I am writing this column just after the November 5^th elections, and am trying to assess the effects of the results on our nation's environmental policy for the next two years. The organization that I look to for factual information on how our elected officials vote on environmental issues is the League of Conservation Voters (LCV), a non-profit organization that was founded in 1970, and that has published a National Environmental Scorecard for every Congress since then. For the Scorecard, experts from many respected environmental and conservation organizations select key votes on which members of Congress should be graded. The most recent full 48 page publication, published in February 2002, covers the 2001 votes of the 107^th Congress; eight Senate votes and 14 House votes. An abbreviated eight page preview version covering the 2002 votes (sixteen Senate votes and eight House votes) is available on the LCV web site, www.lcv.org.

Frank Lautenberg's wasn't an incumbent in the 107^th Congress, but his votes in his earlier terms are on record. I don't have the report for 2000, but for the 104th and 105th Congresses he scored 100%, and for the first session of the 106^th he scored 78%. Most of our members are in the 4^th and 12^th US congressional districts, where Chris Smith and Rush Holt were re-elected. Smith's scores for the 105^th, 106^th, and 107^th Congresses, respectively, were 83%, 80%, and 73%. Holt's scores, for the 106^th and 107^th, respectively, were 100% and 100%; he was designated an Environmental Champion by LCV. For congressman from New Jersey overall (six Republicans and seven Democrats) in 2002 the score for Senate votes was 88%, and for House votes 81%. In 2001 the scores had been a little higher, at 94% and 87%.

Given the track records of the people we elected in New Jersey, from both parties, I think environmentalists can feel pretty good. That's the good news, but there are statistics in the section of the Scorecard that covers the scores for party leaders that are like a kick in the stomach. The average scores for the Republican Party leadership for the Senate and the House, respectively, for the 107^th Congress (2001 and 2002) were 2% and 0%. They were 0% and 4% in 1999.

It appears, on November 6^th, that Republicans have won control of the Senate and kept control of the House. Thus control the legislative branch of our federal government for the next two years will be in the hands of the zero and two percent crowd, party leaders who work against and virtually always vote against protection of the environment, complementing those of like mind who run the executive branch. It's gonna be a tough two years for the environment.