Bills

AB 953: California Environmental Quality Act: Department of Fish and Wildlife: review of environmental documents: revenue and cost tracking and accounting.

  • Session Year: 2021-2022
  • House: Assembly
  • Latest Version Date: 2021-03-17
Version:

The California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) requires a lead agency, as defined, to prepare, or cause to be prepared, and certify the completion of an environmental impact report on a project that it proposes to carry out or approve that may have a significant effect on the environment or to adopt a negative declaration if it finds that the project will not have that effect. CEQA also requires a lead agency to prepare a mitigated negative declaration for a project that may have a significant effect on the environment if revisions in the project would avoid or mitigate that effect and there is no substantial evidence that the project, as revised, would have a significant effect on the environment. CEQA requires the lead agency to consult with a public agency that is a responsible agency or a trustee agency during the environmental review process.

Existing law authorizes the Department of Fish and Wildlife to impose and collect a filing fee to defray the costs of managing and protecting fish and wildlife trust resources, including, but not limited to, consulting with other public agencies, reviewing environmental documents, recommending mitigation measures, developing monitoring requirements for purposes of CEQA, and other activities protecting those trust resources identified in the review pursuant to CEQA.

This bill would require the department to separately track and account for all revenues collected under the above filing fee provision and all costs incurred in its role as a responsible agency or trustee agency under CEQA.

Existing law establishes the Office of Information Security within the Department of Technology for the purpose of ensuring the confidentiality, integrity, and availability of state systems and applications and to promote and protect privacy as part of the development and operations of state systems and applications to ensure the trust of the residents of this state. Existing law requires an entity within the executive branch that is under the direct authority of the Governor to comply with the information security and privacy policies, standards, and procedures issued by the office. This bill would require state agencies not covered by the provisions described above to adopt and implement comparable information security and privacy policies, standards, and procedures, perform a security assessment at least every 3 years to determine compliance with the entirety of the adopted information security standards, and confidentially submit certification of compliance with the adopted standards, and, if applicable, corrective actions plans to address outstanding deficiencies, to the Assembly Privacy and Consumer Protection Committee.Because the required certification would be made under penalty of perjury, the bill would expand the crime of perjury and impose a state-mandated local program.Existing constitutional provisions require that a statute that limits the right of access to the meetings of public bodies or the writings of public officials and agencies be adopted with findings demonstrating the interest protected by the limitation and the need for protecting that interest.This bill would make legislative findings to that effect.The California Constitution requires the state to reimburse local agencies and school districts for certain costs mandated by the state. Statutory provisions establish procedures for making that reimbursement.This bill would provide that no reimbursement is required by this act for a specified reason.
Authors shown for version:
Amended Assembly (3/17/2021)

Bill Author