October 2003 California Today, PLanning and Conservation League Newsletter

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THE PLANNING & CONSERVATION LEAGUE VOLUME 33, NUMBER 5

OCTOBER 2003

C A L I F O R N I A

TODAY

PCL, PCL Foundation
he recall of California's Governor, Gray Davis, and the election of Arnold Schwarzenegger is the single most dramatic political and electoral event in California history. How the environmental community responds to this political earthquake will be determinative of our ability to shape public policy for at least the next three years. Although Mr. Schwarzenegger did not speak extensively about environmental issues on the campaign trail, he did issue an "Action Plan for California's Environment", the most comprehensive plan of any candidate seeking to replace Governor Davis. In many respects, the Schwarzenegger plan is consistent with the goals of the environmental community in that it calls for "cut(ting) air pollution statewide by up to 50% and significantly reduce California's dependence on foreign oil before the end of this decade." Other aspects of the plan include actions to "protect California's rivers, bays, and coastline by opposing oil drilling in coastal waters and improving water quality." Regarding energy, the Governor-elect proposes to "solve California electrical energy crisis (by) reducing consumption by 20% within two years through conservation measures; and dramatically increase(ing) the supply of clean, renewable energy sources." In the area of managing growth, the plan would "restore our urban environments by expanding mass transit, creating incentives for infill development, promote environmental justice, and improve our children's
Continues on page 2 Pollution..3 Big Winners..4 Prop 54..7 PCL’s Compact..8

Administration T

and the New

“Governor Davis has been a strong proponent of environmental protection and leaves behind a long list of environmental successes. Mr. Schwarzenegger has also made strong commitments to environmental protection in his campaign and seems to understand that a healthy environment is key to a healthy economy. The first test of his willingness to carry out his campaign promises will be his environmental appointments. PCL stands ready to help the new Governor protect and improve California's environment”
– Jan Chatten-Brown

PCL Board Member

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CALIFORNIA TODAY (ISSN 0739-8042) is the bimonthly newsletter of the PLANNING AND CONSERVATION LEAGUE AND THE PCL FOUNDATION 926 J Street, Suite 612, Sacramento, CA 95814 916-444-8726 FAX 916-448-1789

Continues from page 1

environment." The plan also calls for "tough enforcement" of California's existing environmental laws. The plan provides some specific steps that the new administration would take through executive action, or support if presented bills by the legislature. What is not clear is the degree to which these aggressive and positive planning and environmental protection actions are consistent with or contrary to the new administration's efforts in other areas, such as economic development, eliminating the car tax, proposing and adopting a balanced budget without increasing taxes or cutting education. What is known is that we are entering a time where there are no roadmaps as to where the state is going, or how the new administration intends to get there. The practical challenges of proposing an honest budget that eliminates the car tax ($4 billion in lost revenue), does not raise existing taxes nor propose new taxes, and actually increases spending in public education, are enormous. The structural deficit in the budget alone is nearly $10 billion. As California's only statewide planning and environmental coalition, the Planning and Conservation League and the PCL Foundation will participate in all aspects of setting public policy in this new era. We are currently involved in discussions with members of the Governor-elect's transition team. We will be active in the legislative and regulatory arenas (PCL), and we will be active in the research and the tough work of implementing environmental programs in communities throughout the state (PCLF). As you will see from reading this edition of California Today, PCL and PCLF are having a very successful year with regard to advancing an aggressive package of environmental and planning bills. We are, at the same time, taking on significant new projects ranging from developing strategies to thwart the federal government's relentless assault on California's environment, to reducing children's exposure to lead in urban areas. As the Executive Director of these two organizations, I arrive at work each day with great optimism and enthusiasm. I do so because of the talented staff that works here. A staff that takes on the most daunting planning and environmental challenges of the day, and finds creative, thoughtful and practical solutions that advance good public policy. With the arrival of a new administration, we will renew our efforts to represent you well, to be at the center of the public policy decision-making venues, and to adhere to our principles that have guided us so well for nearly forty years. However, in order to be effective, we need your support and help. It is likely that we will have to add personnel resources in order to meet the challenges that will appear on every front. It is likely that the new administration will need very constant and effective pushing from the environmental community in order for them to walk an environmental line. Please help us rise to these new challenges. Please help us build a stronger and more effective PCL by making a contribution today. Thank you for your continued support.

