Traffic Alert: Watertown's Snell Street & Jefferson Street
WATERTOWN, N.Y. (WWTI) – Two more streets in the City of Watertown will be undergoing a pair of work projects on Thursday.
Jefferson Street will be undergoing a road work project that will close off the road between Mechanic Street and High Street.
Snell Street will be closed for a sewer work project that will close the road between Morrison Street and Leray Street.
Both projects were slated to begin at 8 a.m., but the roads would be re-opened by the end of the day.
Motorists are asked to seek alternate routes or to use caution if having to travel through both areas for the duration of the project.
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San Francisco Chronicle
19 hours ago
- San Francisco Chronicle
Supreme Court delivers another blow to California's imperiled emissions standards
The Supreme Court reinstated legal challenges by oil and gas companies Friday to California's strict emissions standards for motor vehicles, standards that the Trump administration is likely to halt on its own in the near future. Federal law allows California to set tighter limits on auto emissions than the national standard, and since 1990 has allowed other states to adopt California's rules, an option taken by 17 states and the District of Columbia. But fuel companies affected by the increasing use of electric vehicles contend the state's standards are too restrictive and have sued to overturn them. Lower federal courts ruled that companies had failed to show they were being harmed by the standards, and therefore lacked legal standing to sue, because electric car sales are increasing for other reasons. The Supreme Court disagreed in a 7-2 decision. 'The whole point of the regulations is to increase the number of electric vehicles in the new automobile market beyond what consumers would otherwise demand,' Justice Brett Kavanaugh wrote in the majority opinion. 'The government generally may not target a business or industry through stringent and allegedly unlawful regulation, and then evade the resulting lawsuits by claiming that the targets of its regulation should be locked out of court.' But dissenting Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson said lawyers in the case had told the court that the Environmental Protection Agency, under President Donald Trump, was about to withdraw its approval of California's waiver from nationwide standards, 'which will put an end to California's emissions program.' The EPA took that action during Trump's first administration, which was reversed under President Joe Biden. Meanwhile, legislation passed by the Republican-controlled Congress and signed by Trump would prevent California from banning sales of new gasoline-powered vehicles in 2035, a law the state has challenged in court. The Supreme Court 'is already viewed by many as being overly sympathetic to corporate interests,' and Friday's ruling 'will no doubt aid future attempts by the fuel industry to attack the Clean Air Act,' said Jackson, a Biden appointee. In a separate dissent, Justice Sonia Sotomayor said the court should have returned the case to a lower court to await the EPA's action. Kavanaugh, however, said fuel companies affected by California's current standards could seek to prove in court that they were arbitrary and unlawful. His opinion was joined by Chief Justice John Roberts and Justices Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito, Neil Gorsuch, Amy Coney Barrett and Elena Kagan. Liane Randolph, chair of the California Air Resources Board, said it was not a full-scale rejection of the state's emissions standards. 'This ruling does not change California's Advanced Clean Cars rulemaking, nor does it dispute what data has shown to be true: vehicle emissions are a huge source of pollution with grave health impacts, consumer adoption of zero emission vehicles continues to rise, and global auto manufacturers are committed to an electric future,' she said in a statement. But attorney Brett Skorup of the libertarian Cato Institute said the ruling was 'a welcome rebuke to judicial gatekeeping' and affirmed that 'predictable economic harms from government regulation' entitle 'injured parties (to) have their day in court.' The case is Diamond Alternative Energy v. EPA, No. 24-7.
Los Angeles Times
a day ago
- Los Angeles Times
Supreme Court joins Trump and GOP in targeting California's emission standards
WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court on Friday joined President Trump and congressional Republicans in siding with the oil and gas industry in its challenge to California's drive for electric vehicles. In a 7-2 decision, the justices revived the industry's lawsuit and ruled that fuel makers had standing to sue over California's strict emissions standards. The suit argued that California and the Environmental Protection Agency under President Biden were abusing their power by relying on the 1970s-era rule for fighting smog as a means of combating climate change in the 21st Century. California's new emissions standard 'did not target a local California air-quality problem — as they say is required by the Clean Air Act — but instead were designed to address global climate change,' Justice Brett M. Kavanaugh wrote using italics to described the industry's position. The court did not rule on the suit itself but he said the fuel makers had standing to sue because they would be injured by the state's rule. 'The fuel producers make money by selling fuel. Therefore, the decrease in purchases of gasoline and other liquid fuels resulting from the California regulations hurts their bottom line,' Kavanaugh said. Only Justices Sonia Sotomayor and Ketanji Brown Jackson disagreed. Jackson questioned why the court would 'revive a fuel-industry lawsuit that all agree will soon be moot (and is largely moot already). ...This case gives fodder to the unfortunate perception that moneyed interests enjoy an easier road to relief in this Court than ordinary citizens.' But the outcome was overshadowed by the recent actions of President Trump and congressional Republicans. With Trump's backing, the House and Senate adopted measures disapproving regulations adopted by the Biden administration that would have allowed California to enforce broad new regulations to require 'zero emissions' cars and trucks. Trump said the new rules were designed to displace California as the nation's leader in fighting air pollution and greenhouse gases. In a bill signing ceremony at the White House, he said the disapproval measures 'will prevent California's attempt to impose a nationwide electric vehicle mandate and to regulate national fuel economy by regulating carbon emissions.' 'Our Constitution does not allow one state special status to create standards that limit consumer choice and impose an electric vehicle mandate upon the entire nation,' he said. In response, California Atty. Gen. Rob Bonta said 'the fight for fight for clean air is far from over. While we are disappointed by the Supreme Court's decision to allow this case to go forward in the lower court, we will continue to vigorously defend California's authority under the Clean Air Act.' Some environmentalists said the decision greenlights future lawsuits from industry and polluters. 'This is a dangerous precedent from a court hellbent on protecting corporate interests,' said David Pettit, an attorney at the Center for Biological Diversity's Climate Law Institute. 'This decision opens the door to more oil industry lawsuits attacking states' ability to protect their residents and wildlife from climate change.' Times staff writer Tony Briscoe, in Los Angeles, contributed to this report.
