California lawmakers secure climate funding from Newsom

California lawmakers secured $450 million in funding for climate projects from Gov. Gavin Newsom on Tuesday, including $40 million for safe and affordable drinking water, 20 million for clean air monitoring and $70 million for wildfire prevention. The deal comes after months of pressure from Senate Democrats who feared environmental projects could lose funding under changes Newsom’s administration made to California’s carbon market. 

CalMatters reports:

In May, California’s air regulators adopted new rules that offered as much as $2 billion in free pollution permits to fossil fuel companies following intense lobbying from the oil industry. The Legislative Analyst’s Office estimated that the change would cut California’s estimated $4 billion a year in carbon market revenue in half and could drain funding from some programs that were expected to receive money. In response, Senate Democrats accused Newsom of stripping climate programs of critical funding and threatened to block many of his budget priorities. 

In response to Senate Democrat's criticism, Newsom and lawmakers later agreed to use most of the carbon market revenue funds to backfill the state fire department’s budget and to spend $115 million on electric vehicle incentives, but pushed climate negotiations to the summer. Tuesday’s $450 million deal is the final result of those negotiations.