SOLANO COUNTY – The State of California announced today that Solano County will move from the Red Tier into the less restrictive Orange Tier of the Blueprint for a Safer Economy effective Wednesday, June 2, 2021. The California tier-based metrics have helped provide a framework for reopening businesses, schools and other community venues.
In the last two weeks, Solano County has seen a continued decline in case rate to below 6 per 100,000 to qualify for the orange tier. COVID-19 related hospitalizations remain low, and 225,477 county residents have received at least one dose of the COVID-19 vaccine.
“We are seeing a substantial decrease in the spread of COVID-19 in our community, therefore enabling us to move down to the next tier and expanding capacity for our businesses,” said Bela T. Matyas, M.D., M.P.H., Solano County Health Officer. “While we are nearing the end of the pandemic, we continue to encourage our community members to get vaccinated to protect themselves from severe illness and death. Solano Public Health remains dedicated to eliminating barriers to vaccinate the community against COVID-19 by focusing on providing pop-up clinics – meeting people where they are.”
MOVING FROM THE RED TIER INTO THE ORANGE TIER ALLOWS:
Restaurants, including wineries, breweries and distilleries that serve meals, can operate indoors with 50 percent capacity or a maximum of 200 people, whichever is fewer
Breweries, wineries, and distilleries that do not serve meals may open indoors with modifications, including 25 percent capacity indoors, or 100 people, whichever is fewer
Retail establishments can operate indoors with modifications
Movie theaters and places of worship can operate indoors with 50 percent capacity or a maximum of 200 people, whichever is fewer
Gyms and health clubs, including yoga studios, can operate indoors with 25 percent capacity
Graduation and commencement ceremonies can be held outdoors at 33 percent capacity with assigned seating and other modifications
COVID-19 INFORMATION For more information on COVID-19, visit the following websites, including:
New Mexico Stuck With $8 billion in Cleanup for Oil Wells, Highlighting Dangers From Fossil Fuel Dependence
The oil industry boasts that it fills state coffers with revenues from drilling, but a new study finds a serious gap in funding available to tackle the environmental legacy of abandoned wells.
New Mexico is facing more than $8 billion in cleanup costs for oil and gas wells, an enormous liability that taxpayers could be left to pick up if drillers go out of business or walk away from their obligations.
Cleaning up old wells at the end of their operating lives can be expensive, and typically states require drillers to cover part of the cleanup cost at the outset, known as financial assurance requirements. The money is tapped later on when the well or pipeline must be dismantled and cleaned up.
But a study commissioned by the New Mexico State Land Office published on April 30 found that “financial assurance requirements do not exist for much of the oil and gas infrastructure explored in this study, and in some cases where such requirements are imposed, operators may have multiple ways of minimizing or avoiding those requirements.” The study was conducted by the Center for Applied Research, an independent analytical firm.
Inadequate bonding requirements means there is a serious gap in available funding to properly clean up after the fossil fuel industry. According to the report, it could cost as much as $8.38 billion to clean up the state’s tens of thousands of wells and associated pipeline infrastructure. Alarmingly, however, New Mexico only has $201 million tucked away for cleanup, leaving a hole of $8.1 billion.
“That’s $8.1 billion that we don’t have,” New Mexico Commissioner of Public Lands Stephanie Garcia Richard said in a statement. “Enormous sums of taxpayer money and money meant for public schools, along with the long-term health of our lands, are on the line.”
The industry likes to boast that oil and gas revenues contribute roughly a third of the state’s general fund — a fact that the New Mexico Oil & Gas Association (NMOGA) triumphantly advertised in a recent report and regularly highlights on social media.
Indeed, drilling accounts for a large source of state revenues. In April 2021, for example, the state took in $109 million in royalties, a record high. Those funds will be funneled into public services, including schools and hospitals.
As the report exposed, however, the massive liability put onto the public in cleanup costs somewhat undercuts the notion that the oil and gas industry is a financial godsend.
The industry has helped fill state coffers in recent years, with oil production booming to roughly 1 million barrels per day, more than double production levels from five years ago. According to the report, last year the oil and gas industry produced nearly 370 million barrels of oil and 2 trillion cubic feet of natural gas from roughly 60,000 wells, which was transported on 35,000 miles of pipelines.
