Tuesday, November 22, 2005

Terre Haute TribStar.com :: Daniels leads clumsy DST dance

The editors of the Terre Haute Tribune-Star write:

"In reality, however, the governor's biggest first-year fiasco is one entirely of his own making. It is he who decided Indiana had a problem with its clocks and pushed hard to get daylight-saving time adopted by the Legislature...

"Through underhanded political means and last-minute shenanigans by members of his own party in the Indiana House, Daniels managed to “solve” a problem that really did not exist...

"The governor himself is likely to feel enormous heat on the issue next year during mid-term elections. If his GOP loses control of the House, which it only holds by four seats, he may have only himself and his DST policy to blame. Hoosiers in these parts are ticked off about DST and may decide to express their disgust with the governor at the polls next November...

"What's important is that we reach consensus and stick with it. And because Indianapolis is our capital city and has such a significant influence on Hoosier commerce, the rest of the state would be wise to follow its lead.

"Mitch Daniels may be the guy who screwed this up. But we don't have to make things worse."

*****
While I disagree with their recommendation that the state should follow Indianapolis on the time zone, I do agree that the whole state should be in a single time zone.

For many reasons I have already expressed elsewhere, I believe Indiana should lie entirely in the Central zone.

If Indiana were a wide state and bisected by a time zone boundary, as Ohio is, I might agree that it makes sense for Indiana to be split into two time zones. But east-to-west, we only extend across 3.25 degrees longitude and we fit well within the eastern half of the 15-degree Central standard time zone centered on St. Louis (90 degrees longitude).


Terre Haute, Indiana News :: TribStar.com :: Daniels leads clumsy DST dance

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