SB 4

A new report estimates that 171,000 acres of land would be available for housing development if California approves SB 4, Affordable Housing on Faith and Higher Education Lands Act of 2023.

August 31, 2023 - Terner Center for Housing Innovation

The ‘Yes in God’s Backyard’ movement could get a boost from a proposed bill in the California state legislature.

December 30, 2022 - Los Angeles Times

The California governor, known for his outspoken climate advocacy, signed the nation's toughest fracking regulation bill in 2013. His response to those who want to ban fracking is that priority must be on reducing oil consumption.

May 27, 2017 - San Francisco Chronicle

San Benito and Santa Barbara County voters will decide on fracking ban measures on Tuesday that go beyond the controversial extraction technology by including acidization and "steam flooding." Mendocino County will also have a fracking ban measure.

November 4, 2014 - San Francisco Chronicle

Until recently, California's Monterey Shale was estimated to have the nation's highest amount of recoverable oil. Then the Energy Department revised their estimates, lowering it 96%, which turned out to be bad news for fracking moratorium advocates.

August 21, 2014 - Governing

A high profile bill championed by California's environmental community that would have placed a moratorium on fracking and other well stimulation treatment and would have allowed more local control failed to get off the Senate floor on May 29 and 30.

June 2, 2014 - Daily Breeze

A unanimous vote by the Carson city council for the 45-day moratorium on all oil drilling, with or without fracking, was done in response to an application for drilling by Occidental Petroleum even though the company agreed not to utilize fracking.

March 21, 2014 - Los Angeles Times

Calif. Gov. Jerry Brown has made climate protection a centerpiece of his policy agenda, yet he has also embraced the controversial technology of fracking to tap his state's huge shale oil reserves by signing SB 4. He explains his position here.

November 2, 2013 - San Jose Mercury - Science

SB 4 passed the legislature over strong objections from the oil and business community. California will go from having no well stimulation (includes acidizing) regulation set in statute to the nation's toughest, so why are environmentalists unhappy?

September 13, 2013 - Los Angeles Times - Business

Sacramento reporter John Myers suggests that if the oil industry and the Sierra Club both oppose a fracking bill - one for going too far; the other for not going far enough - then state Senator Fran Pavley's bill, "must be doing something right".

September 2, 2013 - News 10/KXTV Sacramento