Matheson makes some moves

So it seems Jim managed to get his name in the press several times today for doing good things. Let's take a took at them.

1. "It's a bad idea to use public money to spend on private academies," said Matheson about Referendum 1. "I'm telling people to vote against it."
   

   Republicans Gov. Jon Huntsman Jr., Congressman Rob Bishop and GOP legislative leadership have endorsed it.
   Matheson says he agrees with encouraging educational innovation and giving parents choices, but vouchers won't accomplish that.
   "That's not what this is about," he said. "This is about taking public taxpayers' funds out and putting them into private schools."
   Guaranteed public education is one of the great traditions America and Utah, he said.
   "It has produced an educated population that has made us a super power. As we now face the challenges of the global economy, this is not the time to be taking resources from the public education system. That would be a mistake."



2. It is good to be in the majority.

   Matheson's bill is aimed to "jump-start" more advanced mine communications, his office says, and would direct the National Institute of Standards and Technology to launch an initiative to come up with a new deep mine communications system.
   "This is a time for an all-out effort, in order to spare mining families from the ordeal that the families of the Crandall Canyon miners and mine rescuers endured," Matheson said.
   "We need next-generation technology that tracks and communicates with miners when accidents occur. Mine safety is our top priority and as we learned in the Crandall Canyon mine tragedy, there's a gap in our ability to locate these miners when tragedy strikes," Matheson said.

   This is a good way to prevent things like Crandall Canyon from happening again. (Banning retreat mining, rather than just studying it, Sens. Bennett and Hatch, is also a good approach)


3. Jim is also helping Moab by lashing out at the DOE for slow walking clean up of the tailings ponds.
   

   "The serious contamination threat to the Colorado River cannot ultimately be resolved without removal of the tailings pile." That's why he is continuing to push the DOE "to end the delays and move forward with the cleanup," Matheson said.

   Now that he is on the committee with jurisdiction over their funding, the Department of Energy will start to listen to Jim.