00:01One time we were the largest producing county in the country. It's really the
00:07reason we discovered oil because it was so prevalent it's literally oozing out
00:11of the ground in Kern County and Santa Barbara. In 2013 we were able to drill
00:18over 3,500 new wells and you fast forward to 2024 only 21 new wells were
00:25drilled in Kern County. Taft is an oil field town period and if you've been up
00:31on Center Street you'd see how it's decimated I mean it's unbelievable. The
00:37economic destruction on a scale it's kind of like the hub of a wheel the
00:42closer you are to the wellhead the closer you are the axle the more
00:46devastating the result. We in the city of Taft we're the hub of the wheel.
00:53I grew up in this industry and this is probably one of the worst downturns I've
00:57ever seen I mean look how long it's lasted. It started when Newsom wanted to make his
01:01run for the presidency he put the pressure on this valley. We had to lay, I think
01:09we're down to 10, 12 full-time people. We use 1.8 million barrels a day at one point we
01:20were in the 80s we were producing 1.1 million barrels a day. Today we produce
01:26276,000 barrels a day and it's going down. It's not that we as Californians are
01:32using less energy. As a matter of fact California's consumption is fourth in the
01:39world behind the US overall China and Texas. Legislation was passed to not issue
01:48permits but to use Cal GEM employees for a regulatory process. So caring about
01:55whether or not oil and gas production contributes to CO2, contributes to etc etc
02:03is not in Cal GEM's statutory authority. Cal GEM is a weaponized agency right now.
02:11They're not based in science and what it does is it drives our workforce to flee to other states
02:18that allow proper permits to be processed and allow development to take place.
02:24In the cleanest oil in the world I'm convinced it's produced right here in California.
02:31You know that issue is solved, there's more permits out, I think that the workforce will expand
02:36with the oil and gas. You know just turning the permits back over to us you know and
02:40giving Kern County the right to say we can drill would definitely turn things around.
02:46Let's go.
02:47Let's go.
02:50Let's go.
02:54Let's go.
02:55Let's go.
02:56Let's go.
02:56Let's go.
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