Free Republic

LOS ANGELES — California's three-member State Lands Commission has passed a resolution urging the Legislature not to support a proposed new oil drilling project off the Santa Barbara coast. ... Last year, Houston-based Plains Exploration & Production Co. unveiled an unprecedented deal with longtime anti-oil conservationists in Santa Barbara County to allow the state's first new offshore oil project in more than 40 years. ... The commission rejected the proposal in January. ... Members of environmental groups accused the governor of attempting a power grab. ...

SACRAMENTO – Among the proposals in the Capital A austere revised budget Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger unveiled May 14 is collecting $100 million by allowing new oil drilling in state waters off the California coast for the first time in 40 years. Awarding the lease would nullify a January ruling by the three-person State Lands Commission, which regulates drilling in the first three miles off the California coast. The commission rejected the lease sought by the Plains Exploration and Production Company to drill in Tranquillon Ridge, offshore from Vandenberg Air Force Base near Lompoc on a 2 to 1 vote, despite...

FORMER HIGHFLYER Plains Exploration & Production (ticker: PXP) is one stock that has run out of gas as energy prices pulled back. However, the oil and natural-gas exploration company has a new investor in billionaire George Soros who has scooped up nearly 6.5 million of the downtrodden shares in 2009. On May 4 Soros's fund, Soros Fund Management, disclosed it now owns 6,467,400 million shares, or a 5.4% stake in the Houston-based Plains Exploration. Soros' hedge fund did not show any stock holdings as of Dec. 31, 2008, meaning the shares were purchased at some point in the last four...