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Arthur T Knackerbracket has found the following story:
California is close to adopting strict Obama-era federal environmental and worker safety rules that the Trump administration is dismantling. But as the legislative session draws to a close, the proposal faces fierce opposition from the state's largest water agencies.
To shield California from Trump administration policies, lawmakers are considering legislation that would allow state agencies to lock in protections under the federal Endangered Species Act, Clean Air Act, Clean Water Act, Fair Labor Standards Act and other bulwark environmental and labor laws that were in place before President Donald Trump took office in January 2017.
Written by one of the most powerful politicians in Sacramento, state Senate President Pro Tem Toni Atkins, D-San Diego, Senate Bill 1 has strong support from some of California's most influential environmental and labor organizations, including some that helped get Gov. Gavin Newsom elected.
But several of California's water suppliers and agricultural interests, which also flex ample political muscle, oppose the measure. This coalition includes the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California, which has made SB 1 a top lobbying priority.
The water agencies fear the state would cement into law endangered species protections and pumping restrictions that would add to uncertainties about pumping water from the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta.
(Score: 2) by ilPapa on Sunday September 15 2019, @04:01PM (2 children)
Yes, it's fiercely contested between people who want clean water and a clean environment and factory farms owned by huge multinationals who would gladly poison 100,000 schoolchildren if it meant a $2 bump in their stock price. Also petroleum companies who give zero fucks if their fracking and drilling pollutes every goddamn thing.
But complicated? Not so much unless you have a stake in trying to portray it as such. Do you honestly believe there is a single good-faith reason why Trump is so keen to roll back Obama era EPA regulations?
You are still welcome on my lawn.
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Monday September 16 2019, @01:03PM (1 child)
Forgive me, but it sounds like you're ignorant of how agriculture works and of how municipal water systems work. Agriculture does not "poison" the water supply. They don't spray crops with mercury, dioxin, or depleted uranium. They spray crops with water, fertilizer, and occasionally pesticides. The first two are meant to help the crops grow, and the last to bring more of the crop to market rather than lose it to insects, which keeps prices lower for people who don't have a lot of money in their food budgets, and to keep sheltered urbanites from throwing tantrums if they see holes in their lettuce leaves and believe the produce has been "contaminated." The pesticides, though, break down in the environment because federal regulations dictate they must, or they cannot be used. Fertilizer and water not absorbed by the crops gets snapped up by other plants and organisms downstream because it helps them grow, too.
As for municipal water supplies, no city takes its water straight from a stream of agricultural run-off, which you seem to fear, but rather treats the water for various things to ensure it is safe to drink. They also have to test it regularly with labs who have to certify it safe (my sister is a chemist who owns such a lab). If the water is not safe, it's a big deal. See: Flint, MI.
Further, you're lumping in fracking, which TFA is not about. That's a different deal entirely than the agriculture vs. city water supplies & endangered species that TFA is talking about. But California doesn't really have fracking to contend with the way that, say, Wyoming, North Dakota, or Colorado do.
Finally, how many schoolchildren really drink water straight out of the tap anymore, anyway? In California people, especially the ones that scream loudest about the Earth, drink their water out of plastic bottles which they blithely throw into the trash afterward. (They don't give a shit, because as soon as the bottle hits the waste stream it's Somebody Else's Problem (TM).)
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 2) by ilPapa on Tuesday September 17 2019, @01:24AM
Yeah, about that:
https://www.wsj.com/articles/farms-more-productive-than-ever-are-poisoning-drinking-water-in-rural-america-11547826031 [wsj.com]
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2018/jul/18/california-central-valley-sinking-arsenic-water-farming-agriculture [theguardian.com]
http://wps.prenhall.com/wps/media/objects/1027/1052055/Regional_Updates/update30.htm [prenhall.com]
Just "pesticides"? Is that all?
Most of them. It sounds like you may live a pretty privileged lifestyle if you think everyone is drinking water out of plastic bottles. And yes, I've lived in California. The EPA is not the source of their water problems.
You are still welcome on my lawn.