Senate Standing Committee on Natural Resources and Water

The Senate Natural Resources and Water Committee will come to order. Good morning. The Senate continues to welcome the public in person and via the teleconference service. For individuals wishing to provide public comment today's participant number is 877-226-8216 and the access code is 146-2692. I will maintain decorum during the hearing as is customary.

We're holden our committee hearings here in the O Street building. So I do ask all ... we do have a quorum, so we can establish that. And we have eight bills on today's agenda. We have a hard stop at twelve noon, although I think that will not be a problem. Bills will be heard in file item order. We have four bills on proposed consent today.

File item number two AB 609 by Assembly Member Papan. File item number six AB 297 by Assembly Member Fong. Vince Fong. File item number eight AB Jones, thousand and 24 by Assembly Member Aguiar-Curry. File item number nine AB 1760 by the Assembly Water, Parks and Wildlife Committee. Before we hear presentation on the bills, let's establish a quorum. Assistant please call the Grove.

Senators Min. Here. Min? Here. Seyarto? Here. Seyarto? Here. Allen Dahle Dahle? Here. Eggman Grove. Grove? Here. Hurtado? Laird. Laird? Here. Limon. Padilla. Padilla? Here. Stern. Allen.

A quorum has been established. Since quorum has been established, we will be able to vote on the consent calendar. Thank you. Assistant please call the role.

For the consent calendar. Senators Min aye. Min Aye Seyarto. Seyarto. Aye Allen Dally. Dally Aye Eggman Grove. Grove Aye Hurtado. Laird. Laird. Aye Limon. Padilla. Padilla Aye.

The vote is 6-0. We'll leave the consent calendar on call. So we'll hear now from our first author. And just as a note, AB 460 file item number one has been pulled from today's hearing.

So we'll start with file item number three, AB 631. Assembly Member Hart, are you prepared? Allen right. You can proceed whenever you're ready.

Good morning, Mr. Chair and Members. AB 631 ensures the California Geological Energy Management Division, also known as Cal-GEM, has 21st century enforcement tools to protect communities from oil operators that violate the law, endangered public health, and threaten the environment.

Calgam currently lacks some of the basic statutory enforcement authorities that most environmental regulatory agencies rely upon, like the California Air Resources Ward, the Department of Toxic Substances Control, and the California Department of Fish and Wildlife.

AB 631 would model other state environmental agencies by authorizing Cal-GEM to seek injunctive relief from a superior court when urgent compliance is needed to protect public health and the environment. The Bill also ensures Cal-GEM has the necessary tools to order an operator to secure oil wells that pose a risk to life, health, property or natural resources.

In my district, Cal-Gem, responded to over 400 leaks at an oil facility operated by one company. Numerous wells were approaching a highly dangerous, potentially explosive situation. While the company ignored orders to fix the issues, calgim was unable to seek an injective order or even to step in to secure the site. This inaction threatened the public health and could have been prevented if Cal-GEM had the authority to force compliance to the courts.

AB 631 modernizes civil and criminal penalties consistent with other environmental agencies in order to ensure appropriate compliance and weber the pattern of treating violations as the cost of doing business.

The Bill wood also allow Cal-GEM to reyes civil prosecution to local and state partner agencies in order to more evenly distribute the burdens of enforcement. In a recent report between 2018 and 2020, calgim issued 66 enforcement orders and only eleven have been complied with. In 2020, Calgim issued over $190,000 in civil penalties and failed to collect a single dollar.

Enforcement data is clear that existing law is not sufficient to deter bad actors. I'm committed to continuing work with the opposition should this Bill move to Senate public safety. In conclusion, AB 631 is an important step to ensure the state has necessary enforcement authority to hold violators accountable and protect communities from environmental health and public health hazards posed by oil operations.

Here with me today is Fatim Fatima from California Environmental voters and Kayla with the center on Race Poverty in the environment.

Thank you. Due to constraints on the length of hearings, each side will be permitted two minutes each for their primary witnesses. You may proceed.

Good morning, Chair and committee Members. My name is Kayla Karimi, here representing the Center on Race, Poverty and the Environment. CRPE is committed to environmental justice and uplifting and underrepresented communities in the San Joaquin Valley.

I would like to thank Assembly Member Greg Hart for introducing AB 631, which gives Calgum the tools necessary to adequately enforce health and safety regulations, a task at which the agency has been failing for its entire history. At CRPE, we work closely with local communities to advocate for their needs and public health.

Our communities are low income communities of color, with neighborhoods often in close proximity to oil and gas wells, and they depend on Cal-GEM to protect them. Many of our communities suffer from effects of living near oil and gas wells, including asthma, chronic headaches, cancer and more. However strong our regulations may be or become, they fail to protect communities when they are unenforced. As a result, human health suffers.

CalGEM must be able to protect our communities from leaks and other harms from both active Wallis and the over 37,000 idle wells. And their ability to safeguard the health of these communities is only as strong as their ability to enforce regulations. Unfortunately, Calgum has been unable to enforce oil well leak remediation in our communities, including near schools, houses and churches.

For instance, just earlier this month, eleven leaking wells were found in the Irwin Lamont areas. A community CRPE works to protect. One was only a few hundred feet away from a high school. These leaks will continue unless Cal-GEM has adequate enforcement mechanisms. AB 631 provides enforcement tools to Cal-GEM such as injunctive relief, coordinated civil enforcement, and increased fines.

These enforcement mechanisms will allow Calgum to hold oil wells operators accountable and better keep communities safe, especially as the tens of thousands of idle wells continue to age and the risk of toxic leaks gets higher. As such, our organization supports AB 631 to ensure Cal-GEM can enforce crucial oil well regulations and protect our communities. I urge you to vote yes on AB 631. Thank you.

Thank you. You may proceed when ready.

Good morning. Chair and committee Members Melissa Romero with California Environmental Voters here in strong support of AB 631, which enhances the authority of the state's oil and gas regulator, CalGEM to take action or impose penalties on oil and gas operators and property owners for violations of the state's own oil and gas laws and regulations.

AB 631 ensures that Cal-GEM has the necessary tools beyond emergency orders to protect communities when issuing an order to secure wells that pose a risk to life, health, property or natural resources. And the Bill has been carefully crafted so that excessive violations for those the penalty amounts in AB 631 model other agencies and are based on the oil and gas industry's company's history of noncompliance with Cal-GEM orders and for accidental violations.

The Bill does require courts to take into account all circumstances and provides that, for example, in the event that something was out of the control of an operator like Vandalism or an act of God, that that would not be a violation. And additionally, the looming issue of 37,000 idle or not in production oil wells means that enforcement will be critical as this infrastructure continues to age and the risk gets higher.

AB 631 brings Calgary enforcement authority into the 21st century and will protect communities from oil companies that violate the law and endanger public health safety, min the environment. Cal-GEM lacks some of the basic statutory enforcement authorities that most other environmental regulatory agencies rely upon.

And this Bill is focused on ensuring Cal-GEM's ability is to enforce existing laws and regulations and discourage truly bad actors from creating harm on communities that are avoidable. We urgent aye vote. Thank you.

Here in room 2100. Those wishing to testify here must limit their comments, their name, affiliation, and position on the measure. You may proceed when ready.

