Earth Day Speech

Speaker: Clark Sorensen
CARR Steering Committee Member

I read in a recent survey of Americans, that they would rather DIE than give a speech in public. Well, no one asked me personally, but considering the alternative, I am thrilled to be up here.

My name is Clark Sorensen and I'm on the Steering Committee of Citizens for Appropriate Rural Roads or CARR. CARR is a locally supported grass roots educational organization dedicated to stopping construction of a proposed new terrain highway from Indianapolis through Bloomington to Evansville IN. I'm here to tell you why I am strongly opposed to this new terrain, NAFTA truck highway, that is on the drawing board at the Indiana Department of Transportation.

INDOT is presently re-doing, at taxpayers expense, the an earlier botched EIS (or Environmental Impact Statement). They say they are reviewing reasonable alternatives to the new terrain highway… At least they are looking at alternatives! I am convinced, if INDOT had the done the EIS process fairly and correctly the first time, the new terrain project would have been dead on arrival - in the toilet. I will tell you why I think that is so.

Today, I will promise you one thing … I'll be up front and honest with you during the speech and if you want to talk to me afterwards, OK?? No BS! I can not make that promise about INDOT, or the highway supporters, based on their performances up until now - which seem to only promote their selfish self interests and paid for concerns. But let's have a little private talk about this highway thing!

I am opposed to the idea of building a new terrain truck highway (a brand new route through mostly unspoiled and undeveloped rural Indiana). The proposed new route of what seems to be an unneeded NAFTA superhighway starts in Indianapolis. It travels down already overcrowded State Route 37 to Bloomington. Continues south on the SR 37 bypass cutting through the middle of Bloomington on SR37. Then it cuts southwest through limestone karst, rural countryside forests, Amish family farms and scarce wetlands to connect 110 miles later to east west Interstate 64 near Evansville. Then on its way to Mexico.

So why is our organization, 70, 000 petition signers, national taxpayer groups, more than a dozen Indiana newspaper editorial editors and environmental groups like Audobon, Sierra Club, Protect Our Woods and Hoosier Environmental Coalition so strongly opposed to this highway? Why did this new terrain highway get on the national Green Scissors report documenting government tax wasting projects for several years in a row?

Well, I don't have the time to tell you all the reasons people are so strongly opposed to the new terrain route, but I will tell you the major reason I am opposed to it! Are you ready?

• AS A WORKING TAXPAYER I CANNOT AFFORD IT!
• IT IS TOO EXPENSIVE - in terms of dollars.
• IT IS TOO EXPENSIVE - in terms of environmental damage.
• IT IS TOO EXPENSIVE - in terms of LOCAL IMPACT like traffic and safety.
• ALL THINGS SERIOUSLY CONSIDERED, WE SIMPLY CAN NOT AFFORD IT!
• BLOOMINGTON CAN NOT AFFORD IT!
• MONROE COUNTY CAN NOT AFFORD IT!
• OTHER INDIANA COUNTIES ALONG THE NEW TERRAIN ROUTE CAN NOT AFFORD IT!
• THE STATE OF INDIANA CAN NOT AFFORD IT!
• THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT CAN NOT AFFORD IT!
• GET THE IDEA? FOLKS, THIS IS NOT ROCKET SCIENCE!
• NEW TERRAIN IS TOO EXPENSIVE! TOO DEVASTATING

This new terrain fiasco is (and always was) a political porkbarrel project, kept alive by special interest campaign contributions and PAC money, cronyism, highly paid mouth pieces and spin doctors and the rich, good old boy network. If INDOT was the international Olympic movement, we would be in the middle of a scandal from HELL! We are talking 100's of millions of tax dollars being wasted!

Do you remember the Walt Disney story about Pinocchio? You know, the toy maker Chipetteo carves a wooden puppet. The puppet comes to life and every time Pinocchio tells a lie, his nose would grow? You all know this story right? Well, I think it would be really great if everyone connected with this new terrain highway fairy tale would be effected by the Pinocchio phenomenon - If you tell a lie, watchout! Your nose will grow!. You know, you say, "New terrain highways will improve the environment," and whoops, your nose grows a few inches. Tell a big lie, "This highway will be blessing to Bloomington's economy and create lots of good jobs," and whoa add a foot or more to your nose.

Many of these highway boosting Pinocchio's make up - flat out lie -spouting favorable statistics about jobs or the construction costs quoting low ball estimates cutting $ 100's of millions of dollars off the the actual costs of construction … But there is never any talk about the cost of the ongoing annual maintenance for a new terrain route when Indiana can not keep repaired what roads and bridges we already drive!

Other Pinocchio's distort the true costs by not including the extraordinary costs to upgrade connecting highways…like SR 37 north of Bloomington to Martinsville on to Indy. How much do you think that will add to the ESTIMATED new terrain costs to upgrade SR 37 North to INDY? …Cutting off businesses, building frontage roads, building over passes and the like. These costs were NOT INCLUDED in the original INDOT estimate for the new terrain route.

