Groups Condemn Kern County’s Fast-Tracking of New Oil & Gas Drilling Permit Applications
BAKERSFIELD, CA–In a setback for climate justice advocates, Kern County’s Board of Supervisors on June 26 voted to approve changes to a zoning ordinance that fast-tracks the approval process for tens of thousands new oil and gas drilling permit applications county-wide.
The decision takes place at a time that the oil and gas industry is spending record amounts of money to stop efforts to hold big oil companies accountable for the catastrophic impacts that fossil fuel extraction has had on the environment and human health in California and around the world.
“These revisions curtail site-specific environmental review and end any further public participation at the county level, including notice to and input from the community members who live and work near future drilling sites,” according to a press release from the Last Chance Alliance (LCA).
Climate justice advocates note that this the county’s third attempt to update its oil and gas permitting ordinance after multiple rulings by California courts found the county’s previous attempts violated the law.
Kern County is responsible for the majority of oil and gas production in California. 75% of the oil producing wells in California are located in Kern, with 87.5 million barrels made per year, according to the Kern Economic Development Corporation.
“Research shows that there is a direct link between polluted air and a number of serious health harms, including asthma, cancer, heart disease, high-risk pregnancies and premature death. The American Lung Association identifies Kern County as having the most polluted air in the United States for both short and long-term particle pollution,” the LCA wrote.
“The county’s own environmental review admits that the ordinance will not only further degrade some of the worst air quality in the nation, it will harm public health and the environment in numerous other ways. These include reducing available groundwater supplies, increasing disruptive noise, diminishing scenic views, harming wildlife, including endangered species and their habitat, and destroying valuable farmland. Low-income communities and communities of color will carry the heaviest burdens from the Board of Supervisors’ decision,” the LCA stated.
In a recent letter, over 90 public interest organizations challenged the county’s leadership to “better protect the health and safety of local communities, improve the county’s long-term economic well-being, and promote a more sustainable future for the county’s residents and all Californians — rather than looking for ways to accelerate oil and gas development and shield it from meaningful environmental review and accountability for impacts.”
Representatives of community groups, environmental, and public interest organizations condemned Kern County’s adoption of this oil and gas permitting ordinance. Although they consider the vote as “a devastating blow to public health, clean air, and California’s climate goals,” they vow to keep fighting to protect California communities from from fossil fuel pollution.
“For too long, our communities in Kern County, especially in places like my hometown of Shafter, have been treated as sacrifice zones for the oil and gas industry,” said Anabel Marquez, Community Advocate, Shafter, California. “This ordinance is yet another example of our local government choosing to protect corporate profits over the health and safety of our families.
“It allows thousands of new oil wells to be fast-tracked in our communities, impacting our air quality and our water supply. We’re already living with the impacts: cancer, asthma, and polluted air, and now they want to double down on this harm. We deserve clean air, safe neighborhoods, and leaders who fight for our right to live with dignity. Our future depends on a just transition away from fossil fuels, not more drilling in our backyards,” Marquez added.
“For too long, Kern County’s elected officials have catered to the oil and gas industry at the expense of public health and the environment,” stated Colin O’Brien, an attorney at Earthjustice. “State officials have the final say on new drilling, but I expect they will follow the law and honestly disclose impacts and institute effective mitigation before allowing new wells to go forward.”
“Elected officials are once again prioritizing polluters with deep pockets over the health and safety of residents,” explained Cesar Aguirre, organizer with the Central California Environmental Justice Network, a member of the VISIÓN Coalition, which advocates to end neighborhood oil drilling across California. “This ordinance rubber stamps a reckless system that has long treated frontline communities, largely Black and Brown, as insignificant places unworthy of protection. But our communities matter. VISIÓN will continue to fight for a just future where every Californian has the right to a clean and healthy environment safe from the harms of oil and gas extraction.”
“Californians are still recovering from the Los Angeles fires supercharged by climate change, but Kern County officials want to pour more fuel on the flames,” said Hollin Kretzmann, an attorney at the Center for Biological Diversity’s Climate Law Institute. “It’s appalling that Kern County is greenlighting tens of thousands of new oil and gas wells right as we brace for another summer of extreme heat and storms. More fossil fuels will only make future climate disasters worse in Kern County and everywhere else.”
“Our air, water and soil have suffered years of abuse and pollution from oil and gas drilling. Instead of fixing the problem, Kern’s leaders are taking away even more of the guardrails that keep our neighborhoods safe,” stated Lori Pesante, Director of Sierra Club’s Kern-Kaweah Chapter. “Sierra Club and our partners will continue to fight for the right of all Kern residents to not be poisoned in our own backyards.”
“The oil industry is trying to get their last dime out of Kern county before going out of business,” noted Ilonka Zlatar, Organizer with Oil and Gas Action Network. “The clean energy transition is underway, and rather than looking for ways to support the local economy as Big Oil withers away, the county supervisors continue to allow irreparable pollution and damage to local communities and the environment for the profit of a few.”
