AB 2087: Regional conservation investment strategies.

Existing law establishes the Department of Fish and Wildlife in the Natural Resources Agency. Under existing law, the department has jurisdiction over the conservation, protection, and management of fish, wildlife, native plants, and habitat necessary for biologically sustainable populations of those species. The California Endangered Species Act prohibits the taking of an endangered, threatened, or candidate species, except as specified. Under the act, the department may authorize the take of listed species if the take is incidental to an otherwise lawful activity and the impacts are minimized and fully mitigated. Existing law prohibits an entity from substantially diverting or obstructing the natural flow of, or substantially changing or using any material from the bed, channel, or bank of, any river, stream, or lake, or from depositing certain material where it may pass into any river, stream, or lake, without first notifying the department of that activity, and entering into a lake or streambed alteration agreement if required by the department to protect fish and wildlife resources.

This bill would authorize the department, or any other public agency, to propose a regional conservation investment strategy, to be developed in consultation with applicable local agencies that have land use authority, for the purpose of informing science-based nonbinding and voluntary conservation actions and habitat enhancement actions that would advance the conservation of focal species and providing voluntary nonbinding guidance for various activities. The bill would authorize the department to approve a regional conservation investment strategy only if one or more state agencies request approval of the strategy through a letter sent to the Director of Fish and Wildlife, as prescribed. The bill would require the strategy to contain specified information and would authorize the strategy to include a regional conservation assessment proposed by the department or any other public agency and approved by the department. The bill would authorize the department to approve a regional conservation investment strategy or amended strategy for an initial period of up to 10 years after a public meeting and a public comment period regarding the proposed strategy or amended strategy have been held and after it finds that the strategy meets certain requirements. The bill would authorize a conservation action and a habitat enhancement action that measurably advance the conservation objectives of an approved strategy and that meet other specified requirements to be used to create mitigation credits. The bill would authorize these mitigation credits to be used to fulfill compensatory mitigation requirements established under any state or federal environmental law, as determined by the applicable local, state, or federal regulatory agency, including compensatory mitigation requirements to compensate for take or other adverse impacts of activities authorized pursuant to the California Endangered Species Act, to reduce adverse impacts to fish or wildlife resources, or both, from activities authorized pursuant to a lake or streambed alteration agreement to less than substantial, or to mitigate significant effects on the environment pursuant to the California Environmental Quality Act. To create these mitigation credits, the bill would require a person or entity to enter into a mitigation credit agreement with the department that meets specified requirements. The bill would prohibit the release of mitigation credits for use, sale, or transfer under a mitigation credit agreement unless the department approves the release in accordance with certain requirements. The bill would require the department to collect fees or other compensation from a person or entity that proposes to enter into a mitigation credit agreement, and from a public agency that proposes a strategy or a regional conservation assessment, to pay for all or a portion of the departments costs relating to the mitigation credit agreement, proposed strategy, or proposed regional conservation assessment. The bill would authorize the department to adopt guidelines and criteria to aid in the implementation of these provisions and would exempt the adoption of these guidelines and criteria from the Administrative Procedure Act. The bill would require the department to submit a report regarding the implementation of these provisions to the Legislature on or before January 1, 2020. The bill would prohibit the department from approving more than 8 regional conservation investment strategies before January 1, 2020, and would prohibit the department from approving a regional conservation investment strategy or regional conservation assessment on or after January 1, 2020, and from entering into a mitigation credit agreement on or after January 1, 2020.