"GOP lawmakers threaten to withhold votes unless environmental rules are rewritten"

The handful of Republican lawmakers most likely to provide crucial votes for Gov. Jerry Brown's budget plan are threatening to withhold their support without a dramatic rewriting of state environmental law.

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Sweeping changes in the California Environmental Quality Act would stand little chance of approval through the normal legislative process, which Democrats — environmentalists' usual allies — control. But the governor's budget cannot pass without some Republican votes, and GOP lawmakers see an opportunity to win long-sought concessions.

Environmentalists expressed outrage at the Republicans' bid. Bill Magavern, director of Sierra Club California, said that what the legislators want amounts to a "wholesale gutting" of the law.

"They're using the state's fiscal crisis as leverage to try to reward the big developers," he said. The proposal "would freeze communities out of the planning process."