Revised daylight bill advances

INDIANAPOLIS -- A revised daylight-saving time bill nudged forward Thursday after an opponent was removed from a panel of lawmakers seeking compromise on the issue and was replaced with someone who advanced the plan.\nThree of four members of a House-Senate conference committee signed off on the plan to mandate statewide observance of the time change, but Rep. Dave Crooks, D-Washington, refused to supply a fourth signature needed to move the bill to the Senate Rules Committee for further consideration.\nCrooks said 81 percent of constituents in his southwestern Indiana district oppose Eastern daylight time, and the state should seek federal hearings on possible time zone changes before considering statewide daylight time.\n"The reason we don't have a consensus on this issue is because Hoosiers don't have a consensus on this issue," Crooks said.\nRepublican House Speaker Brian Bosma removed Crooks from the conference committee and appointed Rep. Randy Borror, R-Fort Wayne, who signed the compromise proposal and advanced it to the Rules Committee.\n It would have to pass that panel, the full Senate and win House passage again to land on the desk of Republican Gov. Mitch Daniels.\nDaniels has lobbied extensively for statewide daylight time, saying it would eliminate confusion and make it easier for businesses to operate in Indiana.\nThe issue has been contentious for decades in Indiana, and this year has been no different. It took two votes to pass the bill in the House this month, and it cleared a second tally only because three Republicans switched their votes.\nSenate President Pro Tem Robert Garton, R-Columbus, said he expected the Rules Committee, of which he is chairman, to consider and vote on the legislation Monday and hopefully advance it to the full Senate.\nBorror said the adoption of daylight-saving time was an economic development move that would help Indiana boost commerce. Forty-seven states and at least 70 nations observe the time change.\n"It's part of announcing to the world that we are willing to change and bring jobs to Indiana," Borror said.\nThe new proposal removed provisions included in the House-passed bill that would allow some counties, on their own, to opt out of daylight-saving time. The U.S. Department of Transportation, which regulates time zones, deemed those provisions illegal.\nIt would still mandate that 77 counties in the Eastern time zone join 15 other counties that change their clocks twice a year beginning in April 2006. Five counties in the Eastern zone already make the time switch, and a pocket of counties in northwestern and southwestern Indiana are in the Central time zone and observe daylight time.\nThe previous bill would have "urged" Daniels to petition the federal government to hold hearings on whether more of Indiana should be moved to Central time.\nThe new proposal would require the General Assembly and Daniels to seek those hearings within 10 days if the bill became law. It also says the state would support any county that seeks a change to the Central zone.\nDaniels said often during the campaign that he preferred that most of Indiana be on Central time, but having all of the state observe daylight-saving time should be the first priority. He largely has tried to keep the issues separate this session.\nDaniels said Thursday that he spoke with federal officials to see whether they could act quickly if he petitioned them for hearings, as the proposed bill requires.\n"It'd be a matter of a few months at most," Daniels said. "It's not a yearlong process."\nCrooks predicted that it would be an emotionally charged process.\n"I sincerely believe the governor and the legislative leaders are opening the biggest can of worms we've seen in Indiana history in quite some time," Crooks said. "This is going to be a time war before it's over with"