Senate Standing Committee on Budget and Fiscal Review

The Senate Committee on Budget and Fiscal Review will come to order. We're holding our Committee hearing at 1021 O Street room 1200. We do not yet have a quorum so we will start as a Subcommitee and I would invite Members of the Committee to come down so we can make quorum public.

Comment will be heard after all discussion items have been presented and today we will hear AB105, which is a budget Bill junior for the Budget Act of 2025 and prior years, and 16 budget trailer bills on various subjects. These bills represent the culmination of work this Committee for the year.

These bills include technical adjustments, clarifying changes and additional details on agreements that were made as part of the June budget but are being implemented now. The majority of the appropriations in this package were accounted for in the June agreement and had remaining details to be worked on over the summer.

New General Fund expenditures total just under $70 million and reflects supporting the administrative work necessary to comply with and respond to the passage of House Resolution 1, additional support for food banks and support for California tourism.

Highlights of the package include $3.2 billion for purposes related to Prop 4, the Safe Drinking water, Wildfire Prevention, Drought Preparedness and Clean Air Bond act of 2024 passed by the voters to support a variety of projects such as wildfire preparedness and resilience, access to clean water, support for nature based solutions, outdoor access, coastal resilience and clean air.

540 million from the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund for the 2025-26 budget year, including 368 million for the Transit and Inner City Rail Capital Program TICRCP and 100 million for the implementation of the Community Air Protection program created by AB617.

It also includes a variety of appropriations and statutory changes in response to the passage of House Resolution 1 and other recent actions at the federal level, including to respond to changes in food benef, in other words, kicking people off food benefits to address vaccine access, in other words to make sure Californians, despite what the Federal Government is doing, can continue to be vaccinated and retaining access to health care services that reflect our values.

Finally, I want to acknowledge that this package includes limited technical cleanup and follow up to the passage of SB131 in June, which was a CEQA reform Bill. I just want to address this matter briefly because there's been a lot of conversation when SB 131 passed.

The Pro Tem and I both talked on the Senate Floor about our desire to do some follow up legislation to address various issues that had come up during the top during the bill's process around advanced manufacturing, around habitat protection and so forth, the Senate has proposed follow up cleanup. It's not really adjustments to SB 131.

The Assembly has indicated that it needs once more time over the fall to work on these issues. And so as a result the item before us today has two adjustments to SB 131.

I know that for many people there's a desire to have more than that and the Senate would like to advance more than those two items in the follow up legislation, SB131.

But the Assembly has indicated that it would like to take more time and we will be working with our colleagues and the Assembly and the Governor and stakeholders over the fall to move towards that ultimate legislation.

I do want to just say that just a few minutes ago the Senate put in print AB145, which is the Senate's proposal for cleanup to SB131. I want to just be clear that Bill is not going to be moving before the end of session because you need a three party agreement to do that.

And the Assembly wants to take more time over the fall and we will engage with the Assembly over the fall. But we thought it was important for the Senate to at least put out publicly what our proposal is in terms of follow up legislation to SB131.

And so AB145 and it is in print, it's online, people can look at it. It will help protect environmentally sensitive locations, require certain labor standards. In addition, it will narrow definition of advanced manufacturing to clean energy manufacturing, semiconductor manufacturing and zero emission buses, trains and rail equipment.

It will protect sensitive communities, sensitive receptors, by having a 300 foot buffer in terms of where this CEQA exemption for advanced manufacturing can be invoked, consistent with the 300 foot buffer around a certain warehouse. And it will ensure that this exemption cannot be used for hotel development.

So, and there are other items in there and folks can take a look. So with that said, Mr. Vice Chair, would you like to make any introductory comments?

Thank you Mr. Chair, I would. So we are sort of happily skipping through our floor sessions and I want to acknowledge we are making reasonable progress there. But all that time proposals are being concocted behind closed doors for very major issues and your budget bills are 11 example of that.

Amidst all day floor sessions peppered with last minute Committee meetings, your many and detailed budget bills, loosely tied to the budget and many filled with policy I might add, were dumped with really little time for our staff to analyze.

And I'd like to acknowledge they did Yeoman's work in getting that analysis done, but almost no time to brief our caucus. In fact, we met for about 15 minutes today during lunchtime. That was our briefing about these bills. And well, I'm going to listen to the presentations and I'll probably have some questions.

I just don't know enough about any of these bills to cast any votes at all. I've never been in this position before. I don't expect any feelings of concern from me on this, though the shortcomings of this process, quite frankly, sometimes seems intentional. But here's the deal.

The knowledge and interests of our constituents, of all of our constituents, there is no way for our constituents, yours and mine, to provide any input or frankly even know anything until after all these deeds are done. That goes for your budget bills as well as for anything else being brewed in the background.

Can you say cap and trade? This is my ninth year as a Legislator and while I've experienced frustrations along the way when I was in the Assembly years ago and my now almost three years in the Senate, the process this week is frankly developing to be the most frustrating I've ever experienced.

And I would commend to your attention an article in Calmatters yesterday that provides a very good description of what's going on, the issues that I'm highlighting. So again, I'll listen to the presentations. I suppose I'll have some questions, but I don't know anywhere near enough at this time to cast any votes. And as I said, I've never experienced that before. Thank you Mr. Chair.

Thank you very much, Mr. Vice Chair. I will just note a lot of this was aired up Budget Subcommittees, but I appreciate your comments. With that we will now go to Department of Finance. Theresa Calvert, the Program budget manager from DOF is here. The Lao is here if questions arise.

And then after the presentation we'll go to Member comments and then public comment and then we will vote on each of the bills. Ms. Keller, great.

Thank you. Good afternoon. Evening Chair Wiener, Vice Chair Niello and Members of the Budget Committee. My name is Teresa Calvert with the Department of Finance and today I will be presenting on Budget Bill Junior which amends the 2025 Budget act and associated budget trailer bills.

As noted, many of the items are technical or clarifying or were items that were delayed to the end of session as part of the June budget agreement.

Some items are in response to changes that have occurred at the state and or federal level since the 2025 Budget act was passed and require a budget response in the current year. I will present on each Bill briefly, and I'm joined by my colleagues to respond to questions the Committee may have.

The first Bill is AB 105, the budget Bill junior which makes changes to various 2025 budget act items which the Chair summarized so, including the House Resolution. One response the Greenhouse gas reduction funds, discretionary allocations and the climate bond allocations.

I would add that the Bill also requires the Department of Finance, in consultation with the California State Transportation Agency, to examine loans or other financing options to support Bay Area local transit agencies.

Similarly, the Bill requires the Department of Finance to examine loan or financing options that might be used to provide state financial assistance for Los Angeles entities. The Bill also includes other changes, including technical revisions. Moving on to the first of the trailer bills is AB144.

This Bill makes various changes to statewide immunization policies to prepare the state for changes in federal guidance, with flexibility for the California Department of Public Health to supplement or modify requirements for specified populations.

This Bill also exempts foster youth and former foster youth with unsatisfactory immigration status until the age of 26 from being impacted by the Medi Cal solutions included in the 2025 Budget act related to individuals with unsatisfactory immigration status.

This Bill establishes the Abortion Access Fund to provide funding for abortion services in a gender Affirming Care program to provide funding to health plans to provide coverage for gender affirming care services. Finally, the Bill authorizes exemptions for certain medical providers and clinics to support the 2028 Los Angeles Los Angeles Olympics and Paralympics Games.

Moving on to AB 146, this Bill makes various changes to the CalFresh program to prepare the state for the impacts of the Federal House Resolution 1 including providing the Department of Social Services with flexibility to make immediate information technology changes to quickly advance efforts that aim to reduce the state's payment error rate and avoid costs associated with the benefit cost sharing provisions in HR1.

The Bill would also establish a complaint resolution process for counties that opt to receive Social Department of Social Services administered Housing and Homeless Program funds. Finally, the Bill includes technical cleanup for legislation adopted as part of the 2025 Budget act to 1 streamline the CalWORKS program and 2 for out of state placements in the Adoption Assistance program.

Moving on to AB147, this Bill is largely technical and amends the 2025 TK to 12 education trailer Bill. Among other things, the Bill amends the accrual schedule for Proposition 98 through fiscal year 2039-40. It also allows the Department of Education to assess fees for private developers of literacy professional development that submit their products for review and approval.

The next trailer Bill is related to higher education. It's AB148. This Bill is largely technical and amends provisions related to higher education, including the following for the 2026-27 and 27-28 budget years.

It allows community college classified employees to access food pantry services offered by campus Basic Needs Centers and adds intent language to shift unutilized funding from the Classified Community College Employee Summer Assistance Program to CCC Basic Needs Centers to accommodate the change for community college's flexible emergency aid.

The Bill adds reporting requirements for the awarding of emergency financial assistance grants as agreed to in the 2025 Budget Act. It also adds language that enables the Chancellor's Office to reallocate funds to ensure that all eligible California DREAM act application filers receive an award.

The Bill also enables a community college Chancellor's office to allocate unallocated resources appropriated for the Zero Cost Textbook program as of June 30, 2025 to a community college district to contract for the establishment of statewide open educational resources infrastructure and its maintenance. The next Bill is AB149, which would enact various changes related to resources programs.

Most notably, the Bill includes statutory changes that expand an existing CEQA exemption for activities or approvals for the bidding, hosting or staging and funding and Olympic Games except for the construction of necessary facilities to also include Paralympic Games.

It adds an exemption from the requirements for a coastal development Permit for temporary development associated with holding the 2028 Olympic and Paralympic Games. It authorizes regulations for the purpose of developing and adopting program guidelines and selection criteria needed to effectuate or implement the programs included in the climate bond to be adopted as emergency regulations.

It also expands muscle prevention activities to include all invasive mussels, including golden mussels, and increases the invasive muscle fee. The following Bill is AB 151. This Bill would implement the Memorandum of Understanding with child care providers United or CCPU as well as parity proposals for non represented child care providers.

The MOU and parity package include one time stabilization payments for represented and non represented child care providers, a one time cost of living adjustment catch up payment for represented providers. It maintains funding for health retirement and training benefit trusts and it also specifies that MOU would be in effect through July 12028. The following measure is AB153.

This Bill would enact various changes related to transportation and climate programs. Most notably, the Bill grants local transit operators the authority to operate charter bus service for the 2026 World Cup.

It raises the number of licensed drivers allowed to participate in the Mobile Driver License Pilot Program, and it also authorizes the Air Resources Board to assess regulatory fees associated with transportation refrigeration units. AB154 this Bill provides a CEQA exemption for climate reporting regulations adopted by the Air Resources Board.

AB155 is a Bill that establishes the California Civic Media Program under the Governor's Office of Business and Economic Development to support journalism, promote civic engagement, and address inequalities among underserved communities.

The Bill includes $10 million General Fund to establish the California Civic Media Fund, which will be used to expand the number of journalists in the state and to support local and community news organizations. This Fund may also accept private donations, gifts, or grants for the intended purpose of supporting media in the state.

It also creates a related advisory board. AB156 would enact various changes related to labor programs. Most notably, the Bill would make various changes related to unions, dues deductions, Fair Labor Standards act requirements for home care workers, and collective bargaining for home care workers.

The mill also makes changes to local government firefighter employment provisions for purposes of permanent career civilian firefighters employed by the Federal Government or contracted to serve at any federal installation and firefighters in Humboldt County related to retirement benefits. The Bill also makes an appropriation for a supplemental pension payment to CalPERS system towards the state's unfunded liability.

AB 157 would enact various changes related to law enforcement and correctional programs. Most notably, the Bill includes appropriation as part of the modification to the Community Corrections Performance Incentive Grant Program and includes other technical changes. AB158 is related to housing programs.

Most notably, the Bill clarifies the intent of the Governor's reorganization plan regarding the duties of the Housing Development and Finance Executive Committee. It restores provisions that were chaptered out by prior legislation.

