Hits and Misses
The coal mines that once dotted South Fayette Township closed many decades ago, but one in particular left behind a long-running legacy of discharge that left Millers Run and Chartiers Creek an unappetizing orange and rendered them unusable for fishing or other forms of recreation. Now, there is the promise that the water will run clean in both tributaries and they will be stocked with trout, thanks to a $13 million acid mine drainage treatment plant that was dedicated Tuesday. Off Route 50, it is designed to treat up to 2.1 million gallons of acid mine drainage per day. It will also remove about 690 pounds of iron pollution every day. The bad news, unfortunately, is there are still many other parts of Pennsylvania dealing with acid mine drainage that could use a plant like the one in South Fayette Township. Acid mine drainage is the commonwealth’s most serious water pollution problem, so there are plenty of waterways yet to be cleaned up.
What is happening in India right now is a tragedy and a lesson for the rest of the world. Leaders in the country that holds 18% of the world’s population believed they had gotten COVID-19 under control, so they took a victory lap and relaxed restrictions. Now, at least 3,000 people are dying in India every day from the virus, though many believe the toll is actually much higher. The country has also been setting records for daily infections, with as many as 300,000 per day. As with the death toll, though, many believe the actual number is vastly higher. The situation in India raises the risks for the rest of the world. Variants rampaging through the subcontinent could reach countries far away, and vaccines that India was going to ship to places like Africa are now being kept for domestic use. Dr. Raman Laxminarayan, director of the Center for Disease Dynamics, Economics and Policy, told The New York Times, “India’s size is going to dominate the global numbers – how the world performs on COVID is going to be very dependent on how India performs on COVID.”
On Wednesday, the governing board of the Pennsylvania State System of Higher Education (PASSHE) gave its preliminary approval to a plan that would merge the administrative and academic functions of California University of Pennsylvania with Clarion and Edinboro universities. Lock Haven, Bloomsburg and Mansfield universities in the center of the state would be similarly merged if final approval is given by the board in July. The mergers appear to be a necessity, given shifts in the higher education landscape, a substantial drop in enrollment over the last decade and the unlikelihood that enrollment will tick up anytime soon. The preliminary approval period allows for 60 days of public comment, so that means proponents and opponents need to weigh in while they still have the chance.
When it comes to social media, we’re repeatedly warned to not always believe what we see, and that’s advice U.S. Rep. Guy Reschenthaler and other Republicans need to follow. Reschenthaler, who represents the 14th District in Washington, D.C., was among the critics of President Biden who posted a false story this week that Biden’s plan to combat climate change would force Americans to limit themselves to one hamburger per month. Except there’s nothing in the plan at all that makes that specification. Jennifer Grygiel, a communications professor at Syracuse University, told the Associated Press that the whole effort to make Biden into the “Hamburglar” was nothing more than “pure propaganda.” If Reschenthaler and other Republicans want to criticize Biden and his policies, that’s fine. That’s the role of an opposition party. But it becomes harder to take their arguments seriously when they don’t stick to the facts.