(Photo: Flickr)

The California Assembly’s Local Government Committee recently approved a plan that enables home and business owners to take advantage of city-backed, low-interest loans for energy-saving improvements. The measure, Assembly Bill 811 by Assemblyman Lloyd Levine, would authorize a concept developed by Cisco DeVries, chief of staff for Berkeley Mayor Tom Bates, that uses city loans, paid back over 20 years through a property tax assessment, to finance the upfront cost of solar panels, dual-pane windows and energy-efficient air conditioning on homes and businesses.

Berkeley and the City of Palm Desert were two main sources of the idea, according to Levine. In November 2007, the Berkeley City Council unanimously approved DeVries’ solar and energy efficiency financing plan. In the weeks following the unveiling of its Sustainable Energy Financing District, which Power Plug Editor Justin Gerdes wrote about for e-Newswire here, Berkeley officials were inundated with hundreds of queries about the plan from Hawaii to Massachusetts and as far afield as Europe and Asia.

The Palm Desert City Council likewise voted unanimously last November to start the process of amending their tax code to allow the city-backed home and business energy upgrades. According to Palm Desert Councilman Jim Ferguson, “Berkeley and Palm Desert probably could not be any more opposite extremes politically. We both agree on the [energy] efficiencies offered by this approach.”

AB 811 next goes to the Assembly Appropriations Committee.