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Wednesday, Nov. 04, 2009

Lawmakers pass water package after removing Sacramento project

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Lawmakers approved a momentous overhaul of California's ailing water system early this morning, but approval came only after Senate President Pro Tem Darrell Steinberg agreed to strip a $10 million earmark for a Sacramento project he personally has championed.

The five-bill package, including an $11 billion bond measure, ended months of tense negotiations involving scores of interest groups over how to bolster supply, improve delivery and solve environmental problems plaguing the water system.

"This vote will be remembered years from now," Assembly Republican leader Sam Blakeslee said after an all-night session that ended shortly before 6 a.m. today.

"This Legislature has been able to accomplish something that no Legislature has been able to accomplish in decades," Steinberg said. "We all know that people ask, 'Can this Legislature actually take on the biggest, most intractable problems, and find solutions?' The answer is yes."

A nearly 90-minute impasse in the Assembly, with the proposed $11 billion bond measure lacking a handful of votes for approval, ended minutes after Steinberg agreed to drop from the bill a $10 million earmark for a nonprofit tolerance center in Sacramento.

"I have worked my heart out to get this water package passed, and the last thing that I would ever want to do is to jeopardize this incredibly important work," he said of removing the earmark.

Steinberg, D-Sacramento, had requested the $10 million earmark for a tolerance center that he has championed for years and has assisted in raising millions for its construction.

The tolerance center is proposed for construction on the site of the old Sacramento City Unified School District headquarters at 16th and N streets.

The project is envisioned as a "statewide hub" to teach tolerance to students and encourage "collaborative problem-solving," according to its Web site.

Language in the bond bill stipulated only that the $10 million "shall be available for capital improvements to nonprofit facilities that provide watershed, environmental justice and urban greening education programs to students in the Sacramento City Unified School District and the surrounding area."

Steinberg, who has been the driving force behind the Legislature's efforts to revamp the state's creaking water system, defended inclusion in the bond bill of a project seemingly unrelated to the state's water problems.

"Frankly, if I have the opportunity to use the power I have to further civil rights and to further California history in any way, I'm going to do that," he said late Tuesday afternoon.

Dennis Mangers, a senior adviser to Steinberg and chairman of the Capital Unity Council, which is overseeing the project, said the proposed center's connection to water was that the center would include an aquarium, a botanical garden and other exhibits dealing with the vital role that water issues have played in the history of California.

The "water education component" would educate visitors about the role water systems play in encouraging successful communities and in triggering conflict.

Mangers said the council, which was created in 1999 in the wake of a series of hate crimes in Northern California, was about halfway to its fundraising goal of $30 million to build the center.

Mangers said the water education element was included as part of the center's plans long before the bond measure was drafted.

Steinberg's $10 million earmark for a project he personally has led sparked controversy shortly after midnight when a story by The Bee was published on its Web site and word began circulating among lawmakers of both houses.

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger hailed the the approval as "an historic achievement" and singled out Steinberg as "a tireless leader, a relentless advocate for the environment and a true statesman."

In the wee hours of the morning, it became clear that controversy over Steinberg's multimillion-dollar earmark was delaying Assembly passage of the water package's proposed $11 billion bond.

Needing 54 votes for passage, the proposed bond measure, Senate Bill 2, received only 43 votes initially, a total that was raised to 50 votes after about 40 minutes of arm-twisting.

Behind the scenes, some legislators were requesting that Steinberg's earmark be removed.

"I went over and talked to (Steinberg) and he said, 'I want to come over and take it out,'" Assembly Speaker Karen Bass said.

Bass predicted that enough votes could have been secured to pass the proposed bond measure, even without striking the earmark, but certain members had objected to the $10 million request and "we were concerned about it, so we struck it out."

Minutes after the earmark was removed, the bond measure passed the Assembly by the bare-minimum of 54 votes needed to secure a two-thirds majority.

Assemblyman Jared Huffman, a San Rafael Democrat who was pushing for removal of the earmark, praised Steinberg's willingness to strike it.

"In the bigger picture, it's going to take away a distraction that wasn't going to help our institution and wasn't going to help the chance of this bond with voters."

In floor debate, Assemblyman Roger Niello, R-Fair Oaks, praised plans for the tolerance center but characterized the $10 million earmark as "pork."

"It's a wonderful project, I support it myself," Niello said. "It has absolutely nothing to do with water."

The five-bill water package now goes to Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, who is expected to sign it.

The bills include efforts to improve conservation, oversee restoration of the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta, better manage groundwater supplies and stiffen penalties for illegal diversion of water.

The package does not take a stand on whether to construct a controversial canal through or around the Delta, sometimes characterized as a peripheral canal, but it proposes creation of a seven-member to council to oversee management of the Delta and potentially decide such delivery issues.

Assemblywoman Alyson Huber, D-El Dorado Hills, proposed an amendment to require a vote by the Legislature before any peripheral canal could be built. The amendment was shelved.

Perhaps fitting for water negotiations that took long months to complete and came down to the wire, the final piece in the package was delayed for almost 40 minutes this morning while sergeants-at-arms searched for Sen. Tom Harman, R-Huntington Beach.

Shortly before 6 a.m., Harman somewhat sheepishly appeared on the Senate floor, and cast the deciding vote for the revamped bond proposal.

Then legislators finally went home - barely beating sunrise.