Senate Standing Committee on Governmental Organization

Good morning and welcome, everyone. The Committee on Governmental Organization will be in order this morning. The docket includes an informational hearing on two sets of amendment extensions to the gaming compact between the State of California and Big Sandy Rancheria and Western Mono Indians of California.

This will be an information item only for those who are observing or participating. There will be no action taken by the Committee. The Committee welcomes public participation and questions from the Members and the public. At this point, we will take up the third amendment extension. And we'll welcome Mr.

Matthew Lee, senior Advisor for Tribal Negotiations in the office of Governor Newsom. Welcome, Mr. Lee, and please proceed when ready.

Well, good morning, Mr. Chairman, distinguished Senators, representatives of tribal governments and members of the public. Thank you very much for having me here this morning. I'll take just a quick moment to set the table.

The procedural posture here is that stepping back from the Third Amendment, just to explain why we are putting a Third Amendment in front of you for one moment, this is the second time that this body has seen the Big Sandy Compact, a compact that was substantively identical to this compact, and I'm happy to say more about that, was ratified last fall.

After compacts are ratified, they are then submitted to the U.S. Department of the Interior for approval or disapproval. What happened in this case was that the compact was disapproved. There were some relatively straightforward things we could do with the compact.

And I'm happy to say more about those that based on the written position we got from Interior, we believe that when this compact goes back to Interior, it would be relatively straightforward to have the compact take effect. And that's why we are coming back to you with this compact today.

In the meantime, because that process takes some time. The Department of The interior has 45 days to act up or down on the compact once it's received. We are also submitting to you these Third and Fourth Amendments to Big Sandy's existing gaming compact. This is a compact that's been in Place since 1999.

The goal of those extensions is just to extend the existing compact to buy time for that Interior approval process to play out. So the upshot of the first, the third, and then the fourth amendment would be cumulative extensions up through, I believe, July 1st of this year.

Thank you very much, Mr. Lee. Are there questions from Members for Mr. Lee? Are there questions or comments from Members of the public? All right. The next item on the docket would be the Second extension Amendment, Fourth Amendment.

Please proceed. And just to put a pin on what I just said, the Third Amendment was in extension up through the first quarter of this year. This Interior approval process is always a bit of a moving target. So we have to be prepared to adjust as we go.

This Fourth Amendment is in extension through the second quarter of this year just, just to make sure that everyone has sufficient time to let that federal process play out.

Thank you very much. Again, Mr. Lee, any questions with respect to this amendment? Everybody looks enthralled, Mr. Lee. I tell you, it's simply a question of better time management. Thank you. Are there any comments from Members of the public who wish to comment on this amendment?

With that, the final item then on the docket is presentation on the new 25 year compact.

And please proceed again. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. Circling back to the substance of the new compact that's in front of you today, this is materially identical to a compact that was before this body and that the Legislature ultimately ratified last fall. As I said, the Department of the Interior ultimately disapproved that compact.

And I'm happy to say more about what happened there if that's of interest.

But the short version is that when Interior disapproved the compact, it said in writing that it would have it essentially took the position that it would have approved the compact if the four corners of the compact had included two things that were already elsewhere in state law.

One was a promise of gaming exclusivity that's promised to tribal governments under the California Constitution and other state laws.

The other is certain CEQA exemptions that were in included in the ratification Bill since those things were already elsewhere in state law and since we had in writing from Interior that the compact would be approved if those things were put in the four corners of the compact.

The compact that you have here in front of you takes the old compact. It takes those two things that were already elsewhere in state law. It puts them in the four corners of the compact. And we anticipate, given Interior's written position, that that compact would be allowed to take effect.

Mr. Lee, just to get ahead of it, are there other material changes to negotiate a compact beyond the issues you just addressed that you might want to.

Include in your testimony beyond the CEQA exemptions and exclusivity? No. No material changes. All right. Thank you, Mr. Lee. Questions for Mr.

Lee from Members of the Committee. All right, thank you. I understand that we have chair Elizabeth Hutchins available, wants to provide some testimony via Zoom, if we can get the chair up.

Yes, Good morning. Like to provide testimony to the Committee. My name's Elizabeth Hutchins. I'm the travel Chairwoman here at Big Sandy Rancheria, which we're located just outside of Fresno, about 35 miles northeast up on the rancheria and also where we're headquartered in the town of Aubrey, California.

