The Politics of Pandering: Michigan’s U.S. Congressional Delegation Fights Fuel Economy. Again.

In October of 2009, A2Politico posted a piece titled, “Time Magazine Raps Rep. Dingell Firmly Across the Knuckles.” This is from that piece:

In the October 5, 2009 issue of Time magazine, the Special Report is titled “The Tragedy of Detroit.” In a sidebar to the piece titled “How Detroit Lost Its Way,” the magazine editors singled out Representative John Dingell for political pandering. They write, “In an effort to prop up their constituencies, politicians like John D. Dingell resisted sensible policies, like more-stringent mileage standards, that would have helped Detroit compete today.”

Mr. Dingell was so deferential to Detroit as chairman of the House energy and commerce committee that Lee Iacocca once said Dingell “stood up for the auto industry beyond the call of duty.” It was this deference that, Washington political insiders believe, prompted President Obama to tacitly back Representative Henry Waxman’s 2008 challenge that ousted Dingell as the long-time chair of the House energy and commerce committee.

Yesterday, Michigan’s entire 14 member Congressional delegation, including Representatives Dingell and Conyers, as well Senators Levin and Stabenow signed a letter sent to President Obama in which Michigan U.S. representatives assert that a “starting” proposal that requires automakers to raise fuel economy fleet average to 56.2 miles per gallon by 2025 is “overly aggressive and not reasonably feasible.”

The letter went on to argue that, “Such a proposal would push beyond the limits or reasonably feasible technology development and would have significant negative ramifications for U.S. jobs and competitivenes….Technology and economics must reasonably support the targets and goals for fuel economy improvement and greenhouse gas emissions reductions, and we are concerned that the administration’s current approach is not leading in that direction.”

Rick Haglund, writing for AnnArbor.com, posted a news piece that suggests the letter was saber-rattling. Haglund writes:

But the automakers’ public outrage belies the work they’re doing in their technical centers to achieve much greater fuel economy in the future.

“The manufacturers have been planning this for years,” said Bruce Belzowski, a researcher at the University of Michigan’s Transportation Research Institute.

Maybe the automakers are just trying to get some leverage in the fuel economy negotiations by blasting the Obama administration’s proposal.

Maybe? They need all the leverage they can get. Representative Waxman and President Barack Obama both agree that passing climate legislation is critical, and both agree that the best place to begin is by significantly increasing fuel efficiency standards.

The automakers have had leverage against such profit-narrowing changes in the form of John Dingell, and Senators Carl Levin and Debbie Stabenow for over two decades. In turn, the lawmakers have enjoyed financial support in the form of campaign contributions from Detroit automakers for just as long. The top donors to Senator Levin between 1989 and 2010 were GM, Ford and DaimlerChrysler, according to campaign finance records compiled by the site OpenSecrets.org. During that time, Levin raised over $27,000,000 dollars and spent $25,000,000 of it running for re-election. Between 1989 and 2010, Senator Stabenow raised over $30,000,000 to run for office. GM is one of Senator Stabenow’s top donors, as well.

Michigan has a push me-pull you relationship with auto fuel economy standards, and according to the piece linked to above in Time Magazine, the automakers have been shortsighted in their efforts to keep fuel economy averages between 25-35 miles per gallon. Had Detroit’s Big Three developed cars with fuel efficiency standards closer to those in Europe, perhaps Michigan would not have lost over 800,000 manufacturing jobs over the past decade.

Of course, Michigan’s U.S. representatives have not been the only ones worshipping the automobile.

In Ann Arbor, John Hieftje has sponsored resolutions and voted to pour exponentially more taxpayer money into constructing parking garages than into alternative transportation, alternative energy programs, incentives for energy savings or improvements by residents, or green technologies. The majority of Ann Arbor’s fleet vehicles are still gas powered, as are the mowers used to trim the grass in the city’s parks—at a cost of $5,000 per acre. Despite Hieftje’s record of spending more on parking garages than on alternative transportation and green energy programs, Michael Garfield, the head of the Ecology Center has endorsed John Hieftje with the following glowing claim: “John has the strongest environmental record of any Mayor in the Midwest…John’s leadership has set the standard for progressive mayors everywhere.”

