BOARD LEGISLATIVE COMMITTEE Friday, March 15, 2019 12:30 p.m. EBRPD – Administrative Headquarters 2950 Peralta Oaks Court Oakland, California 94605
The following agenda items are listed for Committee consideration. In accordance with the Board Operating Guidelines, no official action of the Board will be taken at this meeting; rather, the Committee’s purpose shall be to review the listed items and to consider developing recommendations to the Board of Directors.
A copy of the background materials concerning these agenda items, including any material that may have been submitted less than 72 hours before the meeting, is available for inspection on the District’s website (www. ebparks.org), the Headquarters reception desk, and at the meeting.
Public Comment on Agenda Items If you wish to testify on an item on the agenda, please complete a speaker’s form and submit it to the recording secretary. Your name will be called when the item is announced for discussion.
Accommodations and Access District facilities and meetings comply with the Americans with Disabilities Act. If special accommodations are needed for you to participate, please contact the Clerk of the Board at 510-544-2020 as soon as possible, but preferably at least three working days prior to the meeting.
AGENDA
TIME ITEM STATUS STAFF
12:30 I. STATE LEGISLATION / OTHER MATTERS R Doyle/Pfuehler A. NEW LEGISLATION 1. AB 209 (Limon D – Santa Barbara) Outdoor Equity Grants Program 2. AB 352 (Garcia D – Coachella) Transformative Climate Communities Program 3. AB 556 (Carrillo D – Los Angeles) Community Access Grant Program 4. AB 835 (Quirk D – Hayward) Safe Recreational Water Use 5. AB 968 (Garcia D – Los Angeles) Naturalist Pathway Pilot Program 6. AB 1475 (Bauer-Kahan D – Orinda) Iron Horse Trail Bollinger Canyon Overcrossing 7. AB 1111 (Friedman D – Glendale) Office of Sustainable Outdoor Recreation 8. AB 1191 (Bonta D – Alameda) Howard Terminal Oakland Sports Stadium 9. AB 1718 (Levine D – Greenbrae) Smoking Ban at State Parks and Coastal Beaches 10. SB 45 (Allen D-Redondo Beach) Wildfire, Drought, and Flood Protection Bond Act of 2020 11. SB 127 (Wiener D – San Francisco) Active Transportation Funding
12. SB 367 (Hueso D – San Diego) State Coastal Conservancy Educational Grant Program 13. SB 719 (Hueso D – San Diego) Veterans Fee Exception for State Park Facilities 14. SB 767 (Glazer D- Orinda) Tesla Expansion 15. Other Matters
B. OTHER STATE MATTERS I Doyle/Pfuehler 1. ACA 1 2. Other Matters
II. FEDERAL LEGISLATION / OTHER MATTERS R Doyle/Pfuehler A. NEW LEGISLATION 1. S. 500 and H.R. 1225 (Portman R – OH and Bishop R-UT) Restore our Parks Act 2. H.R. 1132 (Speier D – CA) San Francisco Bay Restoration Act 3. H.R. 1334 (Barragan D-CA) Outdoor Recreation Legacy Partnership Grant Program Act 4. H.R. 1276 (Lowenthal D-CA) America’s Public Land Act of 2019 5. H.R. 1184 (DeGette D-CO) Every Kid Outdoors Act 6. S. 316 (Feinstein D-CA) and H.R. 357 (Garamendi D-CA) Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta National Heritage Area Establishment Act 7. Other Matters
B. OTHER FEDERAL MATTERS I Doyle/Pfuehler 1. Update on S. 47 John D. Dingell, Jr. Conservation, Management, and Recreation Act 2. Other Matters
III. PAVED TRAIL MAINTENANCE FUNDING I Doyle/Pfuehler
IV. ARTICLES
V. OPEN FORUM PUBLIC COMMENT Individuals wishing to address the Committee on a topic not on the agenda may do so by completing a speaker’s form and submitting it to the recording secretary.
VI. BOARD COMMENTS
(R) Recommendation for Future Board Consideration Future Meetings: (I) Information January 18 July 19 (D) Discussion February – NO MTG August 16 March 15 September – NO MTG Legislative Committee Members April 19 October 18 Dennis Waespi (Chair); Ellen Corbett, Colin Coffey May 17 November – NO MTG Director Dee Rosario, Alternate June – NO MTG *December 13 Erich Pfuehler, Government Affairs Manager
TO: Board Legislative Committee (Chair Dennis Waespi, Colin Coffey, Ellen Corbett, alt. Dee Rosario)
FROM: Robert E. Doyle, General Manager Erich Pfuehler, Government Affairs Manager
SUBJECT: Board Legislative Committee Meeting WHEN: Friday, March 15, 2019 12:30 PM Lunch will be served
WHERE: Board Room, Peralta Oaks ______
Items to be discussed:
I. STATE LEGISLATION / OTHER MATTERS A. NEW LEGISLATION 1. AB 209 (Limon D – Santa Barbara) Outdoor Equity Grants Program This bill seeks to establish the Outdoor Equity Grant Program within the Department of Parks and Recreation. The intent of this program is to ensure all students have access to environmental education. The proposed grant program would prioritize students within underserved populations. Priority is given to those eligible for free or reduced-price meals, foster youth or pupils of limited English proficiencies. The program would encourage investment in environmental education curriculum which aligns with state standards, such as the Park District’s Kids Healthy Outdoor Challenge. This legislation aims to increase the availability and capacity of outdoor environmental education programs contributing to healthy lifestyles, sound nutritional habits, and improved outdoor educational and recreational experiences. The Park District would be eligible for grants as outlined in this legislation.
Staff recommendation: Support.
2. AB 352 (Garcia D – Coachella) Transformative Climate Communities Program The Global Warming Solutions Act of 2006 (AB 32) mandated the California Air Resources Board (CARB) develop regulations and market mechanisms to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, and eventually created the Cap-and-Trade Program. In 2012, AB 1532 created the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund to manage the funds generated by the Cap-and-Trade program. The Investment Plan of the GGRF evaluates opportunities for reductions and identifies priorities. Assembly Member Eduardo Garcia has proposed a bill to add and amend sections of the Transformative Climate Communities Program under the Investment Plan. This bill gives specified communities preferential points during grant application scoring for programs intended to improve air quality. The bill also seeks to encourage low-income communities to apply for a grant by using inclusionary scoring criteria. Additionally, the bill calls for increased transparency from state agencies administering competitive grants. It calls for application timelines and reports from the Department of Finance. Finally, the bill would require granting agencies to develop categories for applications based on total population and population density, which may allow for increased opportunities for the District.
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Staff recommendation: Support.
3. AB 556 (Carrillo D – Los Angeles) Community Access Grant Program Assembly Member Carrillo’s legislation calls on the Natural Resources Agency to develop a community access program to ensure all individuals and families, especially disadvantaged communities, have meaningful experiences with natural and/or cultural resources. The bill authorizes a grant program for innovative transportation projects to improve access for disadvantaged and low-income youth. “Local agency’s” are eligible for the grant funding. The District could benefit from such a program.
Staff recommendation: Support.
4. AB 835 (Quirk D – Hayward) Safe Recreational Water Use Assembly Member Quirk’s legislation requires the State Department of Public Health, in consultation with the State Water Resources Control Board, to create safety standards for harmful algal blooms. The Assembly Member is keenly aware of the District’s challenges with blue-green algae and continues to work to address them.
Staff recommendation: Support.
5. AB 968 (Garcia D – Los Angeles) Naturalist Pathway Pilot Program Assembly Member Garcia’s bill calls on the Chancellor of the California Community Colleges, in coordination with the Community Nature Connection, to develop and implement a Naturalist Pathway Pilot Program. The pilot program would be piloted at a community college in a disadvantaged community. It would be designed to provide a pathway for students to become naturalists and have careers as parks and open space professionals. Some East Bay community colleges could be eligible for this program, and it is worthy of support.
Staff recommendation: Support.
6. AB 1475 (Bauer-Kahan D – Orinda) Iron Horse Trail Bollinger Canyon Overcrossing Assembly Member Bauer-Kahan’s legislation would enable Contra Costa County (County) and the Contra Costa Transportation Authority (CCTA) to be the “Construction Manager / General Contractor” of the construction of a bridge for the Iron Horse Trail (IHT) over Bollinger Canyon. With this legislative authority, the County and CCTA could employ the design-build project delivery model as long as it is approved at a public meeting. The County feels using the Construction Manager / General Contractor method would reduce delays for a potentially complex project. As managers of the IHT, the District should support the legislation and be involved the project.
Staff recommendation: Support.
7. AB 1111 (Friedman D – Glendale) Office of Sustainable Outdoor Recreation Assembly Member Friedman’s legislation would create the “Office of Sustainable Outdoor Recreation” (Office) in state government. The current iteration of the bill does not specify which division in state government the Office would be placed. The bill also creates the “California Sustainable Outdoor Recreation Account” which would be authorized to accept
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funding from private sources. The Office would engage with outdoor industry stakeholders to increase opportunities and recreation-related employment in California. It would promote outdoor recreation-related tourism. The Office would also foster communications between government agencies and industry. The legislation is similar to efforts by Assembly Member Eduardo Garcia which the District has supported in the past.
Staff recommendation: Support.
8. AB 1191 (Bonta D – Alameda) Howard Terminal Oakland Sports Stadium Assembly Member Bonta’s legislation is supported by the Oakland A’s. It calls upon the State Lands Commission to approve the Oakland Sports and Mixed-Use Project at Howard Terminal if certain conditions are met. It is a spot bill at the moment, but the A’s have told staff they are supportive.
Staff recommendation: Support.
9. AB 1718 (Levine D – Greenbrae) Smoking Ban at State Parks and Coastal Beaches Assembly Member Levine’s legislation would make it an infraction for a person to smoke in a unit of the state park system or on a state coastal beach. It is similar to efforts by Senator Steve Glazer which the District has supported in the past and is consistent with the District’s own smoking ban.
Staff recommendation: Support.
10. SB 45 (Allen D – Santa Monica) Wildfire, Drought and Flood Protection Bond Act of 2020 Senator Allen’s $4 billion bond legislation takes a fairly comprehensive look at the inter- relation between climate change, restoring fire damaged areas, reducing wildfire risk, creating healthy forest and watersheds, reducing climate impacts on urban areas and vulnerable populations, protecting water supply and water quality, reducing flood risk, and protecting coastal lands. Current allocations are: • $200 million for restoring areas impacted by wildfire, flood, drought or other natural disasters resulting from climate change. • $1 billion for reducing wildfire risk. • $600 million for creating health forests and watersheds. • $300 million for reducing climate impacts on urban areas and vulnerable populations. • $600 million for protecting water supply and water quality. • $300 million for protecting rivers, lakes and streams. • $300 million for multi-benefit flood management projects. • $300 million for protecting fish, wildlife and natural resources from climate impacts. • $200 million for improving climate resilience of agricultural lands. • $300 million for protecting coastal lands, waters, natural resources and wildlife. • $150 million for improving regional climate resilience. • $50 million for enhancing workforce development. There is not currently an allocation category for parks or outdoor access. During the session, there will be significant discussions about the possible nature and categories for a climate /
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resource related bond measure. The District should closely track this effort and work with the East Bay delegation to include the relationship between climate change, wildfire, drought, flooding, human health and natural resource management in whatever bond measure is considered. The current version of SB 45 does contain numerous provisions that could be beneficial to the District.
Staff recommendation: Support.
11. 127 (Wiener D – San Francisco) Active Transportation Funding Senator Wiener’s legislation would establish a Division of Active Transportation within the state Department of Transportation. An undersecretary would be assigned to ensure the department’s active transportation goals are being met. One key goal is to increase bicycle and pedestrian safety. Another is to ensure the state’s active transportation program maximizes the use of federal funds. The legislation also requires pretty extensive reporting requirements for the new division.
Staff recommendation: Support.
12. SB 367 (Hueso D – San Diego) State Coastal Conservancy Educational Grant Program Senator Hueso’s legislation would authorize the Coastal Conservancy to award grants for educational programs. The educational programs can be for adults as well as for students in kindergarten to grade 12. “Public agency’s” are eligible to receive the grants. The Conservancy is also authorized to award grants for the construction and improvement of structures and facilities for educational programs. A pavilion at Point Pinole, for example, could be eligible for these funds.
Staff recommendation: Support.
13. SB 719 (Hueso D- San Diego) Veterans Fee Exception for State Park Facilities Assembly Member Hueso’s legislation would exempt honorably discharged veterans from any requirement to pay a reservation fee for state park facilities. A veteran of war, as defined by the Federal Government, would be issued a pass entitling them to use all facilities, including boat launch facilities, in units of the state park system.
Staff recommendation: Support.
14. SB 767 (Glazer D- Orinda) Tesla Expansion Senator Glazer’s bill would authorize the Department of Parks and Recreation (DPR) to dispose of the “Alameda-Tesla Expansion Area” to permanently preserve the land for conservation purposes. The current version of the bill would require the land only be sold to a local agency or nonprofit organization for use as a park or other open-space purpose. It also requires any revenue gained from the disposal of the property to be deposited in the Off-Highway Vehicle Trust Fund. This would allow DPR to potentially sell the land to Alameda County or the District for the purposes of establishing a park.
Staff recommendation: Support.
