Quote:
Originally Posted by Bikemike
I grew up in Socal in both OC and the Westside (been a resident of over 40 yrs), so I am pretty familiar (perhaps a lot more familiar than yourself?) with the politics and demographics of the region.
Let me ask you: can you back up your claim that the SoCal democratic electorate, through their elected representatives, is concerned about environmental issues to the degree of the Bay Area electorate?
I've listed about a half-dozen statewide bills and provided the author of each bill to back it up. You mustered a single one. Where's the long list of pro-transit and anti-sprawl bills that originate from SoCal counterparts? Weiner, Ting, Huffman, Steinberg, Erskine, Levine, I can go on and on. Where's the counterpart list for SoCal? It isn't enough just to say the sun goes around the earth - you have to give factual support for your claim, or else its worthless.
I think it's great that LA has initiatives like FOLAR and the Bolsa Chica conservancy, and of course "environmental justice" type actions taken in response to LAs horrible air pollution. While deserving credit, these local responses exist in full servitude to the convenience of the electorate, or in the latter case, in servitude to necessity.
On the contrary, I think my argument is based on there being a much more consistent stream of PIVOTAL green and active-transportation laws authored almost exclusively by Norcal reps, laws that require actual SACRIFICE by the electorate who self-imposes it. These are not "tinker around the edges" kind of laws that Socal politicos tend to pay lip-service to when they think their electorate will tolerate the minimal inconvenience such laws pose.
The Greenbelt initiative, for example, is an immensely successful sprawl containment coalition (nonexistent in Socal, and not on their radar either) which called upon every municipality and district in the Bay Area to limit the rubber-stamping of development that is rampant in Socal. The SMNRR is long overdue, but more an attempt to save what remains of the coastal range than a more secular, widespread effort to limit urban sprawl.
That's why it takes a Camp Pendleton to stop LA and SD gobbling up any and every single sq mile of buildable land that exists.
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Well, I'm 50 years old, and have been a resident of Los Angeles County for nearly all that time. Lived in LA proper before moving with the family to SELAC when I was 7, and have seen the demographic changes over the decades in both the city of LA and SELAC. I've been living in the SGV since my late 20s and have also seen the demographic changes here too, even within the last 20-something years.
I don't know why this is a pissing contest, but I don't have time to look up initiatives brought up by SoCal politicians related to the environment. I'm at work right now. You have internet access, you can easily look it up yourself. I don't doubt that some of our politicians here have come up with some bills that were for the environment.
After a quick search, here are a few I found:
SB 100 Clean Energy bill - Kevin de Leon, Los Angeles
AB 1775 No Offshore Drilling - Muratsachi, LA County South Bay
SB 606 Efficient Water Use - Hertzberg, Van Nuys
AB 88 Ban Plastic Microbeads - Bloom, Santa Monica
But hey, if you want to keep thinking that NorCal folk are more environmentally-conscious than SoCal folk, then sige na po!
Regarding Tejon Ranch, according to Wikipedia, the Tejon Ranch Company is one of the largest private landowners in California. The company now owns over 270,000 acres in the southern San Joaquin Valley, Tehachapi Mountains, and Antelope Valley, the largest contiguous piece of private property in the state. Call it capitalism, but I can see why the Tejon Ranch Company wants to develop some of its property, because it wants more money. I guess the argument is they want to create a new town called Centennial (who came up with that name?) that would somehow be self-sustaining, in that people who live there could also work there. I don't buy it, personally. I guess the Tejon Ranch Company made some concessions by agreeing to some preservation of open space, blah blah blah, but it's in a fire zone and it's basically in the middle of nowhere. I personally think that more housing should be built in already-established population centers, but hey, Tejon Ranch, they have the money I guess. If you think that they can buy politicians, I don't doubt that either.