It clarifies the Administration of funding for Round seven of the Homeless Housing Assistance and Prevention Program and makes other various modifications to effectuate changes intended in AB130. AB159 is a cleanup to the wildfire settlement tax exclusion in SB132 enacted in the 2025 Budget act and is necessary to ensure that tax relief is provided as intended.

This Bill additionally clarifies that wildfire settlements qualifying for relief must be related to federally declared or state declared disasters. AME160 this Bill includes changes that are necessary to continue the authority for specified departments to access background check information for their employees, prospective employees, volunteers, contractors, subcontractors, and licensees as specified.

AB 161 is a memorandum of Understanding trailer Bill. This Bill ratifies agreements entered into by the state with the California Association of Professional Scientists, which is bargaining unit 10, and the California Association of Psychiatric Technicians, bargaining unit 18. The Bill also approves agreements between the state and various bargaining units related to salary adjustments for special school employees.

The last of the trailer bills here is AB162. This Bill makes changes for the special election to be held on November 4, 2025 by establishing the timeline to certify the election Results by the 28th day following the election consolidating elections that were scheduled on or before August 8, 2025 by local governments to be held on November 4, 2025 clarifying that resources for special election costs can be distributed directly to counties without an appropriation being made to the state controller and appropriating funding to the Secretary of State to develop the final report on the final costs of the special election due on April 1, 2026.

Those are brief overviews of each of the trailer bills. I am joined by a number of colleagues from the Department of Finance to help in answering questions that you may have.

Thank you very much and thank you to the LAO for being here. Colleagues, are there any questions or comments on any of the yes, Senator Blakespear.

I just have a comment about one of them, SB 158. Is this the right time for that chair? It is. So thank you for the presentation. I'm concerned about SB158 and I don't plan to support that tonight, and I wanted to just briefly explain why so many of you know that.

We've had a lot of conversation about SB131, which passed off the Senate Floor with commitments for further cleanup to address the outstanding Bill.

The outstanding issues in the Bill and those outstanding issues include fixing the overly broad definition of advanced manufacturing and ensuring that projects that are located in habitat for protected species are still subject to full environmental review under ceqa.

There were also labor related concerns and there were tribal consultation concerns, and all of these were brought up by various Members and we were assured that there would be a fix to that. So it's very disappointing to see such an anemic response with SB158, which essentially does none of those things.

I appreciate that there's been some very minor effort toward talking about protecting natural areas that are in already designated conservation areas, but that is just admittedly a very small, small part of the state and areas where we would not be likely to be seeing development anyway.

So the language that is in 158 does not include habitat for Protected species. That was discussed on the floor at the time SB131 was passed and was also specifically called for in a letter that I signed along with 34 other legislators.

So SB158, as it's before us today, does not include environmental protections for Habitat for Protected species, does state, despite the fact that Habitat for Protected Species language is the standard protection that's been added to CEQA exemptions and ministerial processes that waive CEQA review.

So the language is essential to ensuring that we protect endangered species and also that we maintain the opportunity to bring species back from the brink of extinction. So I won't be voting in support of SB158 today, and I urge my colleagues to support legislation next year to address this outstanding concern in a meaningful way.

And I'm happy to see that the Senate has introduced something which I have not had the chance to review yet. But you did announce it, and I forget the number that you said. 145. 145. So I appreciate that we have that imprint. A.B. 145. Okay. And I look forward to reviewing that and addressing this in a meaningful way. Thank you.

Thank you very much, Senator. Thank you for those comments. Before we proceed, we do have a quorum, so we'll call the roll.

[Roll Call]

We're here. Okay. We do have a quorum. Thank you, colleagues. Okay. Additional comments. Senator Durazo.

Thank you. Mr. Chair, a couple of questions. Is there what is the thinking behind helping Californians comply with the work requirements of HR1? Is there some thought as to how we are going to help Californians who are going to be facing that situation?

To the Department of Finance.

Hi. I'm going to, I think, need assistance from one of my colleagues on the work requirements related to HR1. Question.

Good evening. Nick Mills, Department of Finance. So included in the August budget is resources to implement eligibility requirements that are included in HR 1. So there's one time technical assistance resources and one time resources to support staff equivalent to eight positions to begin planning for the Department of Health Care Services to begin implementing these requirements, which go into effect on December 31, 2026.

I was thinking more along the lines... Excuse me, I'm sorry. Is that okay? I'll ask another. I was thinking more along the lines as to what we're going to do to provide support for the Californians who are going to be impacted by HR 1. And I appreciate that resources will go into staffing issues or planning. I'm not sure exactly what you said. But what about the actual support to those Californians who could lose through HR 1 the kind of resources they've had?

That's something that the administration is continuing to evaluate, and, you know, we're still awaiting federal guidance and interpretation on many of the provisions in HR 1 which could, you know, inform course of action and next steps.

Okay, so right now we don't have specific ways that we were planning to help?

That's not included in the August budget proposal.

Somebody else can answer that?

Laura Ayala, Department of Finance. Just like my colleague stated, the resources included in this budget bill are only for current year, for fiscal year 25-26. But the administration is evaluating what resources are necessary to assist Medi-Cal members in meeting those work requirements.

Okay. Okay. I just want to make sure. So we do have, obviously in this budget we have the assistance, but we're thinking about also how to do that next year.

Yeah, that's correct. Right now the resources that we're requesting are for the Department of Health Care Services to begin those planning efforts and preparing to meet the federal requirements.

Okay, thank you. I have another question. This is through AB 149 public resources, and there was efforts or steps were being taken to make improvements at Expo Park in Los Angeles through DGS. And I'd just like to know what's the time frame for making those improvements. I'm particularly concerned because that was part of the that's going to be really needed. Accessibility is going to be really needed for the Olympics and Paralympics.

Stephen Benson, Department of Finance. So yeah, we're continuing to work with Expo Park and the Secretary, the Natural Resources Agency on the level of improvements that are needed there. The initial assessment of needed improvements were sort of broader than just as what's focused on Olympic, like immediate Olympic related things. So we're trying to narrow that scope down and get a better handle on what needs to get done and timeline to get it done. So those are things we're going to be continuing to work on in the near future.

Okay. I only mentioned because of the time frame. That the time frame of, you know, is pushing us to think about accessibility for the Olympics. So that's why. And is there particular issues or anything that you're facing or that you're confronting?

I think just... Yeah. Time frame wise, I think as they develop like specific project scopes that need to get done, trying to just address the most critical things given the state's current fiscal situation, is identifying what those most critical improvements are.

And then I think, you know, we need to get more developed project cost estimates and schedules. But I think for a lot of those types of things, the idea will be to try and develop projects in a way that they can move relatively quickly because, to your point, we don't have a lot of time before the Olympics will need to get going.

Okay, thank you. Mr. Chair. I'm sorry I came a little bit late. But you made some reference, I think to some of the labor issues that had been raised. If you could repeat that.

Sure. Happy to. What I'd indicated was that when we passed SB 131, we, the Pro Tem and I both expressed our desire, which reflects a lot of Members' desires to do follow up legislation to deal with the definition of advanced manufacturing to make sure it's not too broad, to protect natural habitat, and also to address labor standards.

We, the Senate produced a proposal. The Assembly preferred to just address two specific issues and to have further conversations over the fall. And so the bill that's moving is that narrow bill and we will of course participate with the Assembly and the Governor and stakeholders in that conversation.

But the Senate about half hour or so ago, we put in print AB 145, which we do not have a three party agreement on. So it will not move. But it does reflect the Senate's proposal on SB 131 follow up legislation. And we thought it was important to put that into the public domain so people know where we stand.

And that address is various wild habitat issues, definition of advanced manufacturing, buffer zone around advanced manufacturing consistent with warehouse rules, and labor standards. So that's in print now and we welcome people to review it and it'll help inform conversations in the fall.

Okay, so we gotta go after the Assembly.

No, the Assembly... We always... Sometimes we have full agreement with our siblings in the Assembly, sometimes we have different approaches. And it's all good and we will work on it. Thank you. Thank you so much. Okay. Senator Menjivar, then Senator Smallwood-Cuevas, then Senator McNerney, and Seyarto.

Well, Mr. Chair, I'd like to come back on other topics. I'll state my comments on just on this topic on the cleanup for SB 131 and, you know, share some of the concerns as well. Maybe copy and paste some of the concerns that voting or expected to vote on SB 158 on AB 158 with funding $2.1 million to fund a bill that's supposed to have cleanup in it or to fund a bill that we were promised was going to look completely different.

So it's a little difficult to fund a bill that's supposed to look different or how are we supposed to implement something that shouldn't be implemented. And the 300ft setback, even in the Senate proposal now matching the warehouse, the EJ community despised the 300ft setbacks in the warehouse deal and that deal was jammed through last minute as well.

And I don't think that should be the poll we should look at as a appropriate setback within our EJ communities. I would ask that our proposal further expand that. That's something that the EJ groups have been asking for. And also you can imagine the frustration of Committee Members to be asked to be voting on a bill with the hope, a second promise now that there's going to be additional, additional cleanup based on what just came into print now.

So sharing some still outstanding commitment or frustration on that and how advanced manufacturing, if I'm not mistaken, I still don't see our proposal in 145 either. I'm wondering Mr. Chair, if you... If you could indulge me or my Committee Members on what our proposal is for advanced manufacturing.

Is that 145 you have printed out? Okay.

Yes, I just, I need some...

The proposal for advanced manufacturing is it takes the definition and limits it to three specific items, which is clean energy components, components for clean transportation, and semiconductor. And then it has a 300 foot buffer. And I know there are folks who want a different buffer and those are fair topics of conversation.

And then we propose habitat exclusion aligned with SB 423. So I also, just to be clear, the Senate did make that commitment that we're going to do follow up legislation. Of course we can't act on our own. It takes a three party agreement and the Assembly preferred to enact the two specific items now and to work on it over the fall.

And why are we funding the trailer bill? $2.1 million. 2.1? Yeah, 2.1. Why are we funding it?

Well, there are items that I don't think are particularly controversial, but items in there. And so that's typical to pair the trailer bill with the funding.

I would just say if the promise was made for cleanup that the funding should fund a trailer bill that addresses the concerns of the caucus as much as closely as possible. It doesn't fund a bill that a lot of Members voted on only on the contingency.

So just to be clear, I share your frustration. I would like the Senate proposal. My strong preference in the Pro Tem's strong preference would be for that to be what moves and that's obviously a much broader proposal than 158. We did not have a three party agreement to do that. And you know, so that's why the more limited item is before us.

And we're, the Assembly has been very clear with us that they want to work with us and the Governor over the fall and with stakeholders so that we can produce something to do the follow up legislation on those items that we committed to work on, which the Pro Tem and I continue to support. So I'm not, I understand and I share your frustration. Senator Smallwood-Cuevas, followed by Senator McNerney.

And I'm doubling down on the frustration with respect to SB 131. You know, I represent South Central Los Angeles and I share this story often because I spent a good chunk of my life working with chronically unemployed communities from neighborhoods with compounded poverty that are barely holding on in and around what is essentially the industrial arm and muscle of Los Angeles of old.

And I say that because we have spent the last 30 years trying to build wages, workplace protection, opportunities for workers who all lost their jobs in and around that industrial corridor in the 1970s and 80s. And we've been trying to get those wages, trying to get those protections up as the service economy has come in.

And you know, it's taken us about 30 years to try to finally get to a fair minimum wage and living wage. And again, communities have been dying on the vines since we deindustrialized that neighborhood, deregulated that neighborhood, offshored those jobs.

So as we're talking about advanced manufacturing and how we're going to build the green economy and we're at the cusp of launching this opportunity to leave out advanced manufacturing sets us up to do exactly what has happened to South Central. We are going to end up 50-40 years from now trying to come back and raise standards in this industry.

