Oil industry initiative to repeal failure law could be up for a vote in November 2024: Indybay

The announcement that the initiative is eligible for a vote comes just three days after documents filed with the Secretary of State on Jan. 31 showed California’s oil and gas industry spent more than $34.2 million in the 2021-22 legislative session on SB 1137 and other bills. opposition from the oil industry included legislation to ban offshore drilling in state waters and to strip oil and gas companies’ California pensions.

SACRAMENTO, Calif. – An oil-industry-funded initiative to repeal SB 1137, a new California law requiring occupational health and safety restrictions on oil and gas wells, is eligible to vote in the Nov. 5, 2024 general election, the Secretary of State said. California State Shirley. N. Weber announced February 3.

The bill was supposed to go into effect on January 1, 2023, but approval of the ballot initiative would put the new law on hold for more than two years, angering environmental justice advocates who have been pushing for failures for years. .

Under the new law, there must be a 3,200-foot distance between homes, schools, hospitals, kindergartens, parks and other facilities open to the public and new and repaired oil and gas wells. Unlike other oil and gas producing states such as Colorado, North Dakota, and Pennsylvania, California had not required derogations for oil and gas wells until that point.

“The initiative required 997,139 valid petition signatures to be eligible to vote, representing eight percent of the total votes cast for governor in the November 2018 general election,” Weber said. “The initiative has crossed that threshold.”

If it is not withdrawn by the initiator prior to approval, the Secretary of State will certify on June 24, 2024 that the initiative qualifies for voting in the November 5, 2024 general election.

The initiative was supported by the California Independent Petroleum Association (CIPA). Documents filed with the California Secretary of State show that, as of Dec. 2, the oil companies had sent more than $20 million to the Stop the Power Outage committee, the Coalition of Small Business Owners, Concerned Taxpayers, Local Energy Producers, and the California Independent Petroleum Association.

“The Stop the Energy Shutdown petition, supported by nearly a million Californians, has qualified in record time and will give voters the right to vote on a measure that was passed at the last minute with little review and no scientific backing,” CIPA CEO Rock Zirman said in a statement. his speech. statement. “Senate Bill 1137 threatens the livelihoods of more than 50,000 hard-working Californians and forces the state to rely on more expensive imported foreign oil, which is completely exempt from California’s stringent environmental laws.”

According to the documents, eight sponsors of the referendum campaign have spent more than a million dollars each and are responsible for drilling within the allowed 3,200-foot retreat zone:

• Sentinel Peak resources: $4,500,000, 1,475 wells in the drop zone
Signal Hill Petroleum: $3,200,000 for 481 wells in the drop zone
• E&B Natural Resources Management: $2,950,000 for 1,230 wells in the drop zone
• Vaquero Energy Inc: $1,800,000 for 472 wells within the decline zone
• Crimson Resource Management Corp: $1,587,000 for 253 wells in the drop zone
• Macpherson Oil Company LLC: $1,486,000 for 227 wells in the drop zone
• Holmes Western Oil Corp: $1,000,000 per well in the drop zone
• California Independent Petroleum Association: $1,000,000; industry trade association without operating wells

Gov. Gavin Newsom, who signed SB 1137 in September, criticized the oil industry’s efforts to repeal the failing law.

“It’s one thing for big oil to make record profits by ripping off Californians at the gas station. It is quite another thing to insist on the continuation of harmful drilling near kindergartens, schools and our homes,” Newsom said in a statement. “The greedy oil companies know that drilling is causing more children to develop asthma, more children to be born with birth defects and more people to be exposed to toxic and dangerous chemicals, but they would rather endanger our health than sacrifice a single cent of their billionth arrived. .:

“Last year, I proudly signed SB 1137 to stop new oil drilling in our neighborhoods and protect families in California. Big Oil knows that California is moving beyond fossil fuels, so as they leave, these corporations are doing everything they can to extract profits by polluting our communities. We don’t stand for it. California will hold Big Oil accountable, and that will begin by lifting our price gouging fine to prevent gas price spikes like the one we saw last fall,” Newsom concluded.

