Yesterday, the state of California and San Bernardino County settled the lawsuit alleging that the County didn't take global warming pollution into account when it drafted its new growth plan. The L.A. Times has the story.
[California Attorney General Jerry] Brown said that the settlement with San Bernardino County, which is expected to grow by 500,000 people by 2030, "sets the pace for how local government can adopt powerful measures to combat oil dependency and climate disruption."
County officials expressed relief that their long-term growth plan, adopted in March, would remain in effect under the settlement, although it would be amended to include global warming provisions by early 2010.
A copy of the settlement is available here. Various environmental groups will continue their suit against the County.
Republican state senators had cited the lawsuit as one of the reasons they were holding up the state's budget. But the L.A. Times reports that, "In a compromise Tuesday, lawmakers agreed that by 2010, new rules would be adopted spelling out how to mitigate the greenhouse gas emissions of projects covered by the law." The law in question is the the California Environmental Quality Act, which Brown had argued required local governments to take steps to reduce greenhouse gas emissions in their planning process. These rules could be the most powerful and lasting outcome of the Attorney General's efforts to link land use and global warming.
According to the Sacramento Bee, Brown now has his eye on a 14,000 home development in Placer. The story quotes Brown as telling his staff of attorneys, "I want them really thinking about how to shape the land use to reduce oil dependency and greenhouse gases."
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