BOARD MEETING DATE: April 5, 2002
AGENDA NO. 28

Legislative Committee

SYNOPSIS: 

The Legislative Committee considered agenda items including the following legislation for which the Board will consider approving a position: 
AB 1058 (Pavley) – Vehicle Emissions

RECOMMENDED ACTION:

Approve the legislative position recommended below.

Beatrice J.S. LaPisto-Kirtley, Chair
Legislative Committee

Attendance

The Legislative Committee met on March 8, 2002. Present were Committee Chair Beatrice LaPisto-Kirtley, Vice-Chair Jane Carney, and Committee members Michael Antonovich and Cynthia Verdugo-Peralta. Pursuant to the Procedures for Standing Committees of the Governing Board, adopted March 8, 1996, Norma Glover, AQMD Chairman, was appointed as an ad hoc member of the Legislative Committee for the March 8, 2002, meeting only. Supervisor Roy Wilson was unable to attend. [Attachment 1]

Sacramento Update [Attachments 2 and 3]

Allan Lind, AQMD Sacramento Legislative Representative, reported that voters passed Proposition 40, the California Clean Water, Clean Air, Safe Neighborhood Parks, and Coastal Protection Act of 2002, which provides $50 million for the Carl Moyer Program. It is now up to the Administration and Legislature to appropriate those funds.

The Legislative Analyst’s office has completed their analysis of the Governor’s 2002-03 Budget and has concluded that the state will need to identify $5 billion in additional budget solutions. This now creates additional pressure on the Legislature to come up with ways to balance the budget.

Mr. Lind briefly reviewed legislation recently introduced. Staff will prepare analyses on new legislation to bring forward to the Legislative Committee at upcoming meetings. Some of the bills of interest include: AB 2221 (Keeley), which would authorize any person to commence a civil action against any person alleged to be constructing or operating equipment without a required permit; AB 2332 (Keeley), that would require CARB to develop and establish a program to prevent and control indoor air pollution; AB 2312 (Chu), which would create an environmental justice fund at CalEPA to be funded through a portion of fines and penalties collected; and AB 2650 (Lowenthal), that deals with diesel emissions in the ports. AB 2650 currently provides that the local air district impose fines or penalties on marine terminal operators if trucks idle too long. It is the intent of the sponsors to take the air districts out of the role of issuing tickets and instead transfer this authority to a local law enforcement entity. The Committee expressed concern that monitoring for this type of activity is not the mission of other local enforcement authorities and should be the responsibility of the local air district, provided sufficient funding is appropriated to augment existing enforcement staff.

Additional bills of interest include AB 2682 (Chu) and SB 1994 (Soto). These two bills are identical and are intended to place a user fee of 30 cents per barrel of crude oil refined and use the fee to mitigate air and water impacts of the use of petroleum. A portion of the money would go to the Carl Moyer and school bus replacement programs. New legislation also includes: AB 2718 (Oropeza), which would provide incentives for super clean distributed generation technologies, including flared gas; SB 1827 (Torlakson), which would require specified air districts to provide a portion of their
AB 2766 funding to specified small public transit agencies; and SB 2083 (Polanco), which would create an Environmental Education Fund to fund grants through the Superintendent of Public Instruction for programs on environmental issues. [For more information on these and other bills, please refer to Attachment 3.]

Federal Update

Lynnette Jacquez, Lance Larson, and Jeff Shockey of Copeland, Lowery & Jacquez, Washington Legislative Representatives, reported that AQMD Chairman Norma Glover and Dr. Chung Liu, Deputy Executive Officer/Science and Technology, recently traveled to Washington, DC, and met with various Congressional members and staff regarding the AQMD’s four federal funding proposals. Funding requests will be submitted to the appropriate funding sources during the next month. An update on the funding process will be shared at upcoming Legislative Committee meetings.

Recommended Position on Legislation

Staff provided a summary analysis and recommendation on one bill and provided a brief description of the bill. [Attachment 4]
 

AB 1058 (Pavley), would require CARB to develop and adopt, by January 1, 2004, regulations that achieve the maximum feasible reduction of carbon dioxide (CO₂) emissions by passenger vehicles and light-duty trucks in the state. Marilyn Solomon, Deputy Executive Officer, Public Affairs/Public Advisor, stated that the regulations adopted by CARB would not go into effect until January 1, 2005.

Dr. Wallerstein added that this bill is directed toward CO₂ principally as a global warming gas but does have a relationship to the AQMD’s ozone attainment program. The Legislative Committee adopted a Support position on AB 1058. Supervisor Antonovich voted no on the motion.

Other Business

No other business

Public Comment

John Billheimer, Enviro Reality, distributed a report he prepared on Proposition 65 and related legislation recently introduced. [Attachment 5]

Attachments

1. Attendance Roster
2. State 2002 Legislative Proposal Matrix
3. State Legislative Status Report
4. AB 1058 (Pavley) – Vehicle Emissions
5. Paper on Proposition 65 submitted by John Billheimer

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