California is rightfully proud of its natural environment: its parks, wilderness, and protected agricultural lands. And California is proud of its lived environment: diverse neighborhoods, vibrant history and culture, and Native American heritage.
For over 50 years, the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) has provided the primary protection for California’s natural and cultural richness. It has been used to bring agencies and developers into a carefully articulated process to address potential threats to environmental quality and public health. It has guaranteed that the public will be fully informed of a project’s impacts before it is approved—and that any significant impacts will be mitigated to the extent feasible. More fundamentally, CEQA has given community members a chance to express their own vision for the neighborhoods where they live and work.
Recently, under the cover of “fine tuning,” SB 607 has proposed radical changes in the structure of CEQA that would severely restrict the use of its core mechanism, the Environmental Impact Report (EIR). For five decades, EIRs have been the primary document through which agencies, developers, and the public come together for the hard work of environmental protection. Because SB 607 will enable agencies to entirely bypass the EIR requirement, the bill means real harm to California’s environment and communities.
The Trump Administration is already weakening federal environmental laws across the board. CEQA protects Californians by ensuring that government officials “look before they leap” when approving large, potentially polluting projects. Lawmakers should reject SB 607 and keep CEQA strong.
“The Trump Administration is already weakening federal environmental laws across the board. CEQA protects Californians by ensuring that government officials “look before they leap” when approving large, potentially polluting projects. Lawmakers should reject SB 607 and keep CEQA strong.”
It’s astonishing to watch California’s Democrats aggressively criticize Trump, when they’re actually on the same side as Trump. Only skilled politicians can pull that off, but you ultimately “can’t fool all of the people, all of the time”. (I guess they only need to fool “enough” of them, and the system itself ensures that voters don’t actually have a real choice in the first place.)
What’s astonishing to me is the extent to which any semblance of nuance is completely lost in these discussions.
Go ahead and provide the “nuance”. They both are trying to undermine environmental law, and they’re both using threats and lawsuits against their own constituents. They are both heavily-influenced by business interests who ensured that they were the only “choices” (though I’d argue that’s even more true for California’s Democrats).
Of the two, California’s Democrats have more power/impact over what occurs in California (and unlike Trump, it’s not just limited to a 4-year term).
At least the writer of this piece has an understanding of what this bill does, but there’s an order of magnitude of difference between what this bill would do and what the Trump administration is trying to do on the environment, that neither you nor the writer seems to appreciate.
It’s not difficult to understand what the bill would do.
But if you’re suggesting that California’s Democrats are “Trump Light”, I’d agree with you. (That’s part of what allows them to try to separate themselves from Trump.)
George Carlin was right – “politicians are there to give you the illusion that you have a choice. You don’t – you have owners” (referring to underlying business interests). (There was a time when I didn’t believe that.)
Nuance probably grossly understates the gulf.
“It’s not difficult to understand what the bill would do.”
Without looking it up, tell me.
Too late – you already wrote an article regarding this which addresses some of the concerns. It would eliminate the requirement to perform CEQA disclosures under some circumstances. (If you want to know the exact circumstances, impacts, and concerns that would require some references. We can explore that, if you’d like. There’s other examples regarding attempts to weaken CEQA, as, well.)
But I want to emphasize that it’s not JUST this one bill. As you’re already aware, Wiener and the rest of the Democrats (with underlying corporate YIMBY support) have been attempting to force development throughout the state, with the support of underlying business interests. (How is that different than what Trump does?)
This is only one of such attempts to weaken existing laws.
“ It would eliminate the requirement to perform CEQA disclosures under some circumstances.‘
I don’t believe that to be the case. But I’m getting clarification. But comparing whatever this does to gutting the EPA, environmental laws, research on climate change and far more is gross hyperbole.
Well, there is at least one other difference between Trump and California Democrats.
California Democrats try to slap an “equity” label on the business/development interests they support (and more importantly – which supports them). You can see that in your other article today, regarding the use of $450 million dollars in state funding to support development on behalf of “equity”. Same thing regarding support of development to “mitigate climate change”.
Whereas Trump uses the opposite messaging (but with the same goal).
You’re going off topic
Here’s some other links regarding SB 607:
https://www.indybay.org/uploads/2025/04/04/sb-607-opposition-letter-2025-4-4.pdf
“The changes outlined in SB 607 are not minor or “technical fixes” to CEQA; they broadly undermine the carefully designed protections that have been in place for over half a century. SB 607 attempts to lower the threshold for requiring environmental impact reports (EIRs), for nearly all private and government projects – not just infill housing projects, as its stated purpose indicates. These changes would apply across the board and limit public oversight on harmful projects.”
https://www.cnps.org/conservation/speak-out-to-protect-the-california-environmental-quality-act-oppose-ca-sb-607-43341
(Like I said, not much difference between California’s Democrats and Trump.)