U.S. Takes Step to Strip Coast Panel of Its Power

The Reagan Administration took the first step Thursday to strip the California Coastal Commission of its authority to review the environmental impacts of offshore oil and gas drilling projects.

In a draft evaluation released in Washington, the Commerce Department said the commission had not only failed to follow its federally approved California Coastal Zone Management Plan in ruling on development issues, but that its decisions had been “improperly influenced” by political considerations.

State officials immediately assailed the evaluation, accusing the Reagan Administration of attempting to dismantle environmental protections off the coast in the Administration’s zeal to promote exploration and development of oil and gas resources.

‘Just Mined the Waters’

“They have just mined the waters around the flagship of this nation’s coastal management programs,” California Coastal Commission Chairman Michael Wornum charged. He said the evaluation was “just a smoke screen for their real objective--opening the California coast to unfettered oil development.”

Reports have been circulating in Washington for the last several weeks that the Commerce Department was poised to take the first steps to strip the commission of its authority--a process known as decertification.

The first hints of trouble for the commission came last June when Interior Secretary Donald P. Hodel wrote the secretary of commerce charging the California Coastal Commission with “usurping” federal authority. Hodel urged the Commerce Department to critically review the commission’s compliance with the state’s federally approved coastal zone management plan. Hodel specifically singled out what he said was the commission’s adverse impact on “the development of energy resources.”

No state coastal body has ever been decertified in the history of the federal Coastal Zone Act of 1972. Under the act, the state commission has authority to determine if projects on federally regulated lands within the state’s coastal zone are “consistent” with California coastal protection laws. If the commission finds the projects--such as oil drilling in federal waters--is not consistent, the applicant must appeal to the secretary of commerce. The secretary has authority to uphold or overturn the commission’s objection.

However, if the state commission is decertified, it would have no such review authority over such projects as offshore oil and gas exploration and production, ocean incineration of toxic waste, and dumping and mining in national forests located within the 1,000-yard-wide strip along the state’s 1,100-mile coastline. The commission could also lose an annual $1.9-million federal grant.

In a thinly veiled reference to the firing last July of Commissioner Gilbert Contreras by the state Senate Rules Committee, the Commerce Department declared that commissioners should not be summarily dismissed “because of disagreement with their votes, or with their predicted votes.”

State Senate President Pro Tem David A. Roberti (D-Los Angeles) reacted sharply to the reference to Contreras’ firing. Roberti is chairman of the Senate Rules Committee that summarily dismissed the San Diego County builder just before a key vote on Occidental Petroleum’s plan to sink exploratory wells in Pacific Palisades. The plan, however, was approved on a 7-5 vote, despite Contreras’ replacement by Roberti aide Christine Minnehan.

“The Contreras matter dealt very directly with the questions of drilling along the coast and it just corroborates my feeling on the matter,” said Roberti, who charged that the Administration acted out of concern that oil development was being hampered.

Roberti said it was ironic that the federal government viewed Contreras’ firing as “heavy-handed” and said the move to strip the coastal commission of much of its power was “a much more distant and heavier hand than anything we in state government could do.”

Lt. Gov. Leo T. McCarthy, who Thursday joined state Controller Gray Davis in a 2-1 State Lands Commission vote to sue the federal government over offshore oil development issues, said Thursday night that the federal government’s evaluation was “an insult” to California voters who established the commission.

McCarthy also said the move would become an issue during the confirmation hearings in the U.S. Senate on C. William Verity, President Reagan’s nominee to succeed the late Malcolm Baldrige as secretary of commerce.

“These hearings, out of necessity, must be our next arena in the battle to protect our coast. We don’t need another cabinet secretary intent upon muzzling our coastal watchdog,” McCarthy said in a statement.

The draft evaluation was prepared for the Commerce Department by the Office of Ocean and Coastal Resource Management. In the draft, the office said that the coastal commission had “deviated substantially” from several important provisions in the coastal management plan. Before a state commission can be stripped of its authority, there must be a finding that it has substantially deviated from the plan.

Because decertification has never been attempted, the process could take as long as a year. In addition, legal challenges and actions by Congress would stretch out the process until after next year’s presidential election.

The coastal commission has two weeks to comment on the draft evaluation. If the Commerce Department is not satisfied with the response and still believes that the state is not following the coastal plan, California would have 30 days to outline a plan to correct any problems. If the state is still not meeting the conditions, the decertification process would continue.

A state may request a public hearing, a process that could take many months.