Good morning. Erin Woolley on behalf of Sierra Club California and support.

Thank you.

Good morning. Raquel Mason on behalf of California Environmental Justice Alliance Action in support. Thank you.

Thank you.

Seeing no one else in the room, we'll now move on to lead witnesses in opposition.

Do we have any lead witnesses in opposition? Okay, do we just have the one? All right, you have two minutes. Thank you.

Mr. Chair and Members, Paul Deiro, representing the Western States Petroleum Association. We want the offenders of these 129 civil penalties where nothing has been paid. We want payment they're not representative of our Members.

We believe substantially increasing the penalties will not necessarily address what is in fact an enforcement and administrative problem at Cal-GEM. We believe that in some cases, penalties should be increased, but in other cases, they're way beyond the existing models that they're modeled after. We also believe that enforcement of collections is the problem, and we support a solution to that.

We're not sure if this is the Bill. The content of the Bill will do that. We are working closely with the author, and we'll be meeting, having a large meeting this week with the author on the Bill. We will oppose the Bill today.

Thank you for your comments. It will now go to any witnesses wishing to testify in opposition here in room 2100. Again, please limit your comments, your name, affiliation, position on measure saying no one in the room. All right, we'll move on to the witnesses waiting to testify via the teleconference service.

Those wishing to testify should limit their comments, their name, affiliation, and position on the measure. Moderator could you please tell us how many people are in the queue and queue them up? Thank you.

If you're in supporter opposition of AB 631, you may press one and then zero. Again, that is one and then zero in support or opposition of AB 631 and we have one in queue, and we'll go to line 36.

Good morning, Christina Scaringe with the Center for Biological Diversity in Support.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Moderator we have no one else.

No one else in queue.

Okay, thank you for our witnesses. We'll bring the discussion back to the Members. Any questions or comments from our Members? I have a few comments. This Bill does seek to provide Calgam with all the regulatory enforcement tools that other regulators, such as the Department of Toxic Substance Control have, and, of course, meaningful penalties are an important part of enforcement.

That being said, Cal-GEM's current record of civil penalty collection is poor. There have been, I think, some legitimate concerns raised by opposition. And I know that the Author, in talking with him and his staff, is continuing to work with stakeholders in an attempt to address their concerns. And so I'm supporting the Bill today with that commitment from the Author that he will continue to work with opposition and continue to work and inform our staff as to how this is proceeding.

But with that, do we have a motion on the Bill? I'm sorry, would you like to close? Oh, you have comments? It is double referred to public safety. Thank you. We have a motion from Senator Padilla to move the Bill. Assembly Member would you like to close?

Well, you have my commitment to continue to work with the stakeholders involved, and we have meetings scheduled this week, so I appreciate. Respectfully request an aye vote.

Thank you very much. Assembly Member the motion is due pass to Public Safety from Senator Padilla. Assistant, please call the roll.

Senators. Min aye. Min aye. No Seyarto. No. Allen Dahle? Dahle? No. Eggman Grove Grove? No. Hurtado. Laird Limon. Padilla Padilla. Aye Stern.

Okay, the vote count is two to three. We'll leave that Bill open on call. Our next Bill, I see that we have Assembly Member Bauer-Kahan here in the room to present AB 779 from her colleague, Assembly Member Wilson. Assembly Member Bauer-Kahan proceed whenever you're ready.

Thank you, Mr. Chair and Senators. It's an honor to be here on behalf of Assembly Member Wilson to present her Bill AB 779. I want to, on behalf of Assembly Member Wilson, accept the committee's amendments and thank the committee flora their hard work on the Bill.

After years of severe drought and volatile weather exacerbated by the climate crisis, California has increasingly been forced to rely on groundwater to meet its demand for water. In particular, groundwater is a lifeline for California farmers, specifically small farmers who have difficulty accessing or affording alternative sources of surface water.

In response to persisting conditions of extreme drought and concerns over groundwater depletion, we the California Legislature passed Sigma in 2014 the Sustainable Groundwater Management Act. SGMA requires local and regional agencies to formulate plans to ensure sustainable groundwater use on a basinwide basis.

The program is built around local control of groundwater supplies, allowing regions to design groundwater control systems that work best for their own communities. However, as implementation of SGMA has continued to unfold, many have raised concerns as small and disadvantaged farmers have not been adequately represented in the process.

Some of the key burdens of SGMA places on small and disadvantaged farmers are related to the process of water rights adjudication in these groundwater basins where rights are disputed. The adjudications take place in non specialized courts and can be lengthy, expensive and opaque, all factors which exacerbate the existing resource disparities and underrepresentation of small and farmers and disadvantaged communities.

Small and socially disadvantaged farmers can lack the time and resources to sit in on proceedings, track down court documents to stay updated on the process, and can often find difficulty affording the legal cost to stay apprised and fight for their water rights. In 2015, AB 1390 was passed to help streamline the adjudication process and align the process with the goals of SGMA.

However, stakeholders have raised several concerns around the abuses of the process in areas for improvement. For instance, some community Members worry that bad faith actors resort to the adjudication process to extend the time in which they can pump groundwater without restriction.

This past fall, Assembly Member Wilson's office and students from UCLA Law put together a research project along with a series of stakeholder interviews, and identified several ayes of possible improvements to this adjudication process that promote transparency, equity and should benefit all parties involved. Those suggestions come together before you in AB 779.

Assembly Member Wilson's office also convened stakeholder meetings and met with the opposition several times over the last few months and have adopted significant amendments to reflect those conversations. The amendments have addressed several concerned raised, and while there are still a couple of remaining items.

Assembly Member Wilson is confident that she will be able to iron out the remaining concerns, mostly regarding the involvement of DWR or the Water Board min the process.

Additionally, many of the amendments were meant to address the concerns raised by Judicial Council, and while the office was notified last week of additional concerns over separation of powers, they do believe they'll be able to come together on language once again. Assembly Member Wilson looks forward to working with all of the organizations and wants to emphasize her appreciation for their feedback over the lifetime of this Bill.

She would like me to express her thanks to everyone for their research, their work, and the feedback she's received on the legislation, and she looks forward to working with everyone in the coming weeks. Now I'd like to introduce the witnesses here to testify on this Bill, Owen McAleer, a law student from UCLA who helped bring the Bill to her office, and Dave Runsten from the Community Alliance with Family Farmers.

Thank you, Assembly Member. We'll move on to lead witnesses in support and you each have two minutes. You may proceed when ready.

Morning, Senators. My name is Owen McAleer and I'm a third year law student at UCLA. I'm here in support of AB 779, which will improve the efficiency, transparency and accessibility of the groundwater adjudication process. As a student in UCLA's California Environmental Legislation Clinic, my classmates and I researched the Sustainable Groundwater Management Act and spoke with stakeholders, including environmental advocates, agricultural organizations and water law experts.

We repeatedly heard that the current groundwater adjudication process is slow and burdensome for all parties, and especially small farmers and farmers of color. Despite a nearly decade old law meant to streamline the groundwater adjudication process, there remains room to improve transparency and fairness.

