Thursday November 7, 2024
Merced Sun-Star —
California voters authorized $10 billion bond to bolster the state’s fight against climate change, with final election results showing that Proposition 4 was approved by 57% of the electorate.
Prop. 4 authorizes the state to borrow for a broad range of programs, from water conservation and recycling projects to increased forest thinning, planting more trees in cities and restoring coastal wetlands to protect against rising sea levels.
Such definitive results underscore the state’s strong appetite for government efforts to tackle the impacts of warming temperatures. Californians have become all too familiar with extreme drought, wildfires, heat waves and flooding in recent years.
At least 40% of the bond money is required to be spent in disadvantaged communities, which often have the fewest acres of parks, the most air pollution and largest numbers of people at risk from extreme heat and other weather events.