Failing Up: Biden to Nominate Julie Su as Next US Labor Secretary

March 2, 2023 By Seung Min Kim and Zeke Miller 2 Comments

President Joe Biden is nominating Julie Su, the current deputy and former California official, as his next labor secretary, replacing the departing incumbent, former Boston Mayor Marty Walsh.

Su, a civil rights attorney and former head of California’s labor department, was central to negotiations between labor and freight rail companies late last year, working to avert an economically debilitating strike. She also has worked to broaden employee training programs and crack down on wage theft. If confirmed by the Senate, Su would also be the first Asian American in the Biden administration to serve in the Cabinet at the secretary level.

Biden, in a statement on Tuesday, called her a “champion for workers.”

“Julie is a tested and experienced leader, who will continue to build a stronger, more resilient, and more inclusive economy that provides Americans a fair return for their work and an equal chance to get ahead,” he said. “She helped avert a national rail shutdown, improved access to good jobs free from discrimination through my Good Jobs Initiative, and is ensuring that the jobs we create in critical sectors like semiconductor manufacturing, broadband and healthcare are good-paying, stable and accessible jobs for all.”

Su was considered to lead the department when Biden won the White House but instead became the department’s deputy. Walsh announced his intention to leave the administration earlier this month to lead the National Hockey League Players’ Association. Su will serve as the acting secretary until the Senate acts on her nomination.

Biden had been under pressure from the Congressional Asian Pacific American Caucus and other Asian American and Pacific Islander advocates to select Su to head the department. This administration was the first in more than two decades to not have a Cabinet secretary of AAPI descent, despite its regular declarations that it was the most diverse in history. Vice President Kamala Harris and U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai are of AAPI descent but don’t lead a Cabinet department.

Su, if confirmed, would also expand the majority of women serving in the president’s Cabinet. She was confirmed by the Senate to her current role in 2021 by a 50–47 vote.

Su’s nomination drew swift support from Democrats on Capitol Hill, with Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer saying she would be “phenomenal” in the job.

“The president couldn’t have picked a better nominee,” he told reporters. “I’m really excited about her, and we’re going to move to consider her nomination very, very quickly.”

Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., who will preside over Su’s confirmation hearing as chair of the Senate health, education, labor and pensions committee, praised the selection. Sanders had urged consideration of Sara Nelson, the president of the flight attendants union, but made clear Su had his strong support.

“I’m confident Julie Su will be an excellent Secretary of Labor,” he tweeted. “I look forward to working with her to protect workers’ rights and build the trade union movement in this country.”

But Louisiana Sen. Bill Cassidy, the top Republican on the Senate health, education and labor committee who opposed Su when she was selected for deputy secretary, called her work overseeing the department “troubling” and “anti-worker.”

The committee should “have a full and thorough hearing process,” Cassidy said.

Rep. Judy Chu, D-Calif., who chairs the Congressional Asian Pacific American Caucus, said she was “overjoyed” by the selection, thanking Biden in a tweet for “nominating your first AAPI Cabinet Secretary!”

“It certainly is better late than never,” Chu said in a brief interview, citing CAPAC support for Su two years ago for the top Labor post and praising Su’s credentials as a leader and enforcer of labor laws including minimum wage and occupational safety standards. She said GOP criticism about Su had been fully vetted two years ago and that the coming confirmation process will show their charges “have no basis.”

Chu noted that Biden had said he would name a Cabinet that looked like America, and “he fulfilled that promise.”

Su’s nomination also comes at a key moment for labor unions, which have been facing a decline in membership for decades. Unions gained some momentum as workers at major employers such as Amazon and Starbucks pushed to unionize. But Biden — an avowed pro-union president — had to work with Congress to impose a contract on rail workers last year to avoid a possible strike.

Click here to read the full article in AP News

Filed Under: Trending News Tagged With: ,

California Governor Vows to Change Law Blocking New Housing

March 1, 2023 By Olga Rodriguez 7 Comments

California Gov. Gavin Newsom said he’ll work this year to reform a landmark state environmental law that he says has been weaponized by wealthy homeowners to block badly-needed housing for students at the University of California, Berkeley.

Newsom’s comments over the weekend followed a state appeals court ruling that found the University of California “failed to assess potential noise impacts from loud student parties in residential neighborhoods near the campus” as required by the California Environmental Quality Act, or CEQA, when it planned new housing near the university.

The 1st District Court of Appeals’ ruling Friday could delay the building of a complex at Berkeley’s historic People’s Park, which is owned by the University of California, Berkeley, for years or even decades, Newsom said.

The housing complex would accommodate about 1,100 UC Berkeley students and 125 formerly homeless people. Part of the park would be set aside to commemorate its significance in the civil rights movement, university officials have said.

University officials said in a statement Monday they were “dismayed” by the decision and planned to file an appeal with the California Supreme Court, adding that their commitment to building the People’s Park project “is unwavering.”

The university called the appeals court decision “unprecedented and dangerous” because it could prevent colleges and universities across California from building student housing.