Proceedings can take over ten years and total millions of dollars in legal fees. Most small farmers default out of the proceeding before having the opportunity to advocate for themselves, and some have even been forced to sell their operations because of the financial strain of participating in the process. There are also barriers to incorporating neutral sciencebased expertise from state agencies.

That knowledge can help align adjudications with sustainable management goals and fill gaps left when underresourced parties are not able to fully participate in the adjudication process. And the lengthy adjudication process can frustrate SGMA's efforts to improve groundwater management, because in some cases, sigma's sustainable management controls can be temporarily suspended.

AB 779 seeks to make the adjudication process becker for all parties involved to address barriers that historically marginalized users have often faced in the adjudication process. AB 779 would make a number of changes, four of which I'll talk about low first, to make sure the public and all groundwater users understand the process when a new adjudication is initiated. AB 779 would require groundwater sustainability agencies in the basin.

I hate to interrupt you, but if you could start wrapping up. That'd be great.

Sure to invite a representative from DWR or the State Water Board to present at a public meeting. Second, to make it easier for water users and the public to access information about ongoing adjudications, it would ensure that all case management orders are timely posted to DWR's website.

Third, AB 779 requires courts to consider the water use of small and disadvantaged farmers. And fourth, and finally, AB 779 provides safeguards to ensure users don't take advantage of an ongoing adjudication to pump on sustainably.

Thank you very much. Appreciate your testimony. I don't know what I was doing during my 3rd year of law school, but it was nuts. Congratulations on a great Bill. Thank you. Next witness.

Good morning, chair and Members. Dave Runsten Community Alliance of Family Farmers. We've represented small family farms for 45 years in California. Who does poorly in an adjudication. Historians tell us it's the small farms, the rural residents and the environment. AB 779 tries to address some of this unfairness.

It's unfortunate that SGMA didn't eliminate the adjudication avenue because people are using it to try to circumvent the SGMA process. In Cuyama, for example, two large farming operations growing carrots and now owned by hedge funds, filed for adjudication because they didn't like the way the GSA process was going.

The judge said everyone needed to be in court. There are a couple of hundred small pumpers there. We're working with 30 people who banded together to hire an attorney. They're paying about $250 a month, which they can't afford each in Indian Wells, a large pistachio farm that had been planted plunked down in the desert, filed for adjudication.

Also unhappy with the GSA. The GSA tells us there are 800 rural residential wells and small farms not represented in court. What will happen to them? The reality is that the small farms and rural residents cannot afford a lengthy court process. Ideally, the court would appoint class counsel for them, and we will have to see if we can work on that.

So we need to do everything we can to make Adjudication line up with Sigma and the GSPS and try to discourage this end run around the community process to keep Adjudication from taking over every groundwater basin in the Central Valley, bringing in DWR and the Water Board in whatever manner would appear essential. We also support the committee's amendment to eliminate the 2024 date. We strongly support AB 779, and we urge your aye vote. Thank you very much.

Thank you. I will now hear from any support witnesses here in the room in support of AB 779. Seeing no one in the room, I will move on to any lead witnesses in opposition. Do we have lead witnesses in opposition? We have two of you. All right, great. You have two minutes each. You may begin when you're ready.

Thank you. Good morning, chair and Members of the Committee. My name is Alexandra Biering and I work for the California Farm Bureau. We have an opposed unless amended position on this Bill, and I'd like to explain why. And I also want to acknowledge the author's office and her staff because they've been really good and very open and willing to collaborate with us and talk to us like others have laird over many several months. So really appreciate it.

Farm Bureau is California's largest and oldest statewide organization representing farmers and ranchers. 82% of our 22,000 Members are small farmers. This means that Farm Bureau ayes very seriously efforts to assist and support small family farms whose numbers aye ever dwindling in the Golden State due to increasing regulatory pressures and other factors.

This Bill is well intentioned, but doesn't help protect California's small family farms as intended. After SGMA was passed, the Farm Bureau recognized that the law had huge potential to hurt small farmers and ranchers, especially those who only use groundwater or who are in what we call white areas, who can be left out of the room when the decisions were being made by larger entities who are more well organized.

Since SGMA was passed, Farm Bureau has really stepped in a role to represent a lot of those white area growers on SGMA, on GSA boards and other realms. That's why we, along with most of the AG community, advocated for and supported the bills that others have mentioned, AB 1390 and SB 266.

Together, these added chapter Seven, beginning with Section 830, to Title Ten of part Two of the California Civil Code of Procedure establishing special procedures to streamline comprehensive groundwater adjudications and ensure they considered all uses in the basin comprehensively, not just the loudest, largest or wealthiest voices.

Rather than complement that, this Bill would complicate it by establishing new procedures and rules for DWR and the State Water Board, which could both slow down the adjudication process and bias the court's ultimate decision on how groundwater should be allocated among all users in the basin in other words, it's both unnecessary and could cause harm to some of the very entities it seeks to protect.

Again, thanks to Assembly Member's Office and staff on being so willing to work with us and talk through a lot of the issues that are still outstanding. But again, I think that it is a well intentioned Bill. Thank you for your consideration.

Thank you. Next witness.

Morning, Mr. Chairman. Members Bob Reeb with Reeb government relations on behalf of Valley Ag Water Coalition this morning. Again, as I testified last week on another similar matter before the committee, the difference between adjudication proceedings and the Sustainable Groundwater Management Act is very clear. Adjudication is to identify those who have the right to pump groundwater, determine their priority of right, and the amount that they can pump. It is dealing with property rights and therefore is properly before the judiciary.

SGMA, as you all know, is part of the Executive branch approach to determining the best means to achieve sustainable groundwater management. SGMA specifically precludes a GSA from determining water rights. So you have to have adjudication and you have to have, in our opinion, the Sustainable Groundwater Management Act.

Under an adjudication proceeding, the state is authorized to intervene in any adjudication, and the court is authorized to appoint the state Water Resources Control Board as referee or to refer for technical input and access to the State Water Board for their opinion as to the facts facing that basin. So there is really no need to have a representative from either the Department or the ward to provide testimony.

Again, adjudication is first and foremost to determine the priority of groundwater rights. The court may consider equitable allocation only after that occurs. The concern we have with adding disadvantaged communities and small farmers is that they are already, if they are groundwater pumpers, may be a party to the adjudication and the court may make a class so that the cost and time that's necessary for them to participate is reduced.

Finally, the deletion of the prospective application amendment causes concerns for one of my clients in that we do have an adjudication in the central and central Bains and West Coast basin that was entered into min the 1950s and has been operating since that point in time. But recently they did have an adjudication judgment amendment to allow for groundwater storage in those basins. Let me just say that by getting rid of the prospective nature of this Bill, you're going to call into question some of the future for that basin.

Thank you for your testimony. All right, appreciate that. And now we'll move on to any other opposition witnesses here in the room. Again, please limit your testimony to your name, affiliation and position on the measure.

Good morning. Gail Delihant with Western Growers Association. We are opposed unless amended.

Thank you.

Brenda Bass, California Chamber of Commerce. Opposed unless amended.

Thank you.

Kris Anderson, Association of California Water Agencies, opposed unless amended, but appreciate the productive conversations with your office.

Taylor Roshan on behalf of various agricultural associations and oppose unless amended.

Thank you.

