California Construction Trucking Association (CCTA)

Bill Davis, SCCA - 8-25-11

When Samuel Taylor Coleridge penned the Rime of the Ancyent Marinere in 1798, his reference to “water water everywhere” about sailors facing a slow death due to dehydration while surrounded by the undrinkable sea. 

As if air quality regulations were not bad enough, California contractors are facing an equally grisly prospect, “death by a thousand more cuts” from unnecessary regulation over stormwater run-off rules.

The deadline for compliance with the new California stormwater requirements for construction sites was September 2. Construction companies were scrambling to prepare for this game-changer burden.

However, Obama appointees provide blueprint for getting around union anti-discrimination provisions.

Foundation Action, Aug./Sept. 2011 Issue

The National Labor Relations Board (NRLB), a federal agency charged with administering private sector labor law, has ruled against a Teamster workplace scheme that discriminated against non-union workers. Kirk Rammage, the victim of union officials’ discriminatory practices, received free assistance from the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation, Inc. (Foundation) during his extended legal battle.

Although the NLRB previously decided the case in Rammage’s favor in 2009, that ruling was later nullified by the Supreme Court on the grounds that the Board lacked a three-member quorum at the time of the decision.

By Toby Harnden World Last: 8-28-11

For the television reporter, clad in his red hood emblazoned with the CNN logo, it was a dramatic on-air moment, broadcasting live from Long Island, New York during a hurricane that also threatened Manhattan.

“We are in, right, now…the right eye wall, no doubt about that…there you see the surf,” he said breathlessly. “That tells a story right there.”Stumbling and apparently buffeted by ferocious gusts, he took shelter next to a building. “This is our protection from the wind,” he explained. “It’s been truly remarkable to watch the power of the ocean here.”

LA Times, 8-16-11

Terminal operators at the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach that were alleged to be in violation of diesel emission standards will be undertaking cleanup projects estimated to cost $1 million apiece under a settlement reached with California's attorney general.

The seven companies will also have to pay other costs, and let the public know — through advertisements in newspapers, at bus stops and online — of the dangers of diesel exhaust.

OC Register 8-16-11

EDM Laboratories Inc., founded in Orange County in 1969, has moved to Corpus Christi, Tex. because California taxes and fees are too high, said owner Mike St. Amand.

The manufacturer of precision metal parts for NASA, Boeing Co. and other companies started in Garden Grove and moved to Los Alamitos in 1996.

f EDM Labs new headquarters in Corpus Christi

St. Amand put his Los Alamitos building up for sale three years ago. It sold in March, 2011, and the company moved to Texas in May.

Mike D. Smith at the Corpus Christi Caller recently used EDM Labs as the latest example of the success of TexasOne, a program of the Texas Economic Development Corp. “Taxes and fees are the main reason” for the move, St. Amand said in a phone interview.

He owned the company’s headquarters in Los Alamitos and property tax increases were limited by Prop. 13, he said, but government entities raised fees instead, such as Orange County’s sewer connection fee that started at $50 a year, then increased to $100 the next year, $200 the next, $400 the next and $800 last year. EDM Labs’ business license fee almost doubled, St. Amand said.

Capitol Weekly, 8-25-11, CA Political News on 8-27-11

It is all too familiar to hear criticism of California’s regulatory process, also known as promulgation (10 points if you can say that five times fast), so when Senate Pro Tem Darrell Steinberg and the Governor’s recently appointed Jobs Czar, Michael Rossi highlight regulatory reform as key to restoring California jobs, the pronouncements garner the requisite ‘bravos’ and ‘hear, hears’.

Is all regulation bad? Certainly not. But regulation not based on actual data or even a cursory understanding of real world factors, is by all accounts not good for our state and its citizens. One requirement of regulatory agencies that demands concrete, real data is the oft-mocked Economic Impact Analysis (EIA).

OOIDA 8-29-11

The Owner-Operator Independent Drivers Association (OOIDA) triumphed on August 26, in a lawsuit against the Federal Motor Carrier SafetyAdministration (FMCSA) seeking review of a regulation mandating the use of Electronic On-Board Recorders (EOBRs).

Siding with three truck drivers and the Owner Operator Independent Drivers Association, a panel of the 7^th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals vacated and remanded the rule back to the agency for further proceedings. The Court easily sided with OOIDA saying that the FMCSA ignored a federal statute that any regulation imposed for the use of monitoring devices in commercial vehicles must ensure that the devices are not used to harass vehicle operators. The court said that EOBR technology allows the pressuring of drivers to perform at higher levels and to even drive when tired, and thus it vacated the rule. To “vacate” a court order or judgment, means to cancel it or render it null and void.

Public safety pay, pensions pressuring city fathers: Spiraling public safety costs and plummeting revenues have pushed Orange County cities to the brink. Many can't pay their bills without raiding their reserves. Twenty-three Orange County cities outspent their general fund revenues during fiscal 2009-10, the most recent audited year.

CalChamber (August 10, 2011)

As if environmental regulations weren’t already costly and burdensome enough for businesses here – just wait. Our state is without a doubt addicted to fees and taxes. In Southern California were it rains 13 inches a year in about 20 days, in a 80 day rainy season, this is especially absurd.

Now new fee hikes coupled with excessive new proposed requirements could boost costs significantly for any facility required to have a storm water permit. Entities that will feel the impact include small employers, schools, ports, truck yards, large industrial operations, restaurants, parks, farmers markets, even groups that hold car wash fundraisers.

Storm water fees will rise in all categories, putting more economic pressure on businesses struggling to recover from years of recession. The increased costs (as much as a 10-fold price hike for some permit holders) could range from tens of thousands of dollars at small businesses and schools to hundreds of millions of dollars at large facilities owned by ports and industrial facilities.

The new proposed draft storm water permit requirements expand the types of facilities that must obtain the permits, thereby increasing enforcement costs for local governments, which already are financially strapped.

(Grain Valley, Mo., Aug. 9, 2011) –The Owner-Operator Independent Drivers Association (OOIDA) called the administration’s announcement today for greenhouse gas emissions standards for heavy-duty trucks a flawed, one-size-fits-all rule. The new rule ignores input from small-business trucking, overlooks less expensive options to achieve EPA goals of reduced emissions, and will ultimately increase new truck costs.

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced a first-ever rulemaking for new large tractor-trailer trucks that requires trucks to achieve up to approximately 20 percent reduction in fuel consumption and greenhouse gas emissions by model year 2018.

Small business especially want an end to junk science, and demand an open public hearing on how corrupt and irresponsible EPA and state air agencies have become