Letter: State should be in Central zone

My letter to the editor, published Saturday, 8 July 2006.


We have now lived through our first three months in recent history of daylight-saving time. In June and July we observe the more conspicuous peculiarities of staying on Eastern time rather than going back to Central.

The longest day of the year was June 21 — almost 15 hours of daylight. If we had only 60 minutes of daylight shifted from morning to evening that day, sunrise would be 5:32 am, midday 1, and sunset 8:28 pm.

Instead, our earliest sunrise of the year is 6:17 am, our latest midday is 1:50 pm, and our latest sunset is 9:14 pm.

These later times illustrate that we have about 105 minutes of daylight shifted from morning to evening in Columbus. Compared to Central time, this is about three times further than necessary from the DST “design goal” of 60 minutes.

I have heard mixed feelings about this 45-minute excess of evening daylight compared to “nominal” DST. For example, one of my coworkers says he enjoys the extra time for a longer bike ride after work. But, like poet Robert Louis Stevenson, he notices that it is harder to get his visiting grandchildren to sleep when they “have to go to bed by day.”

I frequently hear those with early morning jobs and appointments lament the difficulty of trying to fall asleep while it is still light out, or of getting up by dark on midsummer mornings, when it is “supposed” to be light out.

Indiana is the narrowest state split into two time zones. The next wider is Idaho — more than twice as wide as Indiana. The entire state of Indiana falls well within the natural boundaries of Central time. All 92 counties were on Central time for more than four decades (1918 through 1961). The sun takes 60 minutes to cross each of the 24 time zones. It takes just under 13 minutes to cross from our eastern to our western border. I.e., Indiana is about one-fourth of a time zone wide.

By contrast, Alaska is about 18 times wider than Indiana. It takes about 228 minutes for the sun to get from one side to the other. It is wide enough to be in three or four different time zones and yet it is virtually all on one time zone. Indiana is so narrow it makes me wonder what the feds were thinking when they ever carved us into two time zones in the first place.

The predominant reason Gov. Mitch Daniels gave for pushing Indiana back onto DST was the economic benefit and increased efficiency for business of changing time with the rest of the country. It only stands to reason that putting the whole state back on a single time again would be even less confusing, and therefore even more beneficial for Hoosier businesses.

In their 2006 ruling on Indiana’s time zone, the DOT wrote that their decision was meant to allow communities to fully assess the impact of DST observance. They also reminded governmental representatives that they are free to petition at any time for further changes to the time zone boundary.

Now that we have had a chance to assess the impact of DST on our daily lives, I see much to be gained, and little to be lost, in urging our governor and state legislators to ask the DOT to put the whole state back on Central time again.


Letter: State should be in Central zone

Modern Medicine’s Sleight of Hand by Bill Sardi

Why the claims for preventive prescription drug use ought to be taken with a grain of salt.

Modern Medicine’s Sleight of Hand by Bill Sardi

Congressman Tom Expresses Disappointment at Pence’s Immigration U-Turn

Congressman Tom Tancredo (R-CO), Chairman of the 97-member House Immigration Reform Caucus, expressed disappointment at Rep. Mike Pence’s policy shift on immigration reform. At a Heritage Foundation speech this afternoon, Pence presented what he called “a rational middle ground… between amnesty and mass deportation” that turns its back on a enforcement-first strategy, grants rogue employers amnesty, and would in effect reward illegal aliens for breaking the law...

“Unfortunately, like the President, Pence is breaking from House conservatives who remain steadfast in their support of a security-first approach to immigration,” said Tancredo...

Pence wants to start the new foreign worker program before border security is even proved effective, which is the same strategy that was used in the 1986 amnesty. Twenty years later, the U.S. got amnesty as promised but no border security.

“Pence’s W visa... gives the Administration exactly what it wants: unlimited foreign workers first, enforcement later or never,” said Tancredo...

The Pence plan includes no prevailing wage standard for foreign workers... In fact, almost all current visas require employers to offer the job to American workers before seeking foreign labor, but with no enforcement mechanism, the requirement is laughable.

