65,000 JOBS AND CLEANER AIR IN JEOPARDY (AGAIN)
Your Letters Needed by February 5!
When SB 827 (earlier known as SB 656) by Senator Roderick Wright (D-Los Angeles) was signed into law last year, it re-established a program at the South Coast Air Quality Management District (SCAQMD) that provided tightly regulated public service agencies, pollution control projects, public works agencies, schools, small businesses and others with the ability to access required air permits. For more than a year, a lawsuit by the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) had created a moratorium on the permits, bringing construction projects, business expansions and installation of new, less-polluting equipment to a halt.
With SB 827 the SCAQMD could issue more than 1,200 delayed permits on Jan. 1, meaning workers could be hired and businesses teetering on the brink of bankruptcy could start generating revenue again. But for how long?
The NRDC has struck again with a petition to the U. S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), calling on the federal government to halt SB 827 despite the fact it is wholly enforced within state lines.
Without the SB 827 program, small businesses and public services would not be able to afford required air permits which cost on average about $234,000 for a gas station, $1.6 million for a hospital boiler or a tortilla fryer and oven, and $115 million for a landfill gas-to-energy project. Instead, as we saw over the past year with the moratorium, projects and businesses would stall and the jobs that go with them would be lost.
The SCAQMD clearly delineates the potential impacts if the NRDC petition is granted by the EPA:
• At stake are as many as 1,300 permits that have been on hold, delaying up to $10 billion of investment in new projects in Southern California.
• Tens of thousands of jobs have been lost or new hiring delayed at a time when the region is experiencing the worst economic conditions of the past 50 years.
• The permit moratorium has resulted in a slower clean-up of the environment and even setting back efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions since many of these projects were unable to obtain permits for the installation of modern, cleaner equipment that reduces harmful emissions.
It is unconscionable that the NRDC wants to add to these woes by halting a program that is giving the economy a very helpful jolt and improving air quality in the bargain.
With their votes and signature, the Legislature and the Governor made clear that they support SCAQMD’s permit program for small businesses and public service projects that is the underpinning for 65,000 jobs and cleaner air.
As part of the large coalition supporting SB 827, including labor, small businesses, trade associations, chambers of commerce, school districts, cities, public works agencies and more, your voice is needed once more!
Please take a moment to write a letter to U.S. EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson and urge her to deny the petition to stay SB 827!
Click here to download a sample letter
Please Email your letter to: info@YesOnSB696.com by February 5, 2010.
It will be bundled with other coalition member letters to be personally delivered to the U.S. EPA Administrator.
BROAD COALITION SUPPORTS SB 696
TO SAVE JOBS, CONSTRUCT VITAL PROJECTS
Small business owners, local government leaders, labor leaders, public works officials, a police chief and others gathered at the Long Beach Airport to explain the hardship caused by the moratorium on issuing required permits for critical construction projects by the South Coast Air Quality Management District and to support SB 696, legislation designed to overturn the lawsuit.
View the video news release here.
Why We NEED SB 696 (Wright)
“SB 696 is urgently needed to save jobs and get
southern California’s economy up and running again.”
-- Senator Rod Wright (author of SB 696)
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