The project has faced opposition since its inception and last year two local organizations, Make UC a Good Neighbor and The People’s Park Historic District Advocacy Group, filed a lawsuit against it, citing the CEQA law and saying the university’s environmental impact report had not considered the housing complex would bring more noise to the area.

The landmark 1970 environmental law requires state and local agencies to evaluate and disclose significant environmental effects of projects and to find ways to lessen those effects. But in the decades since its passage, critics say the environmental law has been used by opponents of development to block housing and public transit projects.

Newsom said in a statement posted on Twitter the law is “broken.”

“This law needs to change, and I’m committed to working with lawmakers this year to making more changes so our state can build the housing we desperately need,” he added.

His office offered no additional details Monday about what changes he wants to see — and how soon. The environmental law is often cited as a nuisance but overhauling it is seen as politically perilous. Often, the Legislature passes exemptions for specific projects like sports stadiums to speed development.

Last March, the University of California, Berkeley said it would have to cap student enrollment after the California Supreme Court sided with irate neighbors who sued over the school’s growth. State lawmakers fast-tracked a fix to allow the campus to enroll as many students as planned for the 2022 fall semester, but the legislation did nothing to produce more housing.

State Sen. Scott Wiener, a Democrat from San Francisco, said the appeals court ruling was “horrific” and would have major implications for housing in California because it classifies noise from people as an environmental impact.

“It introduces the idea that people are pollution,” Wiener said.

Click here to read the full article in the AP News

Filed Under: Top Stories Tagged With: , ,

Emerald Triangle Communities Were Built on Cannabis. Legalization Has Pushed Them to the Brink

March 1, 2023 By Alexei Koseff 2 Comments

It’s shortly before 8 a.m. and a touch above freezing at the Trinity County Fairgrounds. The food bank’s February distribution won’t begin for another half hour, but the line of cars already stretches into a third row of the parking lot.

Joseph Felice, his red Dodge pickup idling with the heat cranked up, arrived around 7 to secure a spot near the front — eighth, to be exact — and ensure that he gets his pick of this month’s harvest: frozen catfish filets, eggplant, winter squash, potatoes, cans of mixed fruit, cartons of milk. Getting here early is crucial, because by the time the final cars roll through some two hours later — 210 families served — all that’s left are a few packages of diapers and noodles.

Things are getting desperate in this remote, mountainous community in far northern California, where cannabis is king — the economy, the culture, the everything. Over the past two years, the price of weed has plummeted and people are broke.

The monthly food bank distribution moved from a church to the fairgrounds last summer to accommodate surging demand. There’s only one sit-down restaurant left in town, a Mexican joint that closes every day at 6. Some residents have fled for Oklahoma, where it’s easier for cannabis cultivators to get licensed. Others are stuck, unable to unload their properties amid an abundance of supply and a dearth of demand.

“I don’t see the same faces that I did before,” said Felice, 67, who performed maintenance work for a local grower for five years, until they called it quits at the end of last season.

Felice lost not just his income, but also free housing on the farm. The food distribution is now a crucial bridge between Social Security checks and trips to Redding, 60 miles away, where he can get cheaper groceries.

Click here to read the full article at CalMatters

Filed Under: Trending News Tagged With: , ,

In Sacramento, Power Can Often Reside Within Families

February 28, 2023 By Laurel Rosenhall 3 Comments

Saga of Mia and Rob Bonta is at once familiar — and jarring

SACRAMENTO — Inside the California Capitol, political power often rests within families.

Seats in the Legislature often pass from parent to child or from husband to wife. Five members of the fabled Calderon family of Los Angeles County — three brothers, a son and current Assemblymember Lisa Calderon, the wife of a former assemblyman — have served in the Legislature. And a few years ago, Assemblymember Blanca Rubio and state Sen. Susan Rubio made history as California’s first set of sister lawmakers.

So the story of Assemblymember Mia Bonta and her husband, Atty. Gen. Rob Bonta, is at once familiar and also jarring.

They are Democrats from the Bay Area city of Alameda. Mia Bonta was elected in 2021 to fill the Assembly seat her husband had held after Rob Bonta was appointed attorney general. The pair have been in the news in recent weeks as reporters questioned whether it was ethical for Assemblymember Bonta to oversee taxpayer funding for the office of Atty. Gen. Bonta. Mia Bonta heads the Assembly budget panel focused on public safety, which had purview over the Department of Justice, which is led by her husband.

Political ethics experts raised concerns about the arrangement, and editorial boards criticized legislative leaders for the apparent conflict of interest. Even Chuck Todd, moderator of NBC News’ “Meet the Press,” weighed in.

“It’s a bad look and it’s only going to reinforce what happens when you have one-party rule,” he said after reporter Ashley Zavala of NBC’s Sacramento affiliate broke the story.

Assemblymember Bonta eventually said she would recuse herself from decisions affecting the Department of Justice. Days later, the separation was made formal when the budget chairman moved oversight of the Department of Justice to a different subcommittee. The immediate conflict appears to have been resolved.