Well, maybe not everywhere. For the past several years, Madison, Wisconsin, through its Green Madison program, as offered businesses and homeowners in that city financial incentives and cash back rewards for making energy-efficiency improvements.

And maybe not anywhere. According to a recent study of the aggregate clean economy by the Brookings Institute, between 2003 and 2010 Michigan was the only state in the union that experienced a net loss of green/clean jobs. Knoxville, Tennessee led the way nationwide with a net 14.6 percent increase in the number of green jobs added to the state’s economy over the past seven years. Ann Arbor appears nowhere in the list of the top 100 cities in the United States that appear on the list, even after funneling millions of tax dollars to local “job creation” entity Ann Arbor SPARK—money that would have gone to the public schools. Hieftje sits on the Board of Ann Arbor SPARK, and led the effort to create the tax increment financing scheme that has skimmed millions from the local public schools to give to Ann Arbor SPARK to “create more job announcements than jobs.”

So what’s the answer? Certainly not plowing $100,000,000 into building parking garages that encourage the use gas guzzlers that Michigan’s members of Congress believe automakers should continue to produce. The U.S. is dealing with a significant “fuel efficient car gap,” according to research from the Civil Society Institute (CSI), a not-for-profit think tank that focuses on energy and ecological issues.

According to a piece by MSNBC business editor Rolland Jones in a piece titled, “U.S. stuck in reverse on fuel economy” published in 2006:

CSI found that the number of vehicle models sold in the United States that achieve combined gas mileage of at least 40 miles per gallon actually has dropped from five in 2005 to just two in 2007 — the Honda Civic hybrid and the Toyota Prius hybrid. Overseas, primarily in Europe, there are 113 vehicles for sale that get a combined 40 mpg, up from 86 in 2005. Combined gas mileage is the average of a vehicle’s city and highway mpg numbers. Adding insult to injury is the fact that nearly two-thirds of the 113 highly fuel-efficient models that are unavailable to American consumers are either made by U.S.-based automobile manufacturers or by foreign manufacturers with substantial U.S. sales operations, such as Nissan and Toyota.

According to piece published today in the Financial Times, “The U.S. still has some of the world’s lowest mileage and vehicle emissions standards. European carmakers are expected to achieve fuel efficiency of 60 m.p.g. within nine years.”

The proposed fuel efficiency levels that are being pushed by the Obama White House would put the United States on par with European and Asian countries, for the moment. Michigan Congressional delegation is getting help combatting Obama’s efforts to force automakers to increase fuel efficiency standards by 5 percent per year between now and 2015. The Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers launched a series of radio spots that claim increasing fuel efficiency to 56.2 mile per gallon will cost Americans their jobs, and significantly increase the cost of American cars.

Again, from the Financial Times:

Carmakers said it was technically possible to produce vehicles that met such standards, but warned it would mean smaller, often more expensive cars. Meeting a standard of 56.2mpg would likely add at least $2,100 to the price of a new vehicle.

“We can build these vehicles,” said Gloria Bergquist of the Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers, the industry lobby group, told the New York Times. “The question is, will consumers buy them?”

Michigan’s economic recovery  needs forward-thinking representation in Washington and in every city in our state, not the same old scare tactics, spin and political pandering. In Ann Arbor, people have mindlessly bought the Green Wash served up by the incestuous local Industrial Green Complex for years. The fairytale is that a mayor who has voted to approve budgets that give over exponentially money to pay for new parking garages than on alternative energy or alternative transportation has “the strongest environmental record of any mayor in the Midwest…and sets the standards for mayors everywhere.”

Ann Arbor needs to craft an economic development plan that focuses on the fact that companies with green jobs will go where they are welcomed and encouraged. City staff need to stop spending time and money applying for empty-suit awards for Ann Arbor, and provide the quality of services and infrastructure that will attract businesses to our city. The city’s budget needs to reflect real progressive environmental practices (the purchase of electric-powered and hybrid fleet vehicles, for instance, as well as the purchase of electric industrial mowers), and serious investment in alternative transportation programs, as well as energy efficiency programs such as the one in Madison, Wisconsin.