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15. Other Matters
B. OTHER STATE MATTERS 1. ACA 1 This Assembly Constitutional Amendment would lower the voter threshold to 55% for “the construction, rehabilitation or replacement of public infrastructure or affordable housing.” Under the legislation, “parks, open space and recreation facilities” are considered “public infrastructure.” The proposed Amendment, however, seems to specify only “a city, county, or city and county” can incur bonded indebtedness by a vote of 55%. Thus, special districts would still be required to meet the 2/3rds voter threshold. The California Special Districts Association (CSDA) is actively working to amend ACA 1 to include special districts, parks and recreation facilities and open space. They are optimistic they will be successful, but their proposed amendments are still not in print.
2. Other Matters
II. FEDERAL LEGISLATION / OTHER MATTERS A. NEW LEGISLATION 1. S. 500 and H.R. 1225 (Portman R – OH and Bishop R-UT) Restore our Parks Act Senator Rob Portman and Representative Rob Bishop reintroduced bipartisan legislation to address the $12 billion National Parks Service (NPS) maintenance backlog, which has delayed the upkeep of visitor centers, trails, campgrounds and transportation infrastructure operated by NPS across the country. The Restore Our Parks Act, which overwhelmingly passed the Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources last year, would take existing government revenue and allocate it to the chronically underfunded NPS. The Restore Our Parks Act would be the biggest help to the National Park Service in 50 years – it would cut in half the maintenance backlog at our national parks and help restore 418 national parks. The legislation is supported by a bipartisan group of Senators and Representatives, and more than 100 conservation groups. The bill will establish the “National Park Service Legacy Restoration Fund” to reduce the maintenance backlog by allocating existing revenues the government receives from on and offshore energy development. This funding would come from 50 percent of all revenues that are not otherwise allocated and deposited into the General Treasury not to exceed $1.3 billion each year for the next five years. This does not directly compete for the revenue which is contributed into the Land and Water Conservation Fund.
Staff recommendation: Support
2. H.R. 1132 (Speier D – CA) San Francisco Bay Restoration Act This bill is similar to legislation authored by Senator Dianne Feinstein and Representative Jackie Speier in previous sessions of Congress, which the District supported. The legislation establishes a grant program within the Environmental Protection Agency for restoration projects and specifically states special districts are eligible recipients. The grant program is funded at $25 million a year for FY 2020 through FY 2024. The legislation makes it clear that only projects identified in the “comprehensive plan” are eligible for grant funding.
The District was able to secure language specifically stating that “special districts” are eligible to apply:
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`(c) Grant Program- `(1) IN GENERAL- Pursuant to section 320, the (EPA) Administrator may provide funding through cooperative agreements, grants, or other means to State and local agencies, special districts, and public or nonprofit agencies, institutions, and organizations, including the Estuary Partnership, for activities, studies, or projects identified on the annual priority list.
Grants awarded under this program could not exceed 75% of the total cost, i.e. there is a 25% local match. The bill does not provide any criteria which would prioritize projects in communities near where much of the environmental impact occurs, such as Dotson Family Marsh, but District staff have had a good degree of success in making this case. East Bay Reps. – Khanna, McNerney, Swalwell, DeSaulnier, Thompson and Lee cosponsor, as does Speaker Pelosi and Reps. Huffman and Garamendi.
Staff recommendation: Support, and support a related Senate bill.
3. H.R. 1334 (Barragan D-CA) Outdoor Recreation Legacy Partnership Grant Program Act The Outdoor Recreation Legacy Partnership Grant Program Act would codify a federal grant program that offers matching funds to state and local governments investing in much- needed outdoor outlets. The bill directs the Department of the Interior to establish an outdoor recreation legacy partnership grant program under which Interior may award grants to eligible entities (the states, their political subdivisions, special purpose districts and Indian Tribes) for projects to: (1) acquire land and water for parks and other outdoor recreation purposes, and (2) develop new or renovate existing outdoor recreation facilities. The bill language specifically calls out “a special purpose district, including park districts” as eligible. As a condition for receiving a grant, an eligible entity shall provide matching funds in cash or in kind equal to 100% of the amounts available under the grant. A grant recipient may use the grant to acquire land or water providing outdoor recreation opportunities to the public. A grant may also be used to develop or renovate outdoor recreational facilities, with priority given to projects that: • Create or significantly enhance access to park and recreational opportunities in an urban neighborhood or community; • Engage and empower underserved communities and youth; • Provide opportunities for youth employment or job training; • Establish or expand public-private partnerships; • Take advantage of coordination among various levels of government. Grant funds may not be used for specified costs, facilities and activities, including the acquisition of lands or interests which restrict access to particular persons.
Staff Recommendation: Support
4. H.R. 1276 (Lowenthal D-CA) America’s Public Land Act of 2019 This legislation reaffirms the policy of the United States is both to retain public land in Federal ownership, unless the disposal of public land has been authorized by an Act of Congress, and to retain management authority over public land. It does allow of non-Federal entities to manage Federal land if it is authorized by an Act of Congress or another applicable law and specifies the management must be in the public interest. The bill highlights the role Federal lands play in the economy, preserving habitat and providing hunting opportunities. It specifies
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Federal lands provide outdoor recreation opportunities, ecosystem services and wilderness. It also notes they contain energy, forestry and mineral resources. The legislation has been introduced to push back on the current Administration who has considered reverting control of Federal lands to the states which could then sell them to private developers.
Staff recommendation: Support
5. H.R. 1184 (DeGette D-CO) Every Kid Outdoors Act The Every Kid Outdoors Act is aimed at encouraging kids to get outdoors and experience America’s public spaces, while engaging in healthy activity and educational programs. During the Obama Administration, the Department of the Interior offered fourth graders and their families free entrance to all federally managed public lands. The program contributed to the record-setting visitation to America’s national parks in 2016 as part of the #FindYourPark/Encuentra Tu Parque campaign to commemorate the Centennial of the National Park Service. The Every Kid Outdoors Act codifies this effort into law. It would provide free access to Federal land and waters for students and accompanying individuals. This bill includes all Federal lands and waters, not just National Parks. East Bay Representatives Mike Thompson and Barbara Lee cosponsor. While the program is specific to Federal lands and would not directly impact the District, it is consistent with the goals of the Kids Healthy Outdoors Challenge and other District programming.
Staff Recommendation: Support
6. S. 316 (Feinstein D-CA) and H.R. 357 (Garamendi D-CA) Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta National Heritage Area Establishment Act Senator Dianne Feinstein and Rep. John Garamendi have reintroduced their bills to create a National Heritage Area within the National Park Service for the Delta. The designation is designed to protect and promote the cultural, historical and natural assets of the region. The legislation would authorize modest funding to the California Delta Protection Commission to implement the National Heritage Area, with up to a 50% Federal cost-share for improvement projects. Private property owners and tribes are explicitly protected in the legislation and capable of opting out of any recommendations. State water procurement policy is not within the mission statement of the National Heritage Area. There is also a specific prohibition on the acquisition of real property with any Federal funds provided to the heritage area. The designation has both tangible and intangible benefits. The heritage area concept offers an innovative method for citizens, in partnership with local, state and Federal government, and nonprofit and private sector interests, to shape the long-term future of their communities. It connects local citizens to the preservation and planning process. Heritage conservation efforts are grounded in a community's pride in its history and traditions. It highlights residents' interest and involvement in retaining and interpreting the landscape for future generations. It offers a collaborative approach to conservation that does not compromise traditional local control over the use of the landscape. The partnership approach creates the opportunity for a diverse range of constituents to come together to voice a range of visions and perspectives. Partners collaborate to shape a plan and implement a strategy that focuses on the distinct qualities that make their region special. Designation comes with limited financial and technical assistance from the National Park Service. District staff was instrumental in ensuring the Carquinez Strait was included in the heritage area. Heritage designation could create more recreation and interpretation opportunities for the District particularly at Big Break, as well
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as possible partnerships with other engaged entities. East Bay Reps. DeSaulnier, McNerney and Thompson all cosponsor.
Staff Recommendation: Support.
7. Other Matters
B. OTHER FEDERAL MATTERS I. Update on S. 47 John D. Dingell, Jr. Conservation, Management, and Recreation Act Staff will provide a verbal update about the public lands package which passed the Senate 92-8 and House 363-62.
II. Other Matters
III. PAVED TRAIL MAINTENANCE FUNDING Staff will provide a verbal update about strategies to achieve more funding for paved trail maintenance.
IV. ARTICLES
V. OPEN FORUM PUBLIC COMMENT
VI. BOARD COMMENTS
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Board Legislative Committee Attachment IV March 15, 2019
LOCAL // POLITICS
Both House leaders from California, but they don’t share much else
Tal Kopan | Jan. 24, 2019 Updated: Jan. 24, 2019 4 a.m.
House Speaker-elect Nancy Pelosi of California, who will lead the 116th Congress, holds the gavel as Rep. Kevin McCarthy, R- Calif., leaves the dais at the U.S. Capitol in Washington, Thursday, Jan. 3, 2019. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster)Photo: Carolyn Kaster / Associated Press
WASHINGTON — Reps. Nancy Pelosi and Kevin McCarthy are the leaders of their parties in the House and are both from California.
That’s about all they have in common.
With Pelosi reclaiming the speakership in the new House Democratic majority and McCarthy taking over as minority leader, this Congress is the first in history in which representatives from the same state have held their respective parties’ top posts.
But that state connection has meant virtually nothing thus far in the new Congress, as Washington remains paralyzed by a record-breaking government shutdown with no signs of a thaw between President Trump-led Republicans and Pelosi-led Democrats. In fact, the San Francisco Democrat and Bakersfield Republican have had little direct interaction until this year, and are forging their dynamic as any fresh speaker-and-minority-leader combination would, conversations with lawmakers and aides close to both Californians reveal.
“I think the relationship is embryonic,” said Rep. Jackie Speier, D-San Mateo. “It hasn’t really evolved.”
Pelosi and McCarthy have met twice since the new House was sworn in, ostensibly to negotiate procedural matters. According to their aides, the relationship is “cordial” and respectful, and the meetings went smoothly. They have also been in larger meetings with Trump at the White House as the shutdown has dragged on, the two party leaders falling on starkly opposite sides of the border wall fight.
Their lack of a substantial connection is a product both of their career paths and the nature of the California delegation itself, the largest in the House.
Pelosi has been in her party’s top spot for 16 years and was able to build relationships with McCarthy’s predecessors atop the GOP House leadership. During that time, McCarthy worked his way up from a rank- and-file Republican to his party’s No. 2 post — a job in which he developed ties to Pelosi’s second-in- command, Maryland Rep. Steny Hoyer, but not Pelosi herself.
Hoyer said he and McCarthy have tried to “work together in a positive way” and that Pelosi and her new counterpart eventually will as well.
“I think both of them are professionals. I think both of them want the institution to succeed,” Hoyer said.
Pelosi and McCarthy arrived in Congress 20 years apart. Pelosi, 78, was first elected in 1987, and worked her way up through the ranks before becoming the Democratic leader in 2003. McCarthy, 53, was a congressional staffer when Pelosi came to Washington, and started his time in elective office in the California Assembly in 2002. He was Republican leader in his first term, then won election to the House in 2006.
During Pelosi’s tenure atop her caucus, California’s 53-member House delegation has skewed more and more Democratic. With Democrats having flipped seven GOP-held seats in November, only seven California Republicans remain in the chamber.
The full group does not hold regular bipartisan meetings or mixers, as some states’ delegations do. Rep. Zoe Lofgren, D-San Jose, who chairs the state’s Democratic delegation, sends a letter inviting Republicans to join their weekly meetings each year, but she says she rarely receives even a response — and has never gotten an acceptance.
One Republican, Rep. Doug LaMalfa of Richvale (Butte County), came to a meeting this month about a threat from Trump to cut off or divert disaster funding for California. The Democrats said they appreciated his attendance.
There are individually forged ties across the aisle. In fact, McCarthy is friends with Rep. Karen Bass, D-Los Angeles, who was in the state Legislature when he was. They and Speier organized a few bipartisan social events in past years, but those weren’t repeated in the last Congress. “Truthfully, after Trump came in, it was kind of tough,” Bass said. “It’s two things: I think it’s the state, because we’re so darn big, but I also think it’s this particular moment in history.”
Massachusetts Rep. Joe Kennedy III has connections to both Pelosi and McCarthy. The Kennedy scion is a rising star among Democrats and was one of the handful of lawmakers Pelosi picked to nominate her for speaker among Democrats in November. He and McCarthy are part of a small group of Republican and Democratic lawmakers who work out together daily.
Kennedy described the leaders’ relationship as one of mutual respect, but one that hasn’t had time to grow.
“Your time in the minority as a minority leader, that time is much more focused on trying to unify your caucus and bring back the majority,” Kennedy said. “That’s probably where, over the course of the past several years, the leader (Pelosi) has put her focus.”
Kennedy added, “This job, particularly in the legislative branch, it’s still an awful lot about relationships, and I think Mr. McCarthy has pretty strong ones, obviously in the Republican caucus. But he’s a friendly guy and he’s one that has a number of good relationships with Democratic members, Democratic staff, too.”
It’s unclear how much having a prior connection would matter in the jobs the two hold. Pelosi is the highest-ranking Democrat in government and is navigating her party through its resistance to the Trump presidency. Retaking the House has given Democrats their first foothold in Washington since Trump took office, and Pelosi has taken the lead in the prolonged standoff over Trump’s demand for funding for his border wall.