But as the State Land Office study highlights, the industry is leaving behind enormous costs for the state and the general public to deal with at a later date, a liability that is mostly obscured from public discussion.
The average cost to plug an old well and reclaim the surface is over $182,000 per well, but the state only has the finances to cover a little over $3,200 per well. The funding gap is even more staggering for pipelines. Decommissioning and reclamation costs are roughly $211,000 per mile of pipeline, but available financial assurance only totals about $51 per mile.
A pump jack in Roswell, New Mexico. Credit: BLM. (CC BY 2.0)
The risk to the public from inadequate bonding requirements is compounded by the fact that oil and gas drillers can go out of business long before wells are cleaned up, which can be years or even decades later. The U.S. shale industry has burned through hundreds of billions of dollars in cash, and there have been more than 250 bankruptcies of North American oil and gas companies since 2015. And as the clean energy transition accelerates, the financial challenges to the industry are likely to only grow more severe.
The state has long suffered from the roller coaster cycles of extractive industry, according to James Jimenez, executive director of New Mexico Voices for Children, a health, education, and economic advocacy organization. “We’ve made policy choices in boom times that have really exacerbated our over-dependence on oil and natural gas revenues,” Jimenez told DeSmog.
“Because of the really volatile nature of the oil and gas industries, we haven’t had sustainability in the programs,” he said. A dependence on a boom-and-bust industry has forced the state to make cuts to school systems during downturns in the past.
“We need to reduce this over reliance we have on oil and natural gas to fund really basic important programs like our K-12 education and higher education systems,” Jimenez said. He added that the state should diversify its revenue base, such as through progressive taxation on the wealthy and supporting non-extractive business sectors.
Even as money flows to the state from drilling today, the unfunded liabilities of cleanup that are dumped onto the public also highlight the downside to such high levels of drilling. “The $8 billion that it would take to do the cleanup would have to come from somewhere,” Jimenez said. Dollars spent on cleaning up the waste from the oil and gas industry, are dollars not spent on other important needs, such as rural broadband or road infrastructure, he added.
“The answers are simple and urgent — raise royalty rates and taxes on the industry, stash away the revenues in our Permanent Fund to stabilize cash flows, and spend current budget dollars on investments to diversify our economy,” Thomas Singer, senior policy advisor at the Western Environmental Law Center, told DeSmog via email.
On top of the financial risks from abandoned wells, the fossil fuel industry brings numerous environmental and public health hazards as well. Oil and gas operations have contributed to a deterioration in air quality in the state. And in northwestern New Mexico, there have been more than 300 accidents since 2019, including oil spills, fires, blowouts, and gas releases, and much of it has occurred on Navajo land, as reported by Capital & Main.
A recently published peer-reviewed study found that shut-in conventional oil wells in the Permian basin could be leaking a substantial amount of methane, a powerful greenhouse gas that exacerbates climate change.
“New Mexicans must recognize that while industrialization of our landscape to produce oil and gas brings revenue today, if not properly cleaned up, it also jeopardizes our economy of the future,” Singer said. Allowing drillers “to defer this obligation indefinitely puts the state and taxpayers at great risk that they will have pick up the tab or leave these areas as polluted sacrifice zones.”
[BenIndy editor: Residents of Benicia have for years expressed serious concern about the lack of adequate air monitoring in our “refinery town.” For an excellent background on the lead-up to this important meeting, see Marilyn Bardet’s “Letter to BAAQMD: Must Enforce Refinery Air Monitor Requirements”. Mark your calendar & plan to attend on June 30. – R.S.]
Virtual Meeting on Benicia Community Air Monitoring Site Selection
Invitation to public, sent via email on May 27, 2021
Dear Benicia Community and Stakeholders,
You are invited to attend a virtual community meeting to learn about air quality monitoring and help shape the future of community air monitoring in the Benicia area.
In a joint effort with the City of Benicia, the Air District identified candidate locations in Benicia for a new community air monitoring station. At this meeting, Air District staff will share the sites under consideration and information about how the sites were selected. Community members and stakeholders will have the opportunity to inform final site selection.
