Description

Today marks the release of the 2007 California Coastal Commission Conservation Voting Chart, which measures the pro-conservation scores of the California Coastal Commission, the state’s most powerful agency charged with the protection of our 1,100 mile coastline. The voting chart is produced by the California Coastkeeper Alliance, Coastal Protection Network, League for Coastal Protection, Sierra Club Coastal Programs, and Surfrider Foundation, who teamed up to record, analyze and report on 28 important votes involving significant coastal issues by the Commission in their twelve monthly meetings in 2007. This year’s chart is designed to clearly illustrate the individual Commissioners’ voting trends and the relative success of the appointments made by Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, Senate Pro Tem Don Perata, and the Speaker of the Assembly Fabián Nuñez.

For 2007, the average overall score for the Coastal Commission was 44% pro-conservation, meaning that over half of the Commissioner votes analyzed in 2007 did not favor protection of the coast. The Commission’s 2007 pro-conservation score was 16 points lower than their overall score in 2005, and 32 points lower than the all-time high of 76% in 1997. As noted in the Voting Chart, this year’s voting average falls on the lower end of the Commission’s twenty-year average voting scores