McCarthy, meanwhile, has become a close ally of the president’s, a relationship he cultivated shortly after Trump was elected. He has worked hard to minimize daylight between himself and Trump, even responding tepidly when the president threatened to cut off disaster aid to California’s wildfire relief efforts.
Speier described Pelosi’s relationship with former House Speaker Paul Ryan as “straight up” and “honest,” with the Wisconsin Republican accommodating the Democratic minority on occasional noncontroversial issues. She worked with the two of them on congressional sexual harassment reform efforts, which sailed through Congress after negotiations that found Pelosi and Ryan on the same side.
The California delegation agrees on little across party lines. Asked where McCarthy and Pelosi could potentially work together, most lawmakers suggested disaster relief and possibly transportation funding.
Bass said the communication at the member level is “helpful,” even if it doesn’t result in some “grand policy effort.”
“Maybe there’s not a whole lot of fruit hanging that low,” said LaMalfa.
LaMalfa works across the aisle on water issues in particular. During a Capitol hallway interview, Rep. Grace Napolitano, D-Norwalk (Los Angeles County), stopped to join in the conversation, and the pair agreed that state-level connections are more useful among rank-and-file members than at the top. “That doesn’t mean they don’t talk,” LaMalfa said of McCarthy and Pelosi. “It’s just hard at their level. They’re both spearheading the Democrat-Republican national campaigns.”
LaMalfa said there is “a potential for a little more than what the Ryan-Pelosi (relationship was). They’ll find some way to stand kind of united on not having money taken away from disasters. They’re going to word it different, they’re going to act different on it, but I think there’s going to be common ground.”
Tal Kopan is The San Francisco Chronicle’s Washington correspondent. Email: [email protected] Twitter: @talkopan
Board Legislative Committee Attachment IV March 15, 2019
LOCAL // POLITICS The gun-loving Bay Area Democrat behind Congress’ bill to prevent gun violence
Tal Kopan Feb. 27, 2019 Updated: Feb. 27, 2019 4 a.m.
Former Rep. Gabby Giffords, a gun-violence victim, joins St. Helena Rep. Mike Thompson, author of HR8, on Capitol Hill. Photo: Joshua Roberts / Getty Images
WASHINGTON — The first time Rep. Mike Thompson fired a gun, his dad had to hold it up for him because he was too small to shoot it himself.
The North Bay Democrat passed the hunting license test three years in a row before he was old enough to legally have the permit.
He served with the Army in Vietnam, where he carried an M16. Now, he’s the reason the House may pass gun violence prevention legislation for the first time in more than two decades.
His work on the issue will be vindicated in part Wednesday, when the House is set to pass gun background-check legislation that Thompson has worked on for more than six years.
His bill would expand the requirement for background checks of gun purchasers to those buying firearms in private sales. Those would include gun shows and online sales.
It will be voted on with a bill from Rep. Jim Clyburn, D-S.C., to close the “Charleston loophole” — extending the deadline to complete the background check from three days to 10. Its name is a reference to the 2015 church shootings in Charleston, S.C., in which nine worshipers were killed. The shooter would have failed a background check, but got his gun because the check was not completed in time.
Passage would be a triumph of sorts for Thompson, who made preventing gun violence his consuming focus after the 2012 massacre at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Connecticut. But even with House approval almost assured under the Democratic majority, the long odds in the Republican-run Senate are also evidence that Thompson may have much more work to do.
Rep. Mike Thompson speaks to attendees at a recent community meeting for North Bay wildfire victimsin Santa Rosa. Thompson leads the House Democrats’ renewed charge for gun-control measures. Photo: Liz Hafalia / The Chronicle Thompson, 68, has spent nearly his whole life in the North Bay, having left only for college, military service and political office. He’s an enthusiastic hunter and a frequent presence at local outdoorsman fundraising events.
He vividly remembers his first time handling a gun, when he was 7 or so. He had long been interested in his father’s gun rack, and one day his dad responded to his questions by leading him out the back door.
“Where are you going?” his mother asked.
“I’m going to break him of his infatuation over firearms,” his father replied.
The two drove in his father’s pickup truck to the outskirts of town. His father loaded the rifle with a shell, pointed it toward a fence and told Thompson to shoot the post. “He had to hold the gun up, and I shot the fence post, and I said, ‘Oh let’s do it again! Let’s do it again!’ And he said, ‘Back in the truck,’” Thompson recounted.
When they returned home, his mother asked what had happened.
“It didn’t work,” his father said.
Thompson passed the time until he was old enough to legally obtain a hunting license by taking the gun safety courses for children that lead up to the exam, even though he couldn’t get the license yet. His father, grandfather and uncles all hunted, and he joined them as soon as he could. He also learned how to pluck, clean and cook the results of the hunt.
“Always cook the game,” Thompson said. “If you shot it, or if you caught it, you ate it.”
Thompson is still a skilled hunter. Sen. Joe Manchin, a West Virginia Democrat who like Thompson is a lifelong outdoorsman, has seen him shoot at House vs. Senate skills competitions, and calls Thompson “very serious.”
Fritz Reid, Thompson’s hunting partner for 30 years, said the congressman “is a very good hunter. He’s a good caller, he’s a good shot.”
And the resulting dinners are legendary. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said anyone who snags a Thompson dinner invite knows “the food will be home-cooked and the wine will be Californian.”
It’s not just hunting that has brought Thompson behind a gun, and he’s also been on the other end of them. During the Vietnam War, Thompson deployed as an Army staff sergeant and platoon leader with the 173rd Airborne Brigade, earning a Purple Heart in 1970 when he was wounded by a booby trap explosive.
His first hunt after coming home was at a family friends’ ranch near his hometown. The group was sitting outside the ranch, chatting over lunch, as he flipped through a National Rifle Association magazine.
He recalls his friends talking even then, more than four decades ago, about “anti-gun people ... going to take our guns.” He turned to a spread in the magazine advertising a gun outfitted to look like an M14, a semiautomatic military weapon.
“Here I am just back from Vietnam, and I said, ‘You know guys, I wouldn’t worry about them taking our guns. We’re our own worst enemy: Look at this stuff,’” Thompson said. “‘How can we wheel this stuff out in a civilized society and not expect people who aren’t gun people to not freak out?’”
Rep. Mike Thompson (left) and fellow North Bay Rep. Jared Huffman confer before a recent community meeting in Santa Rosa. Photo: Liz Hafalia / The Chronicle Thompson was elected to the state Senate in 1990 and to Congress eight years later. He has spent much of his two decades in Washington working on issues including veterans’ support, taxes and conservation.
But his focus changed on Dec. 14, 2012, when Thompson came out of a duck blind to find his BlackBerry full of messages. The “traumatic” news of a gunman killing 20 children and six adults at an elementary school in Connecticut shook Thompson to his core, and set him on a path that would become a daily calling.
Thompson spoke by phone with then-Minority Leader Pelosi. The San Francisco Democrat said she had heard from some members who thought it would be “political suicide” to push for gun regulation after the tragedy. Thompson said there should be a task force to determine how Democrats should respond.
Pelosi says she agreed with Thompson — as long as he agreed he would chair it. His leadership was announced at the first caucus meeting when lawmakers returned to Washington.
“As a veteran, a hunter and a gun owner, a builder of consensus, he was perfect to take the lead,” Pelosi said. “And everybody agreed — it was, ‘Of course.’”
But progress was slow. Thompson recalls a Democratic colleague who responded early on to a hallway hello with, “ ‘You’re trying to take everybody’s guns away — that’s killing me at home.’”
Thompson assembled a geographically and ideologically diverse task force membership and convened town halls. Those listening sessions evolved into Thompson’s background check legislation, which he said was the clear choice to “save the most lives the quickest.”
But the bill did not take off, with Republicans running the House and the Democratic-controlled Senate failing to pass its own version in 2013. Democrats who joined many Republicans in voting against it argued that the bill infringed on Americans’ right to own weapons and suggested focusing instead on mental health. “I thought it was going to be much easier,” Thompson said. “I didn’t think it was going to be 6½ years until we got a hearing and a vote.”
Manchin tried to warn him, Thompson said.
“He said, ‘This is going to be tough,’” Thompson said, recalling a meeting years ago in Manchin’s office. “I said, ‘Joe, background checks, I’m a gun owner — every gun owner I know is OK with this. I think we can do it.’ And he just smiled and said, ‘This is going to be tough.’”
Manchin remembers it well, saying he was trying to drive home to Thompson the influence of the National Rifle Association and advocates who fear any gun regulation will lead to more.
“It’s not as slam dunk as it should be,” Manchin said, blaming the gun lobby for opposing the bills.
“Ultimately, the anti-gun agenda could not be clearer,” the NRA wrote in a piece opposing Thompson’s bill. “Rather than focus on enforcing existing laws or adding all necessary records to the existing background check system, anti-gun organizations want to restrict the rights of law-abiding gun owners.”
But Thompson and Manchin have kept at it. Thompson has continued to introduce the bill with Republican Rep. Peter King of New York. Thompson knows gun enthusiasts will pounce on any misstatement or incorrect word, which becomes a “debate stopper,” and he has organized “guns 101” classes to teach lawmakers about different kinds of firearms and how to talk about them with proper vocabulary.
Colleagues describe the father of two and grandfather of three as patient and kind, always willing to hear someone out or guide them on the issue.
“With the white hair, he sits back, he looks like somebody in the House of Lords,” King joked, praising Thompson’s partnership on the issue. “And he listens. No matter how dopey the question is, he never tells them it’s a dopey question.”
Democrats would not be in a position to pass the legislation this week without him, his colleagues and fellow advocates say. They use words like “indefatigable,” “steady” and “ceaseless” to describe him. At a hearing this month that kicked off the bill’s advancement, Democrat after Democrat called out his work by name.
“Mike’s tireless efforts to talk to his colleagues about solutions and win over opponents, coupled with his unwavering devotion to making our country a safer place to live, played a significant role in getting us to this moment,” former Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, D-Ariz., who founded a gun violence prevention group after she was shot in the head in an assassination attempt, said in an email through her spokesman. “Mike is the kind of leader that comes to the table with ideas during the most challenging times.”
Pelosi said the Democrats’ freshman class of 40 lawmakers has helped bring attention to the issue, including Georgia Rep. Lucy McBath, whose son was shot and killed in an argument over music he was playing at a gas station. But she credits Thompson with laying the groundwork. “We were ready because of Mike Thompson,” Pelosi said. “This issue is one that God just blessed us to have this person at this time in this Congress to shape the way we go forward.”
The new members agree.
“Thompson was a rock,” said Pennsylvania Democratic Rep. Madeleine Dean, a longtime gun violence prevention advocate in the state legislature. “He didn’t fatigue, year after year after year. ... He didn’t fatigue on an issue that matters.”
Even with likely passage in the House, the bill faces a rough road. Sen. Pat Toomey, R-Pa., who has carried the legislation with Manchin in the Senate, told The Chronicle that although “hope springs eternal,” he doesn’t see “a path to 60 votes” required to advance it in the chamber.
Thompson hopes that passing the bill out of the House with a strong, bipartisan vote will increase pressure on the Senate. But if not this time, he added, “I won’t quit working on background checks. This is the one we have to do — this is the one we’ve got to get over the finish line.”
It may be his hunting prowess that helps him see his mission through.
“One thing you find with hunters is tremendous optimism,” Reid said of his friend and hunting partner. “Every hunt you go out, even when you have a dead wind, you’re convinced it’s going to be the hunt of a lifetime.”
Tal Kopan is The San Francisco Chronicle’s Washington correspondent. Email: [email protected] Twitter: @talkopan
Tal Kopan
Board Legislative Committee Attachment IV March 15, 2019
CALIFORNIA WILDFIRES California Democrats demand step-up in fire prevention work after shutdown delays
Kurtis Alexander Feb. 1, 2019 Updated: Feb. 1, 2019 4:42 p.m.
FILE - In this Nov. 17, 2018 file photo, President Donald Trump talks with Gov.-elect Gavin Newsom, left, as California Gov. Jerry Brown listens during a visit to a neighborhood impacted by the Camp wildfire in Paradise, Calif. President Donald Trump is threatening to withhold Federal Emergency Management Agency money to help California cope with wildfires if the state doesn't improve its forest management practices. Trump tweeted Wednesday, Jan. 9, 2019, that California gets billions of dollars for fires that could have been prevented with better management. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci, File) Photo: Evan Vucci, Associated Press
California’s congressional delegation is pressing the Trump administration to make up for fire prevention work that hasn’t gotten done since December because of the government shutdown.
Forty-two of the state’s 53 House members, all Democrats, sent a letter Friday to Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue, asking him to account for the lost work of firefighters that would have helped make California more resilient to the types of explosive wildfires the state has seen in recent years. “The loss of over a month of prevention and mitigation efforts could have disastrous effects, and therefore we urge you to take immediate action to make up for lost ground,” the lawmakers wrote.
During the 35-day partial government shutdown, U.S. land management agencies like the Forest Service halted fuel reduction programs such as forest thinning and controlled burns, and stopped much of the fire planning, hiring and training that usually takes place in winter. The Chronicle reported on the suspended activities and the potential problems last month.
Fire prevention work stalled from Sierra National Forest to Yosemite National Park to Butte County, the site of the deadly Camp Fire in November. Some federal employees, who were not authorized to speak with the media, also said fire crews at national parks and forests would not be fully staffed for the upcoming fire season because of recruiting delays.