Good morning. Tricia Geringer with Agricultural Council. Also respectfully oppose, unless amended.

Thank you.

Dennis Albiony of California Pear Growers, California Seed Association and others oppose less amended. Thank you.

Thank you so much. All right, seeing no other opposition witnesses here min the room, we'll move on to witnesses waiting to testify via the Teleconference Conference service. Again, those wishing to testify via Teleconference should limit their name, comments to their name, affiliation and position on the measure. Ms. Moderator, if you could please prompt any individuals waiting to testify in support or opposition of AB 779, we can begin. Thank you.

If you're in support of AB 799 or opposition, you may press one and then zero. Again, that is one and then zero for in support or opposition of AB 799 in one moment. We do have a few in queue. We will go to line eleven. Your line is open.

My name is Micael Glackin, speaking on behalf of Clean Water Action in support of a 799. Thank you.

Thank you.

And next we'll go to line 44. Your line is open.

Good morning, Mr. Chair and Members. Roger Dickinson, on behalf of CivicWell. Formerly the Local Government Commission in support. Thanks very much.

Thank you.

Thank you. And we have no further support or opposition. Thank you.

Thank you to all of our witnesses. We'll bring the discussion back to the dias. Any of our Members have questions or comments? Senator Grove.

Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chair. I pray that your presentation here on behalf of the author is not because she's struggling with something that we all know is very public, but that she's not having a bad day with that situation.

She's doing great. Ask me to fill in for her.

Yeah, okay, good. That makes me feel better. I do have concerns. I know that when again, I think farmers and people in the Central Valley that produce food started pumping groundwater because their surface water was even though they paid for it, it was not allowed to come down to actually grow the food that everybody eats.

They haven't addressed outflows on new biological opinions. And then, of course, we get SGMA, right? And former Assembly Member Dickinson was the one, I believe, that carried that Bill. We made references that this was going to cause a huge problem. Number one, we thought it would be almost impossible to put together groundwater management plans because you had to have every single pumper, regardless if it was five acre feet or 55,000 acre feet, it didn't matter.

You had to have everybody in the program. People managed to overcome that. And then we realized, I believe it was in 2015 that the largest voices did have some say or a larger say so in the process. And then in 2015, we passed AB 1390, and that was to streamline the process and it was actually to streamline the process of adjudication.

And then also it made sure that there weber users that were smaller farmers and more disadvantaged farmers would have a say so in the process. That was just passed in 2015. Since then, there's only been two or only been a few adjudicated cases. So I guess my question is that we haven't given that time to have process. We haven't given it time to go through the process.

There's only been a few cases that have been adjudicated. There were specific ones mentioned in Cuyama and also and those are two of the few in Indian Wallis Valley. But that Bil when we realized that this was a problem, was supposed to address these issues, and it hasn't really had a lot of time to take place and address these issues.

And the other thing is that if this Bill passes, I really do think we'll be back here. I won't because I'll be termed out, but you guys will be back here trying to fix another duplicative process that is more harm to smaller farmers and disadvantaged farmers because again, the carrot grower in Cuyama. They're not going to have an issue with this. Right.

They'll go through the process and continue to grow carrots. But this will actually disadvantage these small farmers even more because it makes it duplicative and there's other processes that they have to go through.

Yes. So bear with me. Members. No, I know I'm sorry I'm going to do my best, Senator, because I'm here and I did hear the Bill in my committee. So I have obviously some knowledge, I have huge concerns, which is why and I respect that, I'm going to do my best to address them.

And obviously, I'll turn to the witness and I will say that I think a lot of what Assembly Member Wilson is trying to do here by asking the court to consider certain things in already existing adjudications, is an attempt to address some of your concerns as it relates to putting more burdens on the farmers.

And so how do we ensure and I know that adjudications that are happening as we sit here today are seeing these problems arise. And so those may not be finished adjudications. They are adjudications that are in process. But ensuring that we allow SGMA to continue, that we allow the courts to take into consideration these factors, I think is something that won't necessarily burden the process, but will allow a little bit more presence for these individuals who, like you said, we saw from the beginning, weren't getting their voices heard.

And I know you may not agree with this Bill, but I know we both share the desire for our small California farmers to thrive and to have the water that they need to do the work that we all need them to do to grow the food we eat every day. But with that, I'll turn it over to my witness.

Okay, thank you. And we appreciate the question. And we were very mindful min drafting this Bill to try and temper any concerns around duplicative process. There are a few provisions that we think should be only a minor increase on the burden to parties. For instance, copying the court on reporting groundwater reporting that's already due to DWR is just a matter of essentially cease and forwarding. And same with the requirement to forward court orders.

It initially required all pleadings to be posted on DWR's website, but we narrowed it to court orders essentially to alleviate the burden on parties. And about the few adjudications since AB 1390s passage, a few of the concerns that our stakeholders raised, even Min, just those couple adjudications, such as the issue of most parties in A basin defaulting right off the bat, and the use of stipulated judgments to kind of prolong unsustainable pumping. Both came up specifically with the post AB 1390 adjudication. So hopefully that's helpful, but happy to follow up.

Thank you. I appreciate that. I appreciate what you're trying to do. I think that 1390 with that, I mean, it was a very expansive groundwater. It was a robust groundwater cleanup for SGMA to allow this. I really do. And I'm going to clip it. I won't be here, but I'll clip it and post it. I really do think you guys will be back here fixing this because I think it causes more detrimental harm to our farmers, our smaller farmers.

Again, large corporate farmers are buying up smaller farmers because of the regulatory process and the lack of water in the state of California.

They can't afford the process that's been going on for years, and that's legislation that comes out of this building, sigma is another thing that happened which allowed larger corporate farmers to purchase smaller farmers because they couldn't participate in the process. We passed 1390 to allow them to participate in the process, and now this Bill will make it duplicative.

And I do believe there's a separation between the judicial issue and on the adjudication process. So that's another separate issue that I know that the author is working with Judicial Council on and has several meetings. But I really do think that this will hinder our smaller farmers even more than what it is today. So I would ask the author to kind of look at that issue.

Thank you, Senator.

Thank you. Senator. Dahle.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Members. So I had to look up what a small farmer is because I fit in that category. Well, I had a question on that. If it's 400,000, I looked it up. It's 400. According to this Bill, it's 10,000 in revenue or 400,000. And if that's gross or take home, I would be less than a small family farmer.

Anyway, I wanted to just make a few comments, and I have a question. Number one, so this is a statewide law, which I think will be fascinating because we have different groundwater basins and they are... So let me give you an example. In the valley, in the Central Valley and northern part of the valley, we have aquifers that we have really good history on.

We know that they're so if you drill a well 10 miles from ones, well, they're all in the same aquifer drafting out of the same aquifer, and we can model those. And we know a lot about them. We know a lot more about the recharge. And we're seeing adjudication on those because we've seen overdraft, right.

So that we're seeing now with SGMA, we're seeing adjudication, but when you move into the foothills and other parts of the state, we don't have an aquifer that we're all pumping out. We have different faults, fractures. And in my district, and our farms, you may drill a well and really 10ft away drill a well and one will have no water and one will have thousands of gallons per minute.

