THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Monday, March 20, 1995 TAG: 9503170030
SECTION: FRONT PAGE: A6 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Editorial
LENGTH: Medium: 54 lines
Florida's Gov. Lawton Chiles is the kind of new Democrat that Bill Clinton was supposed to be. He's now engaged in a regulation-bashing crusade that could teach congressional Republicans a thing or two.
Chiles served three frustrating Senate terms in Washington trying to wrestle the federal budget into shape. He returned to Florida and was elected governor where he's led the charge to downsize bureaucracy and reinvent government. Some of his policies have been unpopular, but this move to eliminate regulations should be a hit.
Chiles was spurred to action by a personal experience. He wanted to build a backyard barbecue, a cook house, and ran into a blizzard of regulations that made the simple project impossible. He bought 200 copies of an anti-bureaucracy book, The Death of Common Sense, gave them to his own government bureaucrats and told them to start looking for rules to repeal.
Turns out Florida has 28,750 rules. According to a report in The Washington Post, Chiles hopes to eliminate half, leaving only those that contribute to public health and safety. His transportation secretary has become a true believer. He's examined 760 rules and has found 330 that should be eliminated.
The Department of Community Affairs, which meddles with anyone trying to develop property, has also seen the light. It now proposes to stay out of any project of 10 acres or less. And The Post report cites a classic example that shows how the law of unintended consequences can take over when regulations are passed on the basis of good intentions.
Seeking to preserve ecologically important mangroves, the Florida Department of Environmental Protection enacted rules that made trimming mangrove trees punishable. Now there are fewer mangroves than ever. Why? Residents, knowing they couldn't prune the trees if they planted them, stopped planting them. Thus, the rules had the opposite effect of the one desired.
Clearly, the Chiles approach of pruning regulation is preferable to that adopted by House Republicans. They are attempting to reduce regulations by creating other regulations that make it difficult to create new regulations. That may eliminate some rules, but it could also multiply bureaucrats needed to rid us of rules.
The Chiles administration is identifying regulations, one by one, that deserve to live and others that deserve to die, then taking the dogs out behind the statehouse and putting them to sleep. Washington should adopt the same method. ILLUSTRATION: LAWTON CHILES
by CNB