Moves on the Senate Appropriations Committee
SACRAMENTO – On a vote of 6-2 that fell along party lines, the California Senate Natural Resources and Water Committee approved Assembly Bill 3030 despite overwhelming opposition from the sportfishing community. AB 3030 now moves on to the Senate Appropriations Committee.
The bill needed at least five votes to pass through committee, and the swing votes were cast by California Senators Ben Hueso (D-San Diego) and Bob Hertzberg (D-Van Nuys). With six democrats in favor and two Republicans opposed, AB 3030 moves on.
The opposition testimony, including phone-in comments, lasted more than an hour and a half, with hundreds of individuals and businesses representing the sportfishing community voicing their opposition to the measure.
“We sincerely thank everyone who called in to voice opposition to AB 3030,” said Wayne Kotow, Executive Director of the Coastal Conservation Association of California (CCA CAL), which is leading the sportfishing community’s charge in opposition to AB3030. Kotow testified in person before the committee.
“We might have lost this battle, but we must continue to fight,” Kotow said. “We will have two more chances to oppose AB 3030 in the Senate Appropriations Committee hearing and, if it gets through that committee, on the Senate floor.”
What started as an international environmental plan to restrict the use of 30 percent of all land and water is now being driven to the extreme here in California with an ocean focus on additional marine protected areas (MPAs) with AB 3030.
“It is important to remember that the sportfishing community is not against conservation, biodiversity, or clean ecosystems,” Kotow pointed out. “We agree that there is climate change that needs to be addressed along with issues of ocean acidification, and water and air pollution. But we don’t see how this bill addresses those issues.”
To learn more about the threat of AB 3030 and ways you can help defeat this unnecessary legislation, visit www.ccacalifornia.org.