Byron Sher, veteran lawmaker who wrote many of California's landmark environmental laws, dies at 98

Byron Sher, a collegial Stanford University law professor who ran for Palo Alto city council in the 1960s after losing a battle over the widening of a local street, then rose to the state Legislature, writing many of California’s landmark environmental laws over three decades, has died.

Known for his affable, easy-going manner, Sher died Saturday of natural causes at his home, on a pear and apple ranch in the Sierra foothills near Placerville. He was 98.

Over a career that stretched from 1980 to 1996 in the state Assembly, and from 1996 to 2004 in the state Senate, Sher passed dozens of groundbreaking bills that made California a national leader in environmental policy.

Among them are the California Clean Air Act in 1987, the state’s Safe Drinking Water Act in 1989, and a complex deal with former Sen. Dianne Feinstein in 1999 to preserve thousands of acres of old-growth redwoods at Headwaters Forest in Humboldt County, some 2,000 years old and 300 feet tall, that Texas financier Charles Hurwitz had threatened to cut down to pay off junk bond debt.

“Byron Sher is the godfather of modern California environmental law,” said Ann Notthoff, a member of the California Coastal Commission who worked for the Natural Resources Defense Council from 1981 to 2020. “He had a huge impact on our land, our water and the oceans, and climate and forests.”

Sher also authored legislation in 1983 that cleaned up more than 10,000 leaking underground gasoline and chemical storage tanks across Silicon Valley and other parts of California; the first law requiring all California cities and counties to set up curbside recycling programs; California’s first rules in 2003 that required utilities to produce renewable energy; the state’s first e-waste recycling rules, which have since prevented more than 1 billion pounds of old computers and other devices from being thrown in landfills or sent to developing countries, and other measures to protect the Sierra Nevada, Lake Tahoe, San Francisco Bay and wild and scenic rivers across the state. Many of his laws were copied by other states and the federal government.

“For anyone who aspired to be a strong environmental legislator, he was the North Star,” said State Sen. John Laird, D-Santa Cruz. “Whether it was land conservation, recycling or other environmental legislation, he was at the forefront of every issue. He was a pioneer.”

Although he was a life-long Democrat, Sher worked with Republicans and Democrats. Several of his key measures were approved by Republican governors like Pete Wilson, Arnold Schwarzenegger and George Deukmejian. Others by Democrats Gray Davis and Jerry Brown.

“The wonderful environmental assets that we have in California are also important to our economy,” Sher said in a 2010 interview. “The states that have the strongest environmental laws have the strongest economies. It has been demonstrated over and over again.”

After he left the Legislature in 2004 due to term limits, Sher served on the board of the Sierra Nevada Conservancy and later the Tahoe Regional Planning Agency until 2013. The Sierra Club named its annual achievement award after him. The California EPA named its central meeting place the Byron Sher Auditorium.

“I don’t think it’s overstating it to say Byron was the single most important legislator on natural resources and the environment in California history,” said Kip Lipper, Sher’s former chief of staff. “It’s not so much in a book or a website somewhere. It’s in the branches of the North Coast redwoods, the tidepools along the coast, the cleaner air people breathe and the water they drink.”

Byron David Sher was born Feb. 7, 1928, in St. Louis, Missouri. His mother, Jeannette Lebermuth Sher, was a home maker. His father, Louis B. Sher, was an attorney interested in Democratic politics. When he was 16, Byron’s father took him to the 1944 Democratic convention, where President Franklin Roosevelt was nominated for a fourth term, sparking his interest in politics.

He attended Purdue University to study engineering, but left after three semesters, graduating later from Washington University in St. Louis with a degree in finance in 1949. He was admitted to Harvard Law School, where he graduated in 1952.

At Harvard he met Linda Bowser, the friend of a classmate. They were married in 1952 and remained married for 61 years until her death in 2014. After teaching law at several universities, including USC, Bryon Sher was hired by Stanford University in 1957.

He taught contracts, consumer law, bankruptcy law and other courses. He became involved in political issues in 1960 when Santa Clara County officials announced plans to widen Oregon Avenue in Palo Alto to a high-speed four-lane road, bulldozing 107 homes. After Sher and other neighbors objected, county and city leaders scaled the plan back somewhat, with landscaped medians, traffic signals and sidewalks in some areas. The plan was narrowly approved by Palo Alto voters in a 1962 election.

Sher ran for city council and was elected with a pro-environment, slow-growth slate of candidates.

Linda, who also had a law degree from Stanford, was instrumental in his political success, said Sher’s son, Ben.

“Her role was very important,” he said. “They would put stamps on envelopes and do addressing and mailing, thank you notes, all of it from the dining room table. She was his #1 fan and worker bee. She would go walking door-to-door with him during campaigns. She was an essential part of his success.”

Sher served on the city council from 1965 to 1967, until he and several others were recalled by a developer-led campaign. He ran again, won and served from 1973 to 1980, including two terms as mayor. He helped lead several key initiatives, notably the purchase in 1975 of 533 acres in Palo Alto’s lower foothills that became the Enid Pearson Arastradero Preserve.

Sher won election to the state Assembly in 1980, succeeding Democrat Vic Calvo. After serving 16 years, he ran for state senate, when former state senator Tom Campbell left to run and win a seat in the U.S. House of Representatives. Sher’s senate district spanned much of Silicon Valley, from San Jose to Los Gatos, Foster City to Half Moon Bay. From 1980 to 2004, Sher won 11 elections in a row.

Fellow lawmakers remembered him Sunday as a gracious and generous mentor in Sacramento, and somebody who was often at the vanguard of emerging environmental issues.

Sher was the first lawmaker in California to use the words “global warming” in a bill, in 1988, as part of a law that required the state to begin measuring greenhouse gas emissions. He worked to help younger legislators get their bills assigned to the right committees and to craft language to help them pass, said Fran Pavley, a former legislative colleague of Sher’s who now works as environmental policy director at the USC Schwarzenegger Institute for State and Global Policy.

“He didn’t have to be out in front,” said Pavley, who wrote several landmark climate change laws after Sher left Sacramento. “He was happy to be behind the scenes. He was humble and didn’t want to diminish someone else’s efforts.”

Sher was an avid tennis player, swimmer and keeper of Dachshunds and Welsh Corgis in his final years. He was preceded in death by his wife Linda, his brother, Donald Sher and sister, Helen Shopmaker. He is survived by his children Adrienne, Benjamin and Katherine Sher; his grandchildren Sarah Burke, Edek Sher, Nathaniel Sher, Dinah Sher Gongora and Noe Gongora; and his great-granddaughter Echo Marie Moncrieff.

No memorial service is planned. In lieu of flowers, the family requests that donations be directed to the International Rescue Committee, a group founded in 1933 by Albert Einstein to help refugees and people suffering humanitarian crises in countries across the world.

“He didn’t want to be remembered as a politician,” said Ben Sher. “He wanted to be remembered as a steward of California’s natural places.”