Report Card on Deukmejian

The Planning and Conservation League Foundation was very disappointed with the very defensive reaction that Gov. George Deukmejian’s press office gave to our recent “1985 Report Card” on the Administration’s environmental record.

Deukmejian received an overall grade of C-minus, which we believe was generous. The governor was given the benefit of the doubt since our evaluation placed his record almost exactly between a C-minus and a D-plus. We had hoped the extensive 81-page report (which took hundreds of professional staff hours to prepare) would be positively received by the governor in a sincere effort to help him improve his environmental record.

The Administration’s major complaint was that we prepare the annual “Report Card” as a “creative approach to advancing (our) agenda.” To this, we plead guilty as charged.

Our agenda is to work for reasonable safeguards for California’s environment and to protect public health from dangerous exposure to hazardous wastes. We hope the Administration’s reaction does not imply that the governor disagrees with these goals.

The Administration’s press release charges that achieving an “A” grade would be too costly to California’s economy. We couldn’t disagree more.

Maintaining a clean and healthy environment is vital to our economy. Our tourism and recreation industries are among the most important in our state. An attractive environment is critical to the productivity of these industries, which provide employment for several hundred thousand Californians.

Tourists don’t spend several billion dollars each year to visit California so they can see offshore oil rigs along the Long Beach coast (the governor received an F-plus on coastal protection issues and a D on Lake Tahoe).

We also disagree that it is too expensive to protect public health from hazardous wastes that can cause cancer and birth defects. The governor vetoed important funding this year for cleaning up hazardous leaks from underground tanks. Because his veto will delay cleaning up these sites, the leaks will continue to get worse, and the costs to the state will ultimately skyrocket. The state economy cannot afford to lose invaluable groundwater supplies because of toxic contamination.

COREY BROWN

Sacramento