E-MAIL ADDRESS: [email protected] WEB ADDRESS: http://www.pcl.org PCL is a membership organization devoted to the passage of sound environmental and planning legislation in California. Membership is $35 a year, and includes a subscription to CALIFORNIA TODAY. Periodicals postage paid at Sacramento, CA. POSTMASTER: Send address changes for CALIFORNIA TODAY to the PCL office: 926 J Street, Suite 612, Sacramento, CA 95814. PCLF BOARD OF TRUSTEES AND OFFICERS DAVID HIRSCH, Chairman ROBERT KIRKWOOD, Secretary-Treasurer HARRIET BURGESS, Trustee COKE HALLOWELL, Trustee ARMANDO RODRIGUEZ, Trustee ANDREA SUMITS, Trustee GERALD H. MERAL, Ph,D., President PCL BOARD OF DIRECTORS SAGE SWEETWOOD, President KEVIN JOHNSON, Senior Vice President GARY PATTON, Vice President, Administration J WILLIAM YEATES, Secretary-Treasurer REGIONAL VICE PRESIDENTS ELISABETH BROWN, Orange County PHYLLIS FABER, Central Valley DOROTHY GREEN, Los Angeles ORGANIZATIONAL BOARD MEMBERS American Farmland Trust Archaeological Conservancy Audubon Society; Bay Area Chapters California Association Of Bicycling Organizations California Association Of Local Conservation Corps California Native Plant Society California Outdoors Californians Against Waste Community Conservancy International Greenbelt Alliance Heal The Bay Laguna Greenbelt Inc. League To Save Lake Tahoe Marin Conservation League Mono Lake Committee Mountain Lion Foundation Mountains Restoration Trust Save San Francisco Bay Association Southern California Agricultural Land Foundation Train Riders Association Of California PCL STAFF FRED KEELEY, Executive Director CORTNEE BEGGS, Administrative Associate ALEXANDRA BORACK, Administrative Associate TYRONE BUCKLEY, Diversity Program Coordinator GUSTINE CHAVEZ, Administrative Director MARC DE LA VERGNE, Associate Executive Director KAREN DOUGLAS, General Counsel MARION GUERARD, Legislative Assistant REBECCA HARRIS, Development Director TIM McRAE, Special Projects Director EDDY MOORE, Transportation Director DAVID SHOREY, Membership Coordinator CHRISTOPHER SMEDLEY, Staff Accountant ˇ MELISSA WHEELER, Administrative Associate CALIFORNIA AFFILIATE, NATIONAL WILDLIFE FEDERATION

FRED KEELEY EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR 2
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AIR & WATE

PCL Takes on
Stormwater Pollution
PCL Foundation releases Stormwater Guide; PCL sponsors legislation to address stormwater pollution