We're going to have to come back and figure out how do we create good jobs. We're going to have to come back and figure out how do we ensure that women and people of color can have fair access to good advanced manufacturing jobs in the green sector. We don't have to do that. We can do it right now. We have the power right now.

And it is so disappointing to hear that we couldn't get a three party agreement to say one simple thing. And that is to say that these jobs should be good careers and that all communities should have access to them through community benefits agreements.

It's often talked about when we looked at 131 from an environmental perspective, but this is an economic perspective that is going to leave so many communities behind. And when do we learn the damn lessons of the past? We have to envision the industry, we have to envision the workforce. We have to begin with the end in mind. And here we've missed yet, you know, another opportunity.

I understand what is embedded inside of this cleanup bill, but unfortunately it makes it very hard to vote for because the key components that are a lifeline for communities like mine are absent. The key pathways for communities to see themselves in this green, this green industry is missing. The key components for folks to be able to access quality union jobs and that have a future workforce that looks like California.

Again, missed opportunity. So it makes it really tough for me to support this bill because, like so many of our community members, particularly those in our union community that have been challenging us to do the right thing in 131 are walking away severely disappointed. This is not about streamlining.

This is about abandoning our opportunity in far too many communities of color by making sure that our advanced manufacturing, our semiconductor fabrication, our battery plants, our lithium processing, that these industries that have been well documented for creating potential opportunities in our communities are now not going to see real workers have an opportunity for good jobs and a good future.

I, you know, hope that we do have commitment from the other house to see this through. I'm going to be vigilant in making sure that we demand advanced manufacturing labor standards and community benefits agreements and that we create the future of work that includes all of us and that these are good jobs. And it makes it very hard for me to vote on AB 151 today. And I agree with my colleagues and their thoughts on that.

Thank you, Senator Smallwood-Cuevas. I do just want to... I'm just looking at the language of AB 145 to make sure it was consistent with my memory. It does have requirements for high road jobs in it. That was something that the Senate felt important, both for the construction of these facilities, but also for the employment within these facilities.

So please do look at the language when you can and then maybe you and I can have a conversation. That is something that, again, for both the Pro Tem and for me was very important to make sure that we are creating good jobs. And so there is a high roads jobs requirement in here.

And that will also be a topic of conversation over the fall. But the Senate, again, we're, we've expressed through this bill that we would that we want that to be in there. So just to clarify. And I know this just came out 45 minutes ago, so but we did put that in there. I want to point that I appreciate your comment because there's a lot of validity to what you say.

I appreciate my colleagues in the Senate taking that step. We need others to step up too.

And then I also just, in terms of the $2 million appropriation that Senator Menjivar mentioned in 158, my read of it is that that applies to the entire trailer bill. The $2 million.

Correct. The $2.1 million is being allocated to the Governor's Office of Land Use and Climate Innovation, and that's to update existing CEQA tiering guidelines for infill projects and to create a statewide map of eligible urban infill sites by July 1, 2027 with input from local governments. And that's been a bit of a proposal that's been around for a little bit and was associated with the SB 131 overall.

So just to clarify that, Senator Menjivar, that 2 million was not for the two pieces of SB 131 cleanup, because I would agree with you that would be an excessive amount of money for that. It's for as part of SB 131, one of the I think not controversial pieces of it was we have the existing Class 32 CEQA infill exemption that's been in existence for a long time. And it's very difficult to use, and one of the reasons is there's never been an official mapping of what is infill and what isn't.

So for cities, for people building things they don't know. And so that bill directed the agency to do that mapping statewide and have that database, which will help both cities and builders. And so that's what the funding is for. It's not for the... Or not just for those two things. Just to clarify. Just to clarify that. So I hope that's helpful. Great. Senator Seyarto. Oh, no. Senator McNerney, my apologies. And then followed by Senator Seyarto and Senator Cabaldon. Was there anyone else that... And then Senator Allen.

Okay. Well, first of all, I want to thank the Chair and the Subcommittee Chairs for your hard work and the staff that put so much into this. It was a difficult year, and you guys did an early job. There's two happy things. The $25 million for Clean Cars 4 All. It makes a big difference in the Valley.

And secondly, the $5 million to see that California develops fusion energy. That's going to make a big difference in our state's future. So thank you for those two things. My third thing is a question about the bill 161. Now, is the intent of this bill to build up scientific expertise in California, or is it to stabilize scientists in the face of what they're fearing from Washington? Or that was the memorandum of understanding between the state and the scientists.

Simply the MOU. But Department of Finance can comment on that. MOU with a bargaining unit. Although I think you and I both agree we need to beef up science.

Well, I mean, there's a real opportunity of scientists that might be looking for something besides Washington right now.

So perhaps DOF can comment on that.

Hanzhao Meng, Department of Finance. So for the, as part of the BU10 satellite agreement between the state and the California Association of Professional Scientists.

So was the intent to build up scientific expertise in California or to stabilize it?

It was a collectively bargained MOU, correct?

Yes, it's part of the MOU agreement.

So it's basically a union sort of contract.

Right.

Okay. And that gives our scientists stability here in California.

Yeah, I don't think, this is not--even though I know you and I are, I think, going to be probably working together to--next year--to try to beef up our science capacity given the disaster that's unfolding--this is about collective bargaining with our state scientists.

Okay.

Yeah.

Thanks. I yield back to you, chair.

Thank you so much. Okay. Where did I write that? Okay. Senator Seyarto.

Thank you. Well, good evening, everybody, and thank you for taking some of our questions. I hope I have some easier questions to handle because I think a lot of what we've been talking about is policy.

When we closed our budget hearings, when we thought we were done with budget hearings a little bit ago, like last month, I believe it was, we had arrived at essentially what our expenditures were going to be and what our revenues were going to be and how much money we had to borrow, and I believe it was 19 million that we had to borrow or move around and General Fund expenditures close to 226 billion, and I thought our revenues were about 207 billion, somewhere in there. So anyway, are those figures accurate still? Do we have any updates on those?

No updates. I think as the chair mentioned, the update would be just kind of the addition of about $70 million General Fund above the June Budget and expenditures for General Fund and mostly primarily related to response and federal policy changes in HR 1 implementation, so that would be the only update I can offer.

And with regard to all of these budget trailer bills, is there a dollar amount that these add up to that is going to add additional cost pressures to our expenditure side of what we're doing in California?

And I think some of--not all of them are General Fund and so what I'm tracking is the kind of the net General Fund addition is related to the budget bill junior which is at 70 million. I don't have a figure of kind of the sum of the appropriations that might be in trailer bill, some of which might have been planned for in June Budget and are just now being--

And that was going to be my next question; were these already--are these expenditures, were they already included in the amount that we had looked at initially and when we did our fake budget in June--I'm sorry, it's not the fake budget--when we did the estimated budget that we get done in June and it has more of an umbrella amount and then we do our trailer bills process, that's when we kind of ferret out where that money is going to be actually appropriated but we had planned for it before.

I don't know if that's the case with some of the Special Fund appropriations that are in the trailer bill, so I can't speak to that, but on the budget bill junior, again, the figure I'm tracking is a 70 million-ish of a General Fund and the rest would have been planned and allocated and already figured into those larger totals at time of June.

Yeah, because I struggle when we start adding, especially when we have such lengthy discussions about policy issues that are coming up when the bill was printed. How long ago was this in print? When did this go in print?

Depending on which measure, but yeah, just within--recently.

Yeah, within. Hard for us to go over all of those policy implications which aren't really a budget. Those should be worked out in regular committees in regular bills and then we apply the budget to them. It just seems like we're using a lot of the budget process to pass a bunch of policy that's really not really the process that we're supposed to be using for that.

And so one of the other expenditures that I was looking at, the very few that I was able to brush through and find, district spending: look like we had $60 million of district project spending. Is that additional or is that, is that in addition to what we were planning on before or is that all new?

Depending on what the district spending at, there are different allocations of funds that were already accounted for at the June 2025 Budget, but, so again, the net General Fund change from June that I'm tracking is the seventy-ish million. So there are different, again, allocations of previously planned expenditures, if that's helpful.

Because those are some of the things that we had talked about when we're trying to tighten our belts or give a haircut or whatever it is, is that if we're running a $19 billion deficit, we probably shouldn't be adding on all these other different expenditures that are not critically necessary for California to move forward.

They're nice, you know, new parks are nice for some, whoever's district that money goes to, but it's not something critical, and I feel like, especially when we're doing a process like this at seven o'clock on the third day--well, now it's going to be four or five days before we get done with this first part of the session--but this is the first year of a two-year session and there is no reason for us to be rushing through some of this stuff, especially the policy stuff and then applying dollar amounts to it and committing to spending those kind of dollars when we haven't even had the real policy discussion on whether we should be doing these things or not in California.

So those are my concerns about the process. I align my concerns with my colleague from Fair Oaks there. This process is ridiculous. It is absolutely ridiculous. I've never seen a budget, or not just a budget, a process like this that we start going backwards and waiving not just one or two rules; it's like we're waiving the entire book of laws to be able to fit this stuff in and nobody's aware of it.

Nobody sees what it is until just a few hours before we get it, and so I am with my colleague. I can't responsibly vote on any of these because we don't really know what these are. We haven't been able to study them, we haven't had them long enough.

We've been sitting in committee all--I mean, not committee--we've been sitting in session all day long and we're spending a lot of money that we don't have, frankly, on programs that we can't afford, frankly. They are nice, they're very kind and generous, but frankly, we can't afford them and we keep going down that path.

And I don't know how we're going to get better when we're losing revenues, not gaining revenues, or our revenues are not, certainly not keeping up with our expenditures. So those are my comments. It looks like you wanted to add.

Senator Seyarto, Gabe Petek, Legislative Analyst, and I was just gonna say--you brought up the budget. I thought I would just take this opportunity to say, on the one hand, there is some net addition to the General Fund of around 70 million.

So far this year in the budget year, revenues have come in a bit above what the budget assumed but that's been very much tied to stock market performance and volatile sources, so we don't know, and there's risks out there in the economy plus we have the effects of HR 1, which could add to our expenditure baseline.

And I would just take opportunity to point out too that the state still does face this structural deficit and so, even though we're focusing on, you know, this year's budget right now, I think, you know, raising some of these broader fiscal concerns is appropriate to keep in mind.

So I'm pretty fiscally conservative and so that, this kind of spending and this type of process makes me--type of process--makes me a little nervous and I shudder to think how much the taxpayers wind up being on the hook for poorly thought-out and rushed policy matters. Thank you.

Okay, thank you. I appreciate it's always a good conversation about what, if any, policy should go in the budget. I will note that the, quote unquote, 'One Big Beautiful Bill,' also known as the 'One Ring to Bind Them All' included various significant policy items including banning gender-affirming care for young people and also banning states from regulating AI. Those were removed only because it was determined they would need 60 votes in the Senate but they were part of that bill, so definitely a broad topic of conversation.

But you guys hate the One Big Beautiful Bill so you must hate this.

No, we do, but I'm just saying, California is not an outlier. Yeah, banning all states from doing it, regulating AI, is definitely not super budget related, but it's an important topic of conversation. Senator Cabaldon.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I have a question and then a few hot takes. So the question is for AB 105 and particularly for the Climate Bond allocations. Well, I guess there's two questions. One, how do we determine how much to spend out of that bond in this particular cycle?

And then second, can you describe for us the sort of the--knowing that this, like nothing else in this bill, went to any subcommittee and that none of the subcommittee chairs were consulted about these items? Can you describe for the public and for us what the framework or the guidelines or the policy for how we ended up with these particular allocations because this is the first time either we or the public are seeing them?

So first question is, how do we determine how much of the Climate Bond from the future are we going to spend now, and then secondly, what is the basis for this expenditure plan for all these specific projects?

