Red Tape

WASHINGTON -- President Bush, believing that he has hit on a winning theme with the American voter, said yesterday he will extend for another four months an election-year crusade to cut, weaken or eliminate government red tape.A freeze on new government regulations, already in place since January, will continue through August as administration officials try to weed out proposals that, in their view, offer health and safety benefits that are not worth the extra costs they add to doing business.

There's a popular saying in the halls of the State House in Annapolis: "Everybody wants to go to heaven, but nobody wants to die. " It's used most often to describe government's classic conundrum - as laudable as a goal might be, people would rather not sacrifice to attain it. That could well describe the flotilla of local government leaders who continue to protest bitterly over the projected cost of a Chesapeake Bay cleanup and Gov. Martin O'Malley's...

Whether it was overshadowed by the East Coast earthquake or merely a victim of public indifference, President Barack Obama's latest effort to reduce regulatory red tape drew all the excitement of Brussels sprouts for dinner. Only the true policy wonks may have found it satisfying, while conservative Republicans thumbed their collective noses and even the business community reacted with a yawn. If the reforms announced Tuesday were intended to establish Mr. Obama's bona fides as some kind of sop to business as part of his reelection campaign, then they clearly fell short.

"Laws were most numerous when the state was most corrupt. " - Tacitus, The Annals III.27 Texas Gov. Rick Perry came in for much ridicule for his televised failure to remember which three federal agencies he has pledged to eliminate if elected president. More embarrassing for Mr. Perry, however, is the fact that he thinks any federal agency could be eliminated (much less three) - and that he says so with a straight face. Such a thing is beyond the realm of possibility, and to believe otherwise is to labor under hopeless delusion.

W hen it comes to helping people weather the effects of a recession, few things are as effective as food stamps. The benefits go to those most desperately in need, and because they must be spent on essential goods, they serve as an immediate boost to the local economy. But it only works if the benefits get in the hands of the right people. That's why it's troubling to see Maryland lagging behind other states when it comes to enrolling eligible families for the benefits and processing the applications of those who seek food stamps.

It's hard to tell who's right in the squabble between the regional Housing and Urban Development office and Baltimore city's Housing and Community Development agency. What's clear is that the dispute is a classic case of bureaucracies getting so embroiled in red tape that the original function they were designed to serve becomes secondary.The feds say Housing Commissioner Robert Hearn's agency hasn't kept track of millions of dollars in Community Development Block Grants awarded during the 1980s.

Protests from residential neighborhoods fearing a flood of prostitutes and strip-tease joints ended last year's attempts to legislate Baltimore's red-light district out of business. The city is trying again. Bills now before the City Council would subject adult entertainment businesses to so many rules they would soon be tied up in red tape.Up to now, go-go bars largely have been regulated by the liquor board. The new plan is to grandfather existing adult entertainment businesses; new ones would be classified as non-conforming uses.

Faced with Medicaid's low payments and bureaucratic red tape, some Maryland doctors are reluctant to prescribe buprenorphine for heroin addicts, even though the drug has been promoted as a potential magic bullet in the war against addiction, according to a survey set for release today. The survey, commissioned by the Center for a Healthy Maryland Inc., found that doctors were not always sufficiently reimbursed for their time and services and that there were other "hassles," including medication preauthorization, a process that in some cases can take 48 hours, and varying and confusing protocols among Medicaid providers.

WASHINGTON -- A panel of experts yesterday urged Congress to overhaul the nation's 60-year-old securities laws governing investors and public companies, but cautioned lawmakers to guard against changes that could increase fraud.The panel, which included three former commissioners of the Securities and Exchange Commission, said a bill introduced in July by Rep. Jack M. Fields Jr., a Texas Republican, has been long needed to restructure outdated laws that add costs and red tape to both companies that issue stocks and brokerage firms.

FOR NEARLY 30 years, Washington has provided housing-subsidy vouchers to millions of low-income Americans. This arrangement, called Section 8, will end soon if the Bush administration gets its way. Instead, federal block grants would be given to the states, which would be free to promulgate their own program details, including eligibility rules. Congress ought to take a dim view of the plans. Today's Section 8 program has serious flaws, but this is not the way to overhaul it at a time when the nation's low-income housing inventory is badly shrinking.

