In response to the hundreds of permits for oil drilling issued during Q1, including 556 within 3,200 feet of communities, Last Chance Alliance groups released the following statements:
“Is Governor Newsom a climate leader? Since January 1st, the administration has approved over 800 permits to drill, the majority of them in the proposed health and safety buffer zone. In other words, in our neighborhoods. Climate leaders don’t do that.”
– Kobi Naseck, Coalition Coordinator, Voices in Solidarity Against Oil in Neighborhoods
“The science has been clear for years: there is no path to a climate-safe future that includes oil and gas. California is undoubtedly a global leader in clean energy, but we’re lagging when it comes to addressing the threats that fossil fuels pose to our communities and our climate. To save lives and protect all Californians, we urge Governor Newsom to immediately stop issuing permits for oil and gas drilling and launch a statewide effort to end California’s reliance on polluting fuels for good.”
– Woody Hastings, Phase Out Polluting Fuels Manager, The Climate Center
“California’s regulators appear to be on a permitting power trip, granting the industry its dying wish for a glut of more drilling with little regard for our planet nor California’s communities. At the start of Q1, it was illegal for California to approve any kind of oil drilling permit in neighborhoods because of the devastating health impacts. By the end of the quarter, after the oil industry spent $20 million to pause the law prohibiting these neighborhood oil permits, we’re in a drastically different place. This is unacceptable. We need Governor Newsom to rein in his rogue regulators and immediately stop approving requests for new permits that are locking us into a toxic future. The wellbeing of millions of Californians is at risk.”
– Amy Moas, Ph.D., Senior Climate Campaigner, Greenpeace USA
“Our Elected Officials to Protect America California network of over 460 elected officials from 49 counties, representing more than half of Californians, have fought for science-based public health setbacks to protect our communities from oil and gas industry pollution. Our communities have suffered for far too long, forced to breathe toxic air and live on contaminated soil from oil and gas facilities in our neighborhoods. As the industry callously attempts to roll back setback laws enacted to safeguard our health, the Newsom Administration must use the authority it has now to deny permits next to homes, schools, hospitals, and places of worship, and stop the oil and gas industry from poisoning California’s most vulnerable residents.”
– Meghan Sahli-Wells, California Director, Elected Officials to Protect America – Code Blue, Former Culver City Mayor
“In public, Governor Newsom presents himself as an environmental champion, supporting legislation to create setbacks and penalties for the oil and gas industry when their profits are too high. Meanwhile, he quietly allows CalGEM, an agency under his authority, to approve over 800 permits to drill, most of them within the setback zone. 800 permits and counting is not an oversight; it is a policy decision.”
– Kayla Karimi, Staff Attorney, Center on Race, Poverty & the Environment
“The most recent IPCC report makes it clear that immediate action to transition off fossil fuels is necessary to avoid the worst impacts of climate change. California approving hundreds of fossil fuel permits, including 556 within the community setback zone, is a clear step backward on climate and environmental justice. This is unacceptable. Governor Newsom must immediately stop permitting fossil fuels and commit to a just transition to more reliable, affordable, and renewable energy sources.”
– Allie Rosenbluth, United States Program Manager, Oil Change International
“Seeing Newsom pushing for accountability from Big Oil is a great step in the right direction, but it doesn’t mean much if his administration continues to entrench California in fossil fuel pollution. We need real climate leadership. Newsom must tell his agency to deny drilling permits in the health and safety buffer to protect Californians from health impacts and from the climate crisis.”
– Ilonka Zlatar, Climate Justice Organizer, Oil & Gas Action Network
“While the ‘Health Buffer Zones’ to protect people living, learning, and healing within 3,200 feet of oil wells would make needed strides for public health, they still fall short of what’s needed to adequately protect the health of our hardworking oil and gas communities. Although more robust protections are needed, maintaining the integrity of the 3,200-foot ‘Health Buffer Zone’ commitment is the least Governor Newsom can do to curb the rates of cancer, heart disease, asthma, and a myriad of other health maladies plaquing our oil and gas communities. For the sake of our patients we see suffering from these preventable chronic diseases every day: Governor Newsom, nurses are calling on you to stand by your word and stop the oil and gas permits today.”
– Scarlett Russell, Programs Coordinator, California Nurses for Environmental Health & Justice
“It’s shameful and immoral for California to approve a fresh onslaught of new oil drilling permits near homes and schools. But above all it’s illegal. Governor Newsom needs to make California’s rogue oil and gas regulator follow the law and heed his call for robust community protections. Newsom has the power to adopt long-overdue safeguards that will put Californians’ health and safety first, and end oil companies’ dangerous drill-at-will dominance. It’s past time Newsom appointed a regulator who won’t rubber-stamp the way to more climate catastrophe.”
– Hollin Kretzmann, Senior Attorney, Center for Biological Diversity Climate Law Institute
“The Governor’s appointed regulators know how harmful oil and gas drilling near homes, schools, and day care facilities, but they continue to rubber stamp their permits. Not only have historical discriminatory housing policies trapped communities of color and low income communities in over polluted neighborhoods, a new study shows that in California, black residents are exposed to the most intense oil and gas operations. By approving permits near homes, schools and daycare facilities in overburdened communities; the Governor’s regulators are perpetuating environmental racism, continuing policies that exacerbate the health disparity gap and environmental injustice in our state. This has to stop.”
– Marjaneh Moini, MD, Board Member, Physicians for Social Responsibility