Sure. So in 25-26, the bill includes 3.3 billion in spending and there are a lot of discussions between departments, the legislature, and the administration on how much departments could allocate, you know, provide funding for certain programs in 25-26. So I would just say it's conversations between the legislature, staff, admin, and programs.

So is that for the total or is it--and then is that also the answer to--because no RFP was issued, no request to any jurisdiction or county or community or anyone else who has climate-supported projects in water parks or the other components of the bond.

So where do these come from and how do we determine that these are the right projects? And maybe as a sub question then, is there a reason why they're so heavily geographically concentrated?

So--Stephen Benson, Department of Finance. So I guess I'll start with the basis of this was in the Governor's Budget, back in January, the administration had proposed about $2.7 billion of spending from Proposition 4, and that was based on going through and working with--we only really had two months between the time when the bond was enacted by voters and when the Governor's Budget was.

So over that two-month period of time, we spent a lot of time having conversations with departments about what would be needed to get, you know, guideline updates, selection criteria updates, like update programs, and then what their capacity was for delivering on some of that.

So the 2.7, the basis of that was conversations within the administration about like what our departments thought was reasonable to be able to deliver on in the first year, and then of course that was proposed.

We had subcommittee hearings about Prop 4, different priorities, different entities had regarding what should be in, what shouldn't be in, how much for different programs, that kind of thing. As you're aware, when the June Budget was passed, there wasn't very much included for Prop 4, just, there was some early action stuff related to wildfire and then we included a couple million dollars to support the implementation of that early action stuff. So very little was done before this.

The bulk of this was done in convert--based on conversations that happened in subcommittees but then further conversations with the legislature through staff at our level and ongoing expressions of the priorities for the different houses as well as administration, and so it's a result of those discussions.

All right. I will just say, and here this is an area where I think I agree with our vice chair and with Senator Seyarto and with others that I find this to be deeply disturbing, the allocations mainly in the Climate Bond, although it is endemic throughout this particular bill. There are more than just a handful of disadvantaged communities plus the North Coast in California.

And there's no basis for that I've been able to determine or that you've been able to identify for why the projects are what they are and why we couldn't ask Californians through their elected representatives at the local or this legislative level to submit projects and to judge them competitively as we put, as we put these resources out.

And I think the comparison of the Big Beautiful Bill is a good one. I have been to several No Kings rallies myself, and the concentration of decision-making power that has emerged through this process this year is very disturbing.

And our long-standing tradition of conference committees and subcommittee hearings throughout this process to be able to give light to decisions that most certainly always involve politics and last-minute deadlines and all of this, that's a natural part of this domain but this has been a disturbing process, and AB 105, I think, in particular, shows that in its most clear way. Second, for me, for AB 158, just a note, I think it was three months ago that we heard this bill.

We heard the 130, the 132 package in this committee in which we met for hours and hours and hours and hours, and most members of this committee expressed very severe reservations about that bill and only agreed to vote for it because of the commitments that changes were coming, not that we would be asking for them, but that the changes would be coming.

I will say I was one of the members of the committee that was the most likely to vote for the bill in its original form. I was a supporter but I heard those commitments being made and they were real and those issues around advanced manufacturing and habitat and tribal consultation and everything else have not been, they have not been adequately dealt with and this bill doesn't, doesn't get there, and there's nothing in this bill.

And I recognize there is some language about HHAP that I would love to have, the Housing and Homeless Assistance Program, that would be nice to have, and the other programs in LCI, but I, I am prepared to join Senator Blakespear in not supporting AB 158 today because I think we need to get back, we need to get to work on the, on an actual bill and I don't want to signal--this is just me personally. AB 145 does not, it does not represent my policy priorities at this stage.

So that's not, I just saw it too, just like everybody else a few minutes ago and that we need to engage the Senate and the administration in a real way to make good on the good faith votes that were cast in this committee and on the floor in the budget in the first time, so I'm not prepared to vote for AB 158 today. I also have very serious reservations about the allocations that are in AB 105.

Okay. Thank you, Senator Cabaldon, and now, Senator Allen.

Thank you. Thank you, Senator. The first thing I want to say is that is somewhat of a--having been so involved with Prop, with SB 857 and Prop 4--Prop 4 is not a list of projects, right? It's mainly money for programs and then the programs have grant processes that they carry out.

I think that most of the earmarks that you're objecting to were actually not Prop 4. They're from the regular budget, but I just want to make sure that that's clarified there because basically all of those things got bunched in together into the same bill, even though they're actually coming from very different sources.

But, you know, the broader concern about equity and balance in those earmarks is certainly a point really well taken, as is your--I just appreciate the comments you just made on AB 158, which I share those concerns having been, having had those very promises made to me that are not unfortunately being kept in this budget.

So I share the concerns about AB 158 as well and I want to also echo and associate myself with Senator Blakespear's comments on the measure. So those are all kind of deep concerns that I have, you know, many of which have been expressed by a lot of folks here.

I also, you know, I think Senator Durazo's comments about the challenges at EXPO are really well taken. You know, we--for some reason, the governor wouldn't allow EXPO to work with parks instead of DGS. I don't understand that. You know, I've actually got a bill that's helping to streamline issues associated with DGS, but there's some bigger issues, I think, that are at play here that I just, I appreciate my colleagues bringing up.

A couple, some good things to mention, I want to shout out our former colleague, Senator Glazer, who worked so closely with Assembly Member Wicks and others on local journalism. That was a major issue of passion for him, and there is some good stuff in AB 155, which is an important step in addressing the decline of local journalism in California, but we know it was not strong enough. It can't be the last. We're going to really need a sustained effort if we want to restore trusted local sources of information.

We know that our local newsrooms are cratering, and across the nation, there's been something like a 75% decline in local journalists since 2002. This is feeding misinformation. It weakens civic engagement.

We also know that literally those towns that don't have a local paper pay a higher rate on their bonds and other forms of borrowing because the market recognizes that strong local journalism makes it much less likely that decisions will be--that there'll be poor decision-making. The decision-makers know that the press is watching.

The staff knows the press is watching and asking questions. So it literally costs the public more money for borrowing for projects if they don't have a strong local journalism, and, you know, this is a massive problem here in California. I think we're ranked 41st in local journalists per capita.

Riverside, San Bernardino, San Joaquin Counties are among the ten lowest in the country in per capita journalism, and so, you know, I don't understand why this local journalism program was placed in GO-Biz. It seemed to me that the State Librarian was the right place to go for this and there's some strange backstory behind that, but, you know, I do, I am happy that this money's coming.

I will say to my colleagues that we're going to have to ensure that the implementation is being monitored closely. I think we have to be ready to act if funding or oversight is ever subject to political pressure. It's one of the many reasons why I thought it would be better for it to be in the Office of the State Librarian.

And I also think as the program grows--and I certainly hope it will because it has to in order to have real impact--we should codify some strong safeguards that protect journalism from political influence and preserve editorial independence, but I'm certainly really excited about what the bill represents, and again, I want to thank Senator Glazer and others who worked so hard on making this happen over the years.

The other thing I just want to say is there is a, there's a lot to--I just want to thank my colleagues and I want to thank the voters for effectively taking a stand in spite of disinterest from various folks, you know, for Prop 4. This really important Climate Bond that was passed last year was overwhelmingly supported by the voters in November, about a third of the money is coming out in this year.

Of course, more will come out in the next few years, but that's, you know, this is money that's going to go toward drinking water in disadvantaged communities, restoring watersheds, habitat threatened by drought, almost half a million for projects to protect communities from wildfire, including money for brush clearance and home hardening and new technology and more money for coastal resilience projects that are going to protect vulnerable communities from the threat of sea level rise, over 100 million to safeguard communities and help us better prepare for extreme heat events, almost 400 million for nature-based climate solutions that are going to help the state reach our 30 by 30 goals and 153 million for climate-smart architecture, over 400 million for parks and outdoor access, 275 million in clean air and energy funding, and again, the vast majority of this funding is not earmarked.

These are programs funding that go through largely the Natural Resources Agency that our various local projects can apply to, and there's a fair curriculum--formula that's applied based on needs, and of course, we know that the needs are incredibly high.

You know, our communities right now are battling wildfires, extreme events, biodiversity loss, and as has been mentioned, all at the same time that federal funding is being eviscerated for so many of these types of important environmental programs. So this plan, you know, I can quibble with all sorts of individual elements just as I did with the language of the bond, quite frankly, but it really does represent an ambitious effort to move quickly to invest these funds in communities up and down the state, especially in this moment where we're seeing such a rollback in federal investment.

We, you know, when we passed the bond last year, we committed--when we passed SB 867, which, of course, facilitated the bond, we committed to ensuring that this investment in climate resiliency would provide results in every corner of the state and no one will be left behind, and this is a down payment on that commitment.

And I'm just--I just want to personally express my excitement about this particular element of our budget plan, and it's, I think, a reflection of a lot of hard work. I see my chief staff, Tina, here, who was so involved with writing the bond, and I just want to thank my colleagues and the voters for helping to make this happen. So with that, I end on a positive note.

Thank you. It's always positive to look at, too. Not everything is bad. Spoken like a true budget chair. Budgets are about trying to get as much as you can. You don't get everything, though. Okay, we'll now go to Senator Laird, followed by Senator Richardson and then Senator Menjivar and then Senator--oh, I'm sorry. I totally skipped you and you were before Laird. My apologies, Senator Laird. I skipped over Senator Grove. Senator Grove, my apologies.

It's okay. I'm used to it, sir. I have some questions for somebody who can answer questions on Prop 4. So Prop 4, there was $2 million that were applied to, subsidence in the Central Valley, where the land is sinking and we have to protect the infrastructure that brings water from north to south.

There was a request for the State Water Contractors. They asked for $33 million. You gave us two million. Somebody explain to me why is that because it's 75 million is in a bond fund that should be issued, and without the subsidence fixing the structure, there's not a water delivery purpose from Northern California to Southern California and you have to have it. So who made the decision to only give us $2 million? I'd like a name, too. I mean, all these people that say, well, it was a decision by one of the three parties, or that kind of stuff--I'm not interested in that. Sorry.

Good evening. Andrew Hull with Department of Finance. I believe that the regional conveyance you're talking about is something that was not proposed in the January 10 Budget; it's something that was added as part of the three-party agreement. We included the $2 million to get the program started but I couldn't tell you who added it or what the discussions were. It was just--

Well I asked the Budget chair and he said it was leadership. What leadership?

I honestly don't know.

How do we deliver water if we can't address the subsidence?

Well a lot of this, the bond itself is something that we're just beginning to roll out. This was based on department's ability where they thought they were at to be able to deliver project funding in the first year, so there's more funding available. It's also something that we could continue to discuss, you know, in January, but it's not the last bite of the apple we are just getting this program up and running.

Is there $75 million available?

For conveyance? I am not aware of $75 million in this bond.

How much is available for conveyance?

The overall flat.

Senator Grove, Rachel Ehlers with the Legislative Analyst's Office. Within the bond, Proposition Four, there is a line item that provides 75 million total available for regional conveyance projects and repairs. The bond language is not specific about what projects those would be for. It defers to either the department or the legislature to allocate those funds for specific projects, but you're correct that the bond contains 75 million for that category of expenditure.

Okay, thank you. I appreciate that. I just wanted to confirm that it has $75 million for conveyance, and if we don't--we have a sinking valley floor. It's adjusting the conveyance system that we have, and if the conveyance system can't let us deliver water, then Los Angeles is not going to have water and they have less water than they had a few years ago. So that's my one beef with that. I appreciate that the $3 billion out of Prop 4 went to--I think it was three billion went to fire prevention.

That's something we all desperately need in every one of our communities and for--appreciate that. I do want to say thank you for--although I'm not going to support the overall thing, I do want to say thank you for $2 million--what a day--$2 million for Kern County to get Child Protective Services money because their explanation to why they did not respond to 20 complaints for little Genesis Mata who was tortured to death--her hands were slammed in a door where her fingers came off and they boiled her in water--the excuse for not responding to the 20 complaints is they are understaffed.

