AB 2143: Fairs.

(1)Existing provisions of the Business and Professions Code define district agricultural associations and their locations, county fairs and their locations, and citrus fairs and their locations, and funding for these entities, and regulate various aspects of financial management of state, county, and local fairs, including revenue from horse racing, and impose various duties on the Secretary of the Department of Food and Agriculture for those purposes.

This bill would repeal a number of these provisions in the Business and Professions Code and would revise and recast them as new provisions in the Food and Agricultural Code. The bill would replace references to the Division of Fairs and Expositions in the Department of Food and Agriculture with the Department of Food and Agriculture. The bill would make additional technical and conforming changes and repeal obsolete provisions.

(2)Existing law requires that all license fees from satellite wagering that are deposited into the Fair and Exposition Fund, a continuously appropriated fund, be deposited into a separate account in the fund for specified purposes, including for health and safety repair projects at fairs, which includes fire and life safety improvement projects, California Code of Regulations compliance projects, and long-term deferred maintenance projects. Under existing law, all revenues transferred into this account are continuously appropriated from that account to the Department of Food and Agriculture, for allocation by the Secretary of Food and Agriculture, at the secretarys discretion, for those specified purposes.

This bill would instead authorize certain revenues deposited into the Fair and Exposition Fund to first be deposited into a separate account in the Fair and Exposition Fund designated by the bill as the California Fairs Trust Account, and would continuously appropriate those revenues for specified purposes. By expanding the purposes for which those revenues may be used, the bill would make an appropriation.

(3)The Horse Racing Law appropriates certain unallocated moneys and other specified moneys to the Secretary of Food and Agriculture for capital outlay to California fairs for fair projects involving public health and safety, for fair projects involving major and deferred maintenance, for fair projects necessary due to any emergency, for projects that are required by physical changes to the fair site, for projects that are required to protect the fair property or installation, such as fencing and flood protection, and for the acquisition or improvement of any property or facility that will serve to enhance the operation of the fair.

This bill would additionally appropriate other specified unallocated moneys in the Fair and Exposition Fund for those purposes.

(4)The Horse Racing Law requires, except as specified, for a fair conducting a live racing meeting, that 1% of the total amount handled on live races, excluding wagering at a satellite facility, be retained by the fair association for payment to the state as a license fee. That law also requires any fair racing association to additionally deduct 1% from the total amount handled in its daily conventional and exotic parimutuel pools and requires that these additional moneys be deposited into the Fair and Exposition Fund, a continuously appropriated fund, and, with the approval of the Department of Food and Agriculture, authorizes the expenditure of these additional moneys for the construction or operation of recreational and cultural facilities of general public interest. Existing law also requires that certain moneys that are not expended within 3 years after being deposited into the Fair and Exposition Fund become available for those purposes.

This bill would instead continuously appropriate those additional moneys deposited into the Fair and Exposition Fund and unexpended moneys described above to the Secretary of Food and Agriculture for capital outlay to California fairs for fair projects involving public health and safety, for fair projects involving major and deferred maintenance, for fair projects necessary due to any emergency, for projects that are required by physical changes to the fair site, for projects that are required to protect the fair property or installation, and for the acquisition or improvement of any property or facility that will serve to enhance the operation of the fair, as specified. By expanding the purposes for which those additional moneys may be used, the bill would make an appropriation.

(5)Under existing law, a violation of the Food and Agricultural Code is a crime.

Because certain of the above provisions would be part of the Food and Agricultural Code, the violation of which would be a crime, this bill would impose a state-mandated local program.

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.