Chuck Darwin<p>More than 50 years ago, a catastrophic oil spill along <br><a href="https://c.im/tags/Santa" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>Santa</span></a> <a href="https://c.im/tags/Barbara" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>Barbara</span></a>’s coastline <br>served to galvanize the modern environmental movement <br>and also helped to usher in one of the state’s strongest conservation laws: <br>the California Coastal Act.</p><p>Now, as the Trump administration seeks to encourage oil and gas production within federal lands and waters, <br>that watershed conservation law is being tested along the same stretch of coastline <br>— and in a way it never has before.</p><p>For months, a Texas-based oil company has rebuffed the authority of the California Coastal Commission <br>— the body tasked with enforcing the act <br>— and has instead pushed forward with controversial plans to revive oil production off the <a href="https://c.im/tags/Gaviota" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>Gaviota</span></a> <a href="https://c.im/tags/Coast" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>Coast</span></a>.</p><p>Ten years after another spill brought oil production here to a halt, <br><a href="https://c.im/tags/Sable" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>Sable</span></a> <a href="https://c.im/tags/Offshore" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>Offshore</span></a> <a href="https://c.im/tags/Corp" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>Corp</span></a>. has begun repairing and upgrading the network of oil pipelines responsible for that 2015 spill, <br>🆘without Coastal Commission approval and ignoring the commission’s repeated demands to stop its work, officials say.</p><p>🔥“This is the first time in the agency’s history that we’ve had a party blatantly ignore a cease and desist order like this and refuse to submit a permit application,” <br>Cassidy Teufel, deputy director of the California Coastal Commission, told a packed town hall recently.</p><p><a href="https://www.byteseu.com/897172/" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" translate="no" target="_blank"><span class="invisible">https://www.</span><span class="">byteseu.com/897172/</span><span class="invisible"></span></a></p>