And please forgive me for this, but that is the base biggest line of bullshit I've ever heard in my life, so thank you for the $2 million in the budget trailer bill to address the situation of understaffing or under-resourced individuals that should be investigating claims that come into the Department of Child Protective Services.

Thank you for--and Toni Atkins and I worked on the Imagination Library and, you know, the State Librarian's kind of in our way trying to expand that program and you guys are making a way. It was opened up in Orange County, Los Angeles, a lot of Northern California counties.

So I appreciate that fix in the budget, but I mainly wanted to comment about the $75 million that should be available from conveyance even though it doesn't offer specific projects. The subsidence issue in this, in the Central Valley, again, is the only way you're going to transport water to Los Angeles and you should focus on that, in my opinion, and then the Child Protection Services. So thank you.

Thank you, Senator Grove, and my apologies for almost skipping over you. Senator Laird.

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair, and thanks to the staff for all the work in getting us here, and I know some of the staff members related to various things didn't even go home last night so I am very grateful for the time that is being committed. A few things.

First, in AB 105, I want to thank Finance for fixing the housing financing problem for 600 units that are in Santa Cruz County because a year and a half ago, they didn't understand the way it was going to be financed and that groundbreaking is happening in a couple of weeks and in AB 105 is the fix that will allow that to go ahead.

Secondly, on Proposition 4, where there's been an animated discussion, I know there was a lot of concern by stakeholders that we weren't appropriating things and this is a very good and healthy amount, and when you look at what it actually does, I mean, I have a farmworker, disadvantaged community, San Lucas, that is about to completely run out of clean water. This appropriation will unleash the project that will really help them get to clean water.

There's a major dam in that same area in southern Monterey County that has a broken spillway, and in the atmospheric rivers, they can't fill it up more than half. The dam safety money here will get to a point that that water is done, and we were ground zero for the atmospheric rivers two years ago, and the Coastal Resiliency money will deal with some of the leftover issues that exist there.

There is not money here from the pot from the San Andreas Corridor, and I really look forward to that moving ahead at the right time. The State Librarian fits in the Education Budget Subcommittee, and we heard the journalism item, and there's two.

We heard it and the real issue was is that part of it was an ask of Senator Glazer and it's really being institutionalized in the budget. That is a great thing for all the reasons that were outlined. And then maybe I'm going to do the reverse of ending on a positive note, and that is I did not vote for 131, the budget trailer bill. I had voted against some of the policy in it in a Policy Committee and yet it was being placed in the budget bill with limited input, not the way it would happen in the policy project.

That was the reason there had to be a commitment to clean up three different items, and it's just hard to understand why we can do that bill in a matter of days and don't have much choice and you can have six to eight weeks to make good on the three commitments that were made to try to fix it and not have it ready here to do it. That is very difficult. And one issue, the tribal issue, seems to have fallen off the table completely.

And I know, I was sitting right about here and going back and forth with the chair on that bill in committee and we just really need to do it, and so I would associate myself with the comments of Senator Cabaldon, and I didn't want to be in this position.

I don't want to have to debate whether or not to approve this bill because it doesn't make good the three commitments that were made by the Senate President on the floor when this bill moved ahead, and we have, I mean, that's the reason that we should not do monumental policy in the budget.

We should do it through the process so that we have a chance to have those give and takes, we have a chance to fix it before it just goes in a big thing and then we have to make commitments to fix it because it didn't go through the process where you can have give and take and witnesses when you can amend it and try to deal with it, and it puts us in this exact position.

So it's really sad that we just don't have that fully done the way the bill was in front of us. So just, that is a comment, and I just, once again, as a former legislative Budget Committee chair, I appreciate--the thing that drove me crazy when I was a cabinet secretary was that the governor would sign the budget, and I think it was three days later we had to submit our request for the next year.

We didn't even know how anything would be happening and it would just regenerate, and so here we are. I imagine all the requests have been made already and here we are in the trailer bills adopting things that will reflect on what those should be. So, Mr. Chair, I appreciate the chance to comment.

Thank you, Senator Laird. Thank you for acknowledging that SB 607 did move through two committees, and thank you, Senator Blakespear, for working with us on that, on that bill. Sometimes announcements are made and all of a sudden it becomes a budget issue. So it was definitely a--

Yes, but then all of a sudden it becomes a budget bill where we are obligated to vote for it. When I voted against 607 because I thought it was flawed, I was not obligated to vote for it because it was a budget bill.

I'm not criticizing, I'm saying what happened, which I did very much try to move it as a policy bill when it was moving along. So thank you, Senator Laird. Senator Richardson.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Got a few questions here that I'm going to run through as fast as I can, and since we've gotten some of this information fairly recently, I would just ask for the record that members will be able to submit questions and get more detailed answers during the recess about some of this stuff because, you know, this is my first year back, so I'm not familiar with some of these projects and programs and I think it might be helpful, so hopefully we'll be allowed that opportunity even though we're going to be voting on this in the next couple days. Is that correct?

Oh, absolutely.

Okay. So that being said, I have a couple questions. Number one, on, regarding--and I'm just in AB 105--for under-resources, it says that 90 million for regional projects, 30 million for Department of Forestry and Fire Protection, CAL FIRE, 45 million for Sierra Nevada Conservancy, 15 million for Santa Monica Mountains Conservancy.

And my question is, you have further back in this these conservancies two pages later, page four, additional money allocated in some cases to the same conservancies, and so I'm trying to understand is this in addition to--are these numbers in addition to or cumulative or--I'll give you one for example. Santa Monica receives 25.4 million and then on here you have 15 million. So does that mean they're getting 40 million or what's the numbers?

Stephen Benson, Department of Finance. Yeah, those are cumulative. The way these have things structured is there's, as you were, Prop 4 has a number of sections in it and they authorize different amounts of bond financing for different purposes. We've set it up so those budget items sort of go along with different sections of the Bond Act. So they're cumulative. They're appropriations for funding out of different sections of the Bond Act.

So help me define cumulative. Does that mean they're separate line items or they're one item--one line item that the two numbers are combined?

They're separate line items, so like there's, like for Santa Monica, there's the 15 million for regional projects and there's later on there's another item with a different dollar amount. Santa Monica has both of those dollar amounts. It's a total of 30 or whatever--I don't--forget what the second number is, but you add them together, that's the total amount authorized but they're for different purposes. The 15 is--

So not to cause problems with the gentleman from Santa Monica here to my right, I'd like to--when we first had the wildfire situation, we were told that certain conservancies were going to qualify for wildfire home hardening and things like that, and I brought up the question that not all the conservancies were noted, and I was told, 'well, because that's because in the past, that's where the fires were.' Well, we soon found out that with Altadena and Palisades, there are other communities that can have fire issues just like any other.

So if you could help me understand then on page four, this has to do with the climate change impacts on communities, fish, wildlife, and natural resources, but again, you have some of the same conservancies. Are all of the conservancies listed on here?

So let me try and clarify a little bit. So what you're seeing on page four, those allocations aren't to do with wildfire. Those are to do with biodiversity and nature-based solutions. And so in the Bond Act, there are sections that specify certain amounts for each of these conservancies. They have to go to those conservancies--that's how the Bond Act is written--and so we're making some appropriations to each of those conservancies for them to start implementing their programs.

Are these all of the conservancies?

I think that is--I'm not seeing any that are missing off the top of my head, but I wouldn't swear an affidavit right now saying that there's none missing.

Okay. Which conservancy is the Palos Verdes Peninsula Land Conservancy in?

I'm not certain. We don't have conservancies that cover the entire state, so I would have to look up where that location is and see if there's a conservancy that has jurisdiction in that area or not.

Okay. So, Mr. Chairman, if I could get further information about the conservancies and how this funding works, but my point is, is you have some conservancies who are getting money with CAL FIRE, some of the same conservancies that are getting them for risks of climate change, impacts on community, and so on, and they're not all covering all of the areas that also have needs, so I would just like additional information on how the conservancy programs work, how money is determined that goes to which ones, and so on.

Sure. I can help clarify a little bit that there are some conservancies that are a bit more statewide. So for example, the Wildlife Conservation Board, while not conservancy in its name, does a lot of the similar types of things and it has statewide jurisdiction and so there would be grant programs and stuff like that that would serve pretty much all communities.

And then, like the Sierra Nevada Conservancy, for example, covers something like a third of the state, and then you have things like Baldwin Hills Conservancy or Rivers and Mountains Conservancy, Santa Monica Conservancy, that have small, smaller geographical areas.

And so conservancies, I guess, aren't created equally in the sense of, like, the regions that they cover, but from like, let's say, a wildfire--the first bucket you were talking about was regional projects. The reason it's split across those three different departments is that--so Santa Monica, of course, covers--that conservancy covers a smaller geographical area.

CAL FIRE, of course, covers the entire state. Sierra Nevada Conservancy also covers about a third of the state or actually probably more than that. And so, those departments will sort of work together in terms of how the money rolls out so that really the whole state has access to funding from that regional project--regional projects pot--sorry. It's just being administered through different departments because their various jurisdictions cover all of the state.

Okay, so I'm going to preface my comment by saying, this isn't your fault. I'm not saying it's your fault. However, I'm going to give you a little math explanation. If Santa Monica is getting 25 million and wildfire has the entire state and they're all fighting for this little bit here, and you've got some areas that get all of it from their area but you have other funds where you've got several groups that are fighting, right--not fighting--attempting to have access to resources.

So my point is--and again, it's not your fault; I recognize that and that's why we're here and I hope to work with you going forward--but my point is is that from an equitable perspective, it may sound good--oh, wildlife, whatever, has the whole state--but think about what that means.

So that means the whole state is competing for this one pool where certain areas get the whole apple, and that's a problem because we have communities all over the state that need to utilize the resources.

I completely understand that and we take that into account while these conversations are going on. I would clarify though, that, like, for example, that regional projects pot, it's 127 million total authorized. We're not appropriating all of that this year. So while Santa Monica Conservancy does have 15 million in there, I think that's reflecting some priorities that folks expressed in regards to responding to the recent fires in January.

I think the vast majority of the funding in Prop 4 for the regional projects will be administered on a more statewide basis so that there is the ability for all areas of the state to benefit from those projects.

Okay. Asked and answered and understood, but we'll live to fight another day. You'll see me in a couple months.

Always happy to help explain things if it's helpful.

Okay. Well, I not only want to explain, I want to make sure all communities are getting access to the money. My next question has to do with...try again to be--okay. Under energy, utilities, and air quality, you have 368 million to the California State Transportation Agency for competitive and formula Transit and Intercity Rail Capital programs. Do you have any details on more specifically what would fall under that? So like, for example, Metro funding and things like that, does it fall in these categories?

Sorry. James Moore with the Department of Finance. So this pot of funds was part of the original SB 125 transit funding that included 5.1 billion a couple of years ago. Part of it was General Fund through a series of a budget solutions. Some of it was shifted to the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund and then spread out over multiple years.

This restores some of the discretionary Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund that was used, and so one of the programs here is given to trades agencies on a formula basis and the other one is given to capital projects that have already been selected by the transportation agency, and so Metro, I'm sure, is a recipient of some of these funds, but it's a statewide plan.

And then my next question is on page six, number 17, it says--this is under health--and it says appropriates expenditure authority of 11.3 million, and it goes, it breaks it down to support the development of DHCS of a comprehensive hospital value strategy. So can someone help--what do we mean by spending $11.3 million for strategy?

And I asked that question because in my community and some of the other members here, we have hospitals that are on the verge of closing because they don't have seismic--they can't meet the seismic requirements, and I'm just curious, has there been a discussion about any funding regarding seismic capabilities versus hospital value strategies?