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he PCL Foundation proudly announces its most recent publication, Stormwater Pollution: Causes, Impacts and Solutions. Stormwater Pollution explains that stormwater pollution is the result of rain washing pollutants from our rooftops, streets, lawns, and fields into California’s streams, rivers, and eventually into the Pacific Ocean. The report focuses on urban runoff, the effect of stormwater in California’s increasingly urban landscape on the health of humans and our environment. Finally, the report recommends that local governments have greater ability to raise funds to reduce the health, economic, and environmental threats posed by stormwater pollution. Stormwater is the primary source of coastal pollution in southern California. Stormwater runoff is the number one known source of beach closure days and beach warning days, which occur when indicator bacteria exceed levels established by the state. These closures have the effect of diminishing tourist revenue - Huntington Beach alone lost over $20 million in tourist revenue in 1999 due to beach warning days and beach closure days. PCL has teamed up with Assemblymember Tom Harman (R-Huntington Beach) to sponsor Assembly Constitutional Amendment 10, a bill introduced in the 2003-04 legislative session. ACA 10 proposes to implement to the primary recommendation of our Stormwater Pollution guide. The recommendation is to amend the California constitution to allow local governments to raise fees on property owners without a two-thirds vote of the people in order to fund prevention and treatment programs that reduce stormwater and urban runoff pollution. It is necessary to change the constitution because Proposition 218, passed by the voters in 1996, limited the ability of cities and counties to raise such fees without a two-thirds vote (a nearly impossible threshold). ACA 10 has passed through its first two committees and awaits action on the Assembly floor. The Assembly can take it up at any time when it returns in 2004. ACA 10, like all constitutional amendments, will need a twothirds majority vote in both houses of the legislature and then majority approval of the voters in order to become law. PCLF has laid out the case for why this change is necessary; PCL will be fighting next year to see it happen.

For more information, please contact Tim McRae, PCL Special Projects Director, at (916) 313-4523 or [email protected]. 3
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Salton Sea, Forest Wa Big Winners this Legis
hree bills passed this session, SB 317 (Kuehl), SB 654 (Machado), and SB 277 (Ducheny), completely restructured the proposed water transfer between the Imperial Irrigation District (IID) and thirsty cities in southern California. The Salton Sea - and California water policy is better off because of it. Under the terms of the revised water deal, $20 million of Proposition 50 funds will go to development of a restoration plan that, to the maximum extent feasible, protects bird species, eliminates air quality impacts, and protects water quality at the Salton Sea. The plan could include activities at the Colorado River Delta.

Measures on Renewable Energy, Air and W

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To help fund the restoration plan, the legislation authorizes a precedent-setting arrangement where the State will sell IID water and dedicate the profits - estimated at $290 - 350 million dollars -- to the Sea. New fees on interim surplus water and on future water transfers from IID will also help fund the restoration plan. PCL General Counsel Karen Douglas, a lead negotiator of this agreement for environmental groups, said "Two years ago, a head-on collision between the biggest long-term agriculture to urban water transfer in the country and the environment seemed inevitable." Since then, the deal has been rewritten to protect the

Salton Sea and establish unprecedented environmental conditions on the water transfer. "This sends a strong message that water plan-

"This sends a strong message that water planners must address the environmental consequences of water transfers."
ners must address the environmental consequences of water transfers," Douglas said. Two years ago, when Douglas first began working to protect the Salton Sea, the outlook for this troubled oasis was very bleak. The proposed transfer threatened to significantly cut inflows to the Sea, sharply increasing salinity and exposing up to 80 square miles of seabed. This was a recipe for environmental disaster, not only for birds and wildlife, but also for people who would be exposed to blowing dust from the dried-up Sea. The region already suffers some of the worst air quality in California. However, the water transfer seemed almost inevitable. It was a fundamental part of the Quantification Settlement Agreement (QSA), which quantified water

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atersheds are slative Session
allocations on the Colorado River. If the QSA was not signed by December 31, 2002, California stood to lose more than a million acre-feet of Colorado River water under the terms of the 4.4 Plan, an agreement to reduce California water use from the Colorado River to 4.4 million acre-feet. Many people worried that this would cause southern California water agencies to pump more water from the Bay-Delta. Nevertheless, PCL and a handful of allies rallied to save the Salton Sea. After two years of hard work, negotiators reached agreement on a much more environmentally friendly water deal in the last week of this legislative session. The QSA was finally executed on October 10th, 2003.

