A few months ago I set a new personal goal: get into nature at least once a week.  It really didn’t matter what I ended up doing as long as it took me outdoors – hike, trail run, rock climb, wildlife watch, camp, picnic, paddle, soak, swim, sunbathe, backpack, photograph wildflowers… You get the idea.

And what a grand idea it was!  Not only have I enjoyed doing all of those activities, but I’ve also gotten to explore Californian parks that I previously knew little about, if at all.

My guess is that you have a story similar to mine – a love for California’s vast and varied open spaces and all that they have to offer.  After all, it’s hard to live in such a beautiful state and not get out and enjoy its natural features in one form or another.

And now, here’s the bad news: many of these treasured open spaces may not be accessible much longer.

Last year Governor Brown called for the closure of 70 state parks.  Included on the the hit list are parks that I’ve fallen in love with like Henry Coe State Park where you can hike amongst old oaks and madrones to a picturesque swimming hole, and Castle Rock State Park where I first began rock climbing.

This week park funding came back into the news with Governor Brown’s release of the May budget revise.  Not only are parks still on the table for closure, but the revised budget proposes more cuts to the funding of game wardens, rangers, and lifeguards.  Those cuts come at a time where the State Park System is already understaffed and overburdened with deferred maintenance totaling to over $1 billion.  Furthermore, these parks suffer from the pains of a tightened budget as access prices increase, hours of operation diminish, and select facilities, trails, or camping areas close.

What doesn’t make sense is this: continued cuts to the State Park System will not save money, but will in fact cost the state more in the long run.  Closing parks means:

   — a loss of revenue for local communities neighboring parks and for the state via taxes generated by tourism;

   — increases in deferred maintenance once the parks reopen their gates; and

   — costs associated with addressing crime, vandalism, and other illegal activities like marijuana cultivation.

While some of the parks on the closure list have found ways to stay open thanks to financial support from their communities or intervention from nonprofits (including Castle Rock and Henry Coe SPs), others have not been so lucky.

Fortunately, Assemblymember Jared Huffman is championing a bill that would provide diverse funding for the State Parks System.  Assembly Bill 1589, the California State Parks Stewardship Act of 2012, addresses short- and long-term needs for California state parks, achieving budget savings without wide scale park closures.

Specifically, AB 1589 would:

   — Encourage formation of a state compact that guarantees an ongoing level of state funding for operations and maintenance of state parks.

   — Create a State Park Enterprise Fund to be used for installing modern revenue and fee collection equipment and technologies to increase park visitation and revenues.

   — Produce a California state park environmental license plate which vehicle owners could purchase and have the fees go towards support of state parks.

   — Provide the option for taxpayers to voluntarily purchase an annual state park access pass when they file their taxes.

   — Require the Department of Parks and Recreation to be more transparent about how it evaluates and selects specific parks for closure, and places a cap of 25 state park units on the number of park closures allowed from 2012 to 2016 without legislative approval.

TAKE ACTION: Ask your legislator to support AB 1589, the California State Parks Stewardship Act, today!

It’s only been in the last couple of years that Californians began hearing about fracking, and few of us thought that it was even happening in our state. Fracking – shorthand for hydraulic fracturing – is a method that is used to extract natural gas and oil deeply trapped below shale deposits. A process that has been in use for decades, fracking requires vast amounts of water laden with a concoction of chemicals to be pumped under high pressure to blast through shale and push up trapped gas.

Well, it turns out that California has been getting fracked for years in areas including Los Angeles, Ventura, Monterey, Santa Barbara, and Kern Counties. What’s even more shocking is that current law allows the fracking industry to operate largely unregulated in the state. This is despite the fact that all around the country numerous public health and environmental problems are bubbling up around fracking sites. One of the biggest problems linked to fracking is the contamination of groundwater. In fact some water contains such high levels of gases or chemicals that it can be lit on fire!

Last year CLCV began advocating in support of a bill to require disclosure of fracking locations, amounts of water used in fracking operations, and a list chemicals used in the process. While the bill’s author negotiates amendments with industry, the environmental community is looking to another fracking bill introduced this year by environmental champion Fran Pavley to help get at least some sort of protections in place.

Senate Bill 1054 (Pavley) would require oil and gas well operators to provide advance notice to the nearby property owners and occupants, water suppliers, and local government before they frack. This isn’t revolutionary. It’s being a good neighbor. And it is the practice that is already required from any significant development project – fracking just somehow had slipped through the cracks.

Since wells may extend for literally miles in a horizontal direction from the vertical well-head, it’s only fair that neighboring residents and owners be given advance notice that a well is to be drilled or fracked.

TAKE ACTION: Ask your State Senator to support SB 1054 today!

