Ringside: Twelve Scarcity Enabling Laws to Scrap

Last week, as a representative of the California Policy Center, I had the opportunity to testify before a U.S. House of Representatives subcommittee at a hearing on the topic of “California Fires and the Consequences of Overregulation.” While my remarks were limited to five minutes, the written testimony that we entered into the Congressional Record was extensive. The policy recommendations we made were gathered from experts throughout the state including attorneys specializing in water rights, property rights, land use, and environmental law, along with representatives from private industry and public agencies, civil engineers, journalists, activists, and politicians.

Two weeks ago some of these recommendations were summarized on the topic “Ten State Water Laws to Scrap,” and, one week ago, “Conditions to put on Federal Relief Funds.” This week, drawing further from our written testimony submitted to Congress, are twelve more laws we recommend for repeal. Each of these flawed pieces of legislation play a role in stifling economic development. More specifically, they stifle healthy capitalist competition, which is the only practical way to deliver affordability, abundance, resilience, sustainability, and even in many respects the goals of equity and environmental protection in California. In short, these laws are doing far more harm than good. Let’s get rid of them all. Here they are:

Twelve Scarcity Enabling Laws to Scrap

1 – Repeal the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA, 1970), or, limit standing for lawsuits to elected law enforcement officials, and waive CEQA for housing, manufacturing and other employment projects, forest management, and infrastructure/utility and public service projects.

2 – Repeal the California Endangered Species Act (Fish and Game Code Section 2050 et. Seq) and the Fully Protected Species statutes (Fish and Game Code §§ 3511, 4700, 505, 5515) that duplicate and go far beyond the federal ESA.

3 – Repeal SB 1137 (2022) that requires 3,200 foot setbacks of oil wells from “sensitive receptors.” This bill puts California’s oil extraction and distribution industry at risk of collapse, risking in-state distribution capacity and only increasing imports of foreign oil.

4 – Permanently waive the California Air Resources Board (CARB) restrictions on prescribed burns that reduce fuel loads and fire risk in California’s forests and chaparral.

5 – Repeal AB 32 (Health and Safety Code § 38500 et seq.) and associated Executive Orders (S-3-05, B-16-12, B-18-12, B-30,15, B-55-18) that empower the Air Resources Board to regulate and reorder the entire California economy under the guise of climate change and reducing GHG emissions.

6 – Repeal SB 350, the Clean Energy and Pollution Reduction Act of 2015, that requires an increasing percent of California’s energy to come from non-fossil fuel sources.

7 – Repeal Public Resources Code 25402 that requires the California Energy Commission to adopt energy efficiency standards for residential and non-residential buildings. While there were no national energy standards in the 1970s and most of the 1980s, a national energy code (ICC IECC) is now updated every 3 years.

8 – Repeal SB 391 that requires statewide transportation investment and planning to be dictated by climate change/GHG reduction mandates resulting in blocking new highway investments and congestion relief.

9 – Repeal SB 375 (Gov’t Code Section 65080 (b)(2)) that subordinates all land use and housing development policy to government-created Greenhouse Gas Reduction (GHG) and Vehicle Miles Traveled Reduction (VMT) reduction targets.

10 – Repeal AB 686 that mandates “Affirmatively Furthering Fair Housing” obligations on local governments that duplicate and exceed the federal Fair Housing Act and require suburban cities and counties to develop high density affordable housing in existing neighborhoods.

11 – Repeal Labor Code Section 1720 et seq. that duplicates and goes beyond federal Davis Bacon requirements for public works projects adding huge costs to housing and infrastructure.

12 – The labor force is restricted right now due to AB 5. Rescinding AB 5 (2019) will allow small business architects, engineers and contractors to supplement their staff. There are not enough of these technical staff in the region so rescinding this bill would have a major impact on the speed of new construction including rebuilding in Los Angeles and elsewhere.

There is so much more, but we are going to have to move on. To view all of these recommendations, the entire written testimony can be found here.

Over the next several weeks, we look forward to refocusing on solutions. In particular, we will return to reviewing proposed projects and emerging technologies that will deliver cost-effective energy, water, transportation and housing innovations. Whether based on breakthrough technology, or simply adhering to practical common sense, these innovations will expose as obsolete the mandated remedies that our State Legislature feverishly seeks to impose.

It was fascinating while in Washington, DC to hear first-hand the impressions of people from the other 49 states have of California. Without exception, they characterized our state as the most beautiful place on earth. No argument there! But otherwise, and also without exception, we were criticized as having strayed from our roots. We have lost the practical vision that informed our leaders in the 1950s and 1960s when they built the infrastructure that even now, stretched to the limit through subsequent neglect, sustains our population.

We have also, in a curiously selective manner, lost faith in the ability of our otherwise peerless high-tech innovators to come up with new technologies to deliver energy and water abundance at affordable prices. Why is it that the Silicon Valley mantra of “better, faster, cheaper” applies to everything else, but not to these essentials of civilization? Our legislature attempts instead to destroy our legacy producers – think reservoirs and oil refineries – while mandating and subsidizing half-developed technologies that are not yet commercially competitive.

We can do so much better. Throw away the subsidies. Scrap the mandates. End the war on legacy producers. Encourage research into leapfrog technologies. Set our builders and innovators free, and make California affordable again.