Getting the Whole Story Behind Ritter’s Climate Action Plan

The story behind Gov. Ritter’s Climate Action Plan? A Face the State report today says there’s more than meets the eye. Here’s the heart of it:

[Climate Strategies Watch director Paul] Chesser said his research has shown that a CCS-created template ends up pushing the same costly policy agenda in most or all the different states in which it has operated. Its prescriptions regularly include carbon taxes, cap-and-trade regulations, and renewable energy mandates.“The whole stakeholder process has been granted a credibility that it does not deserve,” he said. “It’s a fixed process created, controlled, and run by CCS, and funded by global warming alarmist advocates, which calls everything it does into question.”

In addition to questioning funders of the commission, Chesser is now also vocalizing concerns about the funding arrangements behind University of Colorado professor Heidi Van Genderen’s appointment as the governor’s climate change adviser. He uncovered the fact that Van Genderen is being paid by the left-leaning William and Flora Hewlett Foundation to serve in her official capacity.

Like a watcher and Bob Agard (Get Well Soon!), I was privileged to sit down to dinner Tuesday night with Mr. Chesser. The story he shared demonstrates a major blind spot in Colorado’s MSM: one might call it fear of challenging the Eco-Orthodoxy. But you don’t have to take Chesser at his word to cast a critical eye on the whole situation.

At the very least, Ritter’s Climate Action Plan needs to be vetted by a much more thorough and realistic cost-benefit analysis.