And so well witchers and people that figure out dowsers figure out where the water is at in new technology. That's because we're not all drafting out of the same. But these laws apply to everywhere. And so it's been some of my consternation with the ability to pass statewide laws which when we try to adjudicate, we don't have good information.

And I think that's really what we're after here. If we have, for example, mega farms coming in and putting in huge wells, which we've seen and quite frankly, investment funds doing that, that does penalize the small independent farmer who has a difficult time battling corporate farms. So my concern with the Bill is that one size doesn't fit all.

And when we do legislation that one size fits all, it harms those areas where we have a different scenario that we're trying to deal with. And so I just want to make that note.

And so my question is how do we solve that issue where what happens in Kern is totally different than happens in Sierra County, Modoc, Siskiyou when it comes to groundwater? So that's my question to you. And I know this is not your Bill.

No, I appreciate you, Senator, because I was sure you're going to take this opportunity to try to stump me.

I will say this. We don't see the fact we're dealing with SGMA right now in most of the counties I represent, but we're not seeing adjudication of groundwater. But this Bill will come. And so that's my thoughts.

And I will say, I know that this is not necessarily a helpful answer to you. There have been a lot of bills on how do we make these processes more meaningful. And I think one of the best I've seen that didn't even make it was a Bloom Bill from last year that focused on training the judges to understand more about our water basins and our water problems so that they could do a better job of understanding and adjudicating these cases.

I liked that Bill. It didn't make it. So maybe we should revisit that. But I do think that as it relates to this, more information and better information is important. I don't think anybody here is arguing that we should be making decisions based on bad or limited information. And I think that I would argue on behalf of the author that some of what is happening here will bring more and better information that will hopefully allow for differentiation between our aquifers and our parts of our state.

But you hit on a point that I think we as a Legislature struggle with every day. The state is incredibly diverse, right? And whether we're talking about bills in this committee or another committee, we struggle with the fact that rural communities, urban communities, Central Valley communities, northern state communities do need different things. And I do think the answer to that is always more and better information. I agree with you, and I hope this Bill helps address that.

Thank you, Senator. Senator Dahle all right, we have the former Secretary of Natural Resources, Senator Laird. Who has a question.

That was designed to just keep the Senator from Bakersfield from pointing that out. I think I'm at a disadvantage here because I stepped out of the room to present a Bill and I could tell that when the Senator from Bakersfield raised carrot farmers, she may well have been talking about the Cuyama Valley. Even though I represent it. She spent part of her youth there and may know more. So I'm at a disadvantage there.

But is he going to ask a question, sir? Or is he just talking about me.

No, I'm going to make a comment. I'm going to make a comment. Welcome to the Rules Committee. And it's interesting because I heard from the farmers in Cuyama about this Bill and initially they were worried about the 2024 date and if the Adjudication Bains, and with the amendments that have been taken by the author, they have removed their concerns.

And after visiting there and it's a unique place because it's a confluence of four counties. It is where Ventura, Santa Barbara, San Luis, Obispo, and Kern all come together. It's a very small valley. It's farmed and it's overdrafted.

And there's this thing that taught me something after many years of working. in water and that is that there are two farmers, and I heard carrot farmers mentioned they're large farms and carrots is a primary crop and they use 70% of the water in the entire valley. And it is the contention of the small farmers, some of them who use between one and stern acre feet a year, that they conserve. And then you go into the processes such as adjudication and the people that haven't conserved with the larger farms benefit in the baseline as opposed to the smaller farmers that have... permission to show a prop.

Yes, Senator, but if you could try to wrap it up there.

I will, but it's me standing at the Kern County line on the edge of the Cuyama Valley because I texted it to the Senator from Bakersfield.

Would you like that to be entered in the record, Senator Laird?

She might, but she's the custodian. The point is that this Bill attempts to address the needs of those small farmers in exactly these situations and make sure that they have a voice when they are the ones with very small usage that are speaking up and are the ones that are conserving against the larger users that dominate the process.

And this Bill gives them a voice. And so, Will, I think that some of the concerns about this Bill are valid. I know the Author is working and I know the author is trying to address them. But the reason for the Bill is right and the direction of the Bill is right. And these amendments have addressed some of the needs that are expressed by the very small farmers that are involved. So I look forward to supporting it and giving the author the chance to land these questions.

Thank you, Senator Laird, for those comments. We have a motion from Senator Stern to move the Bill. Assembly Member would you like to close?

No, I will leave that as my close. Perhaps. Senator Laird would have been an amazing presenter. Thank you.

So the motion is due pass as amended to Judiciary. And we have a motion from Senator Stern. Assistant please call the roll.

Senators. Min aye. Min. aye. Seyarto? No. Seyarto? No. Allen. Dahle. No. Dahle? No. Eggman. Eggman. aye Grove. Grove. No. Hurtado. Laird. aye Limon. Padilla. Padilla. aye. Stern. Stern. Stern. Senator Stern. Senator Stern. Aye.

The vote count is four three. We'll leave that open on the roll open and thank you.

Okay, our next Bill then is file item number five, AB 57. By Assembly Member Kalra, who is here and ready to proceed. You can begin when ready.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. AB 57 would establish the California Pocket Forest Initiative, a pilot program that would authorize Cal Fire to distribute demonstration grants for pocket forest to public and nonprofit entities. It is a reintroduction of AB 2114, which this committee passed last year. Cal Fire would partner with academic institutions to manage the pilot program and study the effectiveness of the Miyawaki planting method in California.

They will detail their findings and report to the Legislature by January 1, 2030. And the program will sunset on January 1, 2031. A pocket forest is a small plot of urban land that has been densely planted with native plant species. It is designed according to the Miyawaki method, a style of tree planting that directs growers to study and emulate an area's native ecosystem. Over the course of two to three years, the plants will grow into a self sustaining miniature forest that can offer a wide range of environmental and health benefits.

Such benefits include serving as a crucial habitat for California's many unique plant and animal species as well as providing much needed support and sustenance for critical pollinators. Additionally, by expanding nature access to urban areas, this Bill has the potential to improve the health outcomes of tens of millions of Californians. Studies have shown that people will spend at least 2 hours a week in nature are much more likely to report good health and psychological well being.

Therefore, this Bill directs Cal Fire to prioritize grant applications for projects in disadvantaged communities and communities that lack easily accessible green spaces. Pocket forests have already been successfully planted in such varied places as Brazil, India, the United Kingdom, and right here in California and Berkeley.

AB 57 serves as a much needed beacon flora the equitable community oriented environmentalist movement and will ensure that urban communities are able to access and enjoy the many benefits of natural green spaces. With me to provide supporting testimony is Daniel Gluesenkamp, Executive Director of the California Institute for Biodiversity.

Thank you, Chair and Committee Members. I'm Daniel Gluesenkamp with the California Institute for Biodiversity.

Okay, you have two minutes. Okay. I just wanted to get that out there before you started, but anyway, go ahead.

Yes, sir.

Thank you.

So forgive me for speaking a little bit faster now. So we support AB 57, the Pocket Forest Bill. We believe that it brings multiple solutions to various crises that California is facing right now. So what are those crises? As you know, we're in the midst of a biodiversity crisis, which is in gathering and growing. We also have a crisis in access where millions of Californians can't partake in the benefits of nature, which are myriad.

