Countywide : Analyst Says Focus May Shift to Jobs

The era of increasing environmental regulation may be ending as politicians turn their focus toward providing jobs, a business breakfast in Oxnard was told Thursday.

Penny Bohannon, legislative analyst for Ventura County, said legislators in Sacramento are worried about the lingering recession and want to make the state’s business climate as favorable as possible.

Two ways to do that would be to slow creation of new environmental regulations and relax those already on the books, Bohannon said.

Gov. Pete Wilson’s growth management policy unveiled earlier this week, which calls for streamlining some environmental laws, is a good example of that, she said.

“This may be the year you see the pendulum swing a little more to the center,” she said.

Bohannon’s comments came during a workshop on environmental concerns sponsored by the pro-business Ventura County Economic Development Assn. About 50 business owners and managers attended.

Many participants expressed concerns about what they view as the increasing intrusiveness of environmental regulation as they try to run their businesses.

Dodi Bouton, environmental compliance manager for an Oxnard-based defense contractor, said businesses are desperately trying to comply with a multitude of regulations handed down by federal, state and local agencies.

“But it is absolutely impossible for a small company to comply with all of the laws,” she said.

“It is not possible to ensure that you are totally in compliance with the law and won’t get hurt.”

Speaker Gregory W. Brose, who coordinates prosecutions for the district attorney’s environmental protection division, agreed that there is plenty of opportunity to find violations. But the district attorney’s office does not have enough staff to go after minor violators, he said.

“We deal with cases where there is the greatest potential harm to the public and the greatest potential harm to the environment,” he said.