Neither the Department of Agriculture, which oversees the Forest Service, nor the Forest Service immediately responded to a request for comment on Friday’s letter.
But last month Forest Service spokesman John Haynes told The Chronicle that the agency was making “difficult choices” to stop work at national forests while trying to continue critical activities. The department, which is the largest manager of federal land in California, did not specify how many of its employees were prevented from working during the government shutdown, nor exactly what work went undone.
The Department of Agriculture and the Department of the Interior, which oversees the National Park Service, were among the federal agencies that weren’t fully funded from late December through most of January because of a budget impasse between President Trump and Congress. The president demanded that money for a wall along the southern border be included in the federal budget, but many in Congress, mostly Democrats, refused to go along.
Trump agreed to reopen the government on Jan. 25 but has signaled that he will allow another partial closure if the wall isn’t financed.
Friday’s letter requests a full breakdown of fire activities that weren’t completed because of the lapse in funding, including the amount of land that didn’t get cleared of hazardous vegetation and staffing shortfalls that might occur this summer. While the authors called for making up lost ground, they did not detail specific action.
Rep. Mike Thompson, D-St. Helena, who represents much of the area devastated by the 2017 firestorm in Northern California, said he wants the Trump administration to “do everything possible to get (lost) efforts up and running right away.”
“Our state has been hit hard by fires over the last few years and the federal government should be doing everything possible to help residents recover and mitigate future fire risk,” he said.
Just hours before the shutdown, Trump committed to his own brand of fire prevention, issuing an executive order that called for an uptick in logging on federal land. During the funding lapse, however, no new timber projects got off the ground.
Kurtis Alexander is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: [email protected] Twitter: @kurtisalexander
Board Legislative Committee Attachment IV March 15, 2019
LOCAL // POLITICS ‘Your brand is toxic’: Bay Area’s last GOP lawmaker couldn’t overcome Trump
Joe Garofoli Feb. 3, 2019 Updated: Feb. 3, 2019 4 a.m.
Former East Bay Assemblywoman Catharine Baker, a Republican, lost her bid for re-election. “Ninety percent of the feedback we received was, ‘I can’t vote for you because you’re Republican,’” she says. Photo: Santiago Mejia / The Chronicle
Catharine Baker was the only Republican representing the Bay Area in either the Legislature or Congress, until she lost her re-election bid to the Assembly in November. Now there is none.
The two-term incumbent practically ran as a Democrat, and still lost to a political neophyte. That raised the question: If Baker can’t win in the Bay Area, what Republican can? The answer Baker found after spending weeks combing through post-election data and campaign trail anecdotes should be a red flag for Republicans in the Bay Area and beyond in California, heading into President Trump’s 2020 re-election campaign.
“Ninety percent of the feedback we received was, ‘I can’t vote for you because you’re Republican,’” Baker said. “That message to Republicans is, ‘Your brand is toxic in this state.’ That’s why the party has a very faint pulse right now.”
Being a Republican wasn’t a problem for Baker before Trump’s presidency. The Dublin resident won two elections in a district that stretches through the suburbs of central Contra Costa and eastern Alameda counties, where Democrats outnumber Republicans, by advocating policies that appeal across party lines.
Baker is pro-choice. She supports same-sex marriage rights and a pathway to citizenship for undocumented immigrants. She voted for the state’s leading-edge climate change law. She supported gun control measures in the Legislature.
Baker reached out to Democrats and independents — she held 16 town hall meetings with Democratic state Sen. Steve Glazer of Orinda, whose district overlapped hers. She said internal polling showed that 60 percent of voters surveyed in her 16th District approved of her job performance.
Yet Baker lost in November by two percentage points to Rebecca Bauer-Kahan, a Democratic attorney from Orinda who had never run for public office before.
Baker drowned in a wave election with a concrete “R” chained to her ankle.
She wasn’t alone. The GOP lost half the 14 House seats it controlled in California. As usual, no Republicans were elected to statewide office — the last time a GOP candidate won one of those races was in 2006. There are so few Republicans in the Legislature that Democrats tried to invent a word (“giga-majority”) to describe what now amounts to more than a two-thirds supermajority.
Former Republican Assemblywoman Catharine Baker, who lost her re-election bid last year to a Democrat, says anecdotal evidence and data show that the GOP “brand is toxic” in California. Photo: Paul Chinn / The Chronicle 2018 Last month, the GOP lost another one. San Diego Assemblyman Brian Maienschein left the Republican Party to join the Democrats because he couldn’t stomach Trump any longer.
California legislator flips from Republican to Democrat... “I can either keep fighting to change the Republican Party, or I can fight for my constituents,” Maienschein said. “There wasn’t a way that I could continue and feel good about myself and the choices I was making.”
Baker was as anti-Trump as any Republican in the state. She said she wrote in former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice’s name on her 2016 presidential ballot and supported motions to censure Trump while in the Assembly.
She said she’s lost Republican friends and donors by publicly opposing Trump. Some told Baker that they supported her despite her liberal positions on abortion, same-sex marriage and the environment, and couldn’t understand why she wouldn’t stand by the president despite their differences.
“I just felt he was too far out of the bounds,” Baker said in an interview for The Chronicle’s “It’s All Political” podcast. She was still happy to accept Republican help while disapproving of the party’s standard-bearer: “I suppose there’s a hypocrisy there, but one that I’m OK with.”
“Like every self-respecting Republican” who has opposed Trump, Baker said, she is constantly asked why she doesn’t leave the party.
“For me, it is not the right path,” Baker said. “I feel it is so important to not give up on the principles that made me a Republican.”
Baker, 47, grew up during Ronald Reagan’s presidency. She says he stood for things that appealed to her: individual freedom, small government, the power of the free market. She paraphrased Ohio Gov. John Kasich, a prominent GOP Trump critic, in explaining her decision to stay in the party. “If someone comes in and robs your house,” Baker said, “you don’t help them pack or just sit there and watch. You fight.”
The challenge for Baker and others who share her frustrations is what to do next. How to get her party to win again. How to change.
For starters, she is concerned about who will be the next California Republican Party chair. In particular, she’s concerned about former Orange County Assemblyman Travis Allen.
The party chair, who will be elected at the state Republican convention this month, is not only the public face of California Republicans, but must raise money to help elect GOP candidates across the state.
Allen has the most name recognition among the three top candidates for chair after his failed run for governor last year. He finished a distant fourth in the June primary, with 10 percent of the vote. But he has a robust social media presence and has tapped into a vein of pro-Trump supporters in the state — even though Trump endorsed another Republican in the governor’s race, San Diego County businessman John Cox.
Allen has said he wants to rebuild the Republican Party by stressing “Republican values” instead of the “backward thinking” of trying to act more like Democrats. It’s hard to get to the right of him on most issues.
During his campaign for governor, Allen said “the verdict is still out on climate change” as “it will take quite some time for the science to be settled on this.” He promised that he would “cut taxes, get tough on crime, fix our roads and expand our freeways with no new taxes, fix our broken education system, and complete the California state water project.” He offered few policy details beyond his promises to “fix” and “get tough,” even on his campaign website.
He focuses much of his ire on “Bay Area elites” like Gov. Gavin Newsom and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi for ruining the state with liberal ideas.
Baker said the GOP needs to articulate a more positive vision of California’s future. But most troubling of all for Baker is Allen’s argument that Republicans must “support our Republican president.”
Supporting Trump would be “a path to death for the Republican Party” in California, Baker said. Allen defended his support of Trump, telling The Chronicle in an email that “Republicans in California didn’t lose because our country has the best economy in decades or record low unemployment. We didn’t lose because we’ve fixed international trade deals or strengthened our military. Republicans in California lost because the California Democrats out planned, out spent, and out executed the establishment Republican Party.”
Baker thinks it was more than a case of the GOP being outhustled. In California, at least, the party has to embrace comprehensive immigration reform instead of lining up only behind Trump’s plan for a wall on the Mexican border, she said. Most Republicans say they don’t want to address the question of the nation’s 11 million undocumented residents until its borders are secure. But Baker says Republicans must do both and must give undocumented immigrants a way to become citizens.
“If our party can’t come to terms with that — and I mean immediately — we are done in California,” she said.
The other area where Republicans are seriously out of touch with the state is the environment, Baker said. She was one of seven Assembly Republicans in 2017 to support then-Gov. Jerry Brown’s extension of the state’s cap-and-trade program to combat climate change. It’s a market-based approach to curbing greenhouse gas emissions, under which companies must buy permits for every metric ton of gas they emit. Baker said Republicans should recognize that it’s better than heavy-handed government regulation.
But Republicans excoriated Baker and the other GOP lawmakers who backed Brown’s measure, calling them traitors. Chad Mayes, who led the party in the Assembly, was forced to resign his leadership post over it.
“I thought it was one of the most conservative votes I cast in my four years in the Legislature,” Baker said. “We offered a solution that’s consistent with our principles, and the pitchforks came out. You would have thought that Republicans were anti-environment.”
It’s hard to see a political future for someone like Baker. Her state party is largely to the right of her and seems to think its biggest problem is that it’s not conservative enough. There were once enough Democrats open to the idea of electing a moderate Republican, but Baker’s experience shows that may no longer be true.
Baker, however, isn’t discouraged. She’s working as a lawyer now, still in her old district, and pondering her next political step.
“My time in public service,” she said, “is not over.”
Joe Garofoli is The San Francisco Chronicle’s senior political writer. Email: [email protected] Twitter: @joegarofoli
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Board Legislative Committee Attachment IV March 15, 2019
What we know 50 years after Santa Barbara disaster, time to end oil drilling
BY MARY CREASMAN SPECIAL TO THE SACRAMENTO BEE
FEBRUARY 03, 2019 12:01 AM, UPDATED FEBRUARY 03, 2019 12:01 AM Last week marked 50 years since the most disastrous oil spill in California history. The Santa Barbara oil spill spewed three million gallons of crude oil into the Pacific Ocean beginning on Jan. 27, 1969, killing thousands of birds, fish and sea animals.
The spill produced a 35-mile long oil slick along the California coast, devastating coastal communities that rely on these beaches for their livelihoods.
Our state has not issued a new oil and gas lease off California’s coast since that day, and for good reason. The disaster showed us in the clearest possible way how much we have to lose when we open our oceans to the fossil fuel industry. But here’s the problem: The Trump Administration is working on a new plan to expand offshore oil drilling and targeting California’s coast.
In addition, while California has not issued new oil drilling leases, it has continued to operate aging oil rigs off of our coasts. If California truly wants to lead on creating a clean energy future, stopping new oil drilling isn’t enough. We must aggressively plan to shut down existing drilling across the state.
Half a century after the Santa Barbara oil spill, and with latest science showing 12 short years to avoid catastrophic climate change, anything less is putting our future at risk.
Some California lawmakers are beginning to take up this charge. Rep. Salud Carbajal (D- Santa Barbara) is introducing legislation to block all new drilling off the coast of California, a bill that if passed would effectively thwart the Trump administration’s plan to hand our coasts over to the oil industry. He’s joined by six other House members from across the country in introducing bills to block drilling expansion off of nearly every U.S. coastline. Thankfully, California’s new leaders in the House of Representatives have vowed to help lead the way. Freshman members of Congress like Mike Levin, Katie Hill, Harley Rouda, Josh Harder, Katie Porter, Gil Cisneros and TJ Cox made clear from day one that they will reject the politics of pollution and stand firmly with California’s communities, wildlife and natural resources.
In California, we learn from the past and invent the future. We seize the opportunity to create and expand new industries, jobs and solutions. Champions in the state Legislature, like Assemblyman Al Muratsuchi and Senator Hannah-Beth Jackson, have been driving this innovation. They’ve helped protect our shores, beaches and water by passing legislation to prevent offshore drilling in state-controlled waters. No action is bold enough at this point.
The solutions are there – we just need to go all-in on them. And the ball is in Governor Gavin Newsom’s court to act — with urgency — to push the boundaries of California’s climate and energy leadership.
A recent report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change warns we have just 12 years left to act. It’s not enough to halt new drilling off our coastlines. We can’t be the leaders of a clean energy future if we’re propping up the dirty practices of the past.
With California bursting into flames every few months, struggling to survive regular droughts and adapting to deadly floods and mudslides, we are experiencing enough man-made disasters to know we have to do things differently.
PHOTOS-FROM-THE-VAULT
Massive Santa Barbara oil spill still impacts U.S. 50 years later
JANUARY 25, 2019 12:48 PM
Our violence against the environment is not disconnected to the tragedies we are now experiencing. Have we learned our lesson?
Trump has made it clear that he’ll continue to deny science and put us all in jeopardy, so long as the oil industry cashes in. It’s up to our leaders in California to protect the future of our state and lead the country by making certain we don’t forget our past. Through the tragedy in Santa Barbara 50 years ago, we know better. Now, let’s do better.
Mary Creasman is CEO of the California League of Conservation Voters (CLCV).
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Board Legislative Committee Attachment IV March 15, 2019
OPINION // EDITORIALS Editorial: Trump’s acting administration
Feb. 4, 2019 Updated: Feb. 4, 2019 4:50 p.m.
Acting Defense Secretary Patrick Shanahan walks to speak with the media as he waits to greet NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg upon his arrival at the Pentagon, Monday, Jan. 28, 2019, in Washington. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon) Photo: Alex Brandon / Associated Press
From a chaotic post-election transition to an unprecedented shutdown, President Trump’s indifference to the workings of the government he was elected to run has been unmistakable. Among the most dangerous symptoms of this carelessness is his failure to field any semblance of a stable senior staff.