Mia Bonta maintains that her position had been cleared by Assembly ethics officials and that she recused herself to support transparency and stop distractions.

“I definitely note that it’s a thing that needs to be navigated carefully,” she said.

Still, a larger question lingers: Where should public officials who are family members draw the line between their shared interests and their separate responsibilities?

In addition to the many family members who serve together in the Legislature, several state lawmakers have had spouses who work on policy issues that come before the Legislature or serve in local governments that receive state funding.

“I don’t see those situations different from this particular situation,” Mia Bonta said.

The Bontas call themselves partners in life and partners in service. They’ve shared a passion for social justice since they got together as freshmen at Yale. And they’ve used their respective offices to advance some of the same causes.

Last year, Assemblymember Bonta wrote a bill to create an office in the Department of Justice to research policies to curb gun violence. A few months after it stalled in the Legislature, she joined her husband as he announced his department would form the office anyway, but that didn’t spark controversy.

But before Mia Bonta was elected to the Assembly, there was a financial transaction involving the couple that several experts said was legal but unethical. As an Assembly member, Rob Bonta created a nonprofit foundation and solicited donations to it from companies that lobbied the Legislature. He then used the foundation’s money to make a payment to the nonprofit organization that employed his wife.

(He described the $25,000 as a loan in 2020, though tax returns at the time didn’t reflect that.)

It wasn’t the first time Rob Bonta had directed money to Mia Bonta’s employer.

Over several years he donated money from his campaign funds to organizations where she worked, obtaining letters saying the groups would not use the funds for her salary because state law prohibits politicians from using campaign funds for personal benefit. He also asked interest groups to donate to nonprofits where she was employed.

“We’re working on areas of shared passion,” he told me at the time.

After a news story was published about the matter, Rob Bonta stepped down from the board of his foundation and it established new rules prohibiting both members of the couple from making spending decisions and banning donations to organizations that employ either one of them.

And California’s political watchdog agency approved a new rule requiring officials to report their ties to an organization when they ask donors to give money to a group that employs, or is controlled by, the official, their staff or their family members.

“These are relationships with a potential for influence or self-dealing that the public would want to have disclosed,” says a staff report to the commission.

Officials should not direct money to organizations that employ their family members because of the potential for their personal benefit, said Jessica Levinson, a professor at Loyola Law School and former president of the Los Angeles Ethics Commission.

In other cases, she said, defining where to draw the line is not always obvious.

Click here to read the full article in the LA Times

Filed Under: Top Stories Tagged With: , , ,

The latest threats to direct democracy in California

February 28, 2023 By Jon Coupal 2 Comments

Since 1911, Californians have possessed powerful tools to control indolent or corrupt politicians. The rights of direct democracy — initiative, referendum and recall — are enshrined in the California Constitution for reasons that are just as compelling in 2023 as they were more than a century ago.

But make no mistake, politicians hate direct democracy and view it as a threat to their political power or, at a minimum, as an intrusion on their legislative responsibilities. It is no surprise, then, when legislators introduce proposals to weaken direct democracy, and this legislative session is no different.

Last month, progressive legislators introduced Senate Constitutional Amendment 1 to gut the recall power. Under current law, voters can recall a state officer by majority vote and, in the same election, elect a successor with a plurality of the vote. In addition, the state constitution prohibits a public official who is the subject of a recall election from being a candidate for successor.

In a fundamental change to the Constitution, SCA 1 would leave an office vacant in the event of a successful recall until a replacement is elected in a special election, or if there is insufficient time to hold a special election, the office would remain vacant for the remainder of the term. This deprives voters of knowing who might replace the officer they are recalling and creates a new concern that a public office could remain unfilled with no one to perform the duties of that office.

In addition, under SCA 1 the rules would be different for a gubernatorial recall. If a governor is removed from office in a recall election, the lieutenant governor becomes governor for the remainder of the unexpired term. In a one-party state like California, this renders a recall for governor nearly pointless.

If SCA 1 sounds familiar, it is nearly identical to SCA 3, which was introduced in the last legislative session but, fortunately, did not progress very far. Perhaps the reason the proposal stalled last year is the realization that, as a proposed constitutional amendment, it would have to be approved by a majority of the statewide electorate. Public polling reveals that Californians support direct democracy, including the right to bounce bad politicians.

Another threat to direct democracy is an effort by the municipal bond industry to obscure the true cost of tax hikes and bond measures.

Senate Bill 532, introduced by Sen. Scott Wiener, D-San Francisco, seeks to weaken two existing transparency bills, Assembly Bills 809 and 195 (by then-Assemblyman Jay Obernolte, 2015-2016), sponsored by the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association. Taken together these bills state that for all local tax and bond measures, the rate of the tax, its duration and the total amount of money to be raised are disclosed right on the ballot label. While SB 532 continues to include most of this information, for local bonds and tiered special taxes it relegates it off the ballot label and buries it in the separately mailed voter information guide. When confronting special taxes that will be on tax rolls for decades, it is imperative that voters have as much information as possible.

