Views from the nation’s press

The Sentinel & Enterprise (Fitchburg, Mass.) on how the clock’s ticking on a permanent time standard:

The month of March begins Friday, which means that changing the clocks for daylight saving time will soon arrive.

In fact, it’s less than two weeks away.

Daylight saving time begins on the second Sunday in March and continues through the first Sunday in November.

This year, DST starts at 2 a.m. Sunday, March 10, when clocks move ahead an hour, which creates an extra hour of daylight in the evening and an hour less of light in the morning.

It will last until 2 a.m., Sunday, Nov. 3, when clocks “fall back.” ...

These spring-ahead and fallback intervals usually invite discussion about making one of these options permanent.

Most people would seem to prefer to keep the clocks the same rather than changing them twice per year, but that’s where that unanimity ends.

A CBS News poll of 1,612 adults indicated that most Americans don’t like changing the clocks. Of those surveyed, 46% said they preferred daylight saving time all year-round, 33% wanted standard time all yearround and only 21% preferred the current system of switching back and forth . ...

Two states, Hawaii and Arizona, have opted out of using daylight saving time — Hawaii in 1967 and Arizona in 1968. Puerto Rico, Guam, American Samoa and the U.S. Virgin Islands also do not participate in daylight saving time.

According to the National Conference of Legislatures, many states want to stop switching clocks.

In all last year, there were 75 pieces of legislation filed in 29 states, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures . ...

There also are 19 states ready to switch to permanent daylight saving time — Alabama, Colorado, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, Minnesota, Mississippi, Montana, Ohio, Oregon, South Carolina, Tennessee, Utah, Washington and Wyoming — but that requires congressional approval.

However, it’s obvious that a piecemeal approach by individual states isn’t the answer. Only an act of Congress would lead to a permanent time standard conversion ....

The upside of permanent DST outweighs its drawbacks. Unfortunately, due to that lack of congressional consensus, it looks like we’re stuck with the springforward, fall-back status quo.

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