Local Issues
Great Green Victory
Community Choice okayed by Commission
In a last minute midnight compromise decision
brought about by pressure from AB117 sponsor Carole Migden, SF
Supervisor Tom Ammiano and Senate President Pro Tem John Burton,
the California Public Utilities commission voted 5-0 to adopt
an electric utility procurement framework that will leave room
for community Choice Aggregation and renewable energy.
The decision approved a utility procurement framework phasing
in utility contracts, limiting the amount of power the utilities
buy and speed at which they buy it leaving space for San Francisco,
Marin County and dozens of other California cities seeking to
escape utility procurement to aggressively develop renewable resources
and energy efficiency technologies.
Marin Greens, Sustainable Fairfax, Sustainable Mill Valley, Sustainable
Novato and Hunters Point and San Francisco activists joining Ratepayers
for Affordable Green Energy (RAGE) in asking the commissioners
not to order utilities to overbuy power contracts that would make
California dependent on foreign natural gas.
In December the CPUC was prepared to approve a five-year contract
that would have locked in available power plant capacity and put
ratepayers on the hook for 100% gas-fired capacity.
Commission Lynch, seconded by swing vote Commissioner Geoffrey
Brown and Carl Wood, credited coalition members for educating
the Commission on the negative impacts of their previous plan.
A RESOLUTION OF THE GREEN PARTY OF MARIN
OPPOSING THE NATURAL GAS PROCUREMENT PLAN
WHEREAS the purpose of the Green Party of Marin County Council
is to further ecological wisdom and sustainability through political
and social action; and
WHEREAS the Green Party of Marin represents almost
5000 voters who adhere to the beliefs stated above; and
WHEREAS the California Public Utility Commission
(CPUC) is considering a five-year utility procurement plan that
ignores the Community Choice law and the Renewables Standards
that allow local communities to invest in cleaner, more efficient
sources of energy such as solar and wind power and to reduce their
exposure to the volatile natural gas energy markets.
THEREFORE be it RESOLVED that the Green Party of
Marin County Council urges CPU Commissioners to vote down this
proposal and alter it so that local communities are not penalized
for using non-polluting forms of energy, but are encouraged to
use it.
Signed this 5th day of January, 2004 by
John Anastasio, Secretary
Green Party of Marin County Council
Sean Prendiville, Co-Coordinator
Green Party of Marin County Council
For more information contact: http://www.local.org/
For Your Information - At the costs projected by Alpine Power
Co, the $87 billion spent on the war on Iraqi would
buy 192,904 windmills. The total resulting electricity production,
again assuming each windmill can run one
third of the time, would come to more than 1,015 billion kilowatt-hours
per year. This amounts to a little more
than a quarter of all U.S. electricity consumption in 2000.
Marin Greens are also concentrating on the following
local issues:
- Anti-desalination program - We will counter
plans by the Marin Municipal Water District to set up a large-scale
desalination plant at the western end of the Richmond-San Rafael
Bridge. Using large amounts of energy to turn salt water into
fresh water is contrary to the philosophy of sustainability
- living with the resources we have naturally available.
- Wetlands - We will call for a continuous
band of wetlands along the Marin County shoreline that is protected
and publically owned.
- Instant Runoff Voting (IRV) - We will strive
to get IRV ordinances passed in all municipalities so that citizens
can rank their votes and vote their conscience. IRV allows you
to rank as many, or as few, candidates as you wish: first choice,
second choice, and so on. IRV also ensures all elected officials
are elected by a majority vote. Two bills for IRV currently
in review need your support.
SCA 14 amends the California Constitution to allow IRV.
AB
1039 allows IRV in muncipal elections. Vote your beliefs,
not the lesser of your fears! Contact Assemblyman Joe Nation
and Senator John Burton to urge them to support these bills.
Passing these bills will be a huge victory for California voters!
- Election support - We will organize to better
support Greens running for local office.
Marin
Council supports Health Care for all Californians Act
SAN RAFAEL - June 26 - The Green Party of Marin
Council has come out in support of State Senator Shelia Kuehl's
Senate Bill 921, the Helath Care for All Californians Act.