These crises are reinforced by climate change and extreme heat, drought and other amplifying crises. Pocket forests are a solution that can help us address many of these problems. So what is a pocket forest? Pocket forest is a small part. Pocket forests are planted using the Miyawaki method, where native trees, native Alanis grown from locally collected seeds, are planted in high density so that they compete with each other and grow rapidly, grow deep root systems, and don't require as much watering in the future.

Or any watering, really. They're planted in small parcels of urban land. So forgotten edges of parking lots, weedy hillsides at the border of the schoolyard, places that are unloved, perhaps overwatered, underutilized, and aren't yet part of our solutions. So the what we get min return for this is birds and pollinators return to the sites. Sorry, I'm completely flipping this. So I'll just read my script, Mr. Chair.

As long as you're got about a minute left. Thank you.

Okay. Their important facts of these are that they are self maintaining. They require minimal water and chemical inputs, require minimum maintenance beyond perhaps litter cleanup once or twice a year. They certainly require much less watering than probably the lawn or the abandoned site that's already there and likely getting watered, even though it's not benefiting anything.

In return for this, we get birds returning, we get pollinators returning, we get reduced water use, improved groundwater recharge, we get clean air and water, and we ameliorate extreme heat. And again, these are in urban areas where people don't have access to these in the same way that we do in a lot of California. Most important to this is that we get access to nature where we need it most.

We get something beyond these direct benefits to people, though. We get rewilding natural habitats. We get a little bit of nature back in our urban areas, a little bit of wildness and unpredictability, and something that gives children and people who can simply wilk down the block to access nature a chance to reconnect with the world.

Sir, if you can wrap up. Thank you.

Yes, sir. I want to make a case that we need multiple new solutions. Now we're facing crises that we don't understand. We don't know what's going to work. We need to test a lot of different things. We need to test native plant gardening, native plant landscaping, urban greening, green schoolyards. And we need solutions like mathis that address multiple crises, multiple problems. In doing this, we establish a pilot program at Cal Fire where we're.

Your time is well up. Sorry, I tried to have you wrap up and thank you. Thank you very much for coming today. Any other persons in support? Are these me too? Okay, thank you.

Hi. Nicholas Sackett, Social Compassion in Legislation in support.

Mr. Chair and Members Pat Moran with Aaron Reed and Associates representing the California Association of Professional Scientists in support. Thank you.

Fatima Iqbal-Zubair with California Environmental Voters in support.

Good morning, Chair and Members. Jenny Trice on behalf of the County of Santa Clara in support.

Erin Woolley on behalf of Sierra Club California in support.

Ross Bernet on behalf of One Tree Planted in support.

Thank you. Is there anybody else in the room in support? Who'dlike to come up? Okay, so is there anybody in the room in opposition to the Bill who would like to speak as a primary witness? If not, anybody who wants to just come up and say they're just opposed the Bill? If not, we'll go to AT&T operator. AT&T operator. Can you queue up anybody who wood like to express their support or opposition to AB 57? Thank you. And make sure you just say your name, the organization you represent, and whether you oppose or support the Bill. Thank you.

If you're in support or opposition of AB 57, you may press one and then zero. We will go to line 33. Your line is open.

Good morning. On behalf of Public Health Advocates and support.

Thank you. Line 42. Your line is open.

... on behalf of Stop Waste in support. Thank you.

Thank you. Line 41. Your line is open.

Good morning. This is Deepa Butler representing Oval BI. I'm in support.

Thank you. Line 47.

Good morning. Diana Weynand calling on behalf of Climate Reality Project San Fernando Valley and Los Angeles Chapters, California Coalition of Climate Reality project chapters Climate Action California and Santa Cruz Climate Action Network calling in support of AB 57.

Thank you. Line 37.

Thank you, chair Members. My name is Noah Whitley, speaking on behalf of Mid Peninsula Regional Open Space District and the California Association of Local Conservation Corps. In support.

Thank you. Next we'll go to line 18. Your line is open.

Hi, good morning. Alyssa Silhi on behalf of the City of Rancho Cucamonga, also in support. Thank you.

Thank you. You line 52.

This is Janet McGarry on behalf of 350 Bay Area Action in support.

Thank you. And we do have one more in queue. One moment, please.

This is Nominee Hutcher in support from OBBR.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. We have no further support or opposition. Thank you.

Thank you very much. With that, we'll bring it back to the dias. Any questions or comments on the Bill? We have a motion to move the Bill by Senator Laird. We also have a question over here.

Yeah, I just want to appreciate the author. We talked about this issue when we were at the Biodiversity Cop, and we met the Time magazine Teacher of the Year, who happens to be a Californian who built out Miyawaki Forest and demonstrated it in the East Bay, I believe. And we're jealous.

We have FOMO down south, so we want them too. There are so many of those forgotten weedy hillsides and other places that havebeen left behind that are desperate for not just the biodiversity benefits, but also some of the heat related benefits as well. So I think the extreme heat issue is big here.

So we'd love to be added as a co-author, and hopefully we can convince Cal Fire that this is worthy of their attention. And especially, I know we're going to look at the urban forestry program coming up to really focus on what works in these urban forestry contexts, and that small is really big. So thanks.

Senator Grove

Thank you for the Bill. I mean, it really is a good Bill, but I have a question or a concern about the hefty price tag that it's going to come with. And if it doesn't get funded, because I didn't see any funding in there unless I missed it, you could point it out. If it doesn't get funded, is Cal Fire going to be responsible for funding it? And if they are, do they Fund firefighter salaries, equipment that needs to have to have wildfire protection and fighting fires in the mountains? Or do they fund this, I guess because they'd have to make choices.

That's a good question. We've actually had great partnership with Cal Fire on this legislation. The initiative will be added to Cal Fire's existing urban and community forestry program. The program was established under the California Urban Forestry Act 1978, and its stated purpose is to administer state and federal grants that advance urban forestry efforts in California communities.

So the initiative really is sourcing its funding from a long standing, dedicated urban forestry program. And the Cal Fire has anticipated minor absorbable costs since the Bill places it in an existing program. So it actually doesn't have any cost except for the absorbable cost of just adding this as one more category that's eligible under an existing grant.

Okay, I have just a question kind of following up a little bit on that. Once you have it built, once you have established the urban forest, who takes care of it? Who's going to step up and be responsible for the maintenance? upkeep keeping activities that aren't supposed to be going on there out because I think Cal Fire struggles already with our load of trying to do forest management and aye, not forest, but also urban Wildlife interface management. And I'm curious who when we're building something, you say LA, who takes care of this?

That's a good question. It's the jurisdiction that applies for the grant. So, for example, the Miyawaki forest I visited, the Pocket forest I visited in Berkeley, was put in an area of a middle school that was not usable by the students, was street facing, facing the neighborhood.

And so that particular school district would be responsible, just like any other landscaping they have on their property, to maintain it, especially for the first two to three years after that, it's self sustaining and has the benefits of reducing water runoff and the heat benefits and the open space benefits.

