Will Infighting Save California's Climate Laws?

by Chris Santiago · 2010-03-16 09:46:00 UTC
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Funny thing about the coalition backing a ballot initiative to suspend AB 32, California's landmark global warming law: It's not such a coalition after all.

According to the L.A. Times, a brouhaha's been brewing between Ted Costa, one of Suspend AB 32's original sponsors, and the backers willing to rake in big bucks from out-of-state polluters like oil giants Valero and Tesoro.

Costa is the chief executive of People's Advocate, an anti-tax organization that sees red anytime a bill looks green, but now looks like he's turned against those who are against AB 32. (He was "for it before he was against it.")

Why? "I wanted to do a grass-roots operation and involve a lot of people," Costa said in an interview. "But they believe they can run this thing out of the country club, and to hell with the little people of California." Bravo, Ted.

AB 32, as we've written in previous posts, is California's "global warming law," and has spurred job growth and investment in the clean tech sector. Its opponents spuriously claim that AB 32 is hurting job growth in the Golden State and want to suspend it until unemployment has been under 5.5 percent for a full year. (Unemployment is currently above 12 percent, but would be far worse if green jobs were also stymied.)

The dubious math behind the anti-AB 32 campaign has been roundly blasted by economists, as well as by Small Businesses California, a group of 4,000 small businesses that support AB 32. And beyond the number crunchers and entrepreneurs, the majority of Californians support the global warming law.

But what they support now and how they might be manipulated — via expensive and misleading ad campaigns, like the state saw the last time Big Oil was on the ballot — into a fear vote against the bill in tough economic ties are two very different things. We can only hope the initiative dies before it gets to the polls. Of course, that would also mean adding some more folks to the ranks of California's unemployed: The political consultants in Sacramento who could care less about our clean air.

Photo Credit: Marcy Reiford

Chris Santiago is a freelance writer and editor. He most recently worked at McGraw-Hill and "got green" at Oberlin College.
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