Click here to read the full article in the OC Register

Filed Under: Trending News Tagged With: , ,

As City-State Housing War Heats Up, One Rich California Enclave Gets a Pass

February 27, 2023 By Dan Walters 7 Comments

The guerrilla war between Gov. Gavin Newsom and some of California’s 482 cities over housing policy is heating up.

The state has imposed quotas on local governments to provide – on paper – enough land for much-needed housing, particularly projects for low- and moderate-income families, and streamline permits for projects.

While most are complying, albeit with some reluctance, others are trying to thwart the mandate. Resistance is strongest in small suburban cities dominated by wealthy residents who live in spacious homes on very large lots and don’t want dense condo or apartment projects to spoil the bucolic atmosphere of their neighborhoods.

That said, the sharpest conflict in California’s housing war pits a not-so-wealthy Orange County city, Huntington Beach, against the state. The city has basically declared it won’t meet the state’s demands, and Newsom and Attorney General Rob Bonta are suing to force compliance.

“The City of Huntington Beach continues to attempt to evade their responsibility to build housing, but they will simply not win,” Newsom said last week, just before Huntington Beach formally declared its rebellion. “City leaders have a choice – build more housing or face very real consequences – including loss of state funds, substantial fines, and loss of local control.”

“The city has a duty to protect the quality and lifestyle of the neighborhoods that current owners have already bought into and for the future sustainability of Huntington Beach,” City Councilman Pat Burns wrote in a letter to his colleagues prior to their action. “Radical redevelopment in already-established residential neighborhoods is not only a threat to quality and lifestyle, but to the value of the adjacent and neighboring properties.”

Afterwards, Newsom’s office tweeted, “Tonight, Huntington Beach leaders decided that their residents don’t need affordable housing. This is a pathetic pattern by politicians more focused on taking down pride flags than on real solutions. CA needs more housing. Time for Huntington Beach to start acting like it.”

It’s at least noteworthy that the affluent suburbs seeking ways around their quotas, mostly in the San Francisco Bay Area, are overwhelmingly Democratic in their political orientation while Huntington Beach is a Republican stronghold.

Interestingly, while the battle over land use and housing continues elsewhere, residents of arguably California’s most exclusive community don’t have to worry about multi-family housing projects spoiling their ambiance because of a quirk in the law.

That would be Montecito, home to celebrities galore, including Oprah Winfrey, Rob Lowe, Ellen DeGeneres and, most recently, expatriate British Prince Harry and his wife, actress Meghan Markle.

Montecito lies next to the Santa Barbara but is not a city. Rather, it is an unincorporated community governed by the Santa Barbara County Board of Supervisors.

The county’s cities have their own quotas, but all of its unincorporated territory is folded into one quota of 5,664 units. The county’s plan, unveiled last month, identifies potential building sites, mostly near the cities of Santa Barbara and Santa Maria and the communities of Orcutt, Goleta, Isla Vista and Carpinteria.

Some of the sites are vacant while others are occupied, including some shopping centers and churches. None is in Montecito or an adjacent enclave called Summerland, even though the county’s inventory of vacant land includes about a dozen parcels, some of them fairly large, in those two communities.

Click here to read the full article in CalMatters

Filed Under: Top Stories Tagged With: , ,

Bills Would Let Transgender People Seal Name-Change Requests

February 27, 2023 By Hannah Schoenbaum, Sophie Austin, and Manuel Valdes 4 Comments

SEATTLE (AP) — You can change your name, but in many states you can’t completely shed your old one — something that’s of particular concern to transgender people and that legislators in at least two states are trying to change.

A bill in Washington would allow gender expression and identity as reasons to seal, or keep out of the public record, a future petition for a name change. And a California bill would require the sealing of petitions by minors to change their name and gender on identity documents.

In states where such petitions aren’t sealed, transgender people can be susceptible to cyberbullying or even physical violence because their previous names, and by extension their lives, are an open book in the public record, advocates warn. Students, for instance, can and do easily find and share such records when they are looking for background on a new kid in town, one advocate noted.

Maia Xiao, a University of Washington graduate student, has changed her name in that state and said the publication of a transgender friend’s name-change records in an online forum led to relentless harassment, including hate mail. She wrote last summer to Democratic state Sen. Jamie Pedersen to urge reform.

“It feels very close to me,” said Xiao, who would not disclose the name of her friend, citing privacy. “I don’t live a very online life, but it’s really scary to know that something so personal can be so easily accessed by transphobic trolls who want to cause harm.”

Pedersen is sponsoring the Washington legislation, which passed the Senate this month with bipartisan support and is expected to also pass the House. The bill is modeled on laws in New York and Oregon and would also extend records privacy to refugees, emancipated minors and people who have been granted asylum.

Currently, only people subjected to domestic violence can have their name changes easily sealed in Washington. Some other states, including California, also make exceptions for victims of crimes like human trafficking, stalking and sexual assault.

“This seemed to me like a simple action that could go a long way in making transgender people a lot safer in our state,” Pedersen said.

