SACRAMENTO – California Governor Edmund G. Brown Jr., Oregon Governor Kate Brown and Washington Governor Jay Inslee issued the following statement today in response to a planned presidential executive order to revise offshore oil and gas leasing in federal waters:
“Today’s unilateral action is short-sighted. For good reason there has been no federal expansion of oil and gas drilling along our shared coastline for more than 30 years. We still remember what happened in Santa Barbara in 1969, Port Angeles in 1985, Grays Harbor in 1988 and Coos Bay in 1999. We remember the oil soaked beaches and wildlife and the devastating economic impacts to local communities and the fishing industry. Now is not the time to turn back the clock. We cannot return to the days where the federal government put the interests of big oil above our communities and treasured coastline.”
Last December, Governor Brown called on the federal government to use its authority under Section 12(a) of the Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act to permanently withdraw federal waters off the coast of California from new offshore oil and gas leasing and guarantee that future oil and gas drilling in these waters is prohibited. The Governor also launched a new partnership of jurisdictions around the world committed to protecting coastal communities and economies from the threat of rising ocean acidity.