State of the State Misses The Mark

Sierra Club California’s environmental advocates today watched Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger’s short “State of the State” address with disappointment.

Like most Californians, we are caught up in the pain and worry surrounding the state’s fiscal crisis. Gov. Schwarzenegger’s short speech failed to address those very real concerns by proposing real leadership (Click on the photo at right to watch the speech).

Instead of spinning his wheels with a short address, Gov. Schwarzenegger should be declaring 2009 to be the Year of the Green Jobs, as Director Bill Magavern suggested in a recent KQED radio interview. We have opportunities to create and improve public transit, water supply, affordable housing, flood protection and energy efficiency – all without harming our environment or spending money we don’t have.

California’s legislative leaders, Assembly Speaker Karen Bass and Senate President Pro Tempore Darrell Steinberg, have a plan to stimulate the state’s economy by spending already-approved bond money on “green infrastructure” projects that would improve our state’s economy without affecting its ecology. What’s more, the proposed Green Economic Stimulus Plan looks out for the next generation by providing green jobs training.

Gov. Schwarzenegger also missed his chance to tell California that he’s going to halt his unproductive efforts to suspend California’s environmental laws, after balking at signing a state budget fix that didn’t include enough rollbacks of California’s treasured environmental protections.

As the Governor concluded his remarks today, “Let us resolve the budget crisis, so that we can get on with the people’s work.”

And, we might add, let’s get the Green Economic Stimulus Plan in place, so we can get people to work!

Sierra Club California, Others Fight For Tough Diesel Rule

Shouldn’t California’s trucks carry a fair share of California’s efforts to reduce pollution?

Sierra Club California Director Bill Magavern and other key figures in California’s environmental movement have banded together to ask the California Air Resources Board to do just that. The letter asks the regulators to improve enforcement and enaction of their proposed diesel truck rule, set for a Dec. 12 vote.

The rule would require trucks to lower the amount of harmful diesel emission particles they exhaust into California’s air. With diesel emissions expected to go up as much as 40 percent by 2020, it’s a good time to address these harmful pollutants. What’s more, with the fuel efficiency improvements brought on by changes to the truck rule, truckers will recoup their costs in about 2-3 years.

Cutting truck emissions will lessen the environmental health burden on California families. A November 2008 study found that air pollution in just the South Coast and San Joaquin Valley regions costs the California economy $28 billion annually.

A tight, responsive rule also will help the state reduce the pollution that causes global warming, the environmental experts say. Reducing heavy-duty vehicle emissions must be part of California’s efforts to take on those pollutants.

If you want to get involved, consider joining Breathe California’s Bus for Breath. This group will help send people to the air board meeting to advocate adoption of a protective, productive rule.

Click here to read the entire letter from California environmentalists and health advocates.

Sierra Club California Hails New Toxics-Fighting Law

It’s long been one of our state’s saddest absurdities: Toxic regulators have the authority to classify a child’s lead-tainted lunch box as hazardous waste – but can’t do anything to stop the child from eating lunch out of it.

That’s about to change. Today, I was honored to join Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger in Los Angeles as he signed two landmark chemical policy reform bills, AB 1879 by Assemblymember Mike Feuer (D-Los Angeles) and SB 509 by Senator Joe Simitian (D-Palo Alto). These two bills give California’s Department of Toxic Substances Control new authority to promote "green chemistry" practices aimed at lowering the toxic burden of products California families buy and use every day.

In my remarks at the signing ceremony, I hailed the most successful environmental legislation of 2008 in our state and asserted Sierra Club's position that Californians should be able to buy products for our households without having to worry that we're bringing home hazardous substances that could harm our families.

As Assemblymember Feuer put it, "Instead of putting partisan politics first, we’re putting peoples’ health first." We worked hard all year long with Mr. Feuer and our allies at Breast Cancer Fund, CA League of Conservation Voters and Environment California to craft this landmark legislation.

For environmental health advocates like us, the hard work has just begun. I will continue to participate in the implementation of this law, standing up for a healthy future for all Californians.
- Bill Magavern


Click here to watch the governor sign AB 1879 (opens as Windows Media Player file)

Message To The Governor: Sign These Bills!