Some officials and law enforcement officers worry that criminals who request a name change could escape accountability under the proposals. The Washington bill would allow courts to unseal a name change file if law enforcement had reasonable suspicions, and sex offenders and incarcerated people would still be ineligible for a sealed name change.

“This is not the intent of the bill, and such cases would be rare, but there needs to be procedures in place to prevent it,” Jennifer Wallace, executive director of the Washington Association of County Officials, said in an email.

The approaches in Washington and California contrast starkly with recent and mysterious moves in Florida and Texas to compile lists of trans residents using public records, and as lawmakers in at least 39 states consider a torrent of anti-trans bills.

Republicans’ “disturbing” requests for data on transgender residents in some of those states add urgency to his proposal, Pedersen said.

The office of Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton last year requested data on how many people had changed the gender information on their driver’s licenses. The Texas Department of Public Safety found over 16,000 gender changes during the prior two years but didn’t turn over data because it could not determine the reason for each change.

In Florida, Gov. Ron DeSantis asked state universities last month for data on students who had sought or received treatments for gender dysphoria. Neither Paxton nor DeSantis explained why they requested the data.

Harassment from such disclosures can especially target young trans people who struggle with mental health issues or gender dysphoria, advocates say. The same internet forum that Xiao said had targeted her friend came under fire last year for instances of doxxing trans people, or maliciously publishing their personal information online, and has been linked to suicides.

Peers may search students’ names as they move to a new middle or high school and can easily find and share court records related to their petitions for a name and gender change, said Kathie Moehlig, executive director of the San Diego nonprofit TransFamily Support Services. She approached California Assembly Speaker Pro Tem Chris Ward with the idea for the bill after students she advises brought the trend to her attention.

Many families with trans children aren’t even aware such records are public, Moehlig said.

“Somebody’s gender identity is an innate piece about them — it’s intimate,” she said. “They deserve the right to the privacy around their identity.”

The California bill, which was introduced last month and has not yet been scheduled for a hearing, would require the state to seal any petition filed by a person under 18 for a change to gender and sex or to gender, sex and name in identity documents. Also sealed would be documents from a petitioner’s court proceedings.

San Diego lawyer Clarice Barrelet, whose 11-year-old son is transgender, said simply plugging his name into a search engine shows his legal gender change.

He had insisted by age 6 that he should not be called a girl and would grow up to be a man, Barrelet said. He came out as transgender at age 8 and changed the name and pronouns he used in school, even before his mom petitioned the court for a legal change to his identity documents.

Barrelet said she thinks those records should be sealed for children and adults to better protect their privacy.

Click here to read the full article in AP News

Filed Under: Trending News Tagged With: , , ,

Race to Zero: Can California’s Power Grid Handle a 15-Fold Increase in Electric Cars?

February 26, 2023 By Nadia Lopez 10 Comments

As California rapidly boosts sales of electric cars and trucks over the next decade, the answer to a critical question remains uncertain: Will there be enough electricity to power them?

State officials claim that the 12.5 million electric vehicles expected on California’s roads in 2035 will not strain the grid. But their confidence that the state can avoid brownouts relies on a best-case — some say unrealistic — scenario: massive and rapid construction of offshore wind and solar farms, and drivers charging their cars in off-peak hours.

Under a groundbreaking new state regulation, 35% of new 2026 car models sold in California must be zero-emissions, ramping up to 100% in 2035. Powering these vehicles and electrifying other sectors of the economy means the state must triple its power generation capacity and deploy new solar and wind energy at almost five times the pace of the past decade. 

The Air Resources Board enacted the mandate last August — and just six days later, California’s power grid was so taxed by heat waves that an unprecedented, 10-day emergency alert warned residents to cut electricity use or face outages. The juxtaposition of the mandate and the grid crisis sparked widespread skepticism: How can the state require Californians to buy electric cars if the grid couldn’t even supply enough power to make it through the summer?

At the same time as electrifying cars and trucks, California must, under state law, shift all of its power to renewables by 2045. Adding even more pressure, the state’s last nuclear power plant, Diablo Canyon, is slated to shut down in 2030.

With 15 times more electric cars expected on California’s roads by 2035, the amount of power they consume will grow exponentially. But the California Energy Commission says it will remain a small fraction of all the power used during peak hours — jumping from 1% in 2022 to 5% in 2030 and 10% in 2035.

“We have confidence now” that electricity will meet future demand “and we’re able to plan for it,” said Quentin Gee, a California Energy Commission supervisor who forecasts transportation energy demand.

But in setting those projections, the state agencies responsible for providing electricity — the California Energy Commission, the California Independent System Operator and the California Public Utilities Commission — and utility companies are relying on multiple assumptions that are highly uncertain.

“We’re going to have to expand the grid at a radically much faster rate,” said David Victor, a professor and co-director of the Deep Decarbonization Initiative at UC San Diego. “This is plausible if the right policies are in place, but it’s not guaranteed. It’s best-case.” 

Yet the Energy Commission has not yet developed such policies or plans, drawing intense criticism from energy experts and legislators. Failing to provide enough power quickly enough could jeopardize California’s clean-car mandate — thwarting its efforts to combat climate change and clean up its smoggy air.