Cross-posted from the CA League of Conservation Voters (CLCV) blog, Groundswell. 

By Mike Young and Beth Gunston

Late Wednesday, CLCV-endorsed candidate Assemblymember Bill Monning was greeted with some fantastic news: Senator Sam Blakeslee announced that he will not seek re-election. Despite being the incumbent, Blakeslee decided that defending his seat would not be worth the effort since decennial redistricting shifted this coastal district to a new 16% Democratic registration advantage. If that were not insurmountable enough, much of the new district that stretches from Santa Cruz to San Luis Obespo overlaps areas that Monning currently represents in the Assembly.  

In 2010, it was largely argued that Blakeslee only won his race against Democrat candidate and environmental champion John Laird because then-Governor Schwarzenegger made that contest a special election where Democratic voters tend to have extremely low turnout. Whether that's true or not, Blakeslee felt he had no viable chance this time around. Without a serious primary challenger and with the incumbent ducking out, Monning is in a great position to essentially walk into the seat. This will be a big pick-up for the environment. Monning (100% CLCV score) will be a much needed breath of fresh air from Blakeslee (21% CLCV score), especially in the Senate where environmental priorities have had a much more difficult time passing.  Monning is well regarded for his environmental health work around toxics and pesticides, and has been specifically outspoken about the recent introduction of methyl iodide in the state.

But while Monning’s expected win is a great for the environment, it's time to look this gift horse in the mouth. With little hope of a contender to pit against Monning, the polluter interests that helped Blakeslee win in 2010 will likely now spend their money to defeat a more vulnerable target: state Senator Fran Pavley. Pavley, an environmental leader who authored California's landmark global warming laws, has a much more difficult race this year as redistricting has put her in a Senate seat against Tony Strickland with a very narrow registration advantage. In 2008, despite his 2% record on the environment including countless votes against bills to increase renewable energy, Strickland reinvented himself as a renewable energy expert and narrowly won his current Senate seat. With environmental advocates just one seat away from a two-thirds supermajority in the Senate and environmental champion Fran Pavley potentially being ousted, you can bet big polluters will spend more heavily on this race than any others.

So while the prospects for Bill Monning look fantastic, the consequence may be that we will need to work even harder to protect Fran Pavley. Still, much can change between now and Election Day, and nobody quite knows how the top two primary system will change the political landscape. All we know for sure is that in 2012 we must remain vigilant and work towards electing an environmental majority in the Senate. That way we’ll be more likely to pass bold environmental laws along with a balanced budget, taxes, and fees to keep our state moving forward in the years to come.

Cross-posted from the CA League of Conservation Voters (CLCV) blog, Groundswell. 

Nope, this isn’t a reference to another fad diet – at least not for people.  It’s our cars and trucks that need to go low-carb this time, meaning reduce their carbon emissions to help California address its air quality problems and limit its contributions to climate change.

When it comes to consumption options for vehicles, not all fuels are alike.  It’s just like me and my choices for food.  I choose to fuel myself with meat which requires more resources than being vegetarian.  But to decrease my carbon footprint, I limit my consumption of meat and make responsible consumer choices like buying meat that is organically raised and locally sourced.  It can be said that California’s Low Carbon Fuel Standard is trying to do the same with our cars and trucks.

The Low-Carb Fuel Standard looks at the lifecycle of fuel, not just the pollution that results during its burning. As a result, the standard prevents the use of some of the dirtiest fuels like oil from the Tar Sands in Canada – a fuel source with an extraction method that is excessively polluting and carbon intensive.  The standard also requires oil companies to invest in alternative energy sources.

The California Air Resources Board (CARB) is in charge of enforcing the Low Carbon Fuel Standard to help the state achieve its global warming reduction goals.  CARB has moved forward thus far on its implementation, but now the fossil fuel industry has stepped in to fight the standard – they want to maintain the status quo of negligent fuel production.  The oil and gas companies are flooding CARB with industry-funded anti-environmental research and so-called experts seeking to derail this important protection. They don’t care about the impact these dirty fuels have on California’s families and the air we breathe.

Despite industry pressure, CARB is proposing changes to the low carbon fuel standard to ensure that California continues to use cleaner, low carbon fuel. These changes are a key step forward to improve our air and reduce pollution as we move towards clean and renewable energy sources.  

Just like I don’t have plans to stop eating meat, most Californians are not going to stop driving.  Yet we need to find a way to lessen the impact that their choice of motorized transportation has on our health and environment.  By regulating the quality and source of the fuel that we are burning, the state is taking a simple step to move us towards us a more carbon neutral future.

