Life Sciences Legislator of the Year, Other News from Sen. Blakespear

Greetings!

Today is my un-birthday! Born on Leap Day in 1976, I’m turning 12.25 in the stroke between today and tomorrow. Every four years I have quadruple the amount of fun as other years, but tonight a smaller, family birthday dinner is a delightful treat. My mom baking her homemade lemon cake from our backyard lemons will be a highlight!

In Sacramento, the pace keeps getting faster and faster. As the state braces to respond to the decisions that come from Washington, we are having oversight hearings and doing strategic planning.

Also, our first major deadline of the year passed – Feb. 21 was the last day to introduce new bills. To see all the legislation I have introduced, and all I have passed in previous years, visit my Legislation Web Page. I will be continually updating this throughout the year.

Here are four important bills I have recently introduced to protect wildlife habitat funding, speed up the removal of homeless encampments near state roads, encourage the use of solar energy and better understand the source of greenhouse gas emissions.

• SB 427 protects state funding to acquire, restore and enhance wildlife habitats across the state. This funding to safeguard open spaces, restore habitat and protect vital wildlife refuges is valuable and important and should continue. Read more here.
• SB 569 speeds up removal of homeless encampments located near state roads and highways. The state needs to do better in preventing and removing encampments from land that the state has control over, and this bill helps accomplish that. Read more here.
• SB 710 extends one of California’s most valuable incentives to acquire solar energy – an exclusion for solar panels from being assessed on property taxes. We should continue our state’s commitment to solar energy by doing everything possible to incentivize homeowners and business owners to install solar panels and batteries. Read more here.
• SB 755 requires the largest state contractors to report their greenhouse gas emissions annually. California is the fifth-largest economy in the world, and we can’t tackle climate change without a clear picture of our own supply chain's impact on the environment. Read more here.

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SB 427 ensures continued state funding for habitat conservation so that local projects like the Lusardi Creek Loop Trail in San Diego (pictured above) can continue to be built.

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The Senate Environmental Quality Committee, which I chair, held its first hearing of the year this past week.

The information hearing we held this week on Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) programs was extremely helpful and educational. You can watch it here, by scrolling down to 2/25/2025 Environmental Quality Committee and clicking on the watch link. Also, you can find the agenda for the hearing and background on the topic here.

I am a strong believer that EPR can drive real-world change and help the state reach its waste diversion and recycling goals. EPR is useful for products with particularly difficult end-of-life management, such as pyrotechnic marine flares, an EPR bill I’m running this year, because it forces the producers of products to consider the full lifecycle of a product and work toward a responsible, clean end market instead of going straight to our perpetually growing landfills.

The last few years have seen large new EPR programs signed into law in California, including EPR for textiles, for batteries, paint, and of course, for the packaging and single-use plastics in the landmark legislation SB 54.

I believe that the model of EPR developed in SB 54, which captures a big universe of products, has clear recycling and source reduction mandates, and a strong enforcement process, are a reflection of many of the lessons learned and new philosophy driving stronger EPR policies.

There is no other feasible way to meaningfully reduce the pollutant that is plastic.

That’s why earlier this month I wrote a joint letter with Sen. Ben Allen and signed by many of my colleagues urging the Governor to ensure SB 54 regulations move forward without delay.

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I was delighted to be named, along with Assemblymember Rick Zbur (right), as California Life Sciences 2025 Legislator of the Year. Thanks to Sam Chung (Left), who is a great advocate for the California Life Sciences in Sacramento.

 

The life sciences are California's 2nd-largest industry and vital to the state's economic success. With more than 300 life science companies in my Senate district, I know the value of what they do - for the economy and for the public, by developing life-saving drugs and therapies.

I am vice chair of the California Rare Disease Caucus, and I authored Senate Resolution 111‚ which proclaimed August California Life Sciences Month. I have also visited many life science companies to better understand what they do and how I can support them.

The industry directly employs 465,000 people in the state and in 2023, this generated $414.2 billion in annual economic benefits for the state. It leads the nation in research and development investment, delivering innovations that have life-changing impacts on patients.

It’s essential that we maintain the net operating loss deduction and the existing research and development tax credit, and renew our efforts to rein in anticompetitive practices pharmacy benefit managers are using to drive up prescription drug prices. Not to mention, the federal funding that these companies rely on to bring therapeutics to market through the National Institute of Health, is in jeopardy due to cuts our new federal administration is proposing. I’m working with my colleagues to advocate for this crucial funding to keep us healthy, living longer, and treating disease.

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Participating in a panel discussion with (left to right) Channell Fletcher, Deputy Executive Officer of Equity, Communities and Environmental Justice for the California Air Resources Board; Adam Millard-Ball, Director of the UCLA Institute of Transportation Studies; and Mike Manville, Professor and Chair of Urban Planning at UCLA Laskin School of Public Affairs.

How can the state address our long commutes, polluted air around our freeways, and create healthier, happier communities? That was the question we addressed at a panel discussion of experts recently hosted by the UCLA Luskin School of Public Affairs when we discussed using vehicle miles traveled (VMT) in our complicated and complex city and regional planning efforts.

Reducing our VMT is crucial to meeting the state’s clean energy goals and reducing greenhouse gas emissions. We must continue to work on improving public transit, especially train travel, and making it more efficient, reliable and rider friendly.