Laura Ayala, Department of Finance. I can--

Did you say Laura?

Yes.

Ah. Lauras are tough. It's the Lauries that are the weak ones.

What about Lowras?

Those are good.

Okay.

Hopefully no Lauries in the audience.

I can speak to the hospital value strategy that's under the Medi-Cal program, and so the 11 million includes three different funding sources, none of which are General Fund. These are funded partly by fees and intergovernmental transfers and then some federal funds.

But the idea is for the Department of Health Care Services to really take a holistic look at all of the payments that are provided to hospitals, their state directed payments, and to figure out a way to get the most value out of those payments and provide--improve access for Medi-Cal members and improve care delivery. So I can't speak to the comparison between this hospital valley strategy proposal and--

So I would just say for the record with our chair to spend--I mean, I get it. Everything that you said, it seems very reasonable. I just don't know why we spent $11.3 million to do that. So just for the record, I'll make that statement and I stand open to hearing differently. I'm definitely open to that.

On page nine, number 37, general government, there's money appropriated, 20 million one-time for economic development. Does this assist with FIFA and the Olympics?

This isn't specific to my knowledge. This is not specific to FIFA and Olympics. There was Olympics funding in the June budget related to transportation and there are a number of components in the trailer bills related to Olympics. I don't know if one of my colleagues has more information, but I believe it's broader than FIFA and Olympics.

Okay. Could you direct me in here where we do allocate money for FIFA and/or Olympics.

There's--in the AB 105, there's no funding for Olympics, but we did have money in the transportation area in the June budget, and then, if you'll provide me one moment, we do have Olympics in various trailer bills, not funding, but provisions. There's a provision in AB 144 related to exemptions for certain medical providers.

In AB 149, there is an expansion of an existing CEQA exemption and also an additional exemption for Coastal Development Permits related to the 2028 Olympic and Paralympic Games, and then in AB 153, there's an authorization for local transit operators to operate charter bus service for the 2026 World Cup in both the San Francisco Bay area and the Los Angeles area. So we have Olympics efforts underway. The dollar funding, again, was in the June, the June budget related to transportation specifically.

Okay. And then regarding transportation, I see that we're taking out--same page--we're taking out ten million from the Motor Vehicle Account. Don't we also take out money for CARB out of the Motor Vehicle Account?

Right. There's a number of entities that spend out of the Motor Vehicle Account and definitely the Air Resources Board is also one of those entities that spends out of Motor Vehicle Account.

Okay. So if you could give me the total of that account, and then, how much is being taken out?

Oh, fund balance on Motor Vehicle Account as of budget enactment, I'll turn it over to Matt Macedo, one of my colleagues.

Oh, you can give it to me, for the record. I don't want to--

Okay. We're happy to follow up with more details. Yeah.

Okay. Thank you. Even though I had some rapid fire questions there, thank you for all of your work. I know you guys have been working so hard to meet this deadline and to give us a balanced budget, so thank you for all the hours that you've put in and we look forward to working with you--I look forward to working with you. Thank you.

Next is Senator Menjivar.

Thank you so much, Mr. Vice Chair. I want to do a follow-up because Senator Allen mentioned a response to Senator Cabaldon regarding some heavy geographic investments that perhaps they weren't propped for investments, and I guess I'm also asking if they're not propped for investments, where did we get additional money for specific geographic investments?

To Senator Seyarto's point, we were told that, you know, we had to cut Medi-Cal for undocumented individuals or cease to provide funding for that and other things because there was no funding, but now we have additional funding for special projects, district spot projects, in specific geographic areas. If they're not Prop 4, how much money is for specific projects that are outside of Prop 4 from the General Fund?

From General Fund--so I don't have that figure. I know that this was--the notion of future allocations was contemplated at the time of June budget. I don't know that the specifics were developed. If we're talking about new General Fund that wasn't contemplated at the time of enactment, my notes show that it's, again, approximately 70 million that's above the June budget, net General Fund, and a lot of that was related to--the costs related to the response to federal policy changes and the HR 1 implementation. So the net change from the June budget is 70 million.

So 70 million. Those are program-related investments, so not--those are program versus geographic investments. So 70--they're not earmarks--70 million that you're talking about is the only money you can account for from General Fund for additional investments that weren't in the June budget that we voted on.

As a net change from the June budget.

Then I would say, Senator Allen, it sounds like every other earmark investment is coming off from Prop 4.

I do not believe that. I believe that there was a plan at the June budget for future allocation for dollars. I don't believe and I don't have how many specific geographic investments are related to Prop 4, so I don't know that all the geographic investments you're referring to are Prop 4. I don't think I would say that.

Do we know how much--do we know how much specific line item earmarks to projects are in Prop 4? Not pots.

Not pots. I don't know that it's considered like on an earmark basis. I think it's, you know, you start with the bond language and then from there there's probably certain or different levels of specificity within the bond, so I don't know that we could provide that. Stephen?

So with--Stephen Benson, Department of Finance. We can go through the budget bill language and there are some Prop 4 appropriations that are for specific projects. I don't have the total off the top of my head of what that is but we could certainly go through and total that up and provide that information if that's something that's of interest.

If we're going to be here for a little while, I would love that math to happen so we can have those numbers for the public to understand. Prop 4 was passed by Californians. I think it'd be really important for California voters to know where their vote investment is going in the State of California and if it was equitably distributed across California. I would like that number.

I don't know that we can commit to it in this timeframe. We absolutely commit to working with committee staff to see what we can provide, and then I would just note that this is a partial allocation of the bond funding, it's not a total allocation, so it's kind of a point in time--

The total amount of the appropriations is 3.3 billion of the ten billion authorized.

So that's one-third approximately, right? That's a huge chunk. You know, this is going to be the only hearing on this. This is the only hearing on Prop 4, and this is the only time we can hold us accountable for how we're utilizing the money that voters asked us to utilize to invest into their communities.

I can't have an email two weeks from now giving me those numbers. I need to either talk about it here or talk about it on the Senate Floor so that the public knows how much money is going into specific projects.

We can certainly get you the math before the Senate Floor. I can't say for sure that I can get it before this hearing ends, but I will certainly go do some math, and I will say though that of the 3.3 billion being appropriated, the vast majority of it is going to competitive grant type programs where there'll be solicitations, there will be awards being made, you know, based on a competitive application process.

And maybe that is the best route to take for all kind of allocations to ensure that it's a fair approach that--depending on the need, right--because I see some line allocations where I see studies, plans, and I'm like, in a time where a lot of areas are park-poor, children are in schools with no ACs, seniors are dying from heat exhaustion and so forth, I don't think Californians want us to invest tens of thousands, millions of dollars on studies and master plans.

I think it'd be really important for us to ensure that we're investing on actual things that are going to change people's lives in the, in the now versus doing another study that oftentimes sits on our desk or on the department's desk for years to come. Thank you.

Okay. Was that--thank you. Senator Niello, followed by Senator Smallwood-Cuevas, and I believe that's what I have for now.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. A couple of specific questions. I heard that there have been additional revenues, revenues coming in a little bit stronger than expected, the structural deficit notwithstanding, which I'll come back to, but is there--again, I just don't have the detail--is there any additional funding to supplement the initial allocate or budget for Proposition 36?

I will have to rely on one of my colleagues for that response.

Justin Adelman, Department of Finance. There is no additional funding for Proposition 36, but one of the trailer bills does include modifications to a Community Corrections Performance Incentive Grant, which is a public safety related funding mechanism.

Could you tell me what that is?

Sure. So, this is from 2009-2011 realignment.

It's a program to fund and promote probation departments to keeping individuals out of prison sentences and providing funding to assist probation departments in doing that and various evidence-based practices.

We had been working throughout the year on developing modifications to this formula, which had its faults, and so, there is funding for that, but nothing specific to Proposition 36.

Is that at all, excuse me, is that at all related to Proposition 36 activities?

In the sense that it includes public safety, yes, but not specific to Proposition 36.

The other one is we, as you know, we have a $20 billion unemployment insurance debt. And because it's not being paid, employers are paying increased amounts per employee. I think it goes up by $24 per employee every year, maxes out at somewhere around $450 per employee additional.

Frankly, I think that that is absolutely abhorrent that the state is not paying that off, whereas every other state in the union did. Initially, New York didn't fully pay it off, but eventually, my understanding is it did. Is there any funding in here to pay the UI debt down?

There is no additional funding related to that.

So, we are going to continue—I realize this is not your decision, so the comments not directed at you, but we are going to continue to foist upon employers higher and higher costs per employee, which is going to feed into affordability issues. The higher costs businesses have, the higher prices are eventually going to be.

And it just absolutely enslaves me that we are the only state in the union that refuses to allocate—I think we can say anything because there have been some budget funding for this in inconsequential amounts, given the $20 billion debt. I think that's totally inexcusable.

Now, the LAO mentioned the structural deficit, which we continue to have, irrespective of everything that we're talking about here. We have a structural imbalance between programs that have been, excuse me, I know you know what it means. Just so everybody is on the same page.

It means we have a structural, ongoing imbalance between the cost of programs to which we have committed over the last several years versus the revenues that we expect to be receiving over the next few years.

That means that in order to balance future budgets, we're either going to have to raise taxes or reduce programs or reduce spending on various programs.

What has the Department of Defense, Department of Defense, that's become the partner of Department of War, what has the Department of Finance done to begin working on that structural deficit for the next projecting out 2, 3, 4 years?

So, I think it's a continued effort, right? It's a continued effort every year. The dynamics of revenue levels change, which influences that.

So, that will be part of our fall process of evaluating where we are with expenditures, seeing where workload expenditures come in, if there's other outside changes or outside factors, seeing where revenues come in later during the fall.

And then, we propose the budget at Jan. 10 using the best information we have and the best approach that, you know, the Administration has at that time, taking into account a lot of dynamic factors, including, as you said, increasing, you know, increasing expenditures perhaps on the natural via workload or revenue changes and, you know, the projections of those revenues for the multi-year window.

So, it's a continued effort by the Department of Finance and we're launching into it right now for the next turn for the Jan. 10 budget.

All due respect, that sounds like a wait and see.

I mean, it's a continued effort. It's always, always happening, as far as looking at what the factors are that could affect our budget and the budget development.

The heaviest budget development cycle is in this fall now, and the Jan. 10 document is the most detail version of that with, of course, changes that come through the spring again as factors change both on the expenditures and revenue side.

Well, we do have—we do know what we know now, and we know now that there is ongoing program expenditures for the next few years, exceed by significant billions of dollars the revenues that we expect to have coming in.

Now, it sounds like what you're saying is, well, revenues will change and so we can maybe make some adjustments.

But I would like to see, and this is probably hoping too much for a legislative minority member, but I would hope to see the Department of Finance in the context of the upcoming budget, some projections, relative to what you think needs to be done to cure the structural deficit, to handle the structural deficit over the next few years.

It's going to make our budgeting process more and more difficult as time goes by.

Senator Niello.

Yes?

If I may just weigh in here. You know, our office at the Legislative Analyst Office is beginning the work to prepare our fiscal outlook, which will come out in November, and in that, we will be providing updated estimates of revenues and expenditures.

And in this exercise, we'll be trying to build in adjustments to the business baseline of our expenditures that will be affected by this HR 1 Bill in Washington, which probably add to the burden facing the state.

And I guess I would just put on, you know, out there, that with the structural deficit in the range of $15 to 20 billion a year, looking ahead in the forecast period that we had back in May, and given that the Legislature already took the actions to pull back a lot of the onetime spending that had been allocated in the surplus years, a lot of the choices that the Legislature will face will just be even more difficult going forward.

There will be difficult choices before this body. And so, there's nothing right now that I look at when I look across the landscape that gives me a lot of comfort that we're going to grow our way out of this with revenues. In fact, the economy seems to be slowing down.