“We are not yet on track. If we just take a laissez-faire approach with the market, then we will not get there,” said Sascha von Meier, a retired UC Berkeley electrical engineering professor who specializes in power grids. The state, she said, is moving too slowly to fix the obstacles in siting new clean energy plants and transmission lines. “Planning and permitting is very urgent,” she said.

The twin goals of ramping up zero-emission vehicle sales and achieving a carbon-free future can only be accomplished, Victor said, if several factors align: Drivers must avoid charging cars during evening hours when less solar energy is available. More than a million new charging stations must be operating. And offshore wind farms — non-existent in California today — must rapidly crank out a lot of energy.

To provide enough electricity to meet total demand, California must: 

  • Convince drivers to charge their cars during off-peak hours: With new discounted rates, utilities are urging residents to avoid charging their cars between 4 p.m. and 9 p.m. But many people don’t have unrestricted access to chargers at their jobs or homes.
  • Build solar and wind at an unprecedented pace: Shifting to all renewables requires at least 6 gigawatts of new resources a year for the next 25 years — a pace that’s never been met before.
  • Develop a giant new industry: State officials predict that offshore wind farms will provide enough power for about 1.5 million homes by 2030 and 25 million homes by 2045. But no such projects are in the works yet. Planning them, obtaining an array of permits and construction could take at least seven to eight years.
  • Build 15 times more public chargers: About 1.2 million chargers will be needed for the 8 million electric cars expected in California by 2030. Currently, about 80,000 public chargers operate statewide, with another estimated 17,000 on the way, according to state data. 
  • Expand vehicle-to-grid technology: State officials hope electric cars will send energy back to the grid when electricity is in high demand, but the technology is new and has not been tested in electric cars. 
  • Increase electricity production by up to 42% in 2035 and, under a recent scenario, as much as 85% in 2045, according to California Energy Commission estimates. Generation capacity — the maximum that must be installed to meet demand throughout a given year  — would need to triple by 2045.

Day and night charging

Climate change has already stressed California’s energy grid, especially during hot summer months when residents crank up air conditioners in the late afternoon and early evening. 

Providing electricity during those hot summer evenings — when people use the most — will be a challenge, said Gee of the California Energy Commission.

“That’s what we’re particularly concerned about,” he said. “We have enough electricity to support consumption the vast majority of the time. It’s when we have those peak hours during those tough months.”

The total electricity consumed by Californians is expected to surge by 96% between 2020 and 2045, while net demand during peak hours is projected to increase 60%, according to a study commissioned by San Diego Gas & Electric. 

Southern California Edison worries that if drivers charge during late summer afternoons, electric vehicles could strain the grid, said Brian Stonerock, the utility’s director of business planning and technology. Edison’s service area includes the desert, where customers rely on air conditioning, and their peak use times are when solar power is less available as the sun goes down.

Concerns about the grid “are quite a big deal for us,” he said. “We don’t want people to be confused or lose confidence that the utility is going to be able to meet their needs.”

But for many drivers, charging during the day or late at night is not a problem: Most electric cars have chargers that can be automatically turned on after 9 p.m. But for some drivers, especially those who live in apartments or condominiums, charging during those hours may not be an option. 

That’s because — unlike filling a gas tank — charging an electric car takes much longer. Drivers may not have a reliable place to park their cars for long periods of time during the day while they work or late at night when they’re home. To encourage daytime charging, Victor said the state must drastically boost the number of fast chargers and workplace stations.

Click here to read the full article in California Globe

Filed Under: Top Stories Tagged With: , , ,

Los Angeles Area Still Blanketed by Snow in Rare Heavy Storm

February 26, 2023 By John Antczak and Ken Kusmer 5 Comments

A powerful winter storm that swept down the West Coast with flooding and frigid temperatures shifted its focus to southern California on Saturday, swelling rivers to dangerous levels and dropping snow in even low-lying areas around Los Angeles.

The National Weather Service said it was one of the strongest storms to ever hit southwest California and even as the volume of wind and rain dropped, it continued to have significant impact including snowfall down to elevations as low as 1,000 feet (305 meters). Hills around suburban Santa Clarita, north of Los Angeles, were blanketed in white, and snow also surprised inland suburbs to the east.

Rare blizzard warnings for the mountains and widespread flood watches were ending late in the day as the storm tapered off in the region. Forecasters said there would be a one-day respite before the next storm arrives on Monday.

After days of fierce winds, toppled trees and downed wires, more than 120,000 California utility customers remained without electricity, according to PowerOutage.us. And Interstate 5, the West Coast’s major north-south highway, remained closed due to heavy snow and ice in Tejon Pass through the mountains north of Los Angeles.

Multiday precipitation totals as of Saturday morning included a staggering 81 inches (205 centimeters) of snow at the Mountain High resort in the San Gabriel Mountains northeast of Los Angeles and up to 64 inches (160 centimeters) farther east at Snow Valley in the San Bernardino Mountains.