We'll hear endless tirades on the subject of business regulation between now and the 2012 election. Republicans will be against it. Democrats will favor it. Here's a discussion that is heard much less often but which is just as important: How can government best deliver the regulation that both parties agree is necessary? It's a subject on which both Democrats and Republicans often stumble. Only puritan libertarians would argue that government shouldn't control the way developers of offices, stores and housing tracts connect their projects with public highways.

Whether it was overshadowed by the East Coast earthquake or merely a victim of public indifference, President Barack Obama's latest effort to reduce regulatory red tape drew all the excitement of Brussels sprouts for dinner. Only the true policy wonks may have found it satisfying, while conservative Republicans thumbed their collective noses and even the business community reacted with a yawn. If the reforms announced Tuesday were intended to establish Mr. Obama's bona fides as some kind of sop to business as part of his reelection campaign, then they clearly fell short.

As the economy continues to struggle and America tries to reclaim its place in the global economic and financial markets, small business once again is left holding the proverbial bag. As attorney and author Steve Strauss asked in his Aug. 8 column in USA Today, how do we pump the entrepreneurial well even deeper in the face of so much legislative, political, and global red tape? With unemployment constantly hovering around 9 percent and fear grasping every American from Main Street to Wall Street, how does the small business owner stand a chance of survival, let alone the ability to grow and prosper?

— The dock built to hold water-filled tanks of baby oysters stands empty. The new marina for landing fully grown bivalves is being used for now by some crabbers. Encouraged by a new state policy to boost private oyster farming, Jay Robinson and Ryan Bergey applied last fall to lease upward of 1,000 acres in Fishing Bay in southern Dorchester County. They planned to "plant" 100 million hatchery-spawned oysters on the bottom there this year and raise them for sale to restaurants and seafood wholesalers.

In a matter of days, Stanley Hermane will likely go from a crowded orphanage in earthquake-ravaged Haiti to a warm and cozy bedroom in Baltimore. Michael and Monica Simonsen, a Riverside Park couple who have been trying to adopt the 21-month-old boy for most of his life, are eagerly awaiting his arrival. Now it appears that last week's earthquake had a small silver lining for families in the adoption process: Much of the red tape has been removed. The Simonsens are among scores of families looking to benefit from a recent Department of Homeland Security measure that will allow many Haitian children already in the adoption process to come to the U.S. right away.

In a matter of days, Stanley Hermane will likely go from a crowded orphanage in earthquake-ravaged Haiti to a warm and cozy bedroom in Baltimore. Michael and Monica Simonsen, a Riverside Park couple who have been trying to adopt the 21-month-old boy for most of his life, are eagerly awaiting his arrival. Now it appears that last week's earthquake had a small silver lining for families in the adoption process: Much of the red tape has been removed. The Simonsens are among scores of families looking to benefit from a recent Department of Homeland Security measure that will allow many Haitian children already in the adoption process to come to the U.S. right away.

DENVER -- The Florida Panthers, who have been complaining about a lack of respect from fans and the news media around the country, yesterday accused the NHL of giving them one more reason to feel maligned.The Panthers were steaming about an NHL order forcing them to have goalie John Vanbiesbrouck's stick retaped less than a half-hour before Tuesday night's Stanley Cup Finals opener, the biggest game in the franchise's history.A league rule says a goalie's stick cannot have any color of tape on it except white.

Since last May, a Baltimore City task force has been examining which municipal functions could be privatized. The panel, chaired by Councilman Anthony J. Ambridge, has now concluded its study. It estimates that $580 million (30 percent) of the city's current $1.86 billion operating budget already goes to private contracts that had formerly been performed by the municipal government."Such privatization raises two concerns: one, is the city really saving money when all the costs are factored in; and, two, are we considering the social costs to our employees and to the city when we contract services out to the private sector," Mr. Ambridge states in the preamble of a City Council bill he has introduced to create a special office to regulate further privatization.

When it comes to helping people weather the effects of a recession, few things are as effective as food stamps. The benefits go to those most desperately in need, and because they must be spent on essential goods, they serve as an immediate boost to the local economy. But it only works if the benefits get in the hands of the right people. That's why it's troubling to see Maryland lagging behind other states when it comes to enrolling eligible families for the benefits and processing the applications of those who seek food stamps.