New York mayor, NY attorney general to hold ‘people’s hearing’ on climate rule repeal

New York City’s mayor and the state’s attorney general are planning a hearing of their own on the Trump administration’s plan to repeal former President Obama’s climate change rule for power plants.

Mayor Bill de Blasio and Attorney General Eric Schneiderman, both Democrats, announced their plan Friday for a “people’s hearing,” complaining that the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) rebuffed their calls for a formal hearing on the matter in New York.

“New Yorkers are on the front lines of climate change, as tragically demonstrated by Hurricanes Sandy and Irene,” Schneiderman said in a statement.

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“The country’s reliance on dirty, non-renewable fossil fuels for power generation is a major contributor of climate change pollution and its impacts on the lives and livelihoods of New York’s residents, including more frequent and intense storms, rising sea levels, higher temperatures, and increased air pollution. The Clean Power Plan is a vital tool to slash greenhouse gas emissions from one of the leading causes of climate change pollution, fossil-fuel burning power plants.”

De Blasio and Schneiderman have been among the country’s most outspoken opponents of Trump’s environmental agenda. Schneiderman has promised to sue the EPA when it repeals the Clean Power Plan, and has already sued Trump numerous times for regulatory rollbacks.

The EPA was obligated to hold at least one hearing on the Clean Power Plan repeal, which it did in Charleston, W.Va., last month.

The agency is also planning “listening sessions” in the coming months in San Francisco, Kansas City, Mo., and Gillette, Wyo. Additional hearings would require the EPA to extend the public comment period, but listening sessions do not.

The New York City “people’s hearing” is scheduled for Jan. 9 at The New School’s lower Manhattan building.