“The House’s strategy in H.R. 4437 was to fix the illegal alien problem by enforcing the law. Over time, as illegal workers cannot obtain jobs, they go home because they have no other option open to them. Pence takes a much different approach: fix illegal behavior by legalizing it,” said Tancredo. “As a conservative and a friend of Mike Pence, I am baffled by his shift on immigration. I hope he reconsiders his position and returns to an enforcement-first position.”

Congressman Tom Expresses Disappointment at Pence’s Immigration U-Turn

Time Changed -- Curious Inklings

I enjoyed your thoughts on the daylight saving time clock changing.

Sadly, moving back to Kokomo won't help anymore. As of April 2006, the whole state of Indiana now observes daylight saving time with the rest of the country.

Unfortunately, it's still hard to figure out what time it is in Indiana. Indiana's legislators and governor, and the bureaucrats at the U.S. Department of Transportation, saw fit to leave Indiana as the narrowest state split between two time zones. The next larger state split between two zones is about three times wider than Indiana. I believe Indiana is the only state originally well within the confines of a single time zone (central time) to be split into two zones by the federal government.

Most states have gone the other way. E.g., Ohio was originally split down the middle between eastern and central but now lies entirely in eastern.

Most of Indiana now lies in the eastern zone. If the Indianapolis clocks read noon at midday today, the sunrise would be 4:37 am and the sunset 7:23 pm. If we had sixty minutes of daylight shifted from morning to evening (the nominal goal of daylight saving time), sunrise/set today would be 5:37 am and 8:23 pm -- plenty of time for after-work chores and recreation before dusk at 9 pm. Instead, because of the lunacy of putting the majority of the state in the eastern zone, we get a sunrise/set of 6:20 am and 9:05 pm -- 102 minutes shifted from morning to evening -- and it doesn't really get dark until 9:30 to 10:00.

Bill Starr
Columbus, Indiana
Tue, 30 May 2006, 7:37 pm EDT

Time Changed -- Curious Inklings

Theodore Roosevelt on immigration

Timely words from the past for the U.S. today.

From More Liberty, 23 April 2006.

"The following is one of my favorite thoughts on the issue of immigration. It's from President Theodore Roosevelt in a letter to the American Defense Society in 1919, 10 years after his presidency."

--Lou Dobbs, CNN Commentator

"In the first place we should insist that if the immigrant who comes here in good faith becomes an American and assimilates himself to us, he shall be treated on an exact equality with everyone else, for it is an outrage to discriminate against any such man because of creed, or birthplace, or origin. But this is predicated upon the man's becoming in very fact an American, and nothing but an American...

There can be no divided allegiance here. Any man who says he is an American, but something else also, isn't an American at all. We have room for but one flag, the American flag, and this excludes the red flag, which symbolizes all wars against liberty and civilization, just as much as it excludes any foreign flag of a nation to which we are hostile...We have room for but one language here, and that is the English language...and we have room for but one sole loyalty and that is a loyalty to the American people."

--Theodore Roosevelt, 1919

Congressman John J. Duncan, Jr.

Few protections for migrants to Mexico

I had this called to my attention by the "More Liberty" newsletter.

http://www.moreliberty.org/more_liberty/2006/week16/index.html

Points out Mexico's inconsistency with how they demand that their illegal immigrants to the U.S. be treated.

Few protections for migrants to Mexico

WorldNetDaily: Airport screener 'roughs up' woman, 83, in wheelchair

This kind of airport "security" doesn't make me feel any safer. How about you?

WorldNetDaily: Airport screener 'roughs up' woman, 83, in wheelchair

WorldNetDaily: Washington drowns in Republican red ink

Move over Franklin D. Roosevelt.

The 21st century Republicans have outpaced you in federal government spending growth – and it's not a record all members of the GOP are pleased about...

WorldNetDaily: Washington drowns in Republican red ink

GOP spending habits obscene

Cal Thomas is a syndicated columnist. He writes:

NOT SO LONG ago, in a country that now seems far, far away, Ronald Reagan said: "...we don't have deficits because people are taxed too little. We have deficits because big government spends too much..."