We do have additional land out that's just east of Fresno, which has been held in a trust since the twenties to which our gaming establishment established. Establishment will be located just as many other tribes here in California. We also have very rich history and a strong cultural heritage here in the central Sierra Nevada region.

We're very committed to preserving our language, our culture and traditions while also pursuing the modern economic ventures, which of course includes gaming and inter tribal commerce.

SB49 is very vital for our tribe as it will ensure the long term success of our tribe with its economic development and of course, continuing fulfillment to our commitments to not only our Members, but also to our local partners.

This legislation addresses several key objectives that will both provide stability as well as growth for our Tribe's gaming operation. SB 49 would basically extend the terms of our current 99 tribal state gaming compact to provide the continuity and stability of our tribe's gaming operation.

This will also allow their tribe to continue generating essential revenue for our travel programs, our economic development and community services. The Bill would ratify a new tribal State Gaming Compact which not only facilitates new economic development opportunities, but also ensures that we can address the needs of our community and neighboring jurisdictions effectively for many years to come.

Our tribe enjoys strong support from Fresno county and also the Sheriff's Office. We have enjoyed a collaborative effort to ensure community safety and addressing shared concerns with local government leaders.

And for this reason, I would also like to emphasize that under this new compact we have established the Impact Mitigation Fund, which is dedicated to supporting local law enforcement, emergency services and neighboring jurisdictions. This Fund ensures that neighboring jurisdictions have the necessary, necessary resources to address any impacts arising from our gaming facilities.

We would like to extend our sincere thanks to Senator Grove and her staff, as well as the Committee staff for your work and support on this legislation. So at this time, I'd like to thank you for considering my testimony and of course, for your support for the SB 49. Thank you.

Thank you very much. Chair. It's a pleasure to have you here. Echo those comments, questions from the Members of the Committee for Chair Senator Archuleta.

Yes. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Zero, can I put her back on the screen? Well, what I was going to ask is some of the community involvement, workforce development, and some of the things that the tribes give to the communities.

I think a lot of people in the General Public don't understand the contributions that are made and how the monies are distributed among the community when it comes to fire safety, police education, things of that nature. And I thought that maybe the tribal leader could elaborate a little bit on that, but maybe you can.

Well, I am happy to do my best, although I am sure I will not do as good a job as the chair. And I would absolutely defer to the chair and the tribe in terms of how they spend their money in the exercise of their sovereignty. But I think your point is a really good one.

You know, the two points I would make is the compact itself.

You know, all of our compacts since 1999 have contained some, you know, the same basic type of revenue sharing in terms of, you know, there is some revenue that goes to the state for its regulatory costs, there is some revenue that goes to other tribes, both limited and non gaming tribes.

And there is some revenue that can go to, you know, other governmental purposes, the local community, local public services, the mitigation of impacts, I think fire, fire, police, medical response, you know, all, all of those things are sort of within that broad bucket.

The way that is specifically structured here is there's what's called an impact mitigation Fund where if the tribe operates more than its current level of 349 devices, I think it's 1% of Netwin is paid into this Fund which can be used for payments to other governments, local governments, tribal governments, state government, and so on for those kinds of services.

And so I think that goes to the kinds of spending you just put your finger on. I think the other point to make is that of course, in addition to that, you know, let's all. Something that I think is near and dear to all of our hearts is the fact that tribal governments are governments.

You know, they operate their own fire departments, their own public services. And so, you know, anytime you've got any of these compacts, you are looking not only at what are the revenues that that government can share with other governments for their services, but what new services might that tribal, tribal government be able to provide itself?

Mr. Chair, if I can follow up. I see you're on Madam Chair. Mr. Lee. Yes, Chair. If you're happy to respond to the Senator's question. Thank you.

Zero, absolutely. So, yeah, as far as Big Sandy Ranch area, we do a lot of supportive services for our community. We work hand in hand with our Fresno County Sheriff Department to which we, we wholly support them. And one of the large projects that they're working on right now, of course, is for the fallen officers.

And they have a memorial that they are currently under construction for and we have submitted funding for that to have that go pretty streamingly. We also, as far as fire protection, we personally do not have an actual fire Department, but we wholly rely upon Aubrey Volunteer Fire Department.