Senator Lena Gonzalez, author of the postponement bill, also criticized the initiative in a tweet:

“Sanitary protection zones for drilling oil wells have been canceled today! Why? Because… Big Oil • paid people $20 a signature to lie • lie about protecting people when they are protecting their own profits • continues to pollute our communities. We’re still fighting!”

Kobi Nasek, coordinator of VISION, an environmental justice coalition fighting for setbacks, said: “Big Oil pushed the $20 million button to pay for a vote to repeal the hugely popular law. Indeed, this is a big bet, but what they don’t do I don’t understand is that they are betting against the power of the people. They bet against the Californians and lose.”

“This referendum has nothing to do with lowering gas prices as the oil and gas companies claim,” Brandon Dawson, director of the California Sierra Club, said in a press release. “This is a blatant attempt by the polluters to refrain from being held responsible for poisoning California’s most vulnerable communities. These communities – mostly black, brown and low-income neighborhoods – are already bearing the brunt of the effects of climate change, and the repeal of SB 1137 will put them even more at risk.”

The announcement that the initiative is eligible for a vote comes just three days after documents filed with the Secretary of State on Jan. 31 showed California’s oil and gas industry spent more than $34.2 million in the 2021-22 legislative session on SB 1137 and other bills. opposition from the oil industry included legislation to ban offshore drilling in state waters and to strip oil and gas companies’ California pensions.

A flood of big oil and gas lobbying money has also led to the approval of many new and revised oil and gas well permits, including many within the 3,200-foot sanitary safety zone, by CalGEM, the state oil and gas regulator. Uduak-Jo Ntuk, state oil and gas inspector for the California Division of Geological Energy Management (CalGEM), recently stepped down amid a 754% increase in new oil drilling permits issued in the fourth quarter of 2022.

According to Consumer Watchdog and the Fractracker Alliance, the Newsom administration has approved an astounding 13,725 oil and gas drilling permits in California.

CalGEM approved a total of 3,382 permits in 2022, including 551 permits for new well construction and 2,831 permits for oil well workovers.

Big Oil spent a total of $4,220,214 on lobbying in the last quarter from October 1 to December 31, 2022. Thus, the total expenses of oil and gas corporations on lobbying for the eight quarters of the 2021-2022 session amounted to $34,270,001. -access.sos.ca.gov/…

The Western States Petroleum Association, Sacramento’s largest and most influential corporate lobby group, spent $11,720,912 in its 2021-2022 sessions. They spent $1,734,594 of the $4,220,214 spent on lobbying by the California oil and gas industry in the eighth quarter.

Chevron Corporation, the San Ramon-based oil giant notorious for environmental destruction and degradation from the Ecuadorian Amazon to Richmond, California, spent a total of $8,631,118 lobbying California officials for the 2021-2022 session. They spent $782,341 of $4,220,214 on lobbying for fossil fuels in the fourth quarter.

The WSPA and the big oil companies use their power in 8 main ways: through (1) lobbying; (2) campaign spending; (3) maintain and place barkers on control panels; (4) creation of Astroturf groups; (5) work in cooperation with the media; (6) building alliances with trade unions; (7) contributions to non-profit organizations; and (8) sponsoring award ceremonies, including for legislators and journalists.

The Attorney General’s official title and summary of the measure is as follows:

LIMITS THE OPPORTUNITY OF VOTERS, STATE AND LOCAL AGENCIES TO CREATE INCOME FOR PUBLIC SERVICES. CONSTITUTIONAL AMENDMENT INITIATIVE. New or increased state taxes, which are currently passed by a two-thirds majority in the Legislature, also require statewide elections and majority approval. Limits the ability of voters to pay voter-proposed local special taxes by raising the voting requirement to two-thirds. Deprives voters of the ability to advise how to spend the proceeds of the proposed general tax on the same ballot as the proposed tax. Expanded the definition of “taxes” to include certain regulatory fees, broadening the application of tax approval requirements. Some other charges are required by the legislature or local government. Summary of Financial Analyst and CFO Assessment of Financial Impact on State and Local Governments: Lower State and Local Annual Revenues, Potentially Significantly Lower Depending on Future Actions by the Legislature, Local Governments, Voters and Courts. (21-0042A1.)

The Secretary of State’s tracking number for this measure is 1935, and the Attorney General’s tracking number is 21-0042A1.

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