And so if the City of Los Angeles or the City of San Jose applied for that grant on an empty corner parking lot, then they'd be responsible as their property. They'd be responsible for maintaining it. Cal Fire is just as responsible for monitoring and being kind of the administrator of the grant, but has no oversight of the actual property once the grant has been properly filled out and the jurisdiction shows it has the capability of maintaining it. For two to three years to get it to that place where it doesn't need any more water and doesn't need any more heavy maintenance.

Right. So the jurisdiction will take over for the future of that because a lot of cities have grove through this phase where they used to have an open green space, urban forest type thing, and then it got so dilapidated that they took them out, and this includes at schools because of the cost for maintaining.

And so they wound up being astroturf and rubberized pavement. So then we addedto that problem with PFAS and stuff, and now we're trying to go back to the urban thing. I'm just kind of hoping it doesn't. Somebody has to have the funding and the personnel to be able to maintain these. Otherwise they just become another problem for the Senate in about ten years to listen to a Bill to undo those. Well, I don't want it.

That's a very fair question. I think there's two responses to that. One, is I think the traditional planting methods in the past didn't have this kind of thought and it wasn't using this methodology that creates a self sustaining forest environment. Basically, the planting and the planting that's traditionally been done has been random trees, many of which aren't native, and so they need constant maintenance and you lose a little bit of school funding.

So, you know what? We would rather keep our classrooms funded than putting a few more bucks into the maintenance of our landscaping. And that falls into disrepair or a city or any you can put whatever jurisdiction you want. That's why this is much different for long term sustainability. It doesn't require that long term maintenance. And so that's why this is a new method to counter some of the issues that you raise, Senator. And also this is a pilot program, so there will be a report back in 2030. So we can take a look and say, is it happening the way that we've intended? Or Senator Seyarto raise a great point that, you know what? Maybe we should reevaluate this.

I actually did one of these in one of the fire stations that was in, a district that I was in, and today it looks hideous. It really does. And it's just because we're not good farmers, we're firefighters.

I don't know if you use the Miyawaki method.

I don't know if they did. I think we hired something anyway. All right.

Typical landscapers look to what makes it beautifies it as opposed to what's sustainable. And you can do both if you really approach it the right way.

Right, well, this is supposed to be sustainable.

Exactly.

It looks hideous anyway. But thank you for the Bill. With that, we have a motion by Senator Laird and no other comments. So if you can go ahead and assistant the call roll. Oh, do you need to close?

Respectfully, ask for an aye vote. Thank you.

He closed.

Okay. The motion on AB 57 is do pass to Appropriations. Senators Min, Seyarto, Allen, Dahle Dahle. Aye Eggman. Eggman. Aye Grove. Grove. Aye Hurtado. Laird. Laird. Aye Limon. Padilla. Padilla. Aye Stern. Stern. Aye.

Okay. That measure has six votes at 6-0. It's on call. Okay, thank you. Thank you. Assembly Member Calderon.

We have AB 527. Welcome and thank you for your patience while we dealt with the urban forest. The first time urban forest.

Got a lot of urban forest.

Next.

Alright. Good morning, Mr. Chair and Members. I want to begin by thanking the committee staff for working with my staff, and I will be accepting the Committee Amendments. AB 527 will create a grant program to support K-12 school greening efforts, particularly for schools located in disadvantaged or low income communities. As California experiences escalating extreme heat days due to climate change, children who attend urban schools with little to no tree canopies are at an increased risk for heat related illnesses such as asthma and skin cancer.

By converting paved areas into greener spaces, this legislation will help mediate high temperatures the students face. This is a reintroduction of my Bill from last year, AB 2566. That Bill was included in the 2022 budget, which allocated $150,000,000 over two years towards school graining grants. This Bill would codify the grant program to ensure the program is in place beyond the two year funding allocation. Here with me today, speaking in support of AB five two seven, is Alfredo Arredondo on behalf of Tree People,

Welcome, Mr. Arredondo. You have two minutes. Please, if we can stick to that, that'd be great, sir.

Absolutely. Maybe even shorter. Good morning, everybody. Alfredo Arrendondo here on behalf of Tree People this morning. Proud sponsors of this measure, AB 527, which is jones part of a lot of proposals to begin to address and mitigate against extreme heat in this case, especially for some of the most vulnerable in California, our students.

We can cite a stack of scientific articles and journal pieces as well as news articles that are articulating the impact of extreme heat on our school sites today. What we are seeing is an increasing prevalence of these extreme heat days and an increasing prevalence of an environmental injustice that is being foisted on our students on a daily basis because there is a lack of green infrastructure on campus for them to utilize when they're outside of the school classroom itself.

I will actually just say that the analysis by the Committee did a really good job of articulating the problem and the solution sets. We really appreciate the work that has gone into analyzing this Bill and the proposed clarifying language. And with that, I will mention one thing, that the $150,000,000 that was allocated in the budget last year has already gone through the first round of proposals, requests for proposals.

At Cal Fire, they received over $400 million worth of applications for the first onehundred million tranche. That just demonstrates that the need is out there, and a lot of schools and nonprofits working with schools are ready and willing to get these projects done as quickly as possible. So with that respectfully request, an aye vote.

Thank you very much. Did we have anybody else who wish to speak as a primary speaker in favor of this measure? If not, then I will call up the me toos. Just your name, your organization, and your support for the measure.

Good morning. Jenny Trice on behalf of the County of Santa Clara in support.

Thank you. I don't see anybody else. Is there anybody in opposition to the Bill who would like to speak as a primary witness? Doesn't appear that there are any scrambling to the mic, so we will go to the phone lines. I guess I didn't call for just regular opposition. So anybody want to come up and add a me to opposition? No? Then we're going to go to the phone lines AT&T. Operator can we dial up anybody who would like to speak in favor or in opposition? And just your name, your organization you represent, and whether you aye in support or opposition of the Bill.

Thank you. For min support or opposition of AB 527, you may press one and then zero again that is one and then zero from your support or opposition of AB 527. In one moment, we will go to line 55. Your line is open.

Hello. Madison Do Linh with Prevention Institute in support of AB 527 Thank you.

Thank you. And next we will go to line 22. Your line is open.

Hayden Crocker high school student with Go Greenish in support of AB 527.

Thank you. And we have no further support or opposition. Thank you.

Thank you very much. That brings it back to the dias. Anybody on the dias who would like to ask questions? Senator Eggman.

Thank you. And I just want to thank you for bringing this forward Assembly Member. Many of us who especially represent older urban parts of the state, the original cities, we face a crisis with our old trees and not having the infrastructure to care for them.

And as we've been doing work on rolling out behavioral health for our young people and really trying to figure out what it is that means good mental health for our youth, we've been surprised that some of the results are really talking about green space, outdoor space. Being in nature are things that they feel will really improve their mental health, maybe even more than seeing a therapist.

So I thank you for bringing this forward. I think it really addresses the whole human behaviorment and development within our environment. And I'd like to move the Bill.

Thank you. Thank you. Do we have any other questions? Senator Stern?

I don't want to belabor this, just want to echo my colleagues comments asked to be added as a co author at the appropriate time. Sorry, I'm not already on it. I should have been bugging you sooner. I appreciate your leadership year after year on this issue.

