NEWS RELEASE
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: June 27, 2019
Contact: Sandy Bahr, Sierra Club (602) 999-5790, sandy.bahr@sierraclub.org
Sierra Club Releases 2019 Environmental Report Card
Legislature Does Better, but Still Does Not Make the Grade
Phoenix, AZ – Today, Sierra Club released its 2019 Environmental Report Card for the Arizona Legislature and Governor. This year’s report card shows that Arizona still does not have a legislature and governor that are willing to actively address the key environmental challenges we face as a state or move forward with sustainable plans for Arizona’s future.
“The Governor and Legislators passed a stopgap measure on water, the Drought Contingency Plan. Sadly it promotes more of the same—unsustainable development and agriculture—and funds pumps and other infrastructure to facilitate even more groundwater pumping,” said Sandy Bahr, chapter director for Sierra Club’s Grand Canyon (Arizona) Chapter. “In addition to not really addressing water, legislators took no real action to clean up our air, protect wildlife, or address climate change.”
Another session came and went with no real action on the climate crisis. Even resolutions on climate were not heard and no bills to require greater efficiency in appliances, cleaner car standards, or to allow cities to adopt requirements for disclosing commercial building energy use were heard either. Energy measures that did advance related primarily to taxing. One event of note was a proclamation for Earth Day that was read on both the Senate and House floors and recognized a “changing climate” and the need for action. Now we just need that action.
“On the plus side, the legislature did finally re-establish the Arizona State Parks Heritage Fund, albeit without any funding, and Arizona will now have its own public lands holiday on the first Saturday in April,” said Bahr. “The Heritage Fund will provide funding for local parks, historic preservation, and cultural resource protection. The public lands holiday provides an opportunity for all Arizonans to celebrate and protect public lands, including state and local parks, as well as federal public lands.”
The close 31-29 split in the House meant that several environmentally harmful bills did not advance, including one to allow backsliding on water adequacy requirements, HB2111, and one to allow deeper groundwater pumping and to facilitate private interests importing groundwater from outside of an active management area, HB2609. Three anti-public lands bills were again introduced by Representative Mark Finchem; one was vetoed (HB2596), one was struck for another bill (HB2547), and one was never brought to the floor of the Senate (HB2557). That means no anti-public lands measures passed out of the Legislature this session. This too was an improvement.
The grades were better this session, but still woefully inadequate with 19 legislators failing and 26 getting low marks of “Ds.” Three senators and one representative earned an “A+,” which means they voted 100 percent pro-environment and did not miss a vote on the key bills Sierra Club scored. Seven senators and 27 representatives received an “A.” Governor Doug Ducey again earned low marks with a “D” on the 2019 Environmental Report Card.
Sierra Club is one of the country’s oldest grassroots environmental organizations with more than 60,000 members and supporters in Arizona as part of the Grand Canyon Chapter. At the end of each legislative session, the Grand Canyon Chapter develops its report card in order to inform Arizonans about their legislators’ voting records on key environmental issues.
The Sierra Club report card is available on the website in English here and Spanish here.
###