By DAN JUNEAU

Some good news for jobs in Louisiana came out of Dallas last week at a time when the Bayou State can use all the good economic news it can get.

In this instance, the issue involved whether or not a large area of southeastern Louisiana would have to meet stringent new federal Environmental Protection Agency standards. If so, the new standards would have a major impact on growth and economic development in the highly populated industrial corridor between Baton Rouge and New Orleans.

First, some background.

The 1990 Clean Air Act required drastic reductions in the amount of harmful ozone in the air in any geographical area. The act gave local areas until 1999 to meet standards or face tough penalties, including the bump up of the Baton Rouge area from “serious” to “severe” classification, the restriction on the use of federal transportation funds and the imposition of additional offsets for industrial expansion.

These sanctions would hammer Louisiana’s industrial corridor.

Highway funding is already behind demand for improvements.

Restricting any new industrial expansions would only hasten the out-migration of Louisiana workers at a time when the state desperately needs to be creating new jobs to keep better-paid workers here.

In response to the ticking time bomb of EPA sanctions, the Louisiana Department of Environmental Quality developed a plan that included a 30 percent reduction in nitrogen oxide emissions and the creation of a new auto inspection program to be sure the pollution control devices in all vehicles in the impacted area are working properly.

The plan was immediately slammed by some environmental groups, such as the Louisiana Environmental Action Network, as not being aggressive enough in addressing the problems. LEAN had earlier taken EPA to court to have them declare ozone a “severe” problem in the five-parish Baton Rouge Ozone Nonattainment Area instead of a “serious” one, in spite of the fact the area is now very close to achieving attainment of the standard.

If LEAN had been successful, industry and motorists in Louisiana would be facing even harsher remedies than those included in the DEQ plan.

The court ruled the EPA had to act expeditiously on the matter, but did not impose stiffer sanctions. The court, appropriately, left the matter of remedies to the EPA.

For the past several years, the state DEQ has maintained that ozone drifting into Louisiana from the Houston area has at times contributed to the air quality violations that occasionally occur in the Baton Rouge area.

DEQ took great pains to make that case to the EPA and had to fight LEAN and other groups every step along the way. The EPA Region VI office in Dallas agreed with our DEQ last week and approved the state’s ozone reduction plan and granted an extension to meet the ozone standards.

EPA Region VI Administrator Greg Cook acknowledged independent EPA modeling did show significant ozone pollution from Houston traveling into Louisiana and affecting compliance here.

Congressman Billy Tauzin, who has worked diligently on this issue, praised the EPA decision: “Without this approval, key transportation projects throughout the Baton Rouge area would have stalled, seriously impacting economic development for years to come.” Tauzin called the action “a common sense approach which ultimately will benefit both the environment and the economy.”

While LEAN might not agree with Tauzin’s assessment, motorists and workers in the Baton Rouge area most likely would share his opinion if they knew the consequences that would have occurred if the DEQ plan had been rejected and the extension denied.

LEAN members have a right to their opinions … and workers and motorists have the right to celebrate – temporarily at least – that more jobs will not disappear and some of the existing traffic bottlenecks may be removed.

DAN JUNEAU is the president of the Louisiana Association of Business and Industry.