The administration’s constant purging of prominent members has been the most visible facet of its personnel problems, having left half a dozen Cabinet-level officials — more than a quarter of them — serving in an acting capacity: the attorney general, defense secretary, interior secretary, Environmental Protection Agency administrator, chief of staff and Office of Management and Budget director. But a new analysis shows that the ranks beneath these officials are even more ragged. Of about 700 senior, Senate-confirmed administration posts examined by the good-government group Partnership for Public Service and the Washington Post, nearly 40 percent haven’t been permanently filled. In about half these cases, Trump hasn’t even nominated anyone for the job.
The Interior Department offers a striking example. Headed by acting Secretary David Bernhardt since Ryan Zinke resigned under mounting scrutiny over a month ago, the department has many more management vacancies below the Cabinet level. Nearly 60 percent of its positions requiring Senate confirmation haven’t been filled on a permanent basis, including the directors of the National Park Service, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, and the Bureau of Land Management.
The Justice Department, led by acting Attorney General Matthew Whitaker since Jeff Sessions was forced out nearly three months ago, is equally depleted. Its vacant positions include associate attorney general, the department’s No. 3 job; and directors of the Drug Enforcement Administration and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.
This hollowing out of the federal government, which has alarmed some of Trump’s fellow Republicans in Congress, looks to some extent like a deliberate effort to diminish the checks and balances provided by the Senate and the officials it confirms. Some agencies have taken extraordinary steps to skirt legal limits on provisional appointments, and Trump told CBS News’ Margaret Brennan on Sunday that he prefers to keep his lieutenants in acting status. “I like acting,” he said, “because I can move so quickly.”
The portrait of a president doing all the work himself was undercut by leaked schedules allocating most of his hours to “executive time” in the White House residence. Perhaps the capable, diligent executive persona Trump cultivated was just more acting.
This commentary is from The Chronicle’s editorial board. We invite you to express your views in a letter to the editor. Please submit your letter via our online form: SFChronicle.com/letters.
Board Legislative Committee Attachment IV March 15, 2019
Capitol Alert
Californians with bad water ask for help while opposition mounts to Newsom’s proposed tax
BY MADDY ASHMUN
FEBRUARY 07, 2019 11:28 AM, UPDATED FEBRUARY 13, 2019 08:12 PM
Californians with unhealthy drinking water pleaded for help from lawmakers this week but opposition quickly developed to Gov. Gavin Newsom’s proposal to pay for system improvements with a new fee.
“We just upped our water rates, and to turn around and give them a tax on their meter is just not feasible,” said Maxine Israel, director at the Cabazon Water District, which serves about 2,500 customers near Palm Springs. She was among dozens of water experts and advocates who crowded a hearing on Wednesday to discuss how the state can deliver system improvements that would help nearly 1 million Californians who lack access to safe drinking water.
Newsom last month released a state budget that called for a new fee on drinking water to fund drinking water projects. He did not release many details, but the proposal was characterized as similar to a 2017 bill by Sen. Bill Monning, D-Carmel, that would have generated $140 million a year for water projects.
Newsom just after releasing the spending plan called attention to the drinking water proposal by visiting communities in Stanislaus County that are known for delivering water from wells that are contaminated with nitrates and arsenic.
“It’s a disgrace that in a state as wealthy and resourceful as ours that a million-plus people don’t have access to safe, clean drinking water,” he said during his January visit to a neighborhood in Ceres known as the Monterey Park Tract.
Monning’s proposal included a 95 cent monthly tax on residential customers, along with other fees attached to fertilizer purchases and dairy and feedlot production.
“We believe the ratepayer piece is the critical component to creating a guaranteed and predictable source of funding,” Monning said.
He argued that the proposed fund, which has been called a “water tax” by critics, would make money consistently available for the operation and maintenance of water treatment plants in addition to the construction and improvement of them.
A couple dozen residents from the San Joaquin Valley attended the hearing. Several of them spoke in Spanish in rushed testimony while lawmakers tried to wrap up what became a three hour event.
“Please help us have safe drinking water for all human beings,” one said.
Simona Magaña, a Tulare County resident, expressed her support of the tax. The owner of a private well, said she was without water for two years and relied on her neighbor who would bring clean water over in barrels. “I would sit down and cry a lot from the sadness that we live in the richest country in the world and have to go through this,” she said.
But some advocates aren’t convinced that a tax is the best way to address the state’s clean water crisis.
“Why create a new tax when you have a huge budget surplus?” says Cindy Tuck, a deputy executive director at the Association of California Water Agencies (ACWA).
California state government is on track to accumulate a $14.8 billion surplus, and the state is on pace to fill reserve accounts with an additional $16 billion, according to a November report from the Legislative Analyst’s Office.
The water agency association and the California Municipal Utilities Association support alternative legislation that would establish a “drinking water trust,” which would be funded initially with an infusion from the general fund during a surplus year.
Paul Jones, general manager of the Eastern Municipal Water District in Riverside County previewed the proposal and said it could cover operations, maintenance, and consolidation costs, among other things.
The outline cheered lawmakers who want to pay for drinking water improvements without making a new fee.
“I like the trust idea, I think it’s definitely viable” Assemblyman Devon Mathis, R-Visalia, said. “Quite frankly I think anything is better than a tax.”
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Board Legislative Committee Attachment IV March 15, 2019
LOCAL // POLITICS Gavin Newsom on wall funding: ‘Donald Trump, we’ll see you in court’
Tal Kopan Feb. 15, 2019 Updated: Feb. 15, 2019 11:55 a.m.
President Donald Trump speaks at a rally at the El Paso County Coliseum in El Paso, Texas, Feb. 11, 2019. When it comes to congressional end runs, lawmakers warn Trump that what goes around comes around. (Sarah Silbiger/The New York Times) Photo: SARAH SILBIGER;Sarah Silbiger / New York Times
SACRAMENTO — California is likely to sue over President Trump’s declaration of a national emergency along the southern border, on the grounds that funding he plans to divert for his wall would rob the state of antidrug and military construction money, Gov. Gavin Newsom said Friday.
California expects to join several other states in challenging Trump’s action, Newsom and state Attorney General Xavier Becerra said at a news conference shortly after the president announced his action.
“No other state will be more harmed than the state of California” by the fund diversions, Newsom said. “Donald Trump, we’ll see you in court.” Trump laid out his rationale in the White House Rose Garden for declaring a national emergency along the southern border, under which he will draw on money to pay for the wall without obtaining congressional approval.
His acting chief of staff, Mick Mulvaney, said Trump is moving roughly $6.6 billion from administration accounts to supplement the $1.375 billion that Congress approved in the government funding deal he will sign as soon as Friday.
Of the total funds, $600 million will come from a Treasury Department forfeiture fund — a pot of money and assets that the government has seized in criminal investigations. Another $2.5 billion will come from Defense Department’s counter-drug operations, and roughly $3.6 billion will come from military construction.
Newsom said those diversions would hurt member of the military in California and put at risk antidrug law enforcement at border points of entry in the state, “for a vanity project, for a monument to stupidity.”
Newsom and Becerra said the specifics of Trump’s emergency declaration were still being examined, and that they could not yet point to its exact effects on California. But Becerra said California and several other states were likely to go to court soon to try to block the funding diversions.
White House officials said the military construction money being diverted consisted of funding for “lower priority” projects, such as facility repairs and replacements that can wait a year or two.
“Didn’t sound too important to me,” Trump said of the projects he would take money from, in response to a reporter’s question in the Rose Garden.
“We had certain funds that are being used at the discretion of generals, at the discretion of the military, some of them haven’t been allocated yet and some of the generals think that this (border wall) is more important,” Trump said.
California and other states may be joined in legal action against Trump by congressional Democrats. In a joint statement, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-San Francisco, and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., called Trump’s move “a power grab by a disappointed president” that makes the nation “less safe.”
"The president's actions clearly violate the Congress’ exclusive power of the purse, which our founders enshrined in the Constitution,” the Democrats said. “The Congress will defend our constitutional authorities in the Congress, in the courts, and in the public, using every remedy available.”
One area that the White House did spare was a San Francisco Bay restoration project and California flood-control efforts. The Chronicle obtained a document in January showing that the White House was looking at nearly $2.5 billion allocated for California projects overseen by the Army Corps of Engineers as a possible wall funding source.
The projects included $177 million for building up levees and converting 3,000 acres of former salt ponds in the South Bay back into marshlands, as well as nearly $1.6 billion for flood control on the American River in the Sacramento area.
Disaster recovery efforts in Puerto Rico were also examined as options. The ideas drew swift condemnation from Democrats, and some Republicans also spoke out against the reallocation of disaster-related funds.
In an interview with The Chronicle on Thursday, House GOP leader Kevin McCarthy of Bakersfield, a close ally of Trump, said there were “other places” the president could get money for his wall. McCarthy added that’s something he was willing to communicate directly to Trump “very often.”
Alexei Koseff is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: [email protected]. Twitter: @akoseff. Tal Kopan is The San Francisco Chronicle’s Washington correspondent. Email: [email protected] Twitter: @talkopan
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OPINION // OPEN FORUM Newsom needs to make water supply, protections a priority
By George Miller Jan. 23, 2019 Updated: Jan. 23, 2019 5:05 p.m.
Former Gov. Jerry Brown’s plan to build two tunnels to carry Northern California water south has met stiff opposition. Photo: Michael Macor / The Chronicle 2014
Water issues are notoriously difficult for California governors. Just look at former Gov. Jerry Brown’s floundering tunnels proposal for the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta. Yet two factors suggest that Gov. Gavin Newsom must make water a priority.
First, California needs more climate-resistant water supplies. Climate change is making California’s weather more extreme. For the past decade, most years have brought drought or the risk of catastrophic floods. And looking forward, scientists warn that climate change will reduce the water we get from our rivers.
Second, major aquatic ecosystems are in crisis. The Salton Sea is collapsing, threatening waterbirds as well as children in nearby communities who suffer from rising asthma rates caused by blowing dust from a drying sea bed. The San Francisco Bay-Delta is similarly declining — and with growing toxic algae blooms. Without action on water, coming years could bring extinctions, lost fishing jobs and growing human health impacts.
The new governor needs ideas for water sustainability. Fortunately, a growing chorus of voices is offering new water solutions.
Newsom should take a page from California’s campaign to fight climate change. The state’s climate-driven energy policy includes AB32 (a comprehensive program to reduce greenhouse-gas emissions); California’s low-carbon fuel standard (which incentivizes use of low-carbon fuels); renewable portfolio requirements (which require more energy produced from renewable sources) and more. This is a technology-focused, state energy strategy backed by gubernatorial leadership, a clear goal and a sense of urgency. We need the same approach to water.
One key action would be to partner with — and to push — California’s largest cities to recycle the enormous volume of highly treated water they dump into the ocean every year. Los Angeles, San Diego, San Jose and San Francisco all have water recycling plans on paper. Action, however, has been glacially slow.
Dramatic progress on water recycling should be a cornerstone of a new climate-change-driven water strategy. So should capturing urban storm water and building new floodplain projects that can reduce climate-driven flood risk while restoring salmon habitat.
A realistic plan for the San Francisco Bay-Delta is another piece of a climate-driven water strategy. Brown’s delta effort floundered because his water agencies hoped to use new delta tunnels to divert an enormous amount of additional water from a water-starved ecosystem. At the end of his term, that hope ran up against a scientific reality — the bay-delta needs more water flowing through it, not less.
Another benefit of aggressive conservation and water recycling is that Newsom wouldn’t need to look to the delta for more water supply. Instead, his administration should focus on restoring the bay-delta ecosystem, with more environmental flows and wildlife habitat, and on reducing the risk of sea-level rise to water supplies and the hundreds of thousands of delta residents.
Newsom’s picks for environmental protection and water chiefs...
Newsom has an opportunity to implement California’s human-right-to-water requirements. In the Central Valley, the Salinas Valley and in many cities, residents still lack clean, affordable drinking water. All California parents have a right to expect that the water in their taps will be safe for their children to drink, that rivers will be safe to swim in — and, near the Salton Sea, that the air will be safe to breathe.
Finally, Brown often overlooked Trump administration attacks on rivers, San Francisco Bay and the water supplies of California’s largest cities — all in the hope that this would persuade federal agencies to support his tunnels. The Trump administration appears to care only for the interests of a handful of Central Valley congressmen and powerful growers. By contrast, Newsom should stand up to President Trump and fight back on water issues on behalf of all California.
A first step would be to urge the State Water Resources Control Board to finalize a state policy to protect wetlands and streams in response to Trump administration efforts to eliminate federal Clean Water Act protections for these wildlife habitats and drinking water sources. Another would be to work with the Legislature to pass SB1, authored by state Senate President Pro Tem Toni Atkins, D-San Diego, which would strengthen state laws to shield wildlife and water users from federal attacks.
Newsom knows that California does not need to choose between a thriving economy and a healthy environment. New ideas can put that California value into action — with a new direction in the debate over water, the lifeblood of California cities, farms and rivers.
George Miller represented Contra Costa and portions of Solano counties in the U.S. House of Representatives from 1975 to 2015.
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Board Legislative Committee Attachment IV March 15, 2019
LOCAL // POLITICS Kamala Harris’ call-them-out Twitter strategy
Tal Kopan Feb. 24, 2019 Updated: Feb. 24, 2019 12:06 p.m.
