March Madness and NCAA brackets may be done and dusted. But a clean air advocacy group is keeping brackets–and pollution–on the minds of California legislators by delivering these “Clean Air Madness” bracketology posters to each and every legislative office in Sacramento. As spotted Friday in Sacramento, live and in person: The issue, according to the website listed on the bottom of the poster: “California spends billions each year on air quality and climate change, yet none of our state’s Air Quality Districts meet the minimal federal clean air standards.” The underlying message: The California Air Resources Board has become all about climate change, and has lost its focus on clean air as judged by three standards: Worst year-round particulate pollution, worst short-term particulate pollution and worst ozone. The coalition delivering the posters is backing clean trucks and clean fuels legislation, in the form of SB 216, AB 1115 and AB 1406. SB 216 may be…
Here’s a possibly weird turn of events in California politics. Politico is reporting today that Rep. John Garamendi, one of the state’s Democratic congressmen, has introduced legislation mimicking a Trump administration proposal on water. Rep. John Garamendi, who weirdly doesn’t look like Trump or act like Trump… but agrees with Trump on water. According to Politico, the Garamendi bill is also backed by Reps. Ken Calvert and Rob Woodall. It “would extend from 5 to 10 years the maximum term for National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System permits issued under the Clean Water Act.” The proposal is broadly opposed by environmental groups. But Donald Trump apparently loves the idea, and included it in last month’s infrastructure proposal. Garamendi must be pretty clearly sold on the legislation’s merits, because siding with Trump on just about anything except for perhaps the awesomeness of Mom and apple pie isn’t exactly a big political benefit…
In a blow to California progressives, newly-installed Gov. Gavin Newsom has announced today that he is ditching plans for high-speed rail connecting San Francisco and LA. High-speed rail had long been a major transportation objective of California progressives, and a project championed by environmentalists. In addition, it was a project that many flying-averse travelers had hoped would come online in the next few years. Newly-sworn in US Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s “Green New Deal” calls for the eventual elimination of airplanes and a shift to green-powered trains as a method of trans-continental and long-distance travel. Newsom abandoning high speed rail between California’s two major population centers threatens to make that objective significantly harder to achieve, long term.
Water: With ever more climate change underway, drought in parts of California and years of horror stories regarding toxic water coming out of Flint, Michigan, progressives know water policy is important. In the Golden State, progressives are rightly making water policy a priority. But there’s a problem: Newly-inaugurated Gov. Gavin Newsom seems to be going about it in a way that could turn out to actually be regressive. Newsom could end up hurting the same poor Californians he’s trying to help. Where water is concerned, Newsom’s progressivism seems to have gone missing-in-action. If you haven’t heard about Newsom’s plan, the Sacramento Bee has a summary: Gov. Gavin Newsom proposed a tax on drinking water Thursday to help disadvantaged communities clean up contaminated water systems. Newsom’s plan for a “safe and affordable drinking water fund,” included in the new governor’s first budget proposal, attempts to revive an idea that died in the Legislature…
On Friday, California became the first state in the nation to mandate zero-emissions transit buses, with the California Air Resources Board (CARB) voting unanimously that by 2029, all new buses need to be carbon-free. The move will cheer the electric bus industry and some environmentalists. But critics say that as it stands, electric buses can’t do the job California needs from a transit perspective and that unless the technology dramatically improves, CARB just voted to force a slew of lemon vehicles onto the road. The AP quotes the California Transit Association expressing concerns about electric buses performance, as well as money available for the transition. CTA seems to prefer a deadline of 2040 for fully bus electrified fleets. That is probably in part because, while the AP cites proponents of all-electric fleets as saying “they have lower maintenance… costs,” that seems to be a dubious proposition given Los Angeles’ experience of…