The jobs reports have been coming in weaker, inflation is higher, and you know, if anything, California has historically kind of been at the leading edge of the trends, and so, we've seen a slowdown in job growth in California for a little while now. And now, the most recent jobs reports have been showing that nationally.

And so, you know, not predicting a recession, but we have to always be prepared for that possibility. And some of this, some of the warning signs are out there for that. And so, I guess I'm just saying that some of the fiscal challenges that the state faces right now will continue to be there.

And the choices that have already been made kind of took the low hanging fruit that was available from a fiscal standpoint. And so, I think the choices will be even harder as we go into the next year.

And that's potentially exacerbated by the imbalance that we had for a few years relative to out migration and in migration, meaning that for a couple of years, and we haven't talked about that since, and I don't know if this is continuing, but we need to wait for IRS, dated IRS data.

But we had a situation for a few years where it wasn't just a matter of more people moving out than moving into California, but the people that were moving out of California were of a higher educated, at a higher income level than were the people moving in.

Whereas in prior years, it was that particular demographic was a bit of a wash. That has significant impacts obviously on public revenues, but with regard to the question that I asked Department of Finance, I've asked you this question before and you have answered it.

And the reason, it just occurred to me the Department of Finance should be working on this also. And between the two of you, you probably come up with some different data. But, and I'm not presuming that the Department of Finance wasn't working on it, but I've never asked the Department of Finance.

I've asked you about this probably two or three times. And so, that's why I wanted to get it on Department of Finance's radar, and hopefully we can see some additional information as you're working on future budgets, as I know we're will from the LAO also.

Now, I want to welcome those that have expressed frustration relative to what is going on. I welcome you with open arms to my club of frustration.

And I have to say I'm just wondering if my other colleagues from the other side of the aisle are feeling as uninformed and rushed on this as I am and my Republican colleagues are. I have a feeling that the answer to that question is yes.

I'm not trying to engage a conversation, but just bringing up the same sort of challenge we have of transparency and appropriate involvement in the processes that we're pursuing this week. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Vice Chair. And now I will go to, I believe, Senator Smallwood—oh, Senator Menjivar. Oh, Senator Smallwood Cuevas and then Senator Menjivar. Actually, yes, Senator Smallwood Cuevas, my apologies. Thank you.

It's been a long, long day.

Yeah. After I skipped over Senator Grove. I'm not very sensitive to going in the room.

Long, long, long day. You know, I just wanted, in my exuberance over disappointment in 131, in the cleanup of 158, I neglected to ask a question about a couple of items in Trailer Bill 105 and in 160, I wanted to ask about the firefighter transition technical program language that's in AB 149. Can you say more?

Does that increase the number of firefighters? And the question more specifically I'm asking is does that include hand crews across the state? And can you tell me what does it—what is being increased? I know it's the hours, but I'm curious in terms of the numbers.

Sorry, Steve Mintz with the Department of Finance again. So, in 149, the amendment related to firefighters is back in the June budget.

There was language that indicated, put in statute, that indicated that upon appropriation of funding for this particular purpose, CAL FIRE would begin hiring a sufficient number of permanent firefighters to replace what we currently have as existing seasonal firefighters. The budget included $39 million in '25-'26 to start doing that and then $78 million ongoing for that purpose.

That will allow for the transition of a portion of the firefighter, the current seasonal firefighters, call them firefighter ones, into permanent classifications, but not all of them. The language in here where they're amending is right now the statute indicates it was referring to firefighters that were assigned to hand crews.

This amendment just strikes the word "hand crews" and basically says the intent now is to transition all seasonal fire, all existing seasonal firefighters to permanent firefighters. That's the clarification.

And can you confirm for me how many hand crews are, are exist per county and what does that number mean? Whether firefighters or hand crews, how many will be in LA County in particular?

So, this is specific to the firefighters that CAL FIRE employs.

Got it.

And so, it doesn't necessarily have hand crews that are permanently stationed in every county. What we would do in an incident is if, say LA happened in January, obviously we bring hand crews in from all over the state to help address that issue.

They don't actually station there. Turns out LA County actually is one of the contract counties, so CAL FIRE doesn't have hand crews in LA County itself. The county has hand crews that does. And I don't know off the top of my head exactly how many hand crews the county has.

So, it's my understanding there's only two in all of LA County hand crews and that there is no state-funded hand crew that is in LA County, and I just want to point out with over 200,000 folks evacuated, over 17,000 structures burned, I think Senator Richardson was alluding to this point, LA is officially a wildfire zone.

And as we are in making this investment, and I absolutely agree that we need to increase the number of full time firefighters and begin to move a transition, I also think we need to look at ways to ensure that those areas that are urban, those areas that are dense, and those areas that we now know are prone to burn, that we have adequate investment in those hand crews.

Not to mention that there are, you know, thousands of formerly incarcerated firefighters who are looking for an opportunity to be able to put their skills to use, and I did see that there obviously are some investments that are being made with the California Conservation Corps and the CAL FIRE Local Fire Prevention Grants.

Do you know if any of those, the CAL FIRE Local Fire Prevention Grants are going to increase the hiring of formerly incarcerated fire camp members to be able to step into some of these Cal Fires hand crews or firefighting teams.

The local fire prevention grant program that this funding goes through doesn't actually go towards hiring firefighters. They're grants out to local entities.

So, any entity in the state fire safe councils apply, counties, cities, different fire districts apply. They apply for these grants to go in and do various types of fire prevention work—could be fuel breaks, could be community hardening type of improvements. That's what that grant program supports. There are programs in the state.

So, CAL FIRE and the Conservation Corps and CDCR cooperate a Ventura Training Center that is specifically geared towards bringing in folks who recently left the Conservation Camp Program, released, and they're coming back out and they can come in and get trained and receive the training they need to be competitive to apply for firefighting positions.

And CAL FIRE does hire folks from that program quite regularly. CAL FIRE also hires a lot of folks directly out of the Conservation Corps into their ranks and positions as well.

So, there's a number of pathways that are being used and there is work that's funding in Prop 4 and other places that's going towards workforce development type of programs that will help support bolstering that effort.

I would love to hear more about how many folks who are coming out of that Ventura Training Program, which is a remarkable program, that actually get an opportunity to come down into the, unfortunately, two hand crews, but come into an opportunity to work in their own communities doing the fire prevention, mitigation fire, all of the training that they've gotten while in the camps that they have an opportunity to come into their own communities and do that work.

Do we track—is part of this funding to track some of those numbers, in terms of how many of the firefighters who are going to be hired as a result of this money, how many are coming from the Ventura Fire Camp, how many are actually—how many of those graduates are actually moving into full time jobs?

So, this funding in here doesn't go towards tracking that or really this isn't specifically going towards Ventura Training Center either. That funding has ongoing funding to run the program. We could definitely find data in terms of how many of the graduates from that program are being hired by CAL FIRE.

You know, that much I definitely know we could get. Whether or not I could, CAL FIRE, frankly, I guess the Conservation Corps could help me identify whether they're going back to like the community they came from. I don't know if they track that level of data or not. That's something you could certainly ask about though.

Thank you. And then, my final point, and I know my good colleague from Los Angeles raised this, and this is about Expo Park, and I understand that, you know, obviously there is some funding or some language in the trailer bill regarding the Olympics and preparing Expo Park for the Olympics.

We also are going to be preparing for some future monuments. There were some allocations made in the budget, in that regard. I just want to point out that the security funding for the park is a real challenge. We had one child killed inside of the park recently.

We've had some challenges with some bike gangs essentially that have attacked folks inside of the park. We, you know, obviously know that we are inviting millions of visitors to the park and the CHP allocation is such that it just isn't adequate to ensure the safety needs that exist at Expo Park.

I recognize that in this budget that there's nothing here reflecting that. I don't know if there may be some other pots in terms of investments that are being made at Expo Park that can address that need.

But I just want to point out that we, this is a beacon of California in the heart of a community that has a lot of disparity, and we want everyone to be safe, both the residents in and around the park, as well as those who come and visit.

Just wondering, is there additional allocations that maybe aren't reflected here to address some of those needs?

So, agree that the security in the park has been a tricky situation to try and resolve. A few years ago, there was funding done through the budget to set up essentially a park-specific police force, and it's been very challenging trying to recruit, hire, and retain folks into those classifications.

And so, a lot of the security concerns that the park has is a result of an inability to retain those folks.

What's been happening is many of them get recruited, hired, trained, and then once they're trained, they leave and go work for the city Police Department or the County Sheriff's Office, something like that, because they're higher paying jobs that are more appealing to them, once they've received all that training.

So, keeping that actual authorized unit within the park filled has been incredibly challenging. And so, we have continued to be reliant on contracts with CHP and they're also doing some private security. So, those are ongoing conversations that we're having with Exposition Park and with the Natural Resources Agency in terms of how to stabilize and solve that problem.

Sort of ongoing. But right now, what's happening is, within their existing budget, what was in the June budget, they've got some funding to be able to continue and increase their contract with CHP to a certain extent and also to do some funding for private security.

And then, of course, they will continue to try and fill and retain the actual positions they have, but that has been very challenging.

Yeah, well, as we move closer to LA '28 and the Olympics and obviously the World Cup, which is happening in a few months, you know, I think addressing the needs of security, but also the overall safety, you know, making sure there's accessibility at the park and also making sure that it's fully open.

All of the amazing assets that are at the park, including the Air and Space Center, would be critically important as we get ready to welcome the world and hopefully generate the revenues that the state so desperately needs at this time.

And I'm not involved in all the conversation, but certainly, as they gear up for the Olympics and for the World Cup and stuff, there are groups that are discussing venue security and things like that that are multi agency. They include, you know, federal agencies and state agencies and OEs involved and a lot of those types of things.

So, obviously Expo Park's not going to be on its own, I guess, in terms of security for those major events.

Ma'am. Laura? Sorry.

Teresa. Laura is our, one of our DHCS colleagues. Yeah.

Oh, sorry.

I just want to clarify a question I had just to make sure I was talking to my colleagues here. The question I originally had asked is, and you said 70 million is the only General Fund additional investments that we're voting on. The total, only $70 million is coming from General Fund of everything we're voting on.

Net General Fund compared to the June budget.

There are allocations in this budget that were in the June budget, but they weren't, they were not differentiated and now they're spelled out more. So, that was already appropriated money, but it's now more itemized.

Great, okay, thank you.

On that point, how could they have been in the June budget if they were not itemized? And how could we have—especially these geographic earmarks or these project specific earmarks—how could they have been implicitly included in the June budget without us voting on that at that time?

Yeah, they might have been carried in a central—the items here. So, these are being allocated specifically to like the budget, the departments that have them. So, they're itemized by Department. So, I don't, I don't have information on how they reflected in June. They are now allocated out to the departments.

Yeah. Okay. So, like for the climate bond money, the General Fund money, the MediCal money, the Department of Education money, across the transit money, in almost every one, there is at least one, sometimes 40, specific allocations that are in the schedules.

So, the appropriations are still what they were at the program level for transit capital planning, for mental health services or whatever, but now they include of that amount, sometimes 100% of that amount is for this specific earmarked project which we have not heard or seen up until the Bill, since the Bill went in print.

That's what I think that's what we're trying to understand is—and I guess so they're not all climate, of course, but they're all, and they're not all General Fund, but they're across a wide variety of these budget areas.

Yeah, I'm not—I think because the question's fairly broad, I'd maybe work with your Budget Committee staff to see kind of if we can narrow down kind of the areas of interest and get back to you all as soon as possible, recognizing that we are—we don't have much time, but we will work with your Budget Committee staff to kind of see if we can help give more detail, if that's acceptable.

Okay. Seeing no other indications, we'll now proceed to public comment. We'll ask—we'll ask folks to come up and if you could please just please attempt to keep public comment to one minute, that would be appreciated. Thank you.

