Regular gasoline had been selling for about four dollars a
gallon at the Speedway convenience store and gas station on State
Road 19 in Elkhart, Indiana for most of July. Two miles down the
road from Speedway is the Elkhart plant for Monaco Coach, a company
that manufactures recreational vehicles. The Oregon-headquartered
Monaco Coach announced on July 17 that the Elkhart plant and two
others in nearby Wakarusa and Nappanee would close in September.
Fourteen hundred employees would be let go. Monaco Coach had
already laid off 500 employees earlier this year. In June, Indiana
had the highest jump in unemployment of all 50 states as the rate
shot up from 5.3 to 5.8 percent.
Elkhart has been called the RV Capital of the World. More than
100 manufacturers of RVs, mobile homes, tow-behind vehicles and
related parts, employing nearly 28,000 people, are located in the
Elkhart area, according to Dorinda Heiden of the Economic
Development Corporation of Elkhart County. Annual sales total
nearly $7.8 billion, noted Heiden. The Monaco Coach plant closings
would result in the loss of five percent of the area’s RV
workforce.
RV manufacturing and sales is an industry that has been hit
especially hard by the steep increase in energy — particularly
gasoline — costs. Sales have fallen off dramatically. According
the Recreational Vehicle Industry Association, shipments to
retailers in 2008 have declined by 14 percent through May over last
year following a drop of 9.5 percent in 2007 over the previous
year.
One presumes that any information regarding the potential of
lowering energy costs and restoring lost jobs would be tremendous
news in Elkhart and the surrounding area. But this has not been the
case as far as the local media outlets have been concerned.
Local businessman Luke Puckett is challenging freshman U.S.
Representative Joe Donnelly, a former trial lawyer and business
owner, in Indiana’s Second Congressional District. Puckett has made
lowering energy prices a key theme of his campaign. To that end,
Puckett and six other House challengers — all Republicans —
traveled
to Alaska’s Arctic National Wildlife Refuge the week of July 14 in
order to get a first-hand look at the area that holds an estimated
20 billion barrels of petroleum. Donnelly turned down an offer to
join the Alaska trip.
FEW PEOPLE have actually visited ANWR, spoken with local Alaskans
about oil drilling, and inspected the ongoing oil drilling in
nearby Prudhoe Bay in northern Alaska. Puckett did just that. Yet,
when he returned to northern Indiana on July 18, the day after the
announced Monaco Coach plant closings, nearly all of the local
media studiously avoided any mention of Puckett’s trip and his
findings.
Puckett believes “ANWR is the tipping point” to achieving energy
independence in America. If the U.S. starts drilling for oil in
ANWR, he explains, then everything else will fall into place.
Puckett estimates that shale oil excavation, outer-continental
shelf drilling and new refinery construction would soon follow.
Progress toward energy independence in the U.S. has been stymied
for more than three decades as the environmental movement has
successfully blocked efforts to increase oil exploration, drilling,
and refining. This could all change, Puckett believes, if the
federal prohibition on oil drilling in ANWR were lifted.
Puckett made the rounds to local media outlets on July 18 to
personally deliver a press release following his trip and to offer
to speak with reporters. Aside from local NBC affiliate, WNDU-TV,
the rest of the area television stations and the area’s major daily
newspaper, the South Bend Tribune, ignored reporting
Puckett’s trip after he returned. The general managers of WBND-TV
ABC 57 and WSBT-TV CBS 22, and South Bend Tribune managing
editor Tim Harmon did not respond to requests for comment. WSJV-TV
Fox 28 general manager Steve Morris said several interview offers
were turned down by Puckett, a claim disputed by Puckett and a
staffer who accompanied him to the TV station. After commenting on
the interview dispute, Morris added, “Drilling in Alaska has no
more of a tie to RV plant closures than it does to the mortgage
crisis.”
IS THIS ANOTHER example of media bias or media malfeasance? Puckett
states he has the first-hand experience to explode “the myths that
are out there” about ANWR, but he is frustrated that local news
outlets have adopted a media blackout of his trip.
For his part, Donnelly states he is in favor of ANWR drilling;
however, the Puckett campaign claims Donnelly has been inconsistent
in supporting an energy independence agenda. Puckett campaign
spokesman Brian Sikma cited several votes by Donnelly, including
his June 2007 vote on an amendment (roll call vote #553) to end
prohibitions against offshore oil leases in the mid- and
south-Atlantic. According to Sikma, Donnelly voted to keep oil
lease prohibitions in place. A review of the House voting record
shows that Donnelly voted against House Amendment 407. Sikma claims
other Donnelly votes “increased the cost of exploration and
production of domestic oil” or “prohibit[ed] the extraction of
nearly 61 billion barrels of American oil.” A Donnelly campaign
staffer promised campaign manager Andrew Lattanner would comment on
the votes. Lattanner never called back.
Energy costs and a host of other issues will help Indiana’s
Second Congressional District voters decide which candidate should
represent them in Congress. However, oil drilling in ANWR may not
become a part of the debate.