Mapping Timber Cuts
AB 47, authored by Assemblymember Joe Simitian (D–PaloAlto) is another PCLsponsored forestry bill that passed this session. AB 47 requires that timber harvest plans contain maps that show where logging has occurred over the past ten years in the watershed on land owned or controlled by the timber harvest

Water Quality also Enacted
Landmark Forestry Reform Bill Signed!
PCL and the Sierra Club joined forces to pass SB 810, a major breakthrough for environmental advocates, who have been repeatedly stymied in their quest for reform of forestry practices. Senate President pro Tempore John Burton (D–San Francisco) authored the bill, and Assemblymember Joe Nation (D–San rafael) was the Assembly co-author. SB 810 gives Regional Water Quality Control Boards the authority to block the approval of logging plans that would violate water quality standards in a watershed that is degraded by excessive sediment. This problem is especially severe on the North Coast, where nearly 14,000 miles of streams are now listed as "impaired" by the U.S. EPA. Coho Salmon have been lost over half of their historic streams, and some rural residents have lost their water supplies because of logging. Fred Keeley, Executive Director of the Planning and Conservation League, considers SB 810 "the most significant reform of California's Forest Practice Act since it was created in 1973."
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plan submitter. The maps will also be required to contain information on silvicultural prescription (i.e. whether the past timber harvest was a clear cut or a selective cut) and on the location of probable future timber harvests. This information will make it much easier for reviewers of timber harvest plans to see where cumulative impacts of logging are likely to be felt.

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Big Winners this Legislative Season
Continued from page 5 The bill puts teeth into the existing requirement that logging plans must comply with water quality standards. Previously, the California Department of Forestry could approve timber harvest plans over the objections of the regional water quality control boards. SB 810 changes that, allowing regional the water boards to block approval of a timber harvest plan if the plan would cause or contribute to a violation of water quality standards. This new authority only applies in watersheds that have been listed as impaired because of excessive sediment. The bill passed the Assembly with 43 votes, two votes over the 41-vote threshold for passing measures out of the Assembly. Governor Davis signed SB 810 on October 12, 2003. Under the program, California's market for larger solar photovoltaic systems has grown 1000% in two years. Projects built so far include a 4-acre system on top of an Alameda County correctional facility, which will save the County an estimated $15 million in power costs and avoid over 3 million pounds per year of harmful air pollution. "Investing in big systems like this one is a good strategy to create a bigger market with lower prices," said PCL's Eddy Moore. The legislation also establishes the most rigorous clean air standards in the nation for gasfired electric generators participating in the program. Other landmark environmental legislation signed by the Governor include: • SB 288 (Sher), which maintains California's strict air quality standards and rejects the Bush Administration's rollback of the Clean Air Act in California. • SB 700 (Florez), which removes the decades-long exemption granted to agriculture from California's clean air laws. • SB 20 (Sher), which establishes a statewide program to collect and recycle computer monitors, televisions, and similar electronic waste. • SB 923 (Sher), which limits the ability of the State Water Resources Control Board to grant waivers for discharging pollutants to water. Overall, this was a remarkably good year for environmental bills

PCL Sponsored Renewable Energy & Clean Air Bill Signed
PCL staff were thrilled to gain passage of AB 1685, Assemblymember Mark Leno's (D-San Francisco) legislation extending until 2008 California's program to help commercial, industrial, and local governments install their own power supply systems. PCL worked closely with the California Solar Electric Industry Association to protect the "Self Generation Incentive Program." which is funded from a charge on utility bills and which heavily favors solar power. 6

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Race-based Data Does Matter

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n the controversial October 7th ballot, Californians were asked to make some difficult choices. At the same time we were deciding whether or not to recall our Governor, Ward Connerly’s Classification by Race, Ethnicity, Color, or National Origin (CRENO) Initiative was on the ballot as Proposition 54. Proponents were calling it the “Racial Privacy” Initiative. The deceptively named initiative was not about privacy but about denying access to critical information. The proponents of the initiative claimed that it was a major step in creating a color-blind society. The problem is that we do not yet live in a society where race and ethnicity are not an issue. Disparities in health care, education, law enforcement, and environmental protection prove it. Not knowing about societal inequities will not make them go away.