Just as the lengthening budget crisis threatened to push California’s lawmaking process aside, our state’s leaders finally agreed upon a financial plan for the state.

Now that Gov. Schwarzenegger’s attention seems to have shifted from the state’s tangled budget, Sierra Club California has a list of important bills we respectfully ask him to sign – and one that we want him to veto.

Here are some highlights, or you can read the whole letter here:

Sierra Club California urges Gov. Schwarzenegger to sign the following bills:

SB 974 (Lowenthal) – would mitigate air pollution from the ports and increase port efficiency by assessing a fee for each container moving through the ports or Los Angeles, Long Beach and Oakland.

SB 1313 (Corbett) – would ban potentially carcinogenic substances from food packaging, beginning in 2010.

AB 1879 (Feuer/Huffman) – would give the Department of Toxic Substances Control the authority to establish safeguards to protect people and the environment from consumer products containing known toxins like lead, mercury and arsenic.

AB 2347 (Ruskin) – would establish a producer responsibility program for recycling of mercury thermostats.

AB 2447 (Jones) – would ensure that new homes have adequate structural fire protection, without leaving that responsibility to CalFire and the state’s general fund.

Sierra Club California also urges Gov. Schwarzenegger to veto one bill:

SB 1473 (Calderon) - would give inappropriately broad authority to the Building Standards Commission (BSC) to develop and adopt the California Green Building Standards Code (CGBSC). This authority would allow the BSC to exclude expert state agencies such as the California Energy Commission, Cal-EPA, State Water Board, Air Resources Board, and Integrated Waste Management Board, which are already working on various aspects of green building.

Read the full letter to Gov. Schwarzenegger here.

California Leaders Oppose Drilling

California lawmakers have taken a strong stand against an oil industry “culture of corruption” that threatens our coasts.
Assemblymember Pedro Nava and has authored a resolution opposing drilling for oil along California’s coastline. The resolution, which was just approved by our California Legislature, will demonstrate our state’s continued resistance to coastal drilling.

The resolution has become even more important in light of recent news that oil regulators with the U.S. Minerals Management Service have become industry’s lap dogs, not watchdogs (AP).

Not only would new drilling place our precious coasts in the hands of this rogue agency, drilling won’t pay off for more than a decade, the representatives said. Furthermore, it would endanger our state’s $12.5 billion coastal tourism industry and our fishing and aquaculture businesses, Assemblymember Nava explained.

We can reverse our dependence on foreign oil without drilling, Sierra Club California Director Bill Magavern pointed out at today’s press conference. More efficient vehicle efficiency standards, such as California’s Clean Cars Law, would save millions of gallons of oil simply by putting existing technologies to good use. But the Bush Administration continues to stand in the way of this law.

“More offshore drilling is an illusion, not a solution,” said Bill Magavern. “California is trying to lead the way – we just need the U.S. EPA to get out of the way.”

Assemblymember Jared Huffman, Natural Resources Defense Council’s Victoria Rome and Environment California’s Bernadette Del Chiaro also stood against coastal drilling.

Ending The Oil Addiction

Sierra Club California Director Bill Magavern just debated Republican Congressman Dan Lungren over offshore oil drilling.

One of Bill's best points:

"We can't address our smoking problem by looking for new sources of tobacco, and we can't address our oil addiction by drilling off our beautiful coasts. Instead, we need to use less oil, and to find alternatives to oil. That will bring the price down, and, more importantly, wean us off our addiction to oil."

More reasons NOT to drill for oil off California's coasts:

• Drilling our coasts would do nothing to reduce gas prices for the average American family. Opening offshore areas to drilling would only lower gas prices by less than 3-4 cents a gallon, according to the Natural Resources Defense Council.

• Drilling isn't a good, quick fix. It would take at least a decade to bring new leases issued under this plan into production.

• Oil companies are not even using 5,500 offshore leases they already own.

• The honest answer to our oil problem is to use less of it, and that means better, faster fuel economy standards and a shift toward renewable energy. Renewable sources of energy remain a promising path away from our oil dependency, both Bill Magavern and Dan Lungren agreed during their ABC News debate.