Council Coordinator Sean Prendiville said in a
letter to Kuehl, "Over the last decade, it has become clear that
our health care systemcannot be fixed using partial measures that
do not address its structural problems. SB 921corrects the underlying
problems of inefficiency, waste and partial coverage that continue
to undermine California's health care system.
All Californians lose when hospitals close and
emergency rooms are crowded with people who can not receive needed
care in a doctor's office because they have no health insurance.
All Californians lose when billions of dollars are wasted
on unnecessary administrative costs. All Californians and their
employers lose when insurance premiums become unaffordable and
benefits are reduced.
Our current health care system spends between 20-30%
of all healthcare dollars on administrative costs. Under the single
payer system proposed by SB 921, administrative costs are reduced
to 5% of the health care budget, saving $14 billion dollars
that will be redirected into health care services for all
Californians.
California needs a health care system that works
for everyone and treats everyone equally.
Californians need a system that provides them with
security of knowing that they will never lose health insurance
because they can't afford it, or because they condition
or because they lose their jobs. SB 921 provides such a
system. We strongly support it. "
The
Heritage Tree Preservation Act
The Heritage Tree Preservation Act (SB 754), as
introduced by Senator Perata, will ban the cutting of select species
of old-growth trees (Coast Redwoods, Giant Sequoia, Port Orford
Cedars, Douglas-firs and hardwoods) in California on non-federal
forestlands that were alive in 1850, California's first year of
statehood. SB 754 applies protections to the remaining oldest
and largest trees, which represent less than one-half of one percent
of the non-federally owned trees standing
in California today. For more information on the bill, please
go to: <http://www.ancienttrees.org>www.ancienttrees.org or
call Lisa Beyer at 510-444-4710 ext. 308.
The bill has passed the California State Senate
and now is in the Assembly where it is awaits a vote in the Committee
on Natural Resources (June 30, 2003). If and when it passes there,
it will be referred to the Assembly Appropriations Committee,
the Assembly Floor and then to the Governor's desk for a final
signature. Please help us make it happen!
Marin
Council urges passage of Corporate Three Strikes Bill
(SB335)
SACRAMENTO - In an effort to protect Californians
by curtailing "crime in the suites," the Green Party of California
urges the passage of a bill on the senate floor aiming a "three
strikes" law at corporate criminals.
Authored by Sen. Gloria Romero (D-Los Angeles),
the Corporate Three-Strikes Act (SB335) would make California
the first state with a three strikes law for corporate crime.
The bill, which passed in the Senate Judiciary Committee this
month, now heads to the senate floor.
The bill is modeled on the "three strikes" law
for persons, which jails felons for 25 years-to-life on their
third felony, no matter how trivial. The GPCA opposes that law
targeting people, because it serves as welfare for prison industries
and as cruel and unusual punishment against non-violent offenders.
"If this is how California punishes people who
commit felonies, it's certainly appropriate for the Enrons of
the world," said Carmen Balber, a consumer activist at the Foundation
for Taxpayer and Consumer Rights. "California's $35 billion dollar
deficit is largely due to the corporate misdeeds of energy companies,
including Enron, during last year's energy crisis."
"This is landmark legislation," said Gabrielle
Weeks, alternate regional representative to the Green Party of
California. "After so many scandals left millions of pensioners
with no retirement, it's good to see elected officials stand up
for the people's welfare, and say "no"
to greedy corporations."
SB335 would ban corporations convicted of three
or more felony crimes within a 10-year period from doing business
in California. Upon conviction of a third-strike, the state can
revoke the charter of a California corporation or revoke the state
business certification for out-of-state businesses.
The bill covers corporations, nonprofit mutual
benefit organizations, business partnerships and limited liability
companies convicted of violating fraud, tax, bribery, extortion,
consumer and environmental protection, civil rights, labor, employment,
antitrust, political campaign or finance laws.
The bill would curb practices by corporations such
as Santa Barbara-based Tenet Healthcare Corporation, now under
investigation for charges of Medicare fraud, performing unnecessary
medical procedures and gouging the uninsured. Tenet was previously
convicted of Medicare fraud for committing patients to psychiatric
hospitals unnecessarily and holding them against their will. Although
the company changed its name and paid nearly $700 million in fines
and reparations, its corporate behavior appears to be unchanged.
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