What matters to me today are CESA and CEQA.
I’m excited for the privilege of presenting this weekend at my favorite legal conference. Decades-long colleagues, friends, and competitors come together to collaborate, critique, strategize, and encourage.
My topic: the California Endangered Species Act (CESA) and the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA). Most of my clients intentionally and zealously structure their business plan to avoid CESA entanglements and related risks. CEQA, on the other hand, is unavoidable for them.
But two major developments of late have thrown even the most cautious and risk-averse interests into an unprecedented CESA-infested briar patch. First, it has been long-standing truth that California does not protect insects under CESA. Mammals, reptiles, fish, and birds? Yes. Even plants? Yes. But bugs? No. No, that is, until a court transplanted the term “invertebrate” from the CESA statutory definition of “fish” to apply to all insects. New CESA protections for bees, flies, spiders, butterflies, and more? Yes.
Second, California’s vigilance in offsetting any federal environmental backsliding hit new heights with AB 1319. The law, among other things, vests unilateral discretion in staff to summarily afford full CESA protections to over 150 species. Such protections would be determined behind closed doors, without the politically accountable Fish and Game Commission, and would not be publicly announced until AFTER the regulatory prohibitions are in place.
To be clear, yes, protection of our extraordinary and unparalleled California biodiversity must and will remain an essential priority; we just can and must make room for constitutional protections and science-based consideration.
That’s what matters to me today in 250 words or less. What matters to you? I’d really like to know.