Torrance, CA – Legislation by Assemblymember Al Muratsuchi (D-Torrance) designed to protect National Monuments from the proposal by the Trump administration to open new oil and gas drilling leases on federal public lands in California passed the Assembly Floor on May 22.
Assembly Bill 342 prohibits any state agency, department, commission or local trustee, with leasing authority over public lands, from entering into any new lease authorizing the construction of oil and gas related infrastructure upon state lands to support oil and gas production on federal protected lands,
By prohibiting the infrastructure used for oil and gas production, AB 342 will “help California safeguard federally protected land and national monuments within its borders,” according to a statement from Muratsuchi’s Office.
“The bill is meant to protect against the Trump Administration’s further opening of national monuments to oil and gas drilling, as was done in Bears Ears National Monument in Utah. Just last month, the Trump administration announced its intent to move forward with plans to open one million acres of land in Central and Southern California to oil drilling, including areas near Bakersfield, Santa Barbara and possibly in Sierra Nevada,” according to Muratsuchi.
“The Trump Administration is threatening to open hundreds of thousands of acres of federal protected lands to fracking and oil drilling,” said Assemblymember Muratsuchi. “These federal lands include national monuments like wildflower-rich Carrizo Plain and the Giant Sequoia National Monument. We need to fight back to protect our beautiful land. Assembly Bill 342 will prohibit any state infrastructure leases that would support fracking and oil development on these federal lands.”
Assemblymember Muratsuchi said that while federal land use determinations are outside of state jurisdiction, California does have jurisdiction over the use of state lands, including leasing authority in those areas.
“If an oil or gas lease is authorized on federal land, production from that lease will likely require additional supporting infrastructure on state land in order to start and sustain production, as well as facilitate transport of the product,” he stated.
The bill is currently in the Senate and was read for the first time on May 23. It will go to the Rules Committee for assignment.
Suprisingly, there is no opposition to the bill listed on the different legislative analyses of the bill.
On May 9, the Trump administration finalized a controversial plan, entitled “The Proposed Resource Management Plan Amendment and Final Environmental Impact Statement for Oil and Gas Leasing and Development,” to open 725,500 acres of public lands and mineral estate across California’s Central Coast and the Bay Area to new oil and gas drilling.
This move comes just weeks after the Trump administration released its draft plan to reopen more than a million acres of public land and federal mineral estate in the Central California region, including Fresno, Kern, Kings, Madera, San Luis Obispo, Santa Barbara, Tulare and Ventura counties, to fossil fuel extraction. Together the plans target a total of 1,736,970 acres across 19 California counties.
The success of AB 342 follows the stalling of another bill authored by Muratsuchi, AB 345, in the Appropriations Committee of the California Assembly. This legislation to create health and safety zones around oil and gas wells became a two-year-bill on Thursday, May 16.
The bill will be brought up again in 2020. AB 345 would ensure that new oil and gas wells not on federal land are located 2,500 feet away from homes, schools, hospitals, playgrounds and health clinics.
Unlike other oil and gas producing states like Texas, Pennsylvania and Colorado, California at this time has no setbacks from oil and gas drilling operations.
Texas, the nation’s top oil producer, has 250 foot setbacks from oil and gas wells, inadequate for health and safety protections, but even that is much better than California’s lack of any setbacks. Dallas has 1500 foot setbacks to protect homes, schools, hospitals and other facilities.Colorado, Pennsylvania, Texas and other oil and natural gas producing states are at this time still ahead of California on fracking and oil drilling setback regulation.
Frontline communities and environmental justice advocates are hopeful that the Legislature will approve the bill in 2020.
"The Chairperson of the Appropriations Committee, Lorena Gonzalez, indicated her general support for the policy and committed to working with the author to find a way to move the bill forward at the end of the session," according to a a statement from VISIÓN (Voices In Solidarity Against Oil in Neighborhoods), the coalition of frontline and environmental justice groups promoting the bill. "The bill, championed by frontline communities directly impacted by oil and gas operations in partnership with environmental justice advocates, AB 345 will be taken up after this year’s legislative session concludes."
Assemblymember Muratsuchi, the Assistant Majority Leader for Policy and Research, represents California’s 66th Assembly District, which includes El Camino Village, Gardena, Harbor City, Harbor Gateway, Hermosa Beach, Lomita, Los Angeles, Manhattan Beach, Palos Verdes Estates, Rancho Palos Verdes, Redondo Beach, Rolling Hills, Rolling Hills Estates, Torrance, and West Carson.
This failure by the legislators to approve AB 345 at this time is no surprise, since only two bills opposed by Big Oil have been able to make it out of the Legislature to the Governor's Desk over the past four years. Big Oil is the largest and most powerful lobby in the state — and the Western States Petroleum Association is the largest and most powerful lobbying organization.
Low income communities and people of color in Kern County, LA Basin and elsewhere are most impacted by the failure of California regulators to approve health and safety zones around oil and gas drilling operations.
Most Californians, including many environmentalists, are unaware of how effectively Big Oil has captured California regulators.
A review of state permitting records in the report “The Sky’s The Limit: California,” shows that more than 21,000 drilling permits were issued during the Brown administration. These wells include 238 new offshore wells approved between 2012 and 2016 alone, according to Department of Conservation data analyzed by the Fractracker Alliance: www.fractracker.org/…
WSPA and Big Oil wield their power and influence over public discourse in 6 major ways: through (1) lobbying; (2) campaign spending; (3) serving on and putting shills on regulatory panels; (4) creating Astroturf groups: (5) working in collaboration with media; and (6) contributing to non profit organizations.
For more information about Big OIl's enormous power and influence in California, please read my article: www.dailykos.com/...