Comment Log Display

Friday, March 11, 2016

Mary D. Nichols, Chair
California Air Resources Board
1001 I Street
Sacramento, CA 95814

RE: Southern California Consolidation Project’s Site Location


Dear Chair Nichols:

I have been following the status of ARB’s Southern California
Consolidation Project closely as the results will impact not only
my District, but Los Angeles County as well.  I was pleased to read
the ARB Staff Report Analysis of Sites for the Southern California
Relocation Project document released February 11, 2016 recommended
Cal Poly Pomona as the proposed location for ARB and I am writing
to strongly urge the California Air Resources Board to adopt the
staff’s site recommendation for Pomona for multiple reasons.

First, LA County cannot afford the loss of approximately 400 jobs
to Riverside County and to do so is unacceptable. Those skilled
jobs, and the accompanying economic development impacts affect
housing, retail, spousal jobs, etc., and need to remain in LA
County.  Figure 10 in your Staff Report clearly shows most of the
El Monte ARB employees currently reside around LA and these
employees are already engrained in LA County.  Moving to Riverside
would have a wider effect on the County beyond these 400 jobs.

Second, the State needs to be good stewards of its resources, and
allowing ARB to relocate to Riverside would prove costly. As stated
in the Staff Report, the recently revised Professional Engineers in
California Government (PECG) Bargaining Unit 9 MOU with California
requires ARB to pay relocation expenses to qualified employees,
which effects “almost 80% of the [ARB] staff,” at an estimated cost
of “$1.0 million to about $7.3 million” to the State.  Next, the
Staff Report specifies that a move to Riverside would “likely
involve relocation, resignation, or retirement of ARB employees,”
given the differences in driving commutes and long public transit
commutes.  Keeping ARB in LA County “would likely retain more of
ARB’s existing and highly trained workforce necessary to support
ARB’s ability to carry out its responsibilities” and “would be much
less disruptive to ARB’s operations because there would [be] less
disruption to ARB employees.”  Relocating to Riverside would cause
undue financial burdens and longer term concerns for ARB in
maintaining their quality staff and relatedly the outstanding
services ARB provides.  The work that ARB does is important to the
State, and we rely on the quality results that come out of your
facilities; the loss of employees that would undoubtedly occur if
ARB relocated to Riverside would be a detriment.

Lastly, organizations are only as good as the employees that work
for them and I commend the ARB in considering your employees’ views
in the decision.  As evidenced in the Staff Report, the ARB
employees have made their preferences very clear, with
“approximately 85% of the respondents prefer[ing] the Pomona site.”
They cited commute distance and time, the impact a move to
Riverside would make on their personal lives and families, and the
impact to their work.  For the latter, the ability to complete
field/outreach tasks within a day versus overnight, proximity to
ports, railroads, refineries, etc. was a concern, in addition to
“siting in Pomona would likely allow ARB to select from a larger
candidate pool because of its proximity to the Los Angeles area.” 

I strongly encourage ARB to adopt the Staff Report recommendation;
it makes economic and operational sense from multiple angles and it
is consistent with the will of your employees.  I look forward to
hearing the results of the March 17th Board meeting and sincerely
hope that ARB will remain in LA County.  If you need additional
information, please contact my office at 714-529-5502.

Sincerely,



LING LING CHANG
Assemblywoman, 55th District
California State Legislature