Air Board Chief Gets New Post

The chairwoman of the California Air Resources Board, denied confirmation by Democrats in the Senate, stepped down Tuesday but was appointed by Gov. Pete Wilson to a newly created post where she will retain considerable influence over state air pollution policy.

In her new role as “communications adviser” to the Air Resources Board, Jacqueline Schafer will serve as its main spokeswoman for the media and will help the board develop state air pollution regulations and programs by conferring with industry groups, the public and the Legislature.

Wilson spokesman Sean Walsh said the position, which will pay $82,092 a year, was crafted specifically for Schafer because the governor wants her to remain in a key role to guide the state’s air policies, which are increasingly contentious and far-reaching as California struggles to achieve federal clean air standards.

Schafer, named by Wilson to chair the air board a year ago, was forced to resign because the state Senate Rules Committee, entrenched in election-year wrangling with Wilson, refused to confirm her post this year.

Calling Schafer “an outstanding chair of the ARB,” Wilson said in a statement that she will be “continuing to play a major role in the development of air quality policy in this Administration.”

The governor has not decided on a replacement to chair the influential board. Unlike the air resources board’s former press secretary, who reported to the agency’s executive officer, Schafer will report directly to the board’s chairperson, which gives her more independence.

Last November, Wilson ousted longtime air board Chairwoman Jananne Sharpless, largely over a conflict with the trucking industry over state rules requiring cleaner-burning diesel fuel. Wilson then appointed Schafer, who had served in the George Bush Administration as an assistant secretary of the Navy and as a member of the Ronald Reagan Administration’s White House Council on Environmental Quality.

Since Schafer’s appointment, California environmentalists and air quality officials have complained that the air board, known for two decades of independence and stringent standards for vehicles and fuels, has been bowing to influence from Wilson’s office and granting concessions to the industries it regulates.

“I think Jackee Shafer is an instrument of the governor’s policy,” said Cliff Gladstein, president of the Coalition for Clean Air. “She represents what (Wilson) asks her to represent and the responsibility for the bad (state clean air plan) must fall squarely on the shoulders of the governor.”

Sen. Tom Hayden (D-Santa Monica), who played a pivotal role in blocking Senate approval of Schafer, said moving her from the top leadership position to a lesser post “means that the status quo will continue. This is not an argument over simply replacing one person with another, but a larger concern that the agency has become less independent and cozier with polluting industries.”

But Dave Titus of the California Trucking Assn., which represents 2,600 truck companies, said Schafer has “brought some common sense ideas to the environmental arena.”

“She kept lines of communication open between all parties. Compared to the previous administration (under Sharpless), which was 110% adversarial, this was a big, big help to us,” he said.

Walsh said the governor was especially pleased with Schafer’s oversight of the state’s new smog plan, which the air board adopted last week after more than 20 hours of public debate.

The air board succeeded in meeting a Nov. 15 deadline set by Congress, making California the only state in the nation that was able to complete its smog plan on time.

The plan’s most controversial aspect is a massive automobile and truck scrapping program suggested by the oil industry. Under the plan, 75,000 old cars in the four-county Los Angeles Basin would be bought each year for $1,000 each and destroyed. Environmentalists and Southern California air quality officials say the air board set unreasonable expectations for how many old cars and trucks can be removed from the roads.

Last summer, California’s major environmental groups, except the Sierra Club, endorsed Schafer’s appointment.

Times staff writer Carl Ingram contributed in Sacramento.