TAKE ACTION: Send a message to the California Air Resources Board before December 15^th, asking them to protect the low carbon fuel standard from attacks by oil companies and their lobbyists.  CARB is accepting comments on changes to the low carbon fuel standard until noon on December 15th.

 Cross-posted from the CA League of Conservation Voters (CLCV) blog, Groundswell.

A report recently released by the BlueGreen Alliance – “More Jobs, Less Pollution”– makes a new case for recycling.  Often cited by people as the easy “green” thing to do in our lives, it now turns out that recycling plays an important role in helping our economy rebound.

The more we work to divert our waste from landfills and towards recycling and re-using, the more people we will employ.  After all, it takes many hands to sort and reform glass, plastics, paper, and other materials.   

During the recent California legislative session, CLCV helped to pass Assembly Bill 341 (Chesbro).  AB 341 will create new green jobs in California by expanding recycling to every multi-family dwelling and business, and mandating that the state recycle at least 75% of the garbage that it generates by 2020.

AB 341 is another great example of California taking the lead on important environmental issues.  More Jobs, Less Pollution describes the impressive economic and environmental benefits that would result if the federal government were to follow California’s lead:

Achieving a 75 percent diversion rate for municipal solid waste (MSW) and construction and demolition debris (C&D) by 2030 will result in:

•  A total of 2.3 million jobs: About 2.7 times as many jobs as exist in 2008.
• Lower greenhouse gas emissions: The reduction of almost 515 million metric tons of carbon dioxide equivalent (eMTCO2) from diversion activities, an additional 276 million eMTCO2 than the Base Case, equivalent to shutting down about 72 coal power plants or taking 50 million cars off the road.
• Less pollution overall: Significant reductions in a range of conventional and toxic emissions that impact human and ecosystem health.
• Unquantified benefits of reducing ecological pressures associated with use of non-renewable resources, conserving energy throughout the materials economy, and generating economic resiliency through stable, local employment.

Sadly, many recycling programs around the nation don't even come close to being as rigorous as the one that California is setting up via AB 341.  The good news is that with our state taking the lead on yet another environmental issue, we provide a successful blueprint for the rest of the country.  California is known as a trend setter for a reason, and this time it can be with how we handle our waste.

Want to get involved? TAKE ACTION: Check out BlueGreen Alliance's action alert asking President Obama to support a more aggressive recycling agenda modeled after California's.

Cross-posted from the CA League of Conservation Voters (CLCV) blog, Groundswell.

When I think of the basics for survival, a short list comes to mind – food, shelter, warmth, and water.  You could probably survive a couple of weeks without those first three things, but if you’re without drinkable water, you’d be lucky if you lasted half a week.

Here we live in a state that has a larger economy than most countries, yet the most basic need of so many Californians is not being met – access to safe, clean drinking water. 

In fact, according to the Department of Public Health, more than 11.5 million Californians rely on water from suppliers that experienced at least one violation of State Drinking Water Standards. As many as 8.5 million Californians rely on supplies that experienced more than five instances of unsafe levels in a single year. In the Central Valley and Central Coast regions, more than 90% of communities depend on groundwater for drinking while nitrate levels in groundwater are sometimes well above safe limits. Families unable to afford treatment or bottled water are left entirely without safe water, and are at particular risk of adverse health impacts from contaminated water supplies.

California needs to do better; thankfully Governor Brown agrees.

This past weekend Brown signed into law a package of bills known as the Human Right to Water Package.  In his statement about the bills, Brown said,

“Clean drinking water is a basic human right. The bills I have signed today will help ensure that every Californian has access to clean and safe sources of water.”

Thanks to the many people around the state who called or emailed their legislators and the governor in support of the bill package!

The Human Right to Water package looks at a number of ways that the state can help ensure communities are able to provide safe drinking water.  Here are 4 of the bills that CLCV worked on:

• SB 244 (Wolk) – Requires local municipalities to include a plan to provide services to island or fringe communities when they update their general plans.
• AB 938 (V.M. Perez) – Requires that public health notifications about water be made available in the languages the community speaks.
• AB 983 (Perea) – Promotes small community water system consolidation to provide sustainable, affordable solutions where possible.
• AB 1221 (Alejo) – Ensures access to funding to clean up contamination for disadvantaged communities.

To learn more about the human right to water package, visit our website: www.ecovote.org/water.

Cross-posted from the CA League of Conservation Voters blog, Groundswell.

I work for an advocacy group, and one of our jobs is to make sure that Californians have a voice in Sacramento. This applies to our work to pass legislation addressing issues that range from protecting our air quality to improving access to safe water to safeguarding the public from exposure to toxic chemicals.  There are numerous commonsense bills that are introduced every year in the legislature that deal with those issues and more that end up with a barrage of opposition claiming that the bills will do more damage than good.