Yahoo
a day ago
- Yahoo
In a scathing dissent, Justice Jackson says the Supreme Court gives the impression it favors 'moneyed interests'
WASHINGTON — Liberal Supreme Court Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson criticized her colleagues on Friday in a scathing dissent on a case involving vehicle emissions regulations. In her dissenting opinion, she argued that the court's opinion gives the impression it favors 'moneyed interests' in the way they decide which cases to hear and how they rule in them. The court had ruled 7-2 in favor of fuel producers seeking to challenge the Environmental Protection Agency's approval of California clean vehicle emissions regulations. She also said she was concerned that the ruling could have "a reputational cost for this court, which is already viewed by many as being overly sympathetic to corporate interests." With the Trump administration reversing course on many of Biden's environmental policies, including on California's electric vehicle mandates, the case is likely moot, or soon to be, Jackson wrote, making her wonder why the court felt the need to decide it. "This case gives fodder to the unfortunate perception that moneyed interests enjoy an easier road to relief in this court than ordinary citizens," Jackson wrote. The case said that the producers had legal standing to bring their claims, resting on a theory "that the court has refused to apply in cases brought by less powerful plaintiffs," she added. The decision has little practical importance now, but in future, "will no doubt aid future attempts by the fuel industry to attack the Clean Air Act," she said. "Also, I worry that the fuel industry's gain comes at a reputational cost for this court, which is already viewed by many as being overly sympathetic to corporate interests," she added. The court, which has a 6-3 conservative majority, has often faced claims that it is particularly receptive to arguments made by big business. The conservative justices have been especially skeptical of broad government regulations and they have consistently made it harder for consumers and workers to bring class action lawsuits. Last year, the court overturned a 40-year precedent much loathed by business interests that empowered federal agencies in the regulatory process. Some legal experts have pushed back, saying such allegations are misleading. Jackson concluded her dissent by noting the court's "simultaneous aversion to hearing cases involving the potential vindication of less powerful litigants — workers, criminal defendants, and the condemned, among others." Conservative Justice Brett Kavanaugh, who authored the majority opinion, responded to her claims, saying that a review of standing cases "disproves that suggestion." He mentioned several recent rulings in which liberal justices were in the majority, including one last year finding that anti-abortion doctors who challenged the abortion pill mifepristone did not have standing to sue. The bottom line, he added, is that the government "may not target a business or industry through stringent and allegedly unlawful regulation, and then evade the resulting lawsuits by claiming that the targets of its regulation should be locked out of court as unaffected bystanders." Jonathan Adler, a professor at Case Western Reserve University School of Law whose scholarship pushes back on Jackson's theory, said it was notable that no other justices, including her two fellow liberals, signed on to her dissent. "I don't think this case is an example of the court being inconsistent or somehow more favorable to moneyed interests than other sorts of interests," he said in an interview with NBC News. "It's not like the court has closed the door on environmental groups." Adler, who Jackson cited in her dissent, said it can be "very simplistic" to classify cases as pro-business or anti-business simply because there can often be wealthy interests on both sides. The underlying case stems from the EPA's authority to issue national vehicle emissions standards under the federal Clean Air Act. In recognition of California's historic role in regulating emissions, the law allows the EPA to give the state a waiver from the nationwide standards so that it can adopt its own. The case focused on a request made by California in 2012 that EPA approve new regulations, not the state's 2024 plan to eliminate gasoline-powered cars by 2035 for which it also sought a waiver. The Republican-controlled Congress voted earlier this month to revoke that waiver. This article was originally published on