Last week, a Republican Senate voted to raise the debt ceiling to nearly $9 trillion. Senators quickly passed a record $2.8 trillion budget. What would Reagan say now? ...

That Republicans are outspending the most reckless 1980s Democrat (and 1960s Great Society Democrats and 1940s FDR Democrats) is the sorriest spectacle of all.

The Senate vote increased the debt ceiling for the fourth time in five years. The statutory debt limit has now risen by more than $3 trillion since President Bush took office. That any Republican majority could preside over such fiscal irresponsibility is grounds for revoking their party membership...

Why should Republicans be re-elected when one of the major reasons the GOP exists is to reduce the size and cost of government...

Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., said, "This budget could be the final nail in our coffin if we don't watch it." He said GOP spending habits are demoralizing voters...

The Bush administration has sired the biggest new entitlement program in history -- a prescription drug benefit for the elderly. And let's not forget "No Child Left Behind," which massively increased federal education spending.

[Reagan] left the presidency with a surplus. So did Bill Clinton. That a GOP Congress and administration are engaging in such spending is obscene. Little will change if we vote in Democrats. who also have engaged in deficit spending. What to do?

Maybe it's time for a strong third party, or failing that, another revolution.

ContraCostaTimes.com | 03/22/2006 | GOP spending habits obscene

WorldNetDaily: Fight for your right to third party

Doug Powers writes:

Come on, third parties – it's time to gallop into Washington, D.C., in a Trojan horse

WorldNetDaily: Fight for your right to third party

Sri Lanka clocks go back to Tiger time as experiment fails

Maybe the Indiana legislators and governor could take a lesson from this episode 9,000 miles away.

The Associated Press writes:

Sri Lanka is to revert to its previous time zone from April 14 after a failed experiment, lasting nearly 10 years, aimed at maximising daylight hours.

As the country's traditional new year begins clocks will be set five and a half hours ahead of Greenwich Mean Time, falling in line with the rebel Tamil Tigers, who refused to make the switch a decade ago.

In 1996 Sri Lanka advanced its clocks by an hour, then later that year dropped back by 30 minutes.

But the hoped-for cut in electricity consumption did not happen and the move was unpopular as it had upset children's bedtimes.

Guardian Unlimited | The Guardian | Clocks go back to Tiger time as experiment fails

Sink the Dubai Ports Deal!

R. Cort Kirkwood has been writing about American politics and culture for more than 20 years. Regarding the proposed management of U.S. ports by an Arab company, he writes:

Our ports are gateways to America, and it does not make sense to put them under the control of a foreign power -- particularly an Islamic regime tied to al-Qaeda...

If the deal goes through, an Islamic regime will control shipping on the eastern seaboard of the United States...

What the president knew and when he knew it will remain a mystery, but whatever he knew, he knows enough now to threaten vetoing a suggested congressional measure to investigate the deal. This veto threat comes from a supposed conservative... who has never uncapped the veto pen during his five years in office. Not once has Bush seen a spending bill cross his desk that could be cut by a mere penny. But suddenly he sees a bill that merits the veto.

The Bush administration would put a despotic Islamic regime, whose potentates and bankers boast significant ties to al-Qaeda terrorists, in charge of American shipping... The deal is yet another plot, approved in secret, which would undermine American national security and sovereignty for the benefit of the transnational political and commercial plutocrats who manage government and business across the globe...

Unsurprisingly, the government secretly sanctioned the deal...

One marvels that Bush appointed an executive of DPW to a marquee position in his administration, yet knew nothing of the deal that the executive’s employer was consummating to establish financial control of major American ports...

Aside from all this, the Times reported, the deal never received the 45-day review required by U.S. law... Bush officials, apparently, did not believe the company’s owner, a foreign government, warranted that review. The Committee on Foreign Investment was created specifically to review such transactions...

