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Yesterday was Judgment Day for Most Major Environmental Bills in the California Legislature

The Suspense Is Killing AB 224 and SB 375 For the Year--Other Bills Alive for Floor Votes

By Gary A. Patton
Executive Director
Planning and Conservation League

Please excuse our tardiness in getting this update out. PCL has been in triage mode since late yesterday afternoon trying to keep one of our most important environmental bills alive. AB 224 (Wolk) – a PCL sponsored bill dealing with water planning and global warming – was held in a key committee yesterday.

If you have not already done so, please take a moment now to help save this bill.
So, what happened yesterday? Yesterday was Judgment Day for all environmental bills that the California Legislature deemed to be "fiscally significant," which included most of our bills.

To ensure that the leadership in each house has a full understanding of the costs and benefits of the suite of bills being considered each year, all bills that would cost the state at least $150 million are placed on the Suspense File of each house's Appropriation Committee. If a bill that is "on suspense" is considered a top priority (worth the investment, in other words), it's sent along to the house floor for a vote. If not, it stays behind.

This last committee decision always seems to be most significant - and difficult to predict - because all the bills under consideration are in their "second house;" that is, all the Assembly bills are in the Senate and visa versa.

Yesterday, both Appropriations committees met to decide the fate of the bills on their Suspense Files.

The Senate decided to hold AB 224 (Wolk) which effectively means it was killed in the committee. This is particularly disappointing because AB 224 had no opposition and is simply good policy. AB 224 would ensure that water agencies across the state are prepared to adapt to climate change and that they have the information necessary to reduce their greenhouse emissions.

It's critical to move this bill this year. If AB 224 is held, we will miss the opportunity to incorporate climate change into the 2009 DWR Delivery Reliability Report, and the 2010 Urban Water Management Plans. This will mean that climate change will not be addressed in many water plans until 2015.

While the bill didn't pass out of the Senate Appropriations Committee, there's still an opportunity for Senate leadership to make a different decision. Again, if you have not yet asked the Senate Leadership to move this bill, please call now.

We are also very disappointed to report that SB 375 (Steinberg), another top environmental priority bill, did not move on to the Assembly Floor. This measure, which seeks to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by encouraging more compact development when cities and counties update their General Plans, must now wait until next year to be re-considered. That's too long to wait when California is already racing to achieve the emission reduction mandate of AB 32 – the Global Warming Solutions Act of 2006. If this measure is indeed done for the year (and we say if because it ain't over till it's over!), you can count on PCL to continue our efforts to build support for SB 375 and help push it over the finish line next year.

We're pleased to report that most of our other top bills (including those we've been highlighting in the Insider) emerged from the Suspense Files today relatively unscathed, including:

AB 5 and AB 162 (Wolk) – Land Use and Flood Protection

AB 609 (Eng) – Green Buildings

AB 514 and AB 515 (Lieber) – Toxics

AB 558 (Feuer) – Green Chemistry

SB 210 (Kehoe) – Low Carbon Fuels Standard

SB 974 (Lowenthal) – Clean Ports Investment Bill

SB 719 (Machado) – San Joaquin Valley Air District Reform and AB 1108 (Ma) – Toxic Toys, were not on the suspense files because they did not meet the cost threshold.

The full membership of each house will now consider all of the measures which passed off the suspense file yesterday. If your legislator happens to be a swing vote on any of these bills, you'll get an email from us asking you to call them right away. We'll keep you posted!

Gary Patton is the Executive Director of the Planning and Conservation League, a statewide, nonprofit lobbying organization. For more than thirty years, PCL has fought to develop a body of environmental laws in California that is the best in the United States. PCL staff review virtually every environmental bill that comes before the California Legislature each year. It has testified in support or opposition of thousands of bills to strengthen California's environmental laws and fight off rollbacks of environmental protections.

Posted on August 31, 2007

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