Find out more about the "Outer Continental Shelf," the area that would be affected by drilling.

Your secure donation helps us protect our pristine coasts from threats like drilling.

SIERRA CLUB CALIFORNIA SUPPORTS GOVERNOR SCHWARZENEGGER’S POSTPONEMENT OF AERIAL SPRAYING WHILE FURTHER STUDIES ARE CONDUCTED

Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger has ordered a postponement of aerial spraying intended to eradicate the light brown apple moth in 12 California counties. The spraying will not go forward until the completion of additional testing on the efficacy and toxicity of various substances that could be sprayed.

The governor announced the postponement at a meeting today with Senators Carole Migden and Darrell Steinberg, Marin County Supervisor Judy Arnold, Sierra Club California Director Bill Magavern and Paul Schramski, State Director of Pesticide Watch.

Magavern thanked Governor Schwarzenegger for his action, which is consistent with Sierra Club’s call for a precautionary moratorium on the spraying until health effects and alternatives can be fully studied.

Bills Would Protect Consumers from Dangerous Chemicals

This morning, Sierra Club California Director Bill Magavern joined Assemblymembers Mike Feuer (D-Los Angeles), Jared Huffman (D-San Rafael), and Fiona Ma (D-San Francisco), to speak in support of three important pieces of legislation in the fight to protect consumers from dangerous chemicals.

AB 1860 (Huffman) would require immediate removal of recalled toys and other products from the market; prohibits the sale of recalled toys and other recalled consumer products, and imposes stiff fines against those who sell recalled products to prevent the items from surfacing on the Internet or at second-hand stores; requires recalled products to be properly disposed of and for manufacturers to certify their disposal; requires manufacturers to establish a notification system when recalling products; mandates that retailers post recall notices in a conspicuous fashion.

AB 1879 (Feuer) would authorize the Department of Toxic Substances Control (DTSC) to regulate all consumer products that contain the following chemicals: lead, mercury, cadium, arsenic, polybrominated diphenylethers (PBDEs), phthalates, and hexavalent chromium. DTSC currently has limited authority to regulate these chemicals in certain products.

AB 2694 (Ma) would ban lead above trace levels of in children’s toys and products, using the 40 parts per million (ppm) standard endorsed by the American Academy of Pediatrics.

Gang of 14 Republican Senators Holding Budget Hostage at Behest of Oil and Developer Lobbies

Sierra Club California’s Bill Magavern speaks at August 8 press conference with Senate leaders on budget impasse and global warming.


Today I induct the new members of the California Hall of Shame. Senators Aanestad, Ackerman, Ashburn, Battin, Cogdill, Cox, Denham, Dutton, Harman, Hollingsworth, Margett, McClintock, Runner, and Wyland are holding hostage the entire budget for the state of California.

This Gang of 14 privileged white men is obstructing the funding of schools, hospitals, parks and other vital services because the oil and developer lobbies that fund their campaigns want to weaken our keystone environmental law, the
California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA). Forget about the fact that this is a policy issue 8 that should be addressed through the normal legislative process -- because of California's bizarre requirement for a 2/3 majority in each house to pass a budget, blocking the budget is just about the only leverage the Republican Caucus has, so the needs of the people who depend on state services will take a backseat to the wishes of polluters.

These 14 Republican senators (their 15th colleague, Sen. Maldonado, broke with the pack and supported the budget passed by Assembly Democrats and Republicans) want to delay for years the Environmental Quality Act's application to global warming pollution. They're clearly not listening to the people of California, who, according to last month's poll by the Public Policy Institue of California, believe in large and growing numbers that it is necessary to take immediate steps to counter the effects of global warming. Eight in 10 Californians believe global warming will be a very (54%) or somewhat serious (28%) threat to California's future economy and quality of life.

Fortunately, Senate President pro tem Don Perata, backed by the entire Senate Democratic caucus, declared today that he will staunchly defend environmental quality and refuse to flinch in the face of the hostage-taking by the Gang of 14.

Bill Magavern
Senior Representative
Sierra Club California