SLO Board of Supervisors denies Phillips 66’s Oil Trains project

UPDATE

In a 3-1 vote, the San Luis Obispo County Board of Supervisors voted on Tuesday to reject Phillips 66’s proposed oil train offloading terminal.

A press statement from Environmental Defense Center states:

“The Board of Supervisors’ denial was the second community victory in less than a week, after a Superior Court judge ruled that Phillips’ legal challenge to the earlier Planning Commission decision was premature.”

“If built, the Phillips 66 oil trains terminal would have allowed more than 7 million gallons of crude oil to be shipped via rail to its local refinery each week, and made it possible for Phillips 66 to refine volatile and carbon-intensive tar sands crude from Canada. Tar sands crude, when prepared for transport, is thinned with an unstable blend of chemicals that have been known to explode in derailment incidents, which have become increasingly frequent in recent years.”

“Trains servicing the Phillips 66 project would have traveled from the north and south through hundreds of major California cities and smaller communities, including Los Angeles, Sacramento, Davis, Berkeley, Oakland, and San Jose. These trains also would have jeopardized numerous ecologically sensitive areas including the San Francisco Bay and California’s iconic central coast.”

The controversial project had been rejected by the SLO County Planning Commission in October 2016 after a nearly 3-year review process. Phillips 66 had appealed this decision to the San Luis Obispo County Board of Supervisors.

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ORIGINAL POST

Outside of the SLO County Government Center as well as on the inside, protesters made it clear: they’re against the Phillips 66 Spur Expansion Project,

This project would allow the oil company to bring as many as three mile-long trains carrying flammable crude oil into San Luis Obispo County every week.

“It doesn’t benefit the citizens of this area at all – the only beneficiaries of the expansion of this project are the Phillips 66 shareholders,” says protestor Sherri Stoddard.

People from other cities including Santa Cruz, San Jose, and even Silicon Valley were at the event to share how this decision would impact them.

“We’re going to be impacted maybe even more by this whole idea and we did a survey and we delivered a thousand signatures just on Friday, saying this is something our city doesn’t want to do,” Stew Plock a protestor from San Jose tells us.

SLO County Supervisor Adam Hill says the issue has statewide impact. “I think it definitely does add to the gravity of the decision because it’s pretty rare that any decision we has received comment from places all over the state,” he explains.

Those who are in favor of the expansion however, say the project would create jobs and the chances of something going wrong with one of the oil tankers would be minimal.

“The amount of tank cars added by this project have a statistically insignificant chance of creating an event, in fact – to deny the project, would require that the Board of Supervisors would have to require perfection which is not a reasonable standard under California zoning,” says Mike Brown, Government Affairs Director for COLLAB of SLO County.

The planning commission denied issuing a permit to Phillips 66 last year. County supervisors are now considering two appeals that have been brought before them.

Supervisor Hill tells us there is a good chance that they will have a decision by Wednesday but there is a possibility that this will ultimately be settled in court.

Starting Tuesday morning at 8:30 they will be accepting new sign ups for public comment on this issue.