Average Americans are tugging their chin whiskers, wondering whether Bush and his crew are rowing around with one oar... Osama bin Laden and al-Qaeda used the UAE, a small country on the Persian Gulf bordering Saudi Arabia and Oman, as a logistical and financial base of operations for the attacks...

Bush’s approval of the sale of our ports to the UAE represents a deal with the devil where American security and sovereignty are concerned. And if those aren’t concerns enough for Bush and his understrappers, then perhaps the UAE’s dismal record on human slavery and child welfare needs considering. The UAE is a major destination for women sex slaves... as well as imported child slaves, stolen or purchased from other countries, who serve as camel jockeys. A law passed in April 2005 supposedly outlawed the practice, which features oil-rich sheiks gambling on the races, while the children, who run the risk of being trampled to death, train in the burning dessert, live in hovels, and beg for water...

Whatever happens with the ports deal, Americans need to know this latest scheme to undermine American national security and sovereignty is of a piece with nearly everything else this administration has done or failed to do. Bush not only refuses to stop illegal immigration from Mexico, but also suggests a “guest-worker” entitlement that would permit the alien horde to establish a permanent presence on American soil. He also supports handing Social Security benefits to these criminal aliens. The tsunami of illegal immigrants across the southern border poses a domestic security threat not just because so many are drug dealers, rapists, and murderers, but because Islamic terrorists can sneak across the open border unnoticed amid the tide.

Aside from that, the Bush administration hasn’t stopped the unimpeded flow of government-authorized immigrants and visitors from Islamic countries...

Thus does the government spend less time performing constitutional and legitimate duties, such as controlling immigration and providing for national security, and more time supporting a massive, intrusive, and unconstitutional “homeland security” agency with the authority to trace the activities of everyone in the country...

In the same way, perhaps if the Bush administration were not waging an unconstitutional war in Iraq, it could spend more time and money controlling immigration here, which would obviate the unconstitutional, garrison-state security measures that harass law-abiding citizens...

The government now wants to scrutinize the private lives of all Americans: their financial transactions, their e-mail, their phone calls, and their political activities. Someday, the government may force real Americans to carry identification cards. Already, uniformed federal police search old ladies at airports and harass men who have received the nation’s highest decoration for bravery...

Thus has Bush promised to veto a bill that would provide some measure of national security, and a cadre of internationalists and global elites who care nothing for American sovereignty support him...

Average Americans might wonder why any foreign company, state-controlled or not, is running an American port, the way companies from Singapore, Japan, and Denmark run them now...

Thus, this sale. It is another piece of the plan, which includes subverting national sovereignty via immigration and billion-dollar global transactions, to cede control of American business, government, and institutions to the corporate, political, and cultural elites who contrived and command the plan, and will augment their considerable powers at the expense of the consumers and taxpayers who unwittingly support the nefarious enterprise.

It mightn’t matter to Bush and Wall Street’s elite who runs America’s harbors, industry, and commerce. But it might just matter to the average Joe, who wants physical security for his family, a job that pays a living wage, and an economy that flourishes — not wilts. Americans must ask themselves: “Would anyone approve this mad idea for the ports but a man who has gone mad, or a man who isn’t mad at all but perfectly sane, whose loyalties lie not with his people and his country, but with a grandiose liberal abstraction that travels hidden under such disingenuous names as equality, democracy, rights, and freedom?”

Further, Americans must ask themselves: “Despite blustery claims from defenders of the Bush administration that Bush is doing what’s right, is the administration loyal to U.S. citizens and doing what’s right for them, or only to itself and to the rootless elites who empower it and thereby profit from the concentration of political and financial power among the few at the expense of the many?”

An empowering of the elites in our society would explain the threat to veto. Until the average American understands this truth and does something about it, he will toil in futility for Bush, Cheney, and the elites who are plotting America’s demise.

What You Can Do

Readers are encouraged to contact their U.S. senators and representatives urging them to pass legislation blocking the Dubai Ports deal.