And the only thing I wanted to ask, and you may know, or maybe the sponsors or lead witness knows, in that first tranche of the 100 million, how much were schools participating in that ? One concern I have right now. And we're doing legislation in the same area around shade structures, just making sure that's easy and accessible. But I don't want that to be the first solution or the default for everything.

Just to have a bunch of steel over parking lots and then check the box that you've dealt with extreme heat impact on mental health for children and they throw up metal structures and they think it's over. So has there been that effort going on from districts? Big yeah.

Thank you. Assembly Member for each application that was submitted to Cal Fire, a school district was involved. The the school site itself, where that project is proposing to be taking place. And that was on purpose. Last year in the conversations in the budget, we made sure that there was an alignment between last year's proposal and the budget allocation.

Cal Fire took that and ran with it in the development of the guidelines, which includes a requirement that a school site be a part of the application itself. So in every instance, we do have schools appropriately engaged. And so they've been coming to the table and putting forward plans. There's big goals.

For instance, at LAUSD, there's big urban greening campus goals. But execution on that and the sort of reticence from maintenance and services staff to commit themselves to whether it's pocket forest or a new tree set, whatever it may be getting installed.

I sort of sense this aversion to saying you're going to obligate us to a bigger water Bill maintenance costs, so we're not actually going to give you as robust of an application as we could. What do you see out there in the...

You're hitting the nail on the head on the issues that are most pressing for school sites. Right. A lot of these school sites are strapped for cash as is and they're making do with what they have. And so for them it's really important. And this is one of the really key values of the proposal before you is that Cal Fire has really good staff on board already through the urban forestry program that are able to provide technical assistance, walk folks through.

What it's going to take to maintain at a low cost level as those trees are being established in the first five years, and what that means for the long term maintenance. And in many cases it's actually less costly for them to maintain those trees than they would have thought. So it's a part of the process, it's a journey working with individual school sites and that's the importance of nonprofits as well in this.

I will tell Tree People's engagement on this. They're working with 27 different school sites in their first round of applications that they submitted to Cal Fire. So it's a lot of work, but it's good work.

Thanks for that. Onward.

Thank you. Senator Stern, Senator Seyarto has a comment. Comment or question also. So a little bit of the grant process will allow them to have the money, but then the agency has to go through a process to try and get the project done correct? Same process that everybody else goes through in the state. Right. So a lot of that grant gets eaten up by the process. I can tell you.

We'll look at comparing it to the Urban Forestry program which California already administers. It is one of the best examples that California currently has of a program that is investing in disadvantaged communities and seeing the best bang for your buck in terms of as many dollars going to the actual project rather than administrative costs.

Now, when dealing, as I was mentioning, with certain school sites that don't have resources on hand now they will need some support for the administrative capacity to be able to lend their staff time to helping achieve and complete a project. Right? So there is a provision in the Bill to allow for some of that, but at least 80% of the funding will go directly to the project itself.

Right. So my point being is we do a lot of projects, we have a lot of things that come through here where we're doing CEQA, exemptions and things like that. And this is something that really, for these type of projects, needs to be added in.

Because if it doesn't have those CEQA exemptions, your $10,000 project turns into $125,000 project and it takes two years. And it's absurd because all we're really trying to do is create a little bit of forestry on a school campus. And so when these bills come up, I'm supporting your Bill.

I just would like it to address the process that we have in California because it makes most of the money go to something other than and at the end of the day, they can afford the two trees, and that's it. Because everything else went into the process anyway. I'd like to haney people to be mindful when they're creating these bills to remember that and where we can create the exemption for these things so that we can get them done right. That's all. Thank you.

Thank you, Senator Seyarto. Anyone else? Okay, do we have Assembly Member, would you like to close? Ayes.

Thank you for your comments, Senator Seyarto. I completely understand your point and agree. We want as much money to go to the greening efforts as possible. And I'd be happy to add you, as a co author, I respectfully ask for an aye vote.

Thank you. Assembly Member, do we have a motion on AB 527? I'm sorry, I was not here. Assemblymember Eggman has moved the Bill. The motion is due pass as amended to Appropriations. I'm sorry. Thank you. We have a motion from Senator Eggman. Assistant, please call the roll.

Senators. Min Aye. Min. Aye Seyarto. Aye. Seyarto. Aye Allen. Allen. Aye Dahle. Aye Eggman. Eggman. Aye Grove. Grove. Aye Hurtado Hurtado. Aye Laird. Aye Limon Padilla, Padilla. Aye Stern. Stern Aye.

That Bill vote is 10-0. We'll put that Bill on call so we're at the end of our hearing. We have bills on call. If all Members could please return to the hearing immediately, we can finish lifting the calls without delay. I just go ahead and do one run so that people can leave. All right, we'll go ahead and lift the call right now. So we'll go back to the consent calendar. And so assistant please call the roll.

Allen. Aye Eggman. Eggman. Aye Hurtado. Hurtado. Aye Limon. Stern. Stern Aye.

Okay. We'll move on. The vote is 10-0 on the consent calendar.

We'll leave that open on and so we'll move to file item number three, AB 631 by Assembly Member Hart assistant Please call the roll. Sorry. And the motion is due pass to Public Safety.

And the current vote is two to three on that one with Chair voting aye and Vice Chair voting no. Senator Allen. Allen. aye Eggman. Eggman. aye Hurtado. Stern. Stern. aye.

Okay. The current vote on that is six three. We'll put that Bill on call. The next item is file item number four, AB 779 by Assembly Member Wilson. The motion is do pass as amended to Judiciary. Assistant please call the roll.

Current vote is five-three with chair voting, aye. Vice-chair voting no. Senators allen. Allen. aye Hurtado. Limon. Limon. aye.

The vote on that is 7-3. The Bill is out. We will move to file item number five by Assmebly Member Kalra. AB 57. The motion is do pass to Appropriations. Assistant, please call the roll.

Current vote is 6-0. Senator Min aye. Min. aye Ciardo. Allen. Allen. aye Hurtado. Hurtado. aye Limon. Limon. aye.

Okay, the vote the vote on that is 10-0. The Bill is out. Okay, and chen we'll move it to file item number seven. AB 527 by Assembly Member Calderon.

The motion is do pass as amended to Appropriations. Assistant Please call the roll.

Current vote is 10-0 with the Chair and Vice Chair voting aye. Senator Limon. Limon aye.

The vote is 11-0. That Bill is out. And we will now reopen the roll for the consent calendar. Assistant, please call the roll.

Current vote is 10-0. Senator Limon. Limon aye.

Okay. The vote is 11-0. The consent calendar is out. Okay, we'll go back to file item number three. AB 631 by Assembly Member Hart the motion is do pass to public safety. Assistant Please call the roll.

Current vote is six three on that with Chair voting aye and Vice Chair voting no. Senators, Senator Hurtado Limon. Limon aye.

The vote on that is 7-3. The Bill is out. Okay, file item number five. AB 57 by somebody Member Kalra. The motion is do pass to Appropriations. Oh, did I miss number four? No, Okay. And so file item number five. Do pass to appropriations is the motion. Assistant please call the roll. I'm sorry, that one's out. Okay, so we're at the end of our hearing. And so thank you everyone for your patience and cooperation. We've concluded the agenda. Senate Natural Resources and Water Committee is now adjourned.