euphemism for backing off controlling emissions of air pollutants," LeGate charged.

"Another example is the administration's proposal to delay by several years the cleanup of emissions of toxic mercury from coal-fired power plants," he said in a telephone interview.

Dave Eskelsen, spokesman for Utah Power, said that while the utility may not have had direct dealings with Leavitt as EPA administrator, "we certainly have a lot of interface with EPA in terms of environmental controls at our power plants."

"We certainly were supportive of a lot of the things that EPA was trying to do," he said.