Sink the Dubai Ports Deal! (by R. Cort Kirkwood)

Decision hurts state wineries

The editors of the Richmond Palladium-Item have a good editorial on this bill. As they point out, there does not need to be any conflict between active lawsuits and new legislation, as long as the new legislation is not retroactive in scope. Senator Garton makes the claim that everyone would start bringing their lawsuits to the legislature if they do not follow this policy. That assumes that every litigant would be able to find a sympathetic lawmaker and would be willing to wait through the months the legislature is not in session on the gamble that they might pass favorable retroactive legislation.

Indiana Senate President Pro Tem Robert Garton exercises a selective respect for the independence of the judicial branch of government.

The Republican Senate leader last week unilaterally killed a bill that would have allowed wine to be shipped to customers in Indiana, a move that, left unchallenged, could cause great damage to the state's promising homegrown wine industry...

Garton killed the bill arguing, speciously, that because there is a lawsuit pending by Indiana wineries, "it will not be considered further by the Senate this year."

"We are not the judicial branch of government," the Republican leader said.

Consider the ramifications of Garton's position. Want to stop a bill, any bill, from making its way through the Indiana General Assembly? Apparently, all it takes is the filing of a lawsuit? Now consider the hypocrisy.

The Legislature is not, as Garton asserts, the judicial branch of government...

About 30 wineries in the state get up to 40 percent of their sales through mailed shipments, according to state winery officials who say that many could be forced out of business if the Legislature fails to act.

Gov. Mitch Daniels needs to enter this fray forcefully and on behalf of the state's wineries, which are important to the state's tourism and economic development. The days of legislatively picking winners and losers among the state's diverse and competitive alcohol beverage interests must fall beneath the weight of open markets.

Palladium-Item - www.pal-item.com - Richmond, Ind.

Senate's health perk: They still don't get it

The West Lafayette Courier and Journal editors write:

Have your boss try on the thought of a retiree health plan that kicks in after six years on the job, offers coverage at today's premiums, lasts for life and even covers ex-spouses.

Just don't blame us if the peals of laughter ring in your ears as you slink back to your cubicle. Blame [Indiana] senators who just don't get it.

Journal and Courier Online - Editorial

Old-school politician flunking government reform | IndyStar.com

Matthew Tully is a columnist for the Indianapolis Star. He has an interesting column on this session of the general assembly. He writes:

The bill, proposed for the second year in a row by Gov. Mitch Daniels, seeks to go after the pensions of some government workers -- such as excise police and gaming agents -- who take bribes or otherwise rip off the state...

This proposed law would let the state cancel the taxpayer-funded portion of a pension if the worker "is convicted of a felony arising out of (their) service." The felony must be tied to on-the-job "fraud, deceit or abuse," and must result in "financial loss to the public or an unlawful benefit to an individual."

To summarize: If you use your state job to steal money from taxpayers, don't expect taxpayers to fund your retirement...

The bill, however, does not meet Garton's Rules of Good Government. This year, that rule appears to be this: If an idea has anything to do with good government, there's a good chance Garton will make sure it's good and dead...

Sen. Dennis Kruse, R-Auburn, who introduced the bill for the governor, ... got the bill through the Senate Pensions Committee last month, only to watch Garton dump it. Kruse made clear the decision to kill the bill was Garton's...

Garton... acted amid talk of amending the bill to include scofflaw lawmakers -- not a popular idea with some lawmakers. The problem was that passing the bill without lawmakers would be a bad public relations move. So Garton did the easy thing. He shelved the bill.

Still, Garton is not the only one at fault. Some Democrats opposed the bill because unions opposed it. Sen. Sam Smith, D-East Chicago, told me he voted against the bill in committee because he was asked to by "somebody back home."

He would not elaborate beyond saying the bill opponent was a woman who could lose her state pension. Hmm, who could lose a pension under the bill? Only felons who stole from the state. Is that a solid source of advice for a state legislator?