Rainfall totals as of late Saturday morning were equally stunning, including nearly 15 inches (38.1 centimeters) at Los Angeles County’s Cogswell Dam and nearly 10.5 inches (26.6 cm) in the Woodland Hills section of Los Angeles.

“Quite a remarkable storm the last few days with historic amounts of precip and snow down to elevations that rarely see snow,” the LA-area weather office wrote.

The Los Angeles River and other waterways that normally flow at a trickle or are dry most of the year were raging with runoff Saturday. The Los Angeles Fire Department used a helicopter to rescue four homeless people who were stranded in the river’s major flood control basin. Two were taken to a hospital with hypothermia, said spokesperson Brian Humphrey.

In the Valencia area of north Los Angeles County, the roiling Santa Clara River carried away three motorhomes early Saturday after carving into an embankment where an RV park is located. No one was hurt, KCAL-TV reported, but one resident described the scene as devastating.

The storm, fueled by low pressure rotating off the coast, did not depart quietly. Lightning strikes shut down LA County beaches and scattered bursts of snow, showers and thunderstorms persisted.

Derek Maiden, 57, who lives in a tent in LA’s Echo Park neighborhood, collected cans in the rain to take to a recycling center. He said this winter has been wetter than usual. “It’s miserable when you’re outside in the elements,” he said.

Meanwhile, people farther east were struggling to deal with the fallout from storms earlier this week.

More than 350,000 customers were without power in Michigan as of early Saturday afternoon, according to reports from the the two main utilities in the state, DTE and Consumers Energy. Both said they hope to have the lights back on for most of their customers by Sunday night.

Brian Wheeler, a spokesman for Consumers Energy, said half an inch (1.27 centimeters) of ice weighed down some power lines — equivalent to the weight of a baby grand piano.

“People are not just angry but struggling,” said Em Perry, environmental justice director for Michigan United, a group that advocates for economic and racial justice. “People are huddling under blankets for warmth.”

She said the group will demand that utilities reimburse residents for the cost to purchase generators or replace spoiled groceries.

In Kalamazoo, Michigan, Allison Rinker was using a borrowed generator to keep her 150-year-old house warm Saturday after two nights in the cold and dark.

“We were all surviving, but spirits were low on the second day,” she said. “As soon as the heat came back and we were able to have one or two lights running, it was like a complete flip in attitude.”

After driving to a relative’s home to store food, Rinker, 27, compared the destruction of trees to tornado damage.

“The ice that was falling off the trees as it was melting was hitting our windshield so hard, I was afraid it was going to crack,” she said. “There’s just tree limbs everywhere, half of the trees just falling down. The destruction is insane.”

Back in California, the Weather Prediction Center of the National Weather Service forecast heavy snow over the Cascade Mountains and the Sierra Nevada through the weekend.

The low-pressure system was also expected to bring widespread rain and snow in southern Nevada by Saturday afternoon and across northwest Arizona Saturday night and Sunday morning, the National Weather Service office in Las Vegas said.

An avalanche warning was issued for the Sierra Nevada backcountry around Lake Tahoe, which straddles the California-Nevada border. Nearly 2 feet (61 cm) of new snow had fallen by Friday and up to another 5 feet (1.5 meters) was expected when another storm moves in with the potential for gale-force winds and high-intensity flurries Sunday, the weather service said.

In Arizona, the heaviest snow was expected late Saturday through midday Sunday, with up to a foot of new snow possible in Flagstaff, forecasters said.

Weekend snow also was forecast for parts of the upper Midwest to the Northeast, with pockets of freezing rain over some areas of the central Appalachians. The storm was expected to reach the central high Plains by Sunday evening.

At least three people have died in the coast-to-coast storms. A Michigan firefighter died Wednesday after coming into contact with a downed power line, while in Rochester, Minnesota, a pedestrian died after being hit by a city-operated snowplow. Authorities in Portland, Oregon, said a person died of hypothermia.

Much of Portland was shut down with icy roads after the city’s second-heaviest snowfall on record this week: nearly 11 inches (28 centimeters). While the city saw sunny skies and temperatures approaching 40 degrees Saturday afternoon, the reprieve — and thaw — was short-lived. More snow was expected overnight and Sunday.

Click here to read the full article in AP News

Filed Under: Trending News Tagged With: , ,

GOP Voters Favor DeSantis

February 25, 2023 By Seema Mehta 25 Comments

Poll of Californians has Trump trailing for 2024 nod

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis has surged to a lead among California Republicans over former President Trump for the party’s 2024 presidential nomination, a poll released Friday found.

About 37% of GOP voters backed DeSantis, while 29% preferred Trump, according to the new UC Berkeley Institute of Governmental Studies poll co-sponsored by the Los Angeles Times. These numbers are a near mirror image of the support for the two in an August poll conducted by Berkeley.

Other hopefuls trailed far behind, with none receiving more than 7% in the poll.

California matters to Republican presidential contenders despite its overall Democratic majority. Nearly 2.3 million voters cast ballots for Trump in California’s March 2020 primary, the most in any state in the nation.

