Yesterday produced a victory in our fiight for a transparent and fair California Coastal Commission. Assembly Bill 2002 was voted through the assembly late last night. AB 2002 was introduced by Assemblymembers Toni Atkins, Mark Stone and Marc Levine in reaction to the fiing of former Executive Director Charles Lester and it requires any agent that lobbies the Commission to register as a lobbyist with the Fair Political Practices Commission. The bill also requires that in the seven days prior to a public hearing on a specific matter, a Commissioner must report any ex parte communication within 24 hours, and no ex parte communications may occur in the 24 hours immediately preceding a public hearing. 

Our Associate Director of Public Policy, Juan Altamirano, was present at the now infamous Commission meeting where Lester was ousted and he was also there last night when the final tallies were made in support of AB 2002. He and other advocates worked until 9:30 pm to get the necessary 2/3 votes. Assemblymember Stone was especially appreciative of Audubon member emails to their electeds. Stay tuned for more on this effort, we will send action alerts when it comes up for vote again.