Political science

According to Leo Drozdoff, Nevada secretary of conservation and natural resources, policy and science “link up all the time.”

Drozdoff, along with John Laird, California secretary of natural resources, discussed issues on environmental policies of Lake Tahoe at a seminar on April 23 hosted at the University of Nevada, Reno. Laird and Drozdoff spoke mostly on the logistics of protecting Lake Tahoe between two states, to which Nevada contributes one-third of the budget, with the other two-thirds the responsibility of California.

“There’s probably less development on the Nevada side, and less contributions from us,” said Drozdoff. “It’s been a wake up call for the two states to reestablish their relationship.”

He’s referring to Senate Bill 271, which would withdraw Nevada out of the Tahoe Regional Planning Agency (TRPA) if it doesn’t maintain Lake Tahoe conservancy efforts with its share of the lake. The bill was sponsored by Nevada Sen. John Lee (“Tahoe agency held hostage?” Upfront, Feb. 23), and it has been criticized for encouraging division, rather than collaboration, between Nevada and California. According to a post on the Tahoe Project website, a nonpartisan environmental policy organization, “Not least among the concerns is whether Nevada abdicates sovereignty over its lands, and whether the state relinquishes its ability to meet the needs of its citizens, by being party to the Compact in its current form.”

The post goes on to quote Secretary of State Ross Miller, “I believe that withdrawing from the compact doesn’t make any sense. We need shared vision between the two states to make environmental progress.”

Organizations such as the League to Save Lake Tahoe and the Nevada-Eastern California chapter of the Sierra Club have also spoken out in opposition of the bill.

However, Drozdoff, while insisting that Nevada’s departure from the TRPA would be a last resort, spoke about the bill’s potential.

“It puts some science behind concerns,” he said. “And it creates a roadmap for the kind of changes we need to make at the lake.”

The concerns Drozdoff referred to include water clarity of the lake, as well as air quality. The bill states, “The waters of Lake Tahoe and other resources of the region are threatened with deterioration or degeneration, which endangers the natural beauty and economic productivity of the region. … Increasing urbanization is threatening the ecological values of the region and threatening the public opportunities for use of the public lands. … In order to preserve the scenic beauty and outdoor recreational opportunities of the region, there is a need to insure an equilibrium between the region’s natural endowment and its manmade environment.”

When asked by an audience member if Nevada has any right to pull out of TRPA, Drozdoff replied, “There’s no desire to do that.”

“I think they’ve gotten a sense of urgency,” said Laird in regards to the potential effectiveness of the bill. “What we’re focusing on is bringing parties together who normally haven’t been together to talk about these things.”

Changes must be made according to TRPA’s standards by 2013.