So what we've done is we have donated money to them to buy a fire truck or water tender for their station. And then we also have Members of our community that actually serve as a volunteer for that fire Department. We also support our Sierra Unified School District, which a lot of our children attend.

And we are constantly supporting all efforts from sporting events to just community events that they have for the school district and also with the of integrating the cultural competency and so forth with the school district. They have been whole, been pretty much open to be able to insert curriculum for Native American studies within the school district.

So we've been working hand in hand with them on that other scholarship programs that we have. We have a celebration success where we supply Chromebooks to all those who are graduating from Sierra Unified School District. And also our local Chamber of Commerce is we support all the crap feeds we can.

But it really is being that we are the second largest employer of our area, which for years was a logging industry. And when that had gone away, our towns have pretty much have gone elsewhere.

But for the most part, with us being the second largest employer with not only the tribe, but our other businesses, we've been able to be that good community partner and also have swap meets and everything to where we try to engage the community. So we do a lot of community efforts.

We have a Community Food Bank that we do once a month and it's amazing to see how many people and we do a drive through. So we support our community as, as much as we can with also being able to provide a lot of especially with those services.

Of course, you know, referring back to the Mitigation Impact Fund because we're already in discussions with Fresno county when they're building a new fire station near the Millerton Lake area.

And we've already been in discussions with them to try to prolong or to continue with that project to make sure that we are pretty much contributing to our share to help that out.

So I mean there I can go on and on and on and everything we do with our community and how we make our very active efforts to be able to Fund a lot of events and. Yeah, I hope I answered your question.

I mean, like I said, I can get on a soapbox all day and tell you everything that we do.

But for the most part, I think that it's very important to understand that, you know, we actually, you know, we're very fortunate to be in a position to be able to help a lot of entities, and we're only looking forward to the future to be able to help more.

Very Good. Thank you, Mr. Chair and Madam Chair.

Thank you, Senator. Thank you, Madam Chair, for that. Are there any other questions from Members of the Committee for the Chair or for Mr. Lee. Senator Rubio?

Good morning. Thank you so much for everything that you do. One of the things that I just need to sort of highlight and you've already kind of stated is just everything that the tribes do for our communities in so many ways.

And a lot of the times, as a former Council Member, you know, how much you struggle with public safety, fire and all the essential services. And it's just extraordinary everything that, you know, not just you, but all the tribes do. I just have a question in terms of, you know, what I know from my local communities.

Right now, they're struggling. Are they engaging in a much bigger way, or is it you coming to them versus them coming to you? Can you share?

I think it's kind of because we. We work so much together. It is. They. We get a lot of support letters and even though our, you know, request for donations, but for the most part, I mean, if there's, you know, if they're asking for monetary or raffle or whatever, have it be.

It's a unique situation because I think maybe because our community, I don't want to say we're small, but we're pretty networked in a sense that, you know, we've all gone to school together, we grew up together, and so we know each other and so trying to keep, especially like with our school district and primarily because we are a very large advocate for the education that when it comes to scholarship and stuff, we will do our very best to support those programs that have scholarship programs, such as the Shaver Lake Lions Club.

They have quite a few events to which we just, you know, support because we know it's about scholarships. But it seems that we do tend to seek them out and. But a lot of the seeking comes from the community. But we try to do our very best that every request that comes through that we donate something.

I'm sorry, I came in on the toe end. You say you're the second largest employer in the area. I'm sorry if I missed it. Can you share how many jobs you provide?

Yeah. So on the tribal side, we have about 60 employees, which primarily deal with our grants and our housing and our water and so forth. And then on the economic development side, we have about 80 individuals there. Thank you. That's it.

Thank you.

Thank you, Senator. Senator Richardson.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Out of transparency, I just wanted to advise. I did have staff here throughout the hearing, and I'm actually simultaneously chairing a subcommitee with public safety, so excuse my delay. I support the information that we're doing today.

And Madam Chairwoman, all of the work that you've done with the Big Sandy Rancheria of Western Mono Indians of California, I look forward to working with you all.

Thank you. Thank you, Senator. And thank you for the juggling. Other questions from other Members of the Committee. Are there any Members of the public like to provide comment or testimony on this hearing? Seeing no one, I appreciate the engagement and the participation. Madam Chair, Mr. Lee, thank you very much.

Members, Committee, Senate Committee on Governmental Organization will stand adjourned.