California Lawmakers Approve Last-Minute, Sweeping Rollbacks of Environmental Law

California lawmakers today approved one of the most substantial rollbacks of the state’s signature environmental review law in decades, including a controversial exemption that would allow high-tech manufacturing plants to be built in industrial zones with no environmental review.

The changes to the California Environmental Quality Act were embedded in a last-minute budget bill that sailed through the Senate and the Assembly. The new law exempts nine types of projects from environmental reviews: child care centers, health clinics, food banks, farmworker housing, broadband, wildfire prevention, water infrastructure, public parks or trails and, notably, advanced manufacturing.