It is a sad time we live in when scientific findings are censored and silenced in favor of personal or political biases. This cannot be more apparent than in the recent example of Texan officials doing some unofficial editing of a environmental report.

The Texas Commission on Environmental Quality has a contract with the Houston Advanced Research Center to report on the state of Galveston Bay, but their recent paper was apparently too full of references to climate change, destruction of wetlands or sea level to pass muster.

It’s probably not surprising, really, considering that the TCEQ has several top officials appointed by Rick Perry, who shares similar views on climate change.

The vice-president of the Houston Advanced Research Center said that the writers had already tried to make the paper as uncontroversial as possible. They tip-toed around the question of whether climate change was human-influenced and instead wrote a broad review of peer-reviewed studies and findings by the group.

But even this seemed to cross a line. The reference to the sea level rising five times faster than average was deleted by officials at TCEQ. This was a fact.  Not a scientific opinion or a proposed hypothesis, but a fact. A fact that the Texas officials found to be too controversial for them.

It was relatively clear before that Perry and those surrounding his administration were anti-science — they have been quite vocal when it comes to opposing evolution, climate scientists and environmentalists. Now, the administration in Texas has gone as far to remove facts that they disagreed with from a scientific report.

Once the scientists involved discovered that portions had been deleted, every single one removed their name from the paper. Not surprisingly, they wanted no part of the corrupted version of their paper.

Science isn’t something where you can pick and choose the facts you like and the facts you don’t. And whether the TCEQ officials like it or not, a group of researchers have concluded that the sea level in the Galveston Bay is rising. No amount of editing will change that fact.

TCEQ’s claim that the report was “inconsistent with current agency policy” is a shallow cover-up for saying “we didn’t like what you found, so we’re ignoring it.”

When scientific findings don’t line up with your current policies, you change the policies, not the science. This kind of scientific denialism is characteristic of Perry and his supporters.

As silly as it sounds, perhaps environmental policies should be based on facts. Perhaps the TCEQ should look into what scientists have found regarding Galveston Bay before bringing personal politics into it.