SMALL BUSINESS PERSPECTIVE MIA DURING EPA’S DOG AND PONY SHOW
SAINT PAUL (April 8, 2015): The National Federation of
Independent Business (NFIB) is disappointed that the people standing to lose
the most thanks to the EPA’s controversial expansion of the Clean Water Act will
be nowhere to be found when EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy pays a visit to
Minnesota today.
“It would have been nice if Administrator McCarthy had taken
this opportunity to discuss the concerns that small business in Minnesota have
over the unnecessary expansion of the Clean Water Act.” Said NFIB Minnesota
State Director Michael Hickey, “Instead of explaining why it is that a farmer
with property that includes a small pond will be regulated by the federal
government, she has decided to preach to a choir of environmental activists
that will never have to bear the burden of the massive new costs of this
regulation.”
McCarthy is in town today on a road show touting the
expansion of the Clean Water Act that includes stops in Texas as well as
Minnesota. Under the new version of a
bill that was originally intended to protect only navigable waterways, EPA
regulators would have jurisdiction over just about any formation of water no
matter how small, temporary or incidental.
According to the federal EPA and the Army Corps of Engineers, the rule
will cost property owners who want to make improvements, including small
businesses and farmers, more than $100 million.
“The federal government has essentially found a way to
regulate puddles and the price tag for the expansion will be detrimental to
small business. Clearly the administration has put the importance of a public
relations victory lap over the desire to hear the concerns of main street
business owners,” Concluded Hickey.