DeSantis has taken a particularly strong lead among Republican voters with a college degree, who back him by more than 2 to 1 over Trump. The former president has the support of Republicans who did not attend college, and the two run close to even among those who have some college experience but not a four-year degree.

Among California Republicans who voted for Trump in 2020, DeSantis leads by 11 percentage points in the new poll; he trailed Trump by 14 points among such voters six months ago.

“There is serious defection among his ranks,” said Mark DiCamillo, director of the IGS poll. “These voters are now on board with DeSantis more than Trump. That’s fairly significant.”

The poll results come just over a week before DeSantis is scheduled to visit Southern California, with speeches in Orange County and at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in Simi Valley, spots where he will meet with well-heeled Republican donors and party leaders.

The survey also illuminated Californians’ complicated views about President Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris in a state where fellow Democrats outnumber Republicans nearly 2 to 1 among registered voters.

Although Biden’s approval ratings improved in recent months, with 57% of the state’s voters now praising his job performance, the same share of voters don’t want the 80-year-old to run for reelection next year.

Even with Harris’ California roots, nearly 6 in 10 of those surveyed were not enthusiastic about her running for the White House if Biden decides to not seek another term. She grew up in the Bay Area and served as San Francisco’s district attorney, the state’s attorney general and California’s U.S. senator.

“Usually, it’s the case that people in your own area are most positive about you, and people outside of your area learn more about you and eventually get on board. That hasn’t been the case for Kamala,” DiCamillo said. “In fact, looking at … the enthusiasm [voters have for her running] for president, in the Bay Area, it’s less than it is in Los Angeles. That’s telling to me. She’s never had a real strong base of support in the Bay Area, and it’s true the entire two-year period of following her as vice president.”

Regardless of those qualms, barring an unprecedented political shift, California’s 54 electoral votes will easily wind up in Democrats’ column in the November 2024 presidential election. Biden leads DeSantis by 23 points among the state’s voters in a hypothetical match-up and beats Trump by 30 points, according to the poll. In 2020, Biden bested Trump by 29% in California.

The state’s presidential primary, which will occur in March next year, could be pivotal in deciding the Republican nomination. California will once again have the largest delegation at the 2024 Republican National Convention in Milwaukee, where the party will officially select its nominee.

In addition, the state is home to an enormous group of wealthy donors. In 2020, Trump and his supporting groups received more than $92 million from California donors, making the state the third-largest home of his financial backers, according to the Center for Responsive Politics. The numbers are significant undercounts because they do not include contributions to political action committees or individual donations under $200.

This is one major reason why prominent Republicans, including former Vice President Mike Pence, former Secretary of State Michael R. Pompeo and former United Nations Ambassador Nikki Haley are among the White House hopefuls who have visited the state since the last presidential election.

Haley recently announced a 2024 presidential bid; Pence, Pompeo and others are believed to be eyeing a bid.

Along with Trump and DeSantis, Pence, Pompeo and Haley were among the 11 Republicans included in the potential presidential field in the Berkeley IGS poll.

DeSantis is scheduled to speak at the Reagan Library as well as at a fundraiser for the Orange County GOP on March 5. Although it’s unclear whether he is raising money for committees supporting his electoral efforts, DeSantis will meet and mingle with major GOP donors at the events, which are taking place in citadels of wealthy and well-connected conservatives, according to sources familiar with his plans.

The polling shows why such regions may be essential to the DeSantis campaign if he runs. Republican voters who are more educated and wealthier are far more likely to support the Florida governor over Trump.

GOP college graduates backed DeSantis over Trump, 39% to 21%, in the poll, while Republicans with a postgraduate education preferred DeSantis over Trump by nearly 3 to 1. By contrast, Republican voters with no more than a high school education preferred Trump over DeSantis, 45% to 30%.

There were similar disparities among voters with different incomes, with GOP voters in wealthier California households being far more likely to support DeSantis than Trump.

White voters without a college education have long been Trump’s strongest supporters, and his weakness among college-educated voters, which emerged during the 2016 election, helped Democrats win in former conservative bastions such as Orange County that year — the first time the county supported a Democrat for president since the Great Depression. That dynamic was evident in the 2018 midterms and the 2020 presidential contest.

The poll indicates that the college divide is splitting Republican ranks, echoing other surveys that have shown that division nationally.

That could benefit DeSantis in states such as California, in which college graduates make up a large share of the electorate. But it could boost Trump elsewhere in the nation, including parts of the South and the Midwest, where non-college-educated voters dominated GOP primaries.

Voters who stopped their education after high school or didn’t receive their high school degree account for 18% of the Republican electorate in California but made up just over 1 in 3 GOP voters nationwide in 2020, according to the Pew Research Center.

DiCamillo said GOP voters who have a high school degree or didn’t complete it have remained consistent in their support for Trump, which makes sense because they were the foundation of his base.

“But the other segments are moving,” he said. “That’s the vulnerability Trump has this time around … at least in California.”

Click here to read the full article at LA Times

Filed Under: Top Stories Tagged With: , ,