June 10, 2004
6/10 - California: Maybe the Governator's okay
On Friday Jeremy Jackson and I attended a press conference beside the Scripps Pier at which the comments of California Governor Arnold Schwartzenegger were presented to the public by California Resources Secretary Mike Chrisman and head of California EPA, Terry Tamminen. The overall tone of things was pretty good.
It appears that Governor Ahnold has a genuine interest in the health of the oceans, and at least one of their four key recommendations -- opposing federal support of offshore oil exploration -- sounded like a major note of dissent from the current presidential administration.
Perhaps most impressive is just listening to Terry Tamminen, who is a long time environmentalist, having founded the Santa Monica Baykeepers and was Director of Environment Now. He was a fairly shocking choice for the position of head of Cal EPA, and you'd think he would know if the Governor is for real. According to Tamminen, the Governator means what he says, and really does want California to set an example with ocean protection. We'll see in the upcoming months as California considers COPA (the California Ocean Protection Act) and the MLPA (Marine Life Protection Act), which was cut from the state budget, but Tamminen assures everyone they are hard at work keeping it alive.
