As Brown and his allies scrambled to round up support, several moderate Democrats who previously refused to support the legislation said they received calls from Jerry Abramson, deputy assistant to the president and White House director of intergovernmental affairs, urging them to support it.
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SB 32 requires the Air Resources Board to develop technologically feasible and cost-effective regulations to achieve the targeted reductions.
The bill, which was created by Assembly member Jim Cooper, will also require the CIF to hold legislative hearings and report to the Legislature and the Governor on its activities every seven years.
“There were so many of you last year who would not vote for this bill because you knew how damaging it would be to our economy”, Assemblyman James Gallagher, R-Plumas Lake, said of the 16 Democrats and one Republican who opposed or refused to vote on the bill last year but voted for it Tuesday.
The California State Assembly approved legislation Monday that would expand the rights of a deceased homeowner’s surviving loved ones, including widows, widowers and other heirs. If this debate is truly about reducing greenhouse gas emissions, then Californians deserve a real policy discussion that will address the issues raised by the experts. The bill now advances to the state Senate, where it is expected to pass before being signed into law by the governor.
Now the bill has jumped a hard hurdle by passing the Assembly.
While it was crafted with the aim of broadening support for S.B. One more vote and the Legislature will take its place in the annals of California’s storied climate history books. It’s fate is tied to AB 197.
California sold just a fraction of the carbon permits offered to cover emissions this year, receiving the minimum price at an auction last week, regulators said on Tuesday. That program has failed to live up to Brown administration projections, with only 34 percent of available credits sold at auction this month.
So far this year, the state has lost out on more than $1 billion in unsold allowances, which according to the rules of the program can be put up for sale again once two consecutive auctions have sold out (ClimateWire, May 27).
The bill does not extend California’s cap-and-trade program for carbon allowances. Selling out an auction and raising a set amount of revenue does not equate to overall success for the cap and trade program.
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The program is being challenged in court by the California Chamber of Commerce, which argues it’s a tax that should have been approved by two-thirds of the lawmakers in each legislative chamber.