That’s one reason I have worked so hard to revitalize the LOSSAN Rail Corridor, which runs from San Diego to San Luis Obispo. Making rail more appealing means making service more frequent, easier to use and rider focused.

I was thrilled to see LOSSAN receive a federal grant earlier this year to add three daily roundtrips between San Diego and Los Angeles. I hope that will provide more transportation options for people traveling between the two cities.

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Left to right are Javier Garay, Professor of Applied Physics and Materials Science, UC San Diego; James Bullock, Dean of Physical Sciences UC Irvine; Theresa Maldonado, Vice President for Research and Innovation, Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering, UC Office of the President; myself; Sen. Jerry McNerny; Anantha Krishnan, Senior Vice President of Energy Group, General Atomics; and Michale Ginsberg, U.S. President, Tokamak Energy.

Nuclear fusion offers the promise of providing a limitless supply of on-demand, emission-free energy. The development of this emerging technology could significantly move California, and the world, toward a clean energy future.

I was glad recently to meet with nuclear fusion scientists from General Atomics, the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory and across the state (photo above) to learn about the work they are doing.

Fusion has the potential to revolutionize the energy industry. Unlike traditional fossil fuels, it produces no air pollution or harmful emissions. Unlike nuclear energy, it produces no long-lasting dangerous waste.

California is at the forefront of fusion energy research and development. We are home to world-renowned institutions, such as the DIII-D National Fusion Facility in my district in San Diego and the National Ignition Facility at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, where groundbreaking discoveries are taking place right now. Just recently, both facilities passed significant milestones, demonstrating the increasing feasibility of fusion energy production.

I am honored to recognize Raye Clendening as my February Community Champion of the Month as we celebrate Black History Month. Raye has spent her career as an inspiring educator and community activist, empowering students, schools and communities to reach their goals.

When Raye was 11 years old, while attending the Friendship Baptist Church in Pasadena in 1957, she was impacted by hearing Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. speak of the inequities, injustice and discrimination that Black people faced in the South. His words resonated with her because she and her family had lived that experience when she was growing up in the South in 1940s and 1950s.
 

 

Raye Clendening

Raye has lived a fulfilling life as a highly respected educator, mentor, community leader and elected official. As a current member of the Board of Directors of MiraCosta College, she brings a lifetime of experience that began as a teenager.

During her nearly 35-year career in K-12 education in Los Angeles and San Diego counties, Raye opened pathways of success for the students and teachers as a principal in the Fallbrook Union Elementary and Oceanside Unified School Districts. Her dedication and service earned her recognition as the Middle Grades Principal of the Year for the State of California.

In retirement, Raye continues her dynamic leadership as a volunteer to encourage, empower and educate the community. Raye is a founding member of the North County Business and Professional Women’s Organization and the North County African American Women’s Association. As a 2013 graduate of Leadership North County, a program of California State University San Marcos (CSUSM) that seeks to cultivate leaders in the San Diego North County region, Raye was recognized by her cohort with the Fran Aleshire Award as the graduate who exhibits the characteristics of great leadership.

Thank you Raye for your life of incredible service and for all the lives you have touched!

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A homeless shelter in San Diego.

This is exciting news! The state of California, through the Homeless Housing, Assistance and Prevention (HHAP) program, has awarded $50.8 million to programs in San Diego County and $34.7 million to programs in Orange County.

The HHAP program is a block grant that provides multi-year funding to help prevent, and address, homelessness in communities. The funding must be used for housing solutions, and grantees must demonstrate they are using the money to improve homelessness in their regions, with clear timelines and deliverables.

The San Diego County recipients and awards are as follows:

• City of San Diego, $25.8 million
• San Diego City and County Continuum of Care, $12.9 million
• San Diego County $12.1 million

The Orange County recipients and awards are as follows:

• Orange County, $8.3 million
• City of Anaheim, $5.9 million
• City Irvine, $5.9 million
• City of Santa Ana, $5.9 million
• Santa Ana, Anaheim/Orange County Continuum of Care, $8.7 million

In addition, San Diego received state Encampment Resolution Grant Awards. This grant is aimed at providing services and support to people experiencing homelessness in encampments, so they can find paths to safe and stable housing.

The recipients and their awards are:

• City of San Diego and County of San Diego Continuum of Care, $8.4 million.
• City of Vista, $7.8 million.

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Here is some good news: Most San Diego Community Power (SDCP) customers will see their electric bills drop this year.

The average decrease in 2025 from 2024 rates will be 2.8 percent. SDCP offers customers three different programs to choose from. Most customers (96 percent) are on the PowerOn program, and they will see rates about 3 percent lower.

San Diego Community Power is a community choice aggregation program established to provide competition to San Diego Gas & Electric, an investor-owned utility.

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The Carlsbad Flower Fields. (Photo courtesy of the Orange County Register.)

Don’t miss the spectacular Carlsbad Flower Fields, which open tomorrow. The colorful sight draws more than 250,000 visitors each year. An estimated 80 million blooms are expected this spring. Find out more here.

Thank you for your support. I am honored to serve you.

In partnership,

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Email me at Senator.Blakespear@Senate.ca.gov

Call my Encinitas district office at (760) 642-0809

Call my Laguna Hills district office at (949) 598-5850

Call my Capitol office in Sacramento at (916) 651-4038