Old-school politician flunking government reform | IndyStar.com

Brian Howey: Garton has the power... and two opponents

Brian Howey is publisher of The Howey Political Report, the weekly briefing on Indiana politics. He writes the following comments on Indiana's Senate President Pro Tempore Robert Garton:

Just about every major piece of legislation passing through the Senate has needed Garton’s imprimatur. While Gov. Mitch Daniels and other Republicans have often blamed the three previous Democratic govenors for this weedy mess, it was actually Garton and the previous Senate Finance Chairman, Larry Borst, who determined what was in the budget, which tax got cut, or which Hoosier industry was revitalized...

Garton is powerful. Governors worried about angering him. Legislators quake in their boots...

He’s got two opponents this election cycle. Greg Walker, a Republican accountant from Columbus, is challenging the president in the May primary. Urged on by state and national Right to Life organizations, he will take on Garton’s 81 percent pro-life voting record (he has mixed votes on informed consent and has voted against cloning restrictions).

In the November election, Garton finds Democrat Terry Coriden, who served as city attorney for Columbus from 1996 to 2004...

The recent formula for dislodging Senate dinosaurs has been the primary, as Sens. Brent Waltz and Jeff Drozda pulled off in 2004 and 2002...

Brian Howey's Newspaper Column: Duoh! Garton has the power... and two opponents

Advance Indiana: Garton Now Has Serious Democrat Opponent

Gary R. Welsh is a practicing attorney in downtown Indianapolis. He writes:

Senate President Pro Tem Robert Garton can now expect a serious Democratic opponent in this November's election if he survives a primary challenge he faces in May according to the Howey Political Report. Long-time former Columbus city attorney, Terry Coriden, shown above, filed to run as a Democrat in Senate District 41 today.

Garton is already facing primary opposition from Greg Walker, a conservative accountant from Columbus...

Earlier this week Howey reported that Garton told The Republic in Columbus that he was planning to make changes to the legislator health care for life perk, but he made it clear that he did not understand the public's outcry over the benefit. Both Walker and Coriden should have success in exploiting this issue to their advantage.

Advance Indiana: Garton Now Has Serious Democrat Opponent

Advance Indiana: Is Garton About To Be Dethroned?

Gary R. Welsh is a practicing attorney in downtown Indianapolis. He writes (28 Jan 2006):

In the last election differing Republican interests gathered to topple the long-time chairman of the Senate Finance Committee Larry Borst (R-Indianapolis) in the Republican primary with a little-known candidate Brent Waltz. With the announcement at week's end that the longest serving Senate President Pro Tem in Indiana's history, Robert Garton (R-Columbus) will have a primary opponent, it appears those same forces may be coalescing to bring about a similar fate to Garton.

The Howey Political Report tells us that Greg Walker, an accountant from Columbus, filed the necessary papers with the Secretary of State on Friday to challenge Garton in District 41. Garton has never had a serious primary challenge since joining the Senate 36 years ago in 1970, and he has rarely had a serious general election opponent. If Garton isn't running scared yet, he should be.

Garton has never endeared himself to the Christian right. He struck out a moderate position early in his Senate career when he fought for the passage of the Equal Rights Amendment, parting company with many of his more conservative Republican colleagues...

It is likely that Walker will not only have plenty of grassroots support from the Christian right in getting out the vote for him in the May primary, but he will also likely have money from disparate Republicans. That would probably include the likes of former Indiana State GOP Chairman Rex Early, who was instrumental in helping Brent Waltz raise big bucks to challenge Larry Borst two years ago...

Garton's enemies will have plenty of political fodder with which to chip away at him. The worst albatross he faces is the ridiculously self-serving health-insurance-for-life benefit he and his fellow lawmakers created for themselves several years ago. In the face of the staggering liability and public outrage over the program, Garton has remained steadfast in his opposition to modifying the program...

Advance Indiana: Is Garton About To Be Dethroned?

U.S. & Indiana Code on time zones and home rule

Following is a link for United States Code, Title 15, Chapter 6, Subchapter IX, that provides DOT the authority to adjust the time zones.

http://tycho.usno.navy.mil/260.html

Until today, I had primarily viewed the U.S. Code at this page.

