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2006 California Environmental Scorecard

Year In Review

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Of course, a governor has many tools beyond the pen used to sign and veto bills, including appointments, executive orders, the annual budget proposed to the Legislature, and the vigor with which his administration carries out existing laws. Governor Schwarzenegger has used these tools to good effect on a number of occasions by:

• Laying the foundation for AB 32 by issuing a 2005 Executive Order establishing numerical targets for California’s reduction of greenhouse gas emissions and creating the Climate Action Team to identify reduction measures.
• Aggressively supporting California’s legal defense of AB 1493, which requires greenhouse gas emission reductions from vehicles, against the auto industry’s court challenge.
• Approving controversial and important marine reserves in the Channel Islands, regardless of opposition by commercial and sport fishing interests, and funding the state’s marine reserve program.
• Upholding the “roadless rule” to prevent new logging roads from being built in national forests, despite pressure from the Bush administration.
• Publicly opposing, in a letter to Senator Feinstein, federal legislation designed to both overturn Proposition 65, the law that protects California citizens and the State’s drinking water sources from chemicals known to cause cancer, and pre-empt California from adopting stronger food health and safety standards.

Governor Schwarzenegger deserves credit for his willingness to use the tools at his disposal, but we cannot ignore the times when he chose against taking action. For example, in 2006, he:

• Proposed a transportation bond measure largely devoid of “smart growth” principles that could address the root causes of traffic congestion, long commutes, and vehicle air pollution. Fortunately, the Legislature succeeded in forcing some “smart growth” measures into the final measure.
• Allowed Republican legislators to reject the inclusion of funds for parks and natural resource protection in the bond package, ignoring the central importance of parks and protected lands as part of the natural infrastructure upon which a healthy economy thrives.
• Contradicted his stated support for enforcement of environmental laws by vetoing SB 1489. Combined with his support in 2004 of Proposition 64, which blocks public access to the courts to enforce environmental laws, this action leaves his record on enforcement decidedly mixed.
• Undercut his support for alternative fuels by opposing Proposition 87, which would raise an estimated $4 billion over the next 10 years for alternative fuel development from a fee assessment on oil produced in California—the same kind of assessment every other oil-producing state already has.

Next page: "Improved Environmental Lobbying"
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