The California Legislature’s adoption of Senate Bill 100 – committing the state to have an electricity grid powered by 100 percent renewable energy in 2045 – was billed by Sen. Kevin De León, D-Los Angeles, (pictured) as another landmark triumph for the environmental movement in the Golden State.

But the measure’s relatively narrow adoption in the Assembly – on a 44-33 vote – carries loud hints from Democrats who represent poor communities that they see environmental policies that add to the cost of living as increasingly problematic in the state with the nation’s highest level of poverty.

A Los Angeles Times interview with Assemblyman Adam Gray, D-Merced, hammered home this point:

“This is yet another in a laundry list of bills that are discriminatory to the people I represent,” Gray said. He was paraphrased as “saying that supporters were motivated to impress national progressives rather than poor residents in rural communities who would face higher electric bills as a result of the legislation.”

The Assembly Democrats who opposed SB100 besides Gray: Anna Caballero of Salinas, Jim Cooper of Elk Grove, Tom Daly of Anaheim, Jim Frazier of Oakley, Mike Gipson of south Los Angeles, Sharon Quirk-Silva of Fullerton, Blanca Rubio of the San Gabriel Valley and Rudy Salas of Bakersfield.

The issue of how poor people would be affected was very much part of the debate in the run-up to the 2006 adoption by the Legislature of the landmark anti-global warming Assembly Bill 32, which mandated the use of costlier but cleaner energy sources. As a result, a portion of cap-and-trade fees on pollution permits are designated to go to “disadvantaged” communities.

A 2017 report by the California Climate Investments state website said that $614 million in cap-and-trade fees had been spent on these communities, including helping nearly 30,000 homeowners with solar panels and other energy-efficient projects, as well as funding more than 2,600 affordable-housing units.

Energy costs contribute to state’s high poverty rate

But most of the 20 percent-plus of state residents who are impoverished get relatively little direct help in dealing with overall energy costs that aren’t just higher on average than any other state with a relatively temperate climate; they’re also higher than states with harsh winters like Montana and Colorado. And because of unique state rules and fees, gasoline costs more in California than any state but Hawaii.

California’s emergence as the nation’s most impoverished state only became evident in 2011, when the U.S. Census Bureau began issuing state-by-state poverty statistics that included the cost of living. This has helped create an appreciation in the Legislature of the need to add housing stock to try to slow the sharp increase in rent and home prices over the past quarter-century.

But a recent study by Chapman University’s Center for Demographics and Policy found that state energy policies were also a major contributor to high poverty rates.

The study faulted state agencies, starting with the California Air Resources Board, for their impact studies which have consistently minimized the effects of laws like AB32 on the less affluent.

“Notably absent [in the air board’s ‘scoping plan’ for AB32] is any discussion of how the state’s existing costs, let alone additional burdens, severely harm lower-income and historically disadvantaged communities and households,” the study noted.

Gov. Jerry Brown has so far declined direct comment on SB100, but most Capitol watchers expect him to sign the bill. The governor has called climate change the state’s and nation’s most pressing problem.

From water storage to road repair and beyond, legislators have not met Brown eye to eye, raising the prospect of a protracted conflict that continues well into next year, with elections looming next November.

Diminishing returns

Brown had prided himself on a relatively hands-off approach to Sacramento’s fractured political configuration, which has seen moderate Democrats sink strict environmental regulations and Republicans adopt an on-again, off-again approach to negotiations with the governor’s office. “This particular approach of mine has worked in the past,” Brown said, according to the Los Angeles Times. But between California’s drought and its challenges in shifting away from the gas tax to maintain public roads, that comfortable attitude has begun to show diminishing returns.

“Administration officials estimate that $59 billion is needed for state roads, and local officials say an additional $78 billion is required for cities and counties. The longer it takes to reach a deal, the bigger the price tag will be,” the Times reported.

Analysts and opinion writers, long frustrated with the low quality of California’s roads, have homed in on the latest round of infrastructure troubles. “Traffic accidents in California increased by 13 percent over a three-year period — the result of terrible roads and worse drivers,” as Victor Davis Hanson wrote in the San Jose Mercury News. Hanson and others have held up roads as a barometer of the state’s broader political and economic health. “Why is California choosing the path of Detroit,” he asked, “growing government that it cannot pay for, shorting the middle classes, hiking taxes but providing shoddy services and infrastructure in return, and obsessing over minor bumper-sticker issues while ignoring existential crises?”

Looking for leadership

Brown has even taken some implicit heat on infrastructure from within his own administration. The state’s treasury secretary John Chiang recently revealed his belief that the governor needs to launch a new, transparent and top-to-bottom review of California’s infrastructure needs.

“Chiang wants to use the treasurer’s office to foster long-term thinking that California is sorely lacking and arguably has lacked since Pat Brown was governor in the 1960s, Chiang said at his keynote address to the California Debt and Investment Advisory Commission’s event before the Bond Buyer’s California Public Finance Conference,” according to Bond Buyer.

“One of the challenges the state faces is to persuade people of the importance of long-term investment in an environment where many of them distrust the financial markets, Chiang said. That’s where transparency comes in. The state has made progress in governance and management evidenced by its boosted bond ratings, but people still ask what the long-range plan is, Chiang said. […] Such a study would need to come from the governor and the state Legislature, however, not the treasurer’s office, Chiang said. His office’s role would be to provide education.”

Winter worries

Clouding the picture further, Congressional Republicans in Washington have taken Brown to task on plans for shoring up the state’s water infrastructure. “The Republican members of California’s delegation are demanding a government plan to store the deluge of water that could come with El Nino this winter,” the Sacramento Bee reported. “Fourteen GOP lawmakers will send a letter to President Barack Obama and Gov. Jerry Brown on Thursday asking for specifics about how federal and state agencies expect to capture, save and transport water. […] Rep. Devin Nunes, R-Calif., said the governor has opposed a plan approved by the House, and the Senate hasn’t proposed one of its own.”

Meanwhile, the public utilities have joined in the chorus. In an op-ed at the Los Angeles Daily News, California Water Association executive director Jack Hawks warned that “we cannot build a reliable water supply on conservation alone. Customers have been doing an outstanding job during the current drought emergency, but this level of conservation is not sustainable over the long term.”

Sacramento – The California State Board of Equalization (BOE) will consider lowering the excise tax rate for gasoline by $0.075 for Fiscal Year (FY) 2015-16 during its February 24, 2015 meeting in Culver City.

Since 2010, the “fuel tax swap” law has required the Board to adjust this tax rate by March 1st of each year. If adopted, between July 1, 2015 and June 30, 2016, the excise tax rate on gasoline will be $0.285 per gallon. The current excise tax rate of $0.36 is in effect until June 30, 2015.

The excise tax on gasoline pays for public road improvements and mass transit. In FY 13-14, the BOE collected nearly $5.8 billion for the Motor Vehicle Fuel Account, Transportation Tax Fund. Sales tax funds a variety of state and local programs.

If the tax cut happens, it could offset the cap-and-tax trade increase that went into effect on Jan. 1.

Although there were warnings the cap-and-trade tax increase could be as much as 75 cents a gallon, it’s turning out to be more like 10 cents.

So if the BOE follows through, it will counteract most of that.

As of today, according to GasBuddy.com, California has the country’s second highest average gas price, at $2.80 per gallon. Highest is Hawaii, at $3.02.

Lowest is Utah, at $1.92, followed by Idaho, $1.93; Montana, $1.97; and Wyoming, $1.99 — all Western neighbors. Although Nevada is fairly high, at $2.44.

Big competitor Texas is $2.10.