I went looking further today and found out that this is sort of a "Reader's Digest Condensed Version".

The version at the following link is quite a bit more comprehensive, giving some interesting history about when various facets of Subchapter IX were enacted.

http://www.access.gpo.gov/uscode/title15/chapter6_subchapterix_.html

One thing I noticed for the first time is that the enforcement provision in Section 260a appears to apply only to that section, which deals with the dates of beginning and ending DST, not the other Subchapter IX sections.

Also in 260a, I don't remember anyone ever pointing out the following clauses before:

"Ex. Ord. No. 11751, Dec. 15, 1973, 38 F.R. 34725, ... The Secretary of Transportation... is hereby designated and empowered... to grant an exemption from section 3(a) of the Act (which establishes daylight saving time as standard time), or a realignment of a time zone limit, pursuant to a proclamation of a Governor of a State finding that the exemption or realignment is necessary to avoid undue hardship... in the State or a part thereof...

"In deciding to grant or deny an exemption or realignment, the Secretary shall consider, among other things, ... the convenience of commerce, as well as ... undue hardship to large segments of the population..."

I did not hear the DOT even mention this "undue hardship" clause in its description of the criteria it considered for its recent ruling, nor did I hear anything about the governor's power to issue a proclamation of the hardship that falls on Hoosiers due to our being less than half as wide as all of the other states that are split between two time zones.

Also, I think I may have previously opined on Section 262, which deals with "Duty to observe standard time of zones", that it appears to technically only apply to interstate and international common carriers, federal government employees and offices, and legal contracts. Unlike Section 260a, Section 262 has no section on penalties and enforcement for non-compliance.

This could be picking nits, but it might help explain why the federal and state governments never seemed to be much concerned about the five counties which observed eastern daylight saving time for so many years without any official state or federal sanction or authorization.

It might also have a bearing on the success of any attempted "home rule" by counties who prefer to be in a different zone than that assigned by the DOT -- particularly any eastern counties which might prefer central time.

It's interesting that Section 265 actually provides for a couple of specific Texas counties to decide their own time zone just by making a written request.

INDIANA CODE ON HOME RULE

On another subject, I also dug up the section of Indiana Code (36-1-3) that has to do with home rule (it is actually called that).

http://www.in.gov/legislative/ic/code/title36/ar1/ch3.html

Somewhat interesting reading. One thing that particularly caught my eye is that in 1980 the legislature changed the default from the assumption that the local body does not have a particular power to the assumption that it does -- strengthening the hand of local officials in any areas that might be considered "gray areas" of the law.

"A unit has: (1) all powers granted it by statute; and (2) all other powers necessary or desirable in the conduct of its affairs, even though not granted by statute... the omission of a power from such a list does not imply that units lack that power... State and local agencies may review or regulate the exercise of powers by a unit only to the extent prescribed by statute."

If I read it correctly, the term "unit" refers to any governmental entity smaller than the state as a whole.

Looks to me like the feds might be hard-pressed to justify suddenly beginning to take enforcement seriously after 40-some years of effectively condoning violation by the five counties near Cincinnati and Louisville.

Northwestern Indiana county changes mind on Central time

I see that county officials in northwestern Indiana's Pulaski County have voted unamimously to declare "home rule" and stay on eastern time with Indianapolis, whether the DOT grants their appeal to do so officially or not.

While I personally favor central time for the entire state, I am pleased to see this declaration of local sovereignty. Perhaps there are a few counties on eastern who would prefer to join their neighbors on central if it turns out to be this easy.

Pulaski County officials point to the five counties in southeast Indiana that have been exercising "home rule" for decades to keep their clocks in sync with Cincinnati and Louisville, without any official sanction from the state or federal governments, and yet apparently with no objections from them either.

I'll bet there will be lots of pro-eastern folks pleased to see this move, who would raise quite a howl if St. Joseph decided to follow the same precedent and go on central time instead.

AP Wire | 02/06/2006 | Northwestern Indiana county changes mind on Central time