People of color are bearing a disproportionate burden of California’s environmental pollution.

severely harmed if the proposition had passed. People of color are bearing a disproportionate burden of California’s environmental pollution. If the proposition had passed, the state would no longer have had access to information vital to examining whether or not its environmental laws were equally protecting all Californians. We have made great gains in California in acknowledging that race is an issue in environmental protection. Proposition 54 would have been a huge step backward. For example, the proposition would have prohibited state and local government from gathering

race-based information on exposure to toxic materials. Childhood exposure to lead is a serious problem, one that has been shown to be prevalent in communities of color. Even at low levels, it reduces a person’s intelligence, makes it difficult to concentrate or pay attention, and harms hearing. Fighting childhood exposure to lead is a very difficult endeavor and many people are struggling to solve the problem. Clean up efforts are expensive and legislative solutions are difficult to achieve. The initiative would have put yet another barrier in solving an already difficult problem. The fact is, race-based data does matter if we are going to continue our efforts to achieve social and environmental justice. For more information, contact Tyrone Buckley, PCL Diversity Coordinator, at (916) 313-4538 or [email protected].

PCL’s effort to address Environmental Justice concerns through its Diversity Program would have been

Prop 54

(as of Oct 15, 2003 at 12:48 pm)

Yes 2,904,771 36.0% No 5,144,465 64.0%
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Better California Compact
are needed to put these principles into action have either not been implemented at all, or not on a scale to match the severity of the challenge. Putting the “P” back in PCL, the PCL Foundation has decided to help knit together a broad coalition of interests to push for implementation of specific public policy changes that will be effective in blunting sprawl and revitalizing our existing communities and that have a realistic prospect of being enacted either by the legislature and the Governor, or by citizen initiative. The PCL Foundation recently has established a partnership with a team of other advocacy groups working on land use, environmental protection, and social equity, to lead the Better California Campaign. The Better California Campaign will soon begin to reach out to a much wider circle of allies in the business, agriculture, affordable housing, transportation, community revitalization, organized labor, faith, and other communities. The goal of the Better California Campaign is to craft a political “compact” to implement major land use planning reforms and link them to fiscal and other incentives that would be available only to those communities that can demonstrate their commitment to carrying out the reforms. The process of striking this compact will be first be used to organize a coalition that can work to pass legislation in 2004 and 2005 to enact the Better California Compact-the specific policy proposals. Since there are also many administrative changes that need to be made, the Compact must gain support from the Governor’s office. If that support is not forthcoming, we will press for a commitment from the gubernatorial candidates in 2006 to implement the Compact. Finally, we will develop and, if necessary, pursue the “credible threat” of a citizen’s initiative to implement the Compact if the Legislative and Gubernatorial approaches fail and building a coalition to support a ballot measure in 2006. For more information contact Marc de la Vergne, PCL Associate Director, at 916-313-4520 or [email protected].

he impacts of unfettered suburban sprawl and urban disinvestments on the California landscape and on its people are profound and growing. With 11.3 million new residents expected over the next two decades, the need to respond with policies that manage our state’s growth in more sustainable and equitable patterns is acute. The PCL Foundation believes that now is the time to take action, and that further delay will only be catastrophic for our state’s land and people. Among state officials, legislators, business leaders, advocacy groups, and citizens, there exists growing interest in taking action. Many have written persuasively about the problems posed by California’s sprawling and poorly planned growth. Innumerable conferences have been held to discuss these problems and what to do about them. Among those who favor land use reform, agreement generally has been reached on the basic principles of more sustainable and socially equitable land use and development. The problem is that the key public policy changes that

PLANNING AND CONSERVATION LEAGUE • PCL FOUNDATION 926 J Street, Suite 612 • Sacramento, California 95814

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C A L I F O R N I A

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