Failing California: The Chicago Way
What would you do if the regional regulatory agency you ran achieved its goal of eliminating air pollution as a significant problem in your community? If you answered, “declare victory, collect a community service award and possibly a pension, then shut down,” you haven’t spent much time in California. However, if your first thought is, I’ll redefine pollution and reinvent our agency as an economic planning board, dust off your CV: a great future awaits in our entrepreneurial little politburo
The Bay Area Air Quality Management District (BAAQMD), not satisfied at extirpating vestigial air pollution, and finding Christmastime hearth control politically unpopular, has now found the perfect enemy: local greenhouse gases causing dangerous global warming. In a politically savvy move, the latest diktat will be laundered through local planning officials rather than enforced by the air board's own roving fireplace police. Responsibility without authority: the joys of local public service in today’s Golden State.
But what happens if your local officials are heterodox on anthropogenic global warming and resist BAAQMD regulations? Rather than relying on official Church of Gore pronouncements, perhaps your town planner has reviewed the latest data showing that the world has been cooling for the past decade. He may even have downloaded the leaked East Anglia Climate Research Unit files for a first-hand peek at the multiyear cook-the-books effort supporting the worldwide global warming “consensus.” Or perhaps the members of your town council just can’t see how smothering a hundred local construction jobs is going to affect global carbon dioxide concentrations one way or the other.
This is where we meet arm-twisting the Chicago Way:
Bay Area cities and counties are not required to adopt the air district development guidelines, but they may ignore them at their own peril. They could face time-consuming lawsuits by development opponents who could argue that the air district is the best judge of pollution guidelines.
You got that? No need to follow our rules – we’re the hired help while you folks are elected by the people – but our no-growth environmental friends, the ones who helped write the rules purporting to mitigate an imaginary problem, have legal standing to sue you on behalf of the public interest. So you have a choice: you can work with us and possibly, some day, see some sort of politically correct, overpriced economic development in your town, or you can fund a lawsuit, see no local economic growth in your lifetime, and face a lefty challenger in the next election who will helpfully accuse you of wasting scarce taxpayer funds.
Have a nice day.
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May '10
Re: Failing California: The Chicago Way
Fasano noted the Bay Area did not exceed federal area quality standards on Christmas Day, making the "Spare the Air" day a success.
This sounds a little bit like an August 15th sprinkling ban in Phoenix being credited with preventing flooding. Would the Bay Area have exceeded federal air quality standards if every fireplace from San Jose to Marin County had been burning?
Is it time to seriously question the sanity of several Ricochet principals who continue to live in California?
May '10
Re: Failing California: The Chicago Way
Alas, George, you have put your finger not on a political failing, but on a human failing. I'm probably older than you, but I remember when March of Dimes and Easter Seals were narrowly focused charities. They solved the problem they set out to fight.
But folding one's tent, accepting the plaudits, and retiring quietly away runs counter to the normal human lust for power, money, and prestige. So each of those groups, along with every other charitable and governmental group of which I can think, engages in precisely the "goal redefinition" process you pin pointed. They simply don't want to give up the cash, the access to power it provides, or the corner offices it furnishes.
Very few people have the character to exit gracefully at the top.
As with so many other things, that wise old philosopher got it exactly right: "We have seen the enemy and he is us." -- Pogo Very few people have the character to exit gracefully at the top.
May '10
Re: Failing California: The Chicago Way
Greenpeace is another example of an organization that has "Jumped the shark" as it were. Having run out of useful things to do to save the envirnment they want to have chlorine, an element in the Periodic Table, banned as a noxious substance. Sorry but that is not going to happen, not in this universe.
May '10
Re: Failing California: The Chicago Way
Tom- the John M. Olin Foundation actually did deliberately disband as it was supposed to.
But that is indeed the only one. Pew Charitable Trusts these days is a lefty advocate, and Howard Pew has been spinning in his grave for a good 20 years as a consequence.
May '10
Re: Failing California: The Chicago Way
I did like this quote:
"It's a hard thing. You need these rules on bad-air days to protect people who have breathing problems, especially in the valleys where air can just sit," he said. "But on Thanksgiving and Christmas, can we look other the other way? I don't know. It may be worth discussing."
Yep, we have to prevent an insignificant activity on one day to "protect" a small minority of the populace. So nice that they *might* consider worthy of discussion. Your nanny state at work.
And not only was it at work, apparently it was getting overtime....
"Bay Area air pollution inspectors found 47 violators burning wood fires illegally during Christmas Day's "Spare the Air" alert; of those, 27 were logged in Marin, the most of any Bay Area county.
Officials said an equal number of inspectors were deployed to all regions of the Bay Area."
I feel a lot better that the govt "deployed" inspectors on a holiday to put their boot on the neck of the taxpayer, and probably gave them double-time to boot.
Re: Failing California: The Chicago Way
Absolutely. Much of the time I think I'm nuts to live here. However, I grew up in the flatlands of South Florida and have always been a sucker for spectacular views, an amenity Northern California delivers in abundance.
Today was achingly beautiful: crystal-clear air and unlimited visibility. On my run this afternoon -- hot but without a trace of humidity -- I crested a ridge near my house to see the red rooftops of Stanford University, the Bay sparkling in the background and Mt. Diablo in the distance. San Francisco, the Golden Gate Bridge and Mt. Tam were plainly visible to my left thirty miles away, with Moffett Field and San Jose to my right. Incredible. Everyday sights out here that still take my breath away.
May '10
Re: Failing California: The Chicago Way
Everyday sights out here that still take my breath away. · Jun 5 at 8:51pm
No, that was the smoke from those illegal fireplaces robbing you of breath, not scenery. BAAQMD said so.
May '10
Re: Failing California: The Chicago Way
Nice little town you have here. Shame if anything happened to it.
As for Mr. Oyen's questioning the sanity of people who stay in the Fools' Golden State, I can only say that certain personal circumstances hold us here for the next year or two, after which we will seriously look at moving out. Very, very seriously. We'll be sure to turn the lights out when we go.