Sen. Kamala Harris, D-Calif., attends a Judiciary Committee hearing this month. Photo: J. Scott Applewhite / Associated Press
WASHINGTON — When it comes to online conspiracy theories, Sen. Kamala Harris’ campaign follows the old mantra: Sunlight is the best disinfectant.
Traditionally, political public relations teams avoid commenting on conspiracies, misinformation or base insinuations about their clients, believing that calling attention to them dignifies and thus elevates them from the fringes.
But Harris’ communications team has been doing the opposite — immediately calling out material it sees as baseless. Veterans of Democratic presidential campaigns say other campaigns should take note, because the strategy reflects a new normal in politics.
Former President Barack Obama and the Democrats’ 2016 presidential nominee, Hillary Clinton, were plagued by false conspiracy theories, from questioning of Obama’s place of birth (Hawaii) to rumors of Clinton health problems. The internet and social media allow these types of theories to grow and fester, and both candidates were eventually forced to respond. There’s every indication the 2020 presidential field will face more such attacks, enhanced by a voracious political extremist media sphere and foreign propaganda efforts.
Harris’ team has already begun confronting misinformation online, from the seedy to the silly.
When conspiracy theorist Jacob Wohl tweeted that Harris was ineligible to be president because her immigrant parents hadn’t lived in this country for five years before she was born, the California senator’s campaign communications director, Lily Adams, retweeted it and called it out as “garbage” within five minutes. Wohl’s assertion was fictitious: Harris is eligible to run for president as a U.S.-born citizen under the Constitution, and there are no natural-born citizenship requirements regarding parents’ status.
The campaign even wades in when the underlying controversy seems silly. During an interview with radio show “The Breakfast Club,” Harris revealed that she had smoked marijuana in college and talked about music she has listened to, including Snoop Dogg and Tupac. Some listeners blended the answers together, causing a mild internet storm when people pointed out that those artists weren’t performing when the 54-year-old Harris was in college.
Harris campaign spokesman Ian Sams went on offense to dispel the confusion, tweeting out video of the remarks and deriding Harris’ critics for “trying to make Reefergate happen.”
He also jumped in when Harris made a barbecue pit stop in South Carolina and a conservative radio host tweeted a roundabout allegation that Harris was promoting climate change by eating beef — cattle production being a notorious emitter of methane gas.
But Sams noted within minutes that in fact, “It was pork.”
The campaign declined to comment for this story, but political communications specialists who are not working with any current presidential candidates say the lean-in approach of the Harris communications shop is a model of what campaigns will need to do this election cycle.
“I don’t think there’s any option to ignore anything anymore,” said Brian Fallon, who was Clinton’s presidential campaign press secretary and now runs the left-aligned advocacy group Demand Justice. “Any 2020 campaign’s press operation is wise to be constantly monitoring what gets picked up on Twitter, essentially, and to immediately speak to debunk and contain rather than wish it would go away.”
In previous eras, campaigns could wait and see what the media ran with. With the internet, that cycle has been shortened from days to minutes. Most newsrooms monitor Twitter to see what gets traction, and some assign stories accordingly.
Sometimes, what gets traction is Trump’s Twitter feed itself. It’s easy for Democratic campaigns to see the benefits of trying to grab hold of the narrative on social media — as Trump does nearly every day.
To stay ahead of the news cycle, Fallon said, smart campaigns will capitalize on the same social media environment to control what’s being said about the candidate. A campaign’s silence or slowness to respond to circulating allegations could be interpreted as “panic mode,” he added.
“Twitter, I think, has become something of an assignment editor in recent years,” Fallon said. “Only like 20 percent of the general public is on Twitter, but basically 100 percent of political reporters are on Twitter. ... So engaging immediately and confidently and providing new facts and context is a must.”
The need for rapid response is made even more urgent by the revelations about Russia’s propaganda efforts during the 2016 election, which U.S. intelligence agencies concluded were designed to promote Trump’s candidacy. Those operations promoted conspiracy theories online to harm Trump’s rivals and sow political discord.
The Department of Homeland Security has pledged that the administration will combat any such efforts in the 2020 campaign, amid concerns that Trump’s own diminishing of Russian election disruption would carry over into the administration’s work. Chris Krebs, director of the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, said in a recent call with reporters that his office would help “anybody who comes knocking on our door.”
Even so, former Obama campaign press secretary Ben LaBolt agrees that ignoring conspiracy theories is no longer a luxury that campaigns can enjoy. He should know — false theories about Obama’s birthplace plagued the president for years. The persistent queries eventually forced him to release two copies of his birth certificate as he lamentedthe unfounded rumors as “silliness,” adding that “normally (he) would not comment on something like this.”
The notion that responding to a conspiracy theory elevates it is also a thing of the past, LaBolt said. He noted that Trump still promotes conspiracy theories on Twitter and elsewhere without checking on their veracity, from tweeting baselessly about “rigged” Google search results to falsely implying that his 2016 opponent Sen. Ted Cruz’s father was involved in John F. Kennedy’s assassination.
“We live in a world where you can’t even necessarily trust what’s coming out of the president of the United States’ mouth, and he’s not going to check his sources before he tweets something out,” LaBolt said. “Once things are in the ecosystem, they’re in an environment with no editors, and it’s the campaign’s responsibility to serve as those editors.”
Given the president’s history of promoting such theories, effectively defusing them is in some ways a test of candidates’ abilities to stand up to Trump, said Jesse Ferguson, a Democratic strategist and former Clinton campaign spokesman.
“Democrats want a (nominee) that can defeat Donald Trump, and one way to demonstrate that is aggressively taking on the type of conspiracies that he fosters, thrives on and promotes,” Ferguson said. “There’s no candidate who will succeed this cycle without confronting the right-wing conspiracy fever, and defeating fraudulent memes about them.”
Tal Kopan is The San Francisco Chronicle’s Washington correspondent. Email: [email protected] Twitter: @talkopan
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OPINION // OPEN FORUM Open Forum: Sen. Feinstein fails to treat climate change with the urgency it deserves
By Morissa Zuckerman Feb. 27, 2019
In this image from video provided by Morissa Zuckerman, U.S. Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., speaks with a group of students who wanted to discuss the Green New Deal, an ambitious Democrat plan to shift the U.S. economy from fossil fuels and to renewable sources such as wind and solar power, at her office in San Francisco. The students are members of Sunrise Movement, an activist group that encourages children to combat climate change. (Morissa Zuckerman via AP) Photo: Morissa Zuckerman / Associated Press
On Friday morning, I stood in front of Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., while she told me and a dozen other young people that, essentially, we’re toast. Video of the highly publicized encounter between the senator and Green New Deal youth activists has spread far and wide, highlighting not only the deepening generational divide between the emerging electorate and those representing us, but also a real disagreement over how to tackle the climate crisis and social inequity — the most urgent and interlocking moral issues of our time. Feinstein has been in office longer than I’ve been alive. She said to us on Friday, “I’ve been doing this for 30 years. I know what I’m doing,” and then passed around her plan — a watered-down Green New Deal resolution that set a goal to reach net-zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050. That is about two decades later than what the world’s top scientists say is necessary to prevent catastrophic warming.
Given what we now know about the climate crisis, kicking the can down the road is morally reprehensible. The suffering has already begun, with the superstorms and super-wildfires of recent years the most dramatic signals. Poor communities and communities of color are hurt first and worst by fossil fuel extraction and climate change. Continued warming will exacerbate this injustice, claiming millions of lives and costing trillions of dollars both here in California and globally.
Congress has been aware of the threat of climate change for decades, when we still had time to enact a gradual drawdown of fossil fuels. Instead, the GOP elite sold themselves to Big Oil, and the Democratic establishment failed to treat the climate crisis with the urgency it deserves. Now, we’re in the red zone.
That’s what the kids were trying to tell Sen. Feinstein. We decided to visit her office because we are scared about what climate change means for our lives. We understand that our futures are in serious trouble and that politicians are not taking action at the scale our generation needs to survive.
At 24, I was one of the oldest in the room. Surrounded by other activists as young as 7, I was reminded again of the entirely different worlds we inhabit. For younger generations, climate change is not an abstract game of political chess. It is a matter of life or death.
Worse than Sen. Feinstein’s condescending lecture was having her look us in the eyes and refuse to support Sen. Markey and Rep. Ocasio-Cortez’s Green New Deal resolution, the only proposed framework that can provide us with a livable future. When asked about the Green New Deal, 81 percent of Americans and majorities of both parties supportthe suite of policies. It is the only proposed approach that can stop climate change, create good jobs and address inequality at the level that science and justice demand.
There’s much work to be done to turn this vision of a Green New Deal into a concrete package of bills. But we must start by grounding it in what the science says is necessary for human survival. From there, civil society and social movements can work alongside legislators to build the political will necessary. We need a united Democratic front so that this legislation is ready to be passed in 2021 under a new administration.
The excuse that “we can’t afford it” comes down to prioritization, and also ignores what climate change will cost under current trajectories. In November, 13 federal agencies estimated that the U.S. economy would face more than $500 billion per year in costs from sea level rise, extreme weather, lost labor and crop damage by the end of this century. The cost of inaction grows higher by the year.
I wish I could look to my elected officials to fight for me and my generation. Instead, young people are taking that on ourselves. We will keep coming back again and again until our representatives understand our very lives depend on bold, ambitious action.
At the end of our meeting, Sen. Feinstein recommended that I run for Senate someday. By the time I’m old enough to run for the Senate, our future could already be condemned to chaos. Sen. Feinstein: We’re out of time. We need leadership from you now.
Morissa Zuckerman is a volunteer leader with the Bay Area chapter of the Sunrise Movement, one of the youth-led groups spearheading the Green New Deal. She was born and raised in Oakland.
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Board Legislative Committee Attachment IV March 15, 2019
LOCAL // BAY AREA & STATE Oakland A’s ballpark plan gets boost, but what it means is matter of dispute
Kimberly Veklerov Feb. 22, 2019 Updated: Feb. 22, 2019 10:11 p.m.
Shipping containers at Howard Terminal, where the Oakland A’s want to build a ballpark. Photo: Noah Berger / Special to The Chronicle 2018
A bill introduced Friday would give the Oakland A’s new stadium project an essential designation it needs before construction can begin — but the team and its critics are at odds over the intent of the legislation.
The A’s said the bill from Assemblyman Rob Bonta, D-Alameda, would be a vehicle for ensuring that environmental justice concerns in the community surrounding their planned stadium — air pollution, water quality and the potential spread of pollutants in the groundwater — are addressed in the project.
But opponents, both industrial neighbors and environmental groups, said the team’s move is a way to bypass state regulations that typically apply to bayfront development. Alongside the legislative proposal, team leaders said Friday they and the West Oakland Environmental Indicators Project, which studies air quality, have signed a partnership agreement to develop a community-benefits package that could include money for neighborhood infrastructure, air monitoring and expanded public access to the waterfront.
The A’s say it’s about doing right by a community that’s suffered air pollution and other environmental harms for decades. The rate of emergency room visits for asthma, for instance, is almost twice as high in West Oakland as it is across Alameda County, according to county public health data.
“The A’s would represent the biggest, deepest-pocketed partner this community has ever seen,” said Brian Beveridge, co-director of the West Oakland project. “And they’ve started out by saying, ‘How can this benefit the community?’”
But that’s not the part that has irritated critics.
Bonta’s bill, which he introduced in skeletal form, would allow the State Lands Commission to authorize the stadium project as an “approved public trust use,” a designation needed before construction can begin, “if certain conditions are met.” The conditions are yet to be specified.
“The Warriors did the exact same thing,” Bonta said. “A stadium as an approved public trust is not that controversial.”
Under state law, the commission has control over tidelands, including those of the Port of Oakland, where the A’s want to build their ballpark at Howard Terminal near Jack London Square.
A’s President Dave Kaval said the conditions the bill may impose are related to the environment and environmental justice and that it could widen the parameters that regulatory agencies, including the Bay Conservation and Development Commission, could consider in permitting the project.
Right now, the site is designated for port use. The commission voted last month to consider changing it, but has not made a decision.
The stadium, Kaval said, will already go beyond typical environmental requirements around greenhouse gas emissions and building standards. He said the commitment to environmental justice in low-income West Oakland neighborhoods is another example of “raising the bar” and a way to earn the support of community members.
The presence of hazardous and carcinogenic chemicals in the site’s soil and groundwater will probably be remediated only if the ballpark is approved, Kaval said. Port officials are also considering a break bulk terminal for the property, which involves the unloading of cargo carried in containers such as crates and bags. Kaval said it would be “terrible” for air quality because of the particulate matter emitted from operations.
“We’re committed to cleaning that entire thing up. ... Without us doing that, it’s probably just going to stay unmitigated,” Kaval said. “It’s important for people to understand what the alternatives are to our project.” Port tenants and trucking companies fear the level of traffic and access issues that would arise with not only a ballpark but all the adjacent housing and retail the A’s want to build not far from heavy industrial operations. And shipping container pilots have raised concerns about the ballpark’s lights, which their association president said could blind them and lead to catastrophic accidents.
Mike Jacob, vice president and general counsel for the Pacific Merchant Shipping Association, which represents ocean carriers and marine terminal operators at the Port of Oakland, said there would be no need for Bonta’s bill if the A’s abided by existing laws.
