Glendora : Plant-Siting Bill Gains

The Assembly Natural Resources Committee this week passed a bill introduced by Assemblyman Bill Lancaster (R-Covina) that would give air pollution control districts the power to deny operating permits to factories that could pose a hazard to adjacent schools, hospitals or convalescent homes.

The committee passed the bill, AB 3728, by an 8-2 vote Monday, Lancaster aide Bill Nunes said. The bill will next be heard by the Assembly Ways and Means Committee later this month.

Bonita School Board member Sharon Scott, who testified in favor of the bill in Sacramento last month, said the committee’s vote was encouraging.

Lancaster introduced the bill after an acid-mist leak from a Glendora metal-plating plant caused 100 children at a San Dimas elementary school to become ill. If passed, AB 3728 would grant the South Coast Air Quality Board and other pollution control districts statewide the authority to deny operating permits to certain types of plants if they are located next to schools.

On Monday night, the La Verne City Council voted unanimously to support the Lancaster bill. The San Dimas City Council last week voted unanimously to endorse both that bill and a similar bill sponsored by Assemblywoman Maxine Waters (D-Los Angeles) that would require industrial plants within a quarter-mile of a school to install the best available pollution control equipment. The Glendora City Council has declined to endorse the specific language in the two bills but voted last week to endorse the legislation “in concept.”

Waters’ bill, AB 3410, was passed by the Assembly Ways and Means Committee on Tuesday by a vote of 18 to 5.