Calif. budget plan includes new offshore oil

LOS ANGELES

It would be the first new offshore oil drilling on state lands in four decades since a blowout on a platform off Santa Barbara coated miles of ocean and shoreline and galvanized opposition.

Details of the agreement reached late Monday were scarce, but Lt. Gov. John Garamendi, chairman of the State Lands Commission, said Tuesday that the framework involved taking authority for approval of oil leases away from State Lands and giving it to a newly created panel.

AP