“If you’re intending to follow all the existing rules and procedures for how to develop property on the waterfront correctly, you don’t need to run to the Legislature to ask for carve-outs from the requirements that apply to everyone who intends to do development on the bay,” Jacob said.
And David Lewis, executive director of Save the Bay, an environmental group, called the bill “a huge red flag.” He said its very existence and ambiguity — the text now spans just three paragraphs — is a threat to the jurisdiction and authority of regulatory bodies.
Bonta said the “fearmongering” is premature.
“There are concerns about things that are not in the bill that won’t be in the bill. They’ve created a belief of a bill in their heads and then opposed it,” Bonta said of the early criticism. “The A’s have shown an unprecedented commitment to the city, to the environment, to equity. They’ve shown it. They’ll continue to show it.”
Kimberly Veklerov is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: [email protected] Twitter: @kveklerov
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LOCAL // POLITICS Rep. Eric Swalwell will give up East Bay seat if he runs for president
Joe Garofoli Feb. 26, 2019 Updated: Feb. 26, 2019 4:08 p.m.
Rep. Eric Swalwell, D-Dublin, arrives at a Politics & Eggs event Monday in Manchester, N.H. Photo: Elise Amendola / Associated Press
If East Bay Rep. Eric Swalwell does decide to run for president — “We’re getting pretty close,” he says — the Dublin Democrat will give up the House seat he has held since 2013.
“Burn the boats,” Swalwell said, name-checking what Spanish conquistador Hernán Cortés did when he invaded the Aztec Empire in 1519. “They stormed the land. And he had them burn the ships behind them so there was no looking back.
“I would want people to know that I’m putting my all into this and I don’t have a life insurance policy.” The four-term congressman said he wouldn’t resign to run, but would not stand for re-election to the House in 2020. Right now, he says, one of the biggest obstacles to a presidential run is one that many politicians blow off: He’s wondering whether he will have time to spend with his two young children and his wife.
On the new episode of the “It’s All Political” podcast, Swalwell said, “If you’re seeking such a big job that would affect so many people, I think you have to assure the people you’re asking to vote for you that you’re not hedging. And that you don’t have a lifeboat waiting for you.”
That sound you hear in the background could well be former East Bay Assemblywoman Catharine Baker — a San Ramon Republican and Swalwell constituent — printing “Baker for Congress” yard signs. Although she insists she hasn’t picked a path in politics after losing her re-election bid in November.
“I haven’t decided what is next for me and my family or how best I can be of service, but I love our community and know I will be staying very much involved,” Baker said Tuesday.
Of course, Baker would be joined in the race by every Democrat on every mosquito abatement district east of the Caldecott Tunnel. Why not take a shot? Remember, Swalwell was the longest of long shots, a 31-year-old Dublin City Council member, when he defeated 20-term Democratic Rep. Pete Stark in 2012.
But the stakes were lower for Swalwell then. He had a day job as an Alameda County prosecutor and no kids. If he ran for president, he’d he be giving up not only a safe seat but also influential spots on the House Judiciary and Intelligence committees — perches that make him a ready and willing guest on cable TV news shows.
So before he jumps into the presidential demolition derby, Swalwell says he’s asking himself three questions: “Can I make a difference? Do I think I can win? And can I find child care to do the first two?
The child care challenges may be the most daunting. Swalwell and his wife, Brittany Watts, a sales director at the Ritz-Carlton in Half Moon Bay, have two children under 2 years old. Watts just ended her maternity leave.
“So we’re trying to just sort out — ‘How the hell do you do something like this?’ — and still see your kids and make sure that her dreams and aspirations aren’t deferred for too long,” Swalwell said.
That level of introspection and concern for the career of one’s spouse sounds so not like a politician. Part of that attitude is generational. Swalwell is a Millennial, a generation that is a bit more open to risk-taking when it comes to leaving jobs than the Baby Boom generation.
“I’ve told our staff as we plan and look (at running) that the one thing I don’t want on our agenda is, ‘What do I do if I lose?’” Swalwell said.
Another Millennial who has already jumped into the race, the 37-year-old mayor of South Bend, Ind., Pete Buttigieg, just announced that he would not seek a third term. It’s also a high-risk game for Butttigieg: Win the White House or find a day job. Unlike many politicians, he isn’t wealthy. His family, like Swalwell’s and many others of their generation, is carrying more than $100,000 of student loan debt.
“To me, it’s not so much a question of political strategy — it is just that you should be going to serve where you belong,” Buttigieg said this week on “It’s All Political.” “I love being mayor of my hometown. It’s exciting. But it’s also not a job you can do forever.
“The whole idea of my coming in was that we needed change, innovation, fresh blood,” Buttigieg said. “So it would be a little weird if I was the one who was hanging on.”
If Swalwell runs for the White House and falls short, he says his conscience will be clear.
“The truth is, I was the first in my family to go to college. That’s all my dad wanted me to do,” Swalwell said. “I’m going to be fine. I’m playing with the house’s money as far as making my parents proud.
“We’re not trying to sell a book or get a leadership position anywhere else,” Swalwell said. “If I’m going to run, it’s going to be because we think we can win and, more important, make a difference.”
Joe Garofoli is The San Francisco Chronicle’s senior political writer. Email: [email protected] Twitter: @joegarofoli
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Board Legislative Committee Attachment IV March 15, 2019
CALIFORNIA WILDFIRES ‘It’s embarrassing’: California wildfire relief struggles to get through Senate
Tal Kopan March 5, 2019 Updated: March 5, 2019 7:05 p.m.
A downed telephone pole off of Elliott Road after the Camp Fire tore through the town of Paradise, California, on Friday, Nov. 9, 2018. Photo: Gabrielle Lurie / The Chronicle
WASHINGTON — After a months-long delay, key negotiators say Congress is closing in on a deal to pass a disaster relief package, including billions in funding for California wildfire recovery that has been hanging in limbo.
Still, it remains unclear when any bill will advance, and lawmakers say political fights have been holding up the process. “It’s embarrassing,” Sen. Johnny Isakson, R-Ga., said Tuesday of the time it has taken to pass funding for states including California, which suffered devastating wildfires in November, and Georgia, which was hit by Hurricane Michael in October.
“I’m not going to name names, because I’m trying to reach an agreement with them,” Isakson said. “But I think I owe it to the people of California and the people of Kansas and the people of New Mexico, or wherever, if they have a disaster, I owe it to them to get it dealt with as fast as possible. And they owe it to me if my state gets hit. But there are some people that don’t feel that way.”
A group of mainly Southern senators including Isakson introduced a bill last week that would appropriate more than $13 billion in relief for a range of disasters. The Democratic-controlled House passed a $14 billion package during the prolonged government shutdown standoff with President Trump earlier this year. California has requested $9 billion for 2018 and 2017 wildfire recovery.
Negotiations have kicked into high gear in the past few days, with Georgia’s senators huddling multiple times with the top two appropriators in the upper chamber, Sens. Richard Shelby, R-Ala., and Patrick Leahy, D-Vt.
Those talks have started to include the House and the White House, the senators said, with the goal of trying to pass a package before lawmakers leave town March 15 for a weeklong recess.
“I think we’re very close,” Leahy said Tuesday. “All this would have been done last year if the president hadn’t been so anxious to have a shutdown, but Sen. Shelby and I and Sen. Isakson, I think we’ve got a bipartisan solution here.”
Shelby said senators are “trying to figure a way to work to yes. ... We think we’re closer, but sometimes you’re closer and then you get far away in negotiations. But things are fluid, which is good.”
Democrats say the sticking point has been money for Puerto Rico. Republicans have objected to increased funding for the U.S. territory, which was badly damaged by Hurricane Maria in 2017, but Democrats won’t agree to move forward without it.
That fight prevented disaster funding from being tacked onto a spending deal that ended the partial government shutdown in late January.
“I think Puerto Rico needs a lot more relief help,” said Democratic Sen. Mazie Hirono of Hawaii, whose state is also waiting on relief for a series of volcanic eruptions.
“It’s one of the major reasons that the governor says that he wants Puerto Rico to be made a state, because he thinks that if Puerto Rico were a state it would have received a lot more help. Which is a pretty sad commentary, in my view,” Hirono said.
“There’s probably games that are being played, and I think that’s really unfortunate,” said Sen. Jon Tester of Montana, the top Democrat on the Homeland Security appropriations subcommittee. “When we had hurricanes in the South, we got them done. ... And now this happened quite a while ago, and there’s still not a lot of talk on Puerto Rico. It just speaks to the dysfunction of the White House.” The White House did not respond to a request for comment about its position on the bill, or what it may be pressing for in negotiations.
Isakson said Trump “doesn’t want to just write a blank check to expand funding anywhere, but in some places in particular.” Asked to expand on which places, Isakson said, “The president’s very concerned any time you’re spending more money.”
Shelby said Puerto Rico funding is “all in there” now and disagreed that was the only holdup.
“There are several sticking points,” he said. “We’re trying to resolve our differences.”
Hirono organized a letter Monday with California Sen. Kamala Harris that was signed by 11 Democrats, including California Sen. Dianne Feinstein, calling on leaders to immediately bring up a relief bill.
“Over the past year, Californians have faced horrific natural disasters and have only just begun the process of rebuilding,” Harris said. “My colleagues and I sent a letter calling on Senate leadership to quickly address disaster funding so that the full resources of the federal government can be made available to those in California and across the nation who need it.”
Tal Kopan is The San Francisco Chronicle’s Washington correspondent. Email: [email protected] Twitter: @talkopan
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Board Legislative Committee Attachment IV March 15, 2019
TRUMP EXPECTED TO SIGN BIPARTISAN LEGISLATION Conserving California’s vast desert landscape Death Valley, Joshua Tree national parks would grow under public lands bill By Paul Rogers [email protected] In the largest land conservation bill passed by Congress in 10 years, vast areas of California’s desert are headed for new protections that would prohibit mining, roads and off-highway vehicles and enlarge two national parks, Death Valley and Joshua Tree. The bill would designate 1.3 million acres of federal land across the American West as wilderness, the highest level of protection, establish four new national monuments, and set aside more than 600 miles of rivers from dams and other development. For a Congress that has spent years in bitter partisan division, the legislation was
Wildflowers line a road in Death Valley National Park in 2016. The size of the park would be expanded under a new public lands conservation bill recently passed by Congress. ROBYN BECK — GETTY IMAGES
The Surprise Canyon area of the Panamint Mountains in the Mojave Desert would receive new protections under the public lands bill. BOB WICK — BUREAU OF LAND MANAGEMENT
Lands an unusual point of agreement, passing the House and Senate with large bipartisan support. If Trump signs the bill as expected — he has until March 16 to sign or veto it — it will represent a rare environmental accomplishment for his administration. For much of his presidency, Trump has worked to expand development of public lands and expand oil drilling. He has proposed new offshore drilling off California, Oregon, Washington and the Atlantic coast, and pushed for new drilling in Alaska’s Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. He has worked to remove protections on millions of acres for the sage grouse, gray wolf and other atrisk species, and has signaled the United States will withdraw from the Paris Climate Agreement. And whatever Trump’s feelings about California, the state is among the primary beneficiaries of the legislation. The bill establishes 375,000 acres of new wilderness — an area nearly 13 times the size of San Francisco — in the Mojave Desert, most of it on land owned by the federal Bureau of Land Management, where mining, oil exploration and road building will be permanently banned. “From desert tortoises to bighorn sheep, breathtaking wildflower blooms to iconic Joshua trees, the beauty of the California desert is unrivaled,” said Sen. Dianne Feinstein, DCalif. “It’s a defining part of California’s landscape, and I’m proud of our work to ensure it remains that way for future generations to enjoy.” The legislation also enlarges Death Valley National Park by 35 ,9 2 9 acres and Joshua Tree National Park by 4,518 acres, a goal of Feinstein’s for years. It creates an 18,610-acre Alabama Hills National Scenic Area in the Alabama Hills of Inyo County, where over the last century, hundreds of Western TV shows and movies have been shot. And it adds 28 miles of the Amargosa River and the Whitewater River and Surprise Canyon areas of the Mojave Desert to protections under the National Wild and Scenic Rivers Act, which blocks dams and development. In a compromise with off-road vehicle groups, the bill guarantees permanent access to 200,000 acres of BLM land in the desert where off-road vehicles are now driving. “It’s very significant. This finds a nice balance between recreation and ecology,” said Peter Satin, director of land management at the Mojave Desert Land Trust in San Bernardino County. “You’ve got off-road vehicle access matched with expanded wilderness and national parks. The desert is a rich, multi-use landscape that can be enjoyed by everyone. It’s not an empty barren place. It’s full of value.” The legislation’s bipartisan appeal may not be that surprising for a bill that includes something for virtually everyone. Its 662 pages contain more than 170 separate measures, drafted by Republicans and Democrats. There are wilderness protections in Utah, New Mexico and Oregon, along with new protections for hunters on federal land, and a provision to allow Native Alaskans who served in the Vietnam War to homestead up to 160 acres each in rural Alaska on BLM lands. The bill also creates new national monuments to honor the Civil War, at Mill Springs Battlefield in Nancy, Kentucky; civil rights leaders Medgar and Myrlie Evers in Jackson, Mississippi; the victims of the 1928 St. Francis Dam Disaster in Los Angeles County near Santa Clarita; and Jurassic National Monument, 850 acres of BLM land in southern Utah famous for discoveries of dinosaur bones. The bill passed 92-8 in the Senate. Those who followed it closely say the main draw, particularly for Republicans who in recent years have rarely supported new environmental laws, was a provision that permanently reauthorizes the nation’s most important parks funding law. That law, the Land and Water Conservation Fund, uses royalties from offshore oil drilling to not only buy new land for national parks, forests and wildlife refuges, but also to provide millions of dollars every year in local and state grants to cities and counties for swimming pools, baseball fields, local parks, trails and boating marinas. The law, which is authorized to provide up to $900 million a year, had expired last September. “Republicans know that their congressional districts were getting funding from the Land and Water Conservation Fund,” said Vicky Hoover, an advocate with the Sierra Club in San Francisco who worked for four years on the bill. “They didn’t want that money to stop flowing.” Of California’s seven Republican House members, three voted for the bill: Paul Cook, Ken Calvert and Tom McClintock. Four voted against it: Doug La-Malfa, Devin Nunes, Duncan Hunter and Kevin Mc-Carthy. “It’s a big victory, but it’s not a perfect bill. It contained some items that are bad for the environment,” Hoover said. Among those, she cited the Alaska homesteading provision, and the off-road vehicle guarantees in some parts of the desert. Overall, however, Hoover said the measure is key to preserving California’s environment. She noted that large crowds head every year to see wildflower blooms in the desert, and that expanding the protected areas preserves solitude, fragile plants and corridors for bighorn sheep, desert tortoises and other wildlife, which are critical for them to adapt to climate change. “These places in the desert are spectacular,” she said. “For some people it’s more low- key than Yosemite. But the more California’s population expands and we develop more shopping centers and freeways, the more it’s important that we have these protected areas.” Contact Paul Rogers at 408- 920- 5045.
