Why the Media Didn’t Cover Legislation Passed Out of Committee This Week
By Judy Dugan, Research Director, The Foundation for Consumer and Taxpayer Rights (FCTR) and OilWatchdog.org Project
A month ago, with great fanfare, there was an announcement with cameras rolling at a Chevron station in Los Angeles of a package of bills dealing with gasoline prices and refinery practices in California. There was a lot of tough talk about market manipulation and the “Enron” word was mentioned.
But this week, you wouldn’t have known from the MSM in California
that three modest proposals for curbing Big Oil’s consumer abuses
passed their first key committee votes in the California Legislature.
There’s one good reason: Jaded reporters figure Chevron and friends are
biding their time—to amend the bills to meaninglessness, bury them in a
Senate committee, gut them later in a final conference committee or,
their final ace in the hole, depend on Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger to
veto them.
These are the fates that befell nearly every bill that Big Oil
opposed in the state Legislature last year, and the third bill below
has already been amended to mush.
Still, if groups like OilWatchdog
and their supporters can keep up the pressure this year, there’s at
least a chance that the other two measures will amount to something.
Here are the bills:
AB 1552 by Los Angeles Assemblyman Mike Feuer:
It’s probably the best of the lot, because its requirement for much
more complete reporting about the refinery business empowers state
regulators, provides somewhat more public information and makes it
easier for the state Attorney General to take legal action. It’s also
the hardest one for the industry to oppose or Gov. Schwarzenegger to
veto: no overt regulation, no tax.
AB 1610 by Speaker Fabian Nuñez:
Gives the state some authority to directly oversee refinery operations,
including downtime, and to send inspectors to determine the cause and
duration of outages—which were the cause of this year’s short supply.
OilWatchdog wishes the bill required refiners to keep more supply on
hand, which could include imports as well as direct production, but at
least it recognizes the source of the problem: If refiners aren’t
actually gaming the system, they’ve neglected maintenance and
modernization so thoroughly that their refineries are not reliable.
Either is a cause for action.
AB 868 by Assemblyman Mike Davis:
This bill has already been amended to near uselessness. It purports to
attack the “hot fuel” ripoff that costs California drivers about half a
billion dollars a year. Gasoline expands as it gets warmer and provides
less miles per gallon as the temperature goes up.
Hotter fuel is more profitable for retailers, because they buy it at
a price adjusted to a 60-degree standard and sell the expanded version.
Gasoline should be sold through temperature-adjusted nozzles so
motorists get a fair measure for the buck–it’s not rocket science. The
bill acknowledges the dishonesty, then punts, calling for “studies” of
the problem until 2008. An amendment then calls for an “advisory
group,” including industry representatives, to study for another year.
Put your hopes on a federal bill.
For a look back on the announcement of these bills, read Taking on High Gas Prices in California and the Oil Industry: What Will Come Out of the Other End of the Legislative Grinder? and California Speaker of the Assembly on Gasoline Prices: “I believe that there is market manipulation at the refinery level”.
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Judy Dugan is the Research Director of the Foundation for Taxpayer and Consumer Rights,
a nationally-recognized, California-based, non-profit consumer
education and advocacy organization. She joined FTCR in March 2006 and
is a former Deputy Editorial Page Editor for the Los Angeles Times. She
most recently served as Senior Editorial Writer at the Times and was
the Editor of a Pulitzer Prize-winning series on California government
in 2004. Since 1987 she has held editorial positions with the Times
including Assistant Op-Ed Editor and Voices Editor.