Top aides to California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger kept information from their boss to prevent him from taking stronger action to implement a landmark global warming law, the former executive director of the California Air Resources Board claimed this week. Catherine Witherspoon resigned from her position just days after Schwarzenegger fired Robert Sawyer, the chairman of the board, last week.
Witherspoon charged that Schwarzenegger was misled by his advisers, who may have intentionally given the governator bad intel on the global warming law, a key measure that calls for a 25 percent reduction of greenhouse gas emissions in California by 2020. The law is the first of its kind in the country. More from a story in the AP today:
"Witherspoon painted a picture of a governor who was being misled and micromanaged by a staff that was trying to weaken the global warming law out of fear that it would harm businesses. The picture is at odds with the governor's carefully tended public image as an environmental champion. Echoing a complaint that both Democratic legislative leaders have made, Witherspoon said the governor's top aides were single-mindedly focused on using market-based mechanisms to implement the law, even though other methods, particularly regulation, are needed to meet the law's tough standards."
Witherspoon's charges come on the heels of some public comments by Sawyer that Schwarzenegger's staff meddled with the board's actions regarding the law. When Sawyer tried to move more aggressively to implement the measure, he lost his job. From a story in the LA Times:
"[Sawyer] said he was called by a Cabinet secretary who ordered him to limit to three the number of so-called early action measures the board was considering to slow global warming. Environmentalists complained bitterly that the three measures, approved by the board, were not enough, and Sawyer, ignoring the order he had received, unsuccessfully sought to persuade fellow board members to add more measures to the list. He said he was baffled two days after the vote when the governor issued a news release criticizing the board for not taking more action."
UPDATE: The LA Times just posted two new stories on the matter. Here's an excerpt from one:
"Witherspoon said there had been a pattern of interference by the governor's top staff in favor of industry lobbyists seeking to weaken or stall air pollution regulations, including the state's landmark global warming law and proposed regulations on diesel construction equipment and wood products containing formaldehyde.
'They were ordering us to find ways to reduce costs and satisfy lobbyists,'
she said, adding that the governor's chief of staff, Susan Kennedy, and
Cabinet Secretary Dan Dunmoyer took the lead on pressuring the agency staff and board chairman.
Adding insult to injury, she said, members of the governor's staff have publicly blamed her and Sawyer for not doing more — conduct she described as 'Orwellian … a triumph of appearances over reality.'"
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