When:
The workshop will be held using Zoom and will take place on Wednesday, June 30, 2021, from 6:00 PM to 8:00 PM.
Login information to follow in a subsequent notice.
Why:
The Air District monitors air quality as part of ongoing efforts to inform and protect public health. One of the ways the Air District does this is by collecting fees to install, operate, and maintain air monitoring stations in communities near refineries. These air monitoring stations will provide additional information about the levels of pollution experienced by these communities.
The Air District invites you to participate in this community meeting to discuss and review the site selection process and provide feedback on a community air monitoring station within the Benicia community.
Air District staff want to ensure a fair and equitable virtual workshop experience and provide opportunities for all interested parties to participate. Workshop materials will be available on the Air District’s Special Air Monitoring Projects web page beginning June 7, 2021.
Simultaneous language interpretation can be provided upon request at least 72 hours before the event. Contact Brian Butler at bbutler@baaqmd.gov or 415-603-7721 to request interpretation.
Questions may be sent by e-mail to iperkins@baaqmd.gov.
Para información en español, llame al 415-749-4609
中文聯絡電話 415-749-4609
Nói Tiếng Việt xin gọi 415-749-4609
Working to protect public health, air quality, and the global climate,
Your Air District
JohnGlidden.com, by Scott Morris, May 28, 2021
Solano County Sheriff Tom Ferrara. (Courtesy Elect Thomas A. Ferrara Sheriff-Coroner 2022).
VALLEJO – Solano County Sheriff Tom Ferrara announced on Friday that he would run for reelection in 2022, seeking another four-year term after 10 years in the position.
Ferrara has faced recent controversy after it was revealed that several deputies posted symbols of the Three Percenter anti-government militia on social media. Ferrara declined to investigate the extent of extremism in his department, falsely said the FBI cleared the deputies of association with extremist groups, and has faced calls for new oversight of his office.
In a video message posted on Facebook Friday morning, Ferrara touted the support of the deputies’ union and the correctional officers’ union. “Now more than ever Solano County needs proven leadership,” Ferrara said. “I have shown this type of leadership through multiple disasters, civil unrest and the pandemic, which we’ve all experienced in the last few years.”
Ferrara was appointed sheriff in 2012 after his predecessor retired. He won his first election unopposed in 2014 and fended off challenges from sheriff’s Deputy Daryl Snedeker and Fairfield police Lt. Dan Marshall in 2018.
But Ferrara has faced political controversy and protest in recent months after an investigative report revealed that three high-profile members of his staff had openly displayed Three Percenter emblems on social media pages.
They included Sgt. Roy Stockton, a Vacaville councilmember who was endorsed by Ferrara, Sgt. Cully Pratt, the department’s former public information officer, SWAT team member Sgt. Ty Pierce, and Deputy Dale Matsuoka, the department’s homeless outreach coordinator.
In response to the revelations, Ferrara said in a statement that the employees named “all serve this agency and this community with passion and dedication.”
Ferrara argued that the deputies had intended to show support for the 2nd Amendment, but Three Percenter groups often call for violent resistance to the federal government if they interpret restrictions on gun possession as against their interpretation of the Constitution. Three Percenter groups have been implicated in bombing and kidnapping plots and the attack on the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6.
The sheriff later defended the deputies by writing in letters to Benicia Black Lives Matter and the Solano County Democratic Central Committee that he “consulted with the FBI, who confirmed none of my employees are members of any extremist organizations.”
But the FBI disputed Ferrara’s statement, saying that it did not track participation in extremist groups nor is it “sufficient basis for an FBI investigation.”
Unsatisfied by the sheriff’s response, members of Benicia Black Lives Matter have called for the Solano County Board of Supervisors to create an oversight board of the sheriff’s office.
But only Supervisor Monica Brown supported even discussing the suggestion. Meanwhile, the Solano County Republicans have organized in opposition to any new oversight.
Benicia Black Lives Matter has continued to protest the sheriff’s office, including staging a rally outside the sheriff’s office on the anniversary of the police murder of George Floyd in Minneapolis.
Scott Morris is an independent journalist in Oakland covering policing, protest and civil rights. If you appreciate his work please consider making a contribution.
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