From: Susannah H. Dillon
President Central Time Coalition
Carmel
As signs of spring are arriving and morning sunlight greets us once more, this Sunday Hoosiers living in Indiana’s 80 Eastern time counties will be plunged back into dark mornings. Not so for Central time Hoosiers, for whom sunlight will arrive an hour earlier at 7 a.m.
The adoption of Eastern Daylight Time in 2006 brought a major shift in Eastern’s sunlight schedule, the negative effects of which continue to be recognized.
Senate Concurrent Resolution 11, calling for an examination of these effects by a special legislative study group, was overwhelmingly approved in committee by a 5-1 vote with eight senators adding their names as co-authors. Two days later SCR 11 was killed in a closed-door meeting of the Republican Caucus that caused SCR 11 to be withdrawn from further consideration.
What facts caused the caucus to panic? Who is threatened and why? Could it be that the benefits of Eastern time to business are actually myths? Or that public concern would force a time zone debate when Hoosiers learn that our teens have the second-highest suicide attempt rate in the country and that 55,000 students are chronic absentees each year, most due to truancy? Or that millions of dollars being wasted on school delays could be cut in half? Or that July 4th fireworks could return to 9 p.m., and Hoosier children could again grow up seeing stars and lightning bugs?
Central time is Indiana’s right time. It’s a no-brainer.
