{"id":206527,"date":"2026-03-06T01:38:07","date_gmt":"2026-03-06T01:38:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/206527\/"},"modified":"2026-03-06T01:38:07","modified_gmt":"2026-03-06T01:38:07","slug":"oc-climate-plan-is-voluntary-but-too-bureaucratic-orange-county-register","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/206527\/","title":{"rendered":"OC climate plan is voluntary, but too bureaucratic \u2013 Orange County Register"},"content":{"rendered":"

Orange County\u2019s Board of Supervisors last month approved a\u00a0climate action plan<\/a> designed to prod local governments and residents to reduce their carbon footprint, but supervisors were at least realistic about what it\u2019s all about: state funding. Calling it a \u201cgrotesque waste of money,\u201d Supervisor Don Wagner explained that the CAP is necessary \u201cto get the funding that is absolutely critical to this government doing the basic function it needs to do,\u201d per news reports<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Counties need a plan to receive a variety of state grants. As the California Air Resources Board\u00a0explains<\/a>, CAPs aren\u2019t mandatory \u2014 but they are recommended as a \u201cframework for quantifying, tracking and reducing GHG [greenhouse gas] emissions within a jurisdiction\u2019s purview.\u201d The most contentious element monitors how private businesses are reducing their carbon footprint, but supervisors made it clear that none of it is binding.<\/p>\n

We understand the supervisors\u2019 dilemma, but the county should provide a cost-benefit analysis. How much time and how many\u00a0employees<\/a>\u00a0are needed to develop this voluminous report and implement its targets v. how much money the state would risk losing? We question why a county\u2019s ability to fund its basic functions is tied to state grants related to emission-reduction policies.<\/p>\n

Oddly, the plan says \u201ca full CEQA analysis of the municipal measures in the CAP would be initiated at that time before implementation of any proposed measures.\u201d The\u00a0California Environmental Quality Act<\/a>\u00a0is California\u2019s landmark environmental law, which triggers a complex process for analyzing the potential environmental effects of any project.<\/p>\n

Subjecting hundreds of pages of county climate proposals to another governmental review process requiring hundreds of pages of reviews layers red tape upon red tape. CEQA often is blamed not only for holding up housing production, but for also delaying environmentally-friendly projects. How this helps the environment is anyone\u2019s guess.<\/p>\n

There are good ideas in the\u00a0document, from expanding EV charging stations to improving water efficiency and reducing solid waste. But there\u2019s no reason they couldn\u2019t be implemented without all the bureaucracy. But it is what it is, as one might say.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Orange County\u2019s Board of Supervisors last month approved a\u00a0climate action plan designed to prod local governments and residents…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":184673,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[36],"tags":[163,165,164,1965,975],"class_list":["post-206527","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-anaheim","tag-anaheim","tag-anaheim-headlines","tag-anaheim-news","tag-editorials","tag-opinion"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/206527","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=206527"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/206527\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/184673"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=206527"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=206527"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=206527"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}