A measure that would tie Maryland?s car emissions standards to much tighter restrictions won approval Tuesday from a House of Delegates committee.
The House Environmental Matters committee voted 17-4, largely along party lines, to approve an amended version of the clean cars bill. The vote split Republicans on the committee with three voting against the bill and three voting in favor.
The bill could have its first vote on the House floor as early as Thursday, and a final vote in the House could come as early as Feb. 20. A Senate committee considering the same bill could vote on the measure as early as Thursday.
House Minority Leader Anthony O?Donnell, R-St. Mary?s, also a committee member, unsuccessfully offered an amendment to give the Maryland Department of the Environment more power to quickly extricate the state from compliance with California regulations if those regulations would harm Maryland.
O?Donnell has objected to the clean cars bill in the past, saying it gives too much power to an appointed regulatory board on the other side of the country to regulate standards in Maryland.
“I think we?re ceding way too much policy authority ? and I think if we don?t put [O?Donnell?s amendment] in, then a few of us a few years down the road, much like happened in 1999 with the vote to deregulate the utility industry, we?ll regret it,” he said.
Del. Maggie McIntosh, D-Baltimore City, who chairs the committee, said she was confident the legislation adequately protected the General Assembly?s policy-making power.
“This is not the first time we?ve adopted by reference regulation standards from other states on the environment,” she said.
The clean cars bill requires Maryland car dealers? inventories to comply with the California standards by 2011. The standards, which are higher than the federal standards used in Maryland, are designed to reduce air pollution.