I wonder … Maybe they are trying to fool us, the taxpaying public. Naw!

These Pinochios would have you believe that destroying the family farms and homes including those in part of an Amish community or filling in and destroying ONLY 30 acres of scarce wetlands or cutting down ONLY 1000 acres of forests, or paving over ONLY 3000 acres of prime farm land is OK, because there is plenty more where these come from...

Watch out for those noses, they're getting huge!

Some Pinocchio's speak for corporations who support the building of the highway. They spread misinformation and lies. They stand to make huge profits from construction and strip development and real estate deals taking advantage of inside information and/or peddling their influence to locate interchanges on or near their land. These folks make campaign contributions to both political parties to cover their bets.

Some political Pinochios in local office now or planning a run in the future, count on campaign contributions from rich highway boosters. They say with a straight face they are all for Bloomington and at the same time support the new terrain highway running through the middle of town - that just can't make sense. Don't vote for such uncaring, unthinking politicians. Visualize the end product and watch out for these politicians' noses on Election Day. Watch their noses folks, because we just can not afford to continue to elect highway boosters when they are more interested in campaign contributions than our safety, our fair city or our neighborhoods.

Taxpayers will have to pay and pay and pay for this useless corporate welfare public works project into the first half of the 21st Century. This is a Y2K bug of huge proportions! You young people will be paying for this boondoggle every year until you die! Pay for maintaining it as NAFTA Mexico and Canada bound 18 wheel trucks pound pot holes in it... 10,000 trucks a day rumbling through Bloomington … spewing diesel fumes.

These guys say this will help us attract good 21st century jobs? I don't think so.

You young people and your children will pay for maintaining (picking up litter and trash and resurfacing the road and fixing bridges pounded by semi trucks) this boondoggle. . Young people will be paying for environmental damage caused by this boondoggle.

We will never recover the natural Indiana destroyed by this highway. Never!
Breathing fouled air and listening to droning trucks in our local environment. Thousands of trucks pounding through Bloomington.

We are all tired of tax and spend deficit spending to solve non-existent problems that make the big guys richer - corporate welfare! We are just as tired of excess taxes leading to government surpluses. Those "surpluses" end up being spent on boondoggles that - you guessed it! - make the big guys richer - another form of corporate welfare! Most of these use the surplus items are the result of inaction by politicians to begin with.

These highway boosting pirates just don't get it! I swear they don't have a clue OR they think we are all idiots! Just plain stupid. Or don't care! Well do we care? Yes of course!

They talk about jobs that this highway will bring!! " GOOD JOBS" says Pinocchio. The nose shows most jobs created by the new terrain highway will bring are minimum wage service jobs at Motel 6, gas pump jockeys, or fast food jobs at the interchanges. Other jobs they attribute to the highway will really be provided by other Indiana businesses relocating to the area...our gain, is Ft. Wayne's or Gary's or Richmond's loss.

BUT WAIT A MINUTE!

Why might a business relocate to SOUTH WEST INDIANA in the first place? Because of a new terrain interstate truck highway? NO, not in and of itself. Businesses relocate to cities with many reasons:

• Good roads and bridges we all drive every day
• Clean and quite neighborhoods
• Safe, low crime high quality of life cities
• Top notch public schools
• Vocational training
• College educated and trainable labor force
• Recreational facilities
• Public support services
• Fine and performing art facilities
• Higher education facilities
• Public transportation
• Great medical facilities and hospitals
• Clean safe water
• Modern waste water treatment plants and solid waste disposal sites

The list goes on. Collectively, these things are what draw businesses….
NOT INTERSTATE TRUCK ROUTES!

Plain and simple, the costs to construct the new terrain highway together with overly generous tax abatements offered to businesses to lure them to relocate here keep us all broke.

Let me remind you, in case you haven't figured this out, my primary objection to a new terrain I-69 highway through Bloomington is: WE CAN NOT AFFORD IT! No way, no how! Not the money. Not the environment!

When you remove the greed and old boy politics there are, BELIEVE ME, less expensive alternative options available: Such as the far more reasonable idea of upgrading US 41 between Evansville and Terre Haute and then connecting to Indy using I-70…roughly half the cost! Spend that left over money upgrading existing roads and bridges. Or NOT TO BUILD THE THING AT ALL, ANYPLACE and fix twice as many existing roads! Make sense?

We must not take this lightly! Numbers do count. We need you. Mother Earth Needs YOU! IT IS NOT TO LATE FOR YOU TO HELP STOP THIS CRAZINESS. TOGETHER WE CAN DO THE RIGHT THINGS FOR OUR CHILDERN.

Well that wraps up my speech and guess what? My nose didn't grow!!

Earth Day Speech - Clark Sorensen