The Amargosa River area near Death Valley in the Mojave Desert would receive new federal protections as a wild and scenic river under a public lands conservation bill passed by Congress in February. President Trump is expected to sign the bill. BOB WICK — BUREAU OF LAND MANAGEMENT
Board Legislative Committee Attachment IV March 15, 2019
RECORD TURNOVER Is President Trump running a nation or a temp service? By Dana Milbank WASHINGTON » It’s hard to find good help these days. During his campaign, President Trump said he’d “surround myself only with the best.” But by his own account, his administration attracts the opposite. On Saturday, Trump publicly mocked former Attorney General Jeff Sessions, imitating his Southern accent: “The attorney general says, ‘I’m gonna recuse mah-self.’ ” In the same speech, Trump discredited departing Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein by saying the Trump-appointed official, whom the president accused last month of “planning a very illegal act,” had “never received a single vote.” Last week, Trump said soon-to-be-jailed Michael Cohen, once a “good person” and Trump’s personal attorney, was a “failed lawyer” and a liar and, by testifying to Congress about Trump, partially to blame for the breakdown of nuclear talks with North Korea. Director of National Intelligence Daniel Coats may soon be replaced because he caused Trump “disappointment” by expressing (accurate) doubts that North Korea would cooperate with overtures to denuclearize, Trump confidant Christopher Ruddy told CNN. After two years in the White House, Trump appears to be running not a country but a temp service. He’s filled and refilled the roles of WhiteHouse communications director six times, deputy national security adviser five times, national security adviser and health and human services secretary four times each, attorney general and White House chief of staff three times each, and secretary of state, defense secretary and press secretary twice — and has had a rotating cast of defense lawyers. Even “The Apprentice” didn’t cycle through contestants this fast. The only constant: With few exceptions — chiefly daughter Ivanka Trump and son-in-law Jared Kushner — everybody disappoints Trump. Ty Cobb, a former Trump lawyer, told ABC News that special counsel Robert Mueller is an “American hero” and “I don’t feel the investigation is a witch hunt.” Presidential harassment! Trump has suffered a turnover rate in senior jobs of 65 percent, according to the Brookings Institution. Twenty-nine percent of those positions have turned over multiple times. Six former Trump advisers have been either indicted or convicted. Either Trump is a bad judge of talent, or nobody with talent wants to work for him, or he’s a terrible boss — or all three. “He is fundamentally disloyal,” Cohen testified last week. If only his appointees could be loyal and capable. Like Kim. Or Mohammed bin Salman. Or Vladimir Putin. Instead, they leak his schedule to Axios, place anonymous quotes or an op-ed, and disparage him publicly before taking the job (acting chief of staff Mick Mulvaney called him “a terrible human being”), on the job (Gary Cohn), on their way out (Jim Mattis, Nikki Haley) or after departing (Reince Priebus, Steve Bannon, Rex Tillerson, Omarosa Manigault Newman). At least 10 (including “gofer” Cliff Sims, “sick” James B. Comey and “deranged” Andrew McCabe) have written books. Just about everybody lets down the boss. Trump complained that Mulvaney botched border-wall negotiations, Mattis botched Afghanistan, Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome H. Powell botched the bull market — and Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin screwed up by suggesting Powell for the job. Trump blamed the Mueller probe on former White House counsel Donald Mc-Gahn, and he faulted acting attorney general Matthew Whitaker for failing to rein in the Cohen prosecution. Et tu, William Barr? During his confirmation hearings to replace Whitaker, Trump was reportedly startled to learn of Barr’s close friendship with Mueller. Trump’s third attorney general had better finish decorating his new office soon — before Trump’s fourth attorney general inevitably shows up. Dana Milbank is a Washington Post columnist.
With few exceptions — chiefly daughter Ivanka Trump and son-in-law Jared Kushner — everybody disappoints Trump. SAUL LOEB — GETTY IMAGES
Board Legislative Committee Attachment IV March 15, 2019
LOCAL // POLITICS Dianne Feinstein and Kamala Harris’ contrasts expose broader shift among Democrats
Tal Kopan March 10, 2019
UNITED STATES - SEPTEMBER 7: Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., left, and Sen. Kamala Harris, D-Calif., talk as they arrive in the Capitol for a vote on Thursday, Sept. 7, 2017. (Photo By Bill Clark/CQ Roll Call) Photo: Bill Clark / CQ-Roll Call Inc. 2017
WASHINGTON — They’re two of the most prominent women in the Senate and the Democratic Party. They both were born and made their careers in California, specifically the Bay Area. Nine times out of 10, they vote the same way.
But they also exemplify a growing divide among Democrats over the direction the party should take. Sen. Dianne Feinstein is a barrier-breaking politician with a storied career and several substantial laws to her name. But she’s increasingly finding herself at odds with an activist wing of the party frustrated with her attachment to compromise and bipartisanship.
Sen. Kamala Harris is running for president after just two years in Washington and a lengthy career in California as a prosecutor. She has embraced a progressive posture, positioning herself as a fighter against the Trump administration.
The two have a respectful relationship and are rarely in conflict on issues. But their distinct approaches to the job speak to a growing clash of ideas within the party on the best way forward.
“I think the central question when you look at Harris and Feinstein is, do you advance your politics in today’s day and age by being the most compelling and forceful, or do you do it by being the best able to find compromise solutions?” said Aram Fischer, a San Francisco organizer for the progressive advocacy group Indivisible.
Feintein, 85, is a political legend. She was the first woman to be mayor of San Francisco, the first woman from California to serve in the Senate and the first woman to hold multiple leadership positions in the Senate. She’s been a leader on legislation on issues including gun violence prevention, protecting immigrant children and environmental protections.
But she’s also started to run into pushback for her positions on some of those issues today. A video of her chastising children who were urging her to support the Green New Deal went viral, even spawning an online “Saturday Night Live” sketch. She faced criticism for her handling of Palo Alto University Professor Christine Blasey Ford’s allegations that then-Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh tried to rape her while they were in high school, and for her handling of the hearing into those allegations before his confirmation.
Feinstein has also lined up with more California Republicans than Democrats on some key water issues, including teaming with House Republican leader Kevin McCarthy of Bakersfield on extending a controversial water law that environmental advocates say would threaten key river ecosystems. Its supporters say the extension is necessary for drought preparedness.
The five-term senator faced an unexpectedly strong challenge to her re-election last year from the left in former state Sen. Kevin de León, who earned nearly 46 percent of the vote in the November election. The California Democratic Party even endorsed de León, who won 65 percent of ballots from the party’s progressive-trending executive board.
Harris, 54, spent her first two years in the Senate establishing progressive bona fides ahead of her 2020 presidential campaign. Where Feinstein has shunned the Green New Deal resolution, Harris has endorsed it. She was one of only three Senate Democrats who voted against an immigration compromise that would have funded President Trump’s border wall and made cuts to legal immigration in exchange for protecting young undocumented immigrants from deportation, a deal Feinstein supported. Harris walked out of Kavanaugh’s committee confirmation vote in protest — as the committee ranking Democratic member, Feinstein stayed behind — and has pledged to vote against every Trump appellate court nominee. Feinstein has made no such promise, though she has opposed most of his nominees nonetheless. Through their offices, both senators declined to comment for this story.
The pair often vote the same way — 87 percent of the time, according to a vote-tracking project from Pro Publica.
But the difference in style is nevertheless substantive, as the Democratic Party similarly is facing a moment of reckoning on which direction it should take.
“When you look at how Feinstein operates, it’s a throwback,” Fischer said. “She may be the last person in Congress who believes compromise is actually possible in Congress, and I think Harris is of a newer time where, for most of her political career, compromise has not only rarely happened but it may not even be possible. ... The party looks more like Kamala Harris than Dianne Feinstein and that shift has been somewhat quick and very stark, particularly in the Trump era.”
While the differences don’t put Harris and Feinstein at odds directly, the question of the best approach is consuming Democrats in Congress. In the Senate, at least six Democrats have declared they’re running or are exploring a campaign for president. Many of them are running as progressives, while others like Sen. Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota have positioned themselves as centrists.
Across the Capitol, the House has been grappling with an influx of enthusiastic freshmen on opposite ends of the debate. The new Democrats who flipped Republican districts in the midterms, earning the party the House majority, are loudly centrist and promote the idea of bipartisanship. But several progressive members have gained star power by pushing the party further to the left, including New York Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, who defeated the fourth-ranking Democrat in the House in their primary last year.
She has been one of the leading voices for the Green New Deal. After Feinstein’s brush with the young climate activists during which she said, “I’ve been doing this for 30 years. I know what I’m doing,” Ocasio- Cortez hosted a live video chat on Instagram in which she criticized people who say that “working on an issue for 30 years alone is ... what makes someone qualified to solve an issue.”
The New York Democrat told The Chronicle it was not specifically intended to attack Feinstein, but rather the mind-set she represented.
“I don’t think she’s the only one that’s made that argument,” Ocasio-Cortez said. “There’s this idea of just having worked on an issue for a long time as being that alone, like, a rationale. ... Obviously we have to draw on a lot of the work that’s already been done and the experiences of people and folks who have been doing this a long time. That alone I don’t think is sufficient.” Ocasio-Cortez has found an ally in Rep. Ro Khanna of Fremont, a progressive Democrat who has aligned with independent Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont and endorsed his campaign for the Democratic presidential nomination. Khanna campaigned for de León and wrote in an opinion piece that “on the big questions of this new century, Feinstein has been wrong.”
But Khanna said there is room for both approaches in the party and praised Feinstein’s record of policymaking even as they differ on policy.
“There are two aspects to being successful in Washington, D.C.: One is having a vision and proposing bold ideas, and then the other is having a record of getting things done,” Khanna said. “Kamala Harris has brought new ideas on criminal justice reform and moved the conversation on that, and I think Sen. Feinstein has had a record of achieving a lot of things, of getting things done.”
He also said that after her re-election, he sought Feinstein’s help on a legislative issue and found her to be “very, very gracious.”
“She said, ‘Ro ... public service matters more to me. I don’t hold grudges. I want you to know I’m happy to work with you on any issue for the state,’” Khanna said. “I thought it came from a wisdom of being there many years.”
Many of Feinstein’s colleagues also share a hesitation with the pressure from the left to embrace ambitious policies in the hopes of making rapid changes.
Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island, long a Democratic leader on combatting climate change, said he opposes the Green New Deal because it’s not “real legislation.” The nonbinding resolution would put Congress on record not just as supporting a zero-carbon emission country in a decade, but also affordable higher education, health care, economic security and housing for all Americans.
Whitehouse noted the “activist tradition” in the party, from protesters during the Kavanaugh hearing to a group that has targeted Feinstein at her home in the past, to young undocumented immigrant activists assembling at the offices of Democrats who support their cause.
“I think that activist strain has huge promise and opportunity in terms of getting people engaged and interested, but for those of us who need to move to actual bills, we’ve got to focus on the task in front of us rather than on those things,” Whitehouse said.
Democratic Sen. Chris Coons of Delaware, known for reaching across the aisle to Republicans to find common ground on issues, said that focusing on a campaign and focusing on legislation are mutually exclusive.
“It’s not possible to run for president and be a serious legislator at the same time,” Coons said. “Careening around the country to dozens of states, meeting tens of thousands of people, doing hundreds of media interviews and oh, by the way, raising hundreds of millions of dollars — you can’t do all that and seriously legislate.”
He said he’s thankful for Democratic Senate colleagues who opted out of a presidential run and hopes one of the field can strike the right balance between vision and results that require bipartisanship.
“We need folks who get Democratic values and are able to communicate to middle America ... married up to a policy development team back here that’s actually able to carry that through,” Coons said.
Tal Kopan is The San Francisco Chronicle’s Washington correspondent. Email: [email protected] Twitter: @talkopan