“If county supervisors cared about the wellbeing of their community, they would make a path to a sustainable economic model that wouldn’t poison the people and leave them without clean air and water; they would lean into the energy transition and support many new jobs and economic opportunities,” Zlatar said. “Oil is running out. The money will dry up. And what is left behind is orphaned wells, pollution, illness and death.”
“We stand in solidarity with our fellow Californians in Kern County who have – for far too long – lived with an alarming and devastating amount of fossil fuel pollution,” concluded Nicole Ghio, California Director for Food & Water Watch. “Californians across the state are dealing with the impacts of fossil-fuel driven climate change and our leaders must step up and prioritize the health and safety of our communities over the profits of Big Oil companies. Fast-tracking thousands of new oil wells is not the answer.”
Big Oil spends record millions of dollars to lobby California officials
Why is Big Oil able to get away with what it does in supposedly “green” and “progressive” California?
All you have to do is follow the money. The unprecedented lobbying spending spree by Big Oil that took place in 2023 and 2024 has continued into 2025 as the oil industry spends millions to stop the Polluters Pay Superfund Act and other climate legislation.
Gas and oil corporations spent a near-record pace of over $9 million to influence California officials in the first three months of 2025, according to an analysis by Sunstone Strategies and the Last Chance Alliance, The oil and gas industry spent a total of $9,139,655, according to disclosures on the California Secretary of State’s website.
“The industry deployed its profits to fight back against common-sense climate and polluter accountability bills. This Q1 spending spree mirrors Big Oil’s aggressive push in early 2023 to defeat a proposed penalty on oil price gouging,” the groups reported.
As usual, Chevron and the Western States Petroleum Association, the most powerful corporate lobbying group in California, spent more than any other lobbying groups in the state in the first quarter of 2025.
Chevron came in first with $3,758,914 spent, while the Western States Petroleum Association finished second with $3,471,879 spent. That’s well over $7 million between those two organizations alone.
Major refiners Marathon Petroleum, Valero, and Phillips 66 each spent between $230,000 and $300,000.
Marathon Petroleum came in third with $301,023 spent, while Valero finished fourth with $242,781 and Phillips 66 came in fifth with $230,462 spent.
Big Oil and their trade associations actively opposed legislation put forward by the Make Polluters Pay coalition, including Senator Wiener’s SB 222, a bill that would have allowed climate disaster victims to seek compensation from the fossil fuel companies responsible. Those lobbying to kill the bill included Chevron, WSPA, Marathon, and Valero.
The oil industry spent a record total of $38 million in lobbying expenses in California in 2024, shattering by 31 percent the annual state lobbying record of $26.2 million set in 2017, to thwart climate justice and other environmental legislation.
The Western States Petroleum Association placed first in the Big Oil lobbying spending spree with $17.4 million, while Chevron came in second with $14.2 million. Spending by the Western States Petroleum Association and Chevron alone shattered the previous record, coming in at $31.6 million in 2024.
But the oil industry not only spent record amounts of money lobbying California officials in 2023 and 2024. It also sponsored dinners and journalism awards receptions for journalists and the media. For example, WSPA was one of the “lede sponsors” of the Sacramento Press Club’s Annual Journalism Awards Reception on April 11, 2024: www.dailykos.com/…
The good news is that the Western States Petroleum Association didn’t sponsor the Sacramento Press Club’s rewards reception held in May 2025.
WSPA and the oil companies wield their power in 8 major ways: through (1) lobbying; (2) campaign spending; (3) serving on and putting shills on regulatory panels; (4) creating Astroturf groups; (5) working in collaboration with media; (6) sponsoring awards ceremonies and dinners, including those for legislators and journalists; (7) contributing to non profit organizations; and (8) creating alliances with labor unions, mainly in the construction trades.
Major ocean current has reversed direction, according to scientific report
Meanwhile, as the Kern County Board of Supervisors promotes an expansion of oil drilling in the county, intellinews.com reveals that a major ocean current in the Southern Hemisphere has reversed direction for the first time in recorded history. Climatologists are calling this a “catastrophic” tipping point in the global climate system: www.intellinews.com/…
“The development, which was confirmed by Spanish marine scientists at El Institut de Ciències del Mar (ICM-CSIC) in Barcelona, has triggered widespread alarm among climate scientists due to its potential to accelerate global warming and destabilise weather patterns worldwide.
“The collapse involves the deep overturning circulation in the South Atlantic — part of the global conveyor belt of ocean currents — which typically pulls cold, nutrient-rich water up from the ocean floor and drives planetary heat distribution.
“The study, published on July 2, identifies a collapse and reversal of the Deep Western Boundary Current (DWBC) in the South Atlantic — a key part of the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC).”