Good evening, Mr. Chair. Chris McKayley, here on behalf of the Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority, in support of AB 53, particularly the charter bus language that will assist us in delivering proper transportation service for next summer's FIFA World Cup. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Mr. Chair and Members, Brendan Twohig, on behalf of the California Air Pollution Control Officers Association. We appreciate the AB 617 community air protection funding that's included in AB 105, as well as the Clean Cars for All funding.

And I did want to take this opportunity to say we're very appreciative of the continuous appropriation for the AB 617 Community Air Protection Program that's identified in SB 840. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chair and Senators. Doug Subers on behalf of the California Professional Firefighters.

We appreciate the Committee and the staff and the Administration for working with us on a handful of items in AB 105, the Prop 4 spending plan, specifically Section 73 and 74, the CAL FIRE movement, full time staffing for the firefighter one positions, same in AB 149, that language that facilitates the movement to permanent staffing.

We'd like to thank the Committee for AB 156 and Section 4, expanding the displaced firefighter list, and lastly, the changes to the MOU for bargaining unit eight and AB 161. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman, Members. Aaron Reed representing CAL FIRE Local 2881. I let Doug go first because we're on the same position, so ditto what Doug just said. I won't repeat any of it.

Perhaps I want to say one thing about the MOU, we're one of the last of 21 units to get a deal where we give back money to help the state out of the deficit that they're facing. So, that took a lot of work.

And I want to thank the staff here and particularly, Hans Herman, who's in the audience, who kept me advised daily. So, I appreciate that kind of staff work. It's amazing. So, I appreciate your help with CAL FIRE.

Many of you have had fires in your districts and I know Senator Laird had his house get real close to a fire. The largest fire Department in California and probably the second largest fire Department in the United States. Thank you.

Good evening, Chair and Members. Natalie Brown with the Planning and Conservation League. We are deeply disappointed to see that despite commitments from legislative leadership, public outcry and the urging of many legislators, including Senators on this Committee, Californians will see no relief from the incredible harms of the endangered species rollbacks and advanced manufacturing exemption this year, even as projects with extreme damages to workers, families, culturally important resources, and endangered species are already moving forward without public transparency or mitigation.

We have sent information to your offices already on the many ways that the so-called Senate proposal, AB 145, fails to uphold the commitments by legislative leadership to communities, workers, ecosystems, tribes, and fellow legislators, including the continued reliance on more broad, vague, catch-all definitions that will continue to harm Californians to the benefit of mega-polluters.

These projects, including the ones exempt under AB 145, have extreme and fatal histories of explosion, fire, groundwater contamination, hazardous waste mishandling, gas leaks, air pollution, including benzene, lead, arsenic, and more. To be clear, Californians will not be protected under SB 131, SB 158, or AB 145.

These cleanup bills do not fulfill the promises made by leadership for endangered species protections, safety from hazardous industrial projects, or tribal consultation. We implore the Legislature to do better for their constituents and hold leadership accountable to their commitments. Thank you so much.

Thank you, Chair and Members. Asha Sharma on behalf of Leadership Council for Justice and Accountability. We are also extremely disappointed that there is no cleanup on the advanced manufacturing exemption in SB 131.

Thanks to California Democratic leaders and the failure to clean up SB 131, corporations can now build extremely hazardous manufacturing facilities that handle explosive gases and toxic materials next door to homes and schools with no environmental review or public notification.

The Senate proposal in AB 145 is egregiously deficient with heavy industrial facilities handling PFAS and explosive gases being able to be built as close as 300 feet from homes and schools with no environmental review or community notice. 300 feet is the distance from this hearing room to hearing room 1100 across the hall.

This legislative session, we've seen legislative leadership turn their back on their constituents, values like environmental stewardship and equity and concerns from fellow legislators, which we greatly appreciate being raised today, to side instead with mega polluters. It's incredibly disappointing to see such a sudden shift.

We urge immediate action to clean up SB 131 and the Legislature to put real guardrails in place, not more false promises like those in SB 158 and AB 145. Thank you.

Good evening, Chair and Members. Jennifer Fearing, on behalf of Community Alliance with Family Farmers, Surfrider Foundation, and the National Wildlife Federation. Concur with my previous two colleagues. Also, want to thank the Members of this Committee, particularly Senator Blakespear and Senator Cabaldon, for their strong comments about the lack of protections and commitment to the cleanup on 131.

We're very disappointed about that and just broadly disappointed, as Senator Cabaldon said, about the degradation of the policy making process. Over the 20 years I've been here, this is the least transparent process I've experienced, and I hope, in the future, this body will do better. Thank you.

Good evening, Mr. Chair and Members. Brian White here to speak on two items. First, on behalf of Offshore Wind California, we wholeheartedly support and appreciate your efforts in moving the 225 million to help upgrade ports for offshore wind. Want to give a special shout out to Senator Allen and his staff for helping move that money.

Prop 4 voters voted for it and so, we think that's going to be helpful in getting these projects built. Second, on behalf of General Atomics, we support the 5 million for the fusion research and investment program. Appreciate the Administration and the two houses to help move that money to the table. Thank you.

Good evening. Alex Loomer, on behalf of Pacific Forest Trust and the Environmental Protection Information Center. Greatly appreciate the comments by Senator Blakespear, Menjivar, and others on the Committee tonight. And I want to echo the same disappointment that's already been echoed by a number of folks this evening.

The fact that 131 was jammed through in a few days and now we're having to wait months for meaningful cleanup, while meaning while communities and ecosystems are going to suffer, is really disappointing. The voices of tribes are already being silenced while projects are being built atop cultural resources and for what? Advanced manufacturing. It's incredibly disappointing.

I hope we can do better next year. Thank you.

Good evening. Amy Costa, with Full Moon Strategies, on behalf of Alameda County, here in strong support of the health trailer bill, AB 144, specifically the provisions related to gender affirming care, the safeguards for vaccinations and immunizations, as well as the Abortion Access Fund. Thank you.

Good evening. Dan Cha representing the Port of Long Beach, here to support the offshore wind allocation. Greatly appreciative of Senator Allen, Senator Wiener, and especially budget staff.

I think implicit in this funding is the recognition that without—that no offshore wind will happen in California without ports that are capable of supporting the weight and the height of these turbines, some of which are the size of the Statute of Liberty. So, greatly appreciate your support.

Good evening. Rebecca Gonzales with the Western Center on Law and Poverty. I want to thank you for your partnership in determining our state's response to the crisis created by HR 1, in regard to the devastating cuts to SNAP or CalFresh in California.

We are grateful for the investments outlined in SB 105 and SB 146, but we do remain concerned about the 74,000 legally present immigrants in our state who are here on humanitarian grounds who are no longer able to access food benefits.

We hope that we can continue to look at ways to aid this population, but we do appreciate the increase in funding to the food banks.

In addition, we are concerned about the upwards of 600,000 people, which now includes those experiencing homelessness, veterans, former foster youth, parents and caregivers of children over 14, and adults ages 55 to 64 who will now be subject to the strict 3-month time limit on CalFresh benefits unless they can prove compliance with work requirements.

This group, formerly known as "Able Bodied Adults Without Dependent Children," now includes many populations that face additional barriers to employment. We also want to pledge our partnership to bring down the CalFresh payment error and also supportive of the language included in the budget around the housing complaint resolution process with due process protections for HHD programs. Thank you.

Good evening. Raquel Mason with the California Environmental Justice Alliance. I want to align my comments with the folks who spoke before me from Planning a Conservation League and Leadership Council for Justice and Accountability. Especially want to appreciate your comments, Senator Menjivar, for reminding us about the warehouse conversation that we had last year.

It's a similar process where this was dropped on us last minute and we were kind of forced to accept a 300-foot setback, and so, it's deeply disappointing to see that double down in AB 145. 300 feet is never what environmental justice communities called for, said was sufficient, said was protective.

And it's deeply disappointing, again, that the fixes that were promised to you all in SB 131 were not accomplished here.

And yeah, we invite all Members of this Committee to come to our communities and see what 300 feet really looks like, what it feels like to be near these facilities, and why we do not think that 300 feet, as proposed in AB 145, comes at all close to what our communities deserve. Thank you.

Good evening. Jordan Curley, on behalf of American Clean Power, echoing my two colleagues before me on the support of the Offshore Wind funds. Just a thank you and support for those funds and we're very excited to see the potential for the economic growth here in the state that they'll provide. I want to also add on from my colleague at Environment California in support of that funding.

Good evening. Linda Nguy with Western Center on Law and Poverty. While we appreciate the budget does not subject foster youth or former foster youth to MediCal premiums and specifies a grace period for nonpayment of premiums, we remain deeply disappointed that the budget maintains MediCal exclusions that will result in immigrants losing access to health care.

In addition, we support the budget pieces that maintain access to vaccines, gender affirming care, and abortion services. And finally, we appreciate funding for legal immigration services, as well as the Bureau of Descendants of Slavery. Thank you.

Thank you. Mark Farouk, on behalf of the California Hospital Association. I want to say we are in support of the revisions and clarifications related to immunizations that are contained in 144. Also want to thank the budget staff and members, as well as the Administration, for the revisions and the language related to the hospital fee value strategy proposal.

I also want to thank the Senators for their questions related to that proposal. Thank you.

Chloe King, with Political Solutions, on behalf of the County of San Mateo, in support of the health trailer Bill SB 144, specifically the provisions related to the immunization safeguards. Thank you.

Yesenia Jimenez with End Child Poverty in California, also including CRAC in my comment. First, I want to thank Senator Wiener, Senator Ashby, and legislative budget leaders for securing 90 million to address the urgent needs created by the Federal Administration's HR 1 Bill.

This Federal Administration has continued to use every tool in their kit to strip food from refugees, trafficking survivors, and asylees, just like my mother who came to this country as a youth fleeing a civil war.

The inclusion of 20 million in Cal Food to support these newly excluded CalFresh families sends a clear message that California will fight for a food for all future. The money invested for our counties will give workers the tools to fight back as they are forced to implement new federal time limits that impact families with children, veterans, foster youth, and more.

The 30 million invested to prevent California from being subject to a $2 billion federal penalty is a start to ensure our entire anti-hunger safety net is not put into jeopardy due to HR 1. Our immigrant families and children face daily kidnappings and are disappeared, so any investments that this state makes keep our families together.

So, we appreciate for the additional investments, and we celebrate the childcare package included in AB 151 that secures benefits for our workers, childcare workers.

And lastly, sharing the comments of my Western Center colleague, while we wish discriminatory MediCal premiums targeting immigrant adults and the new asset limit tests were not included in this budget, we know your latest commitments show you don't wish to remain in a health care system that discriminates.

We hope to work with you to ensure health healthcare for all really becomes a reality in the State of California again. Thank you.

Hello. Kat DeBurgh with the Health Officers Association of California, here in support of the AB 144 provisions that allow California to make science-based recommendations on vaccines and other preventive medicine. Thank you.

Good evening. Kim Delfino, on behalf of Audubon California, the California Native Plant Society, and the Power Nature Core Coalition. I'll start with a positive comment which is we are appreciative that proposition for climate bond funding is finally being appropriated.

That funding is desperately needed, particularly as we see cutbacks from the federal funding for a lot of conservation habitat and other important projects around the State of California.

My other comments though would align with the concerns that have been raised by numerous other environmental justice and environmental groups about the deep disappointment in not seeing a cleanup for SB 131. Many of you have already made up here on the dais very good comments.

Thank you, Senator Blakespear, Senator Menjivar, Senator Laird, and others for raising the concerns about SB—the threat of SB 131 to habitat and communities. We're deeply disappointed that commitments were made to try to clean that up. SB 145 is, as already commented, not nearly enough. And frankly, SB 158 is—really doesn't do anything. It doesn't protect habitat, doesn't protect communities.

And you know, it's really sad to see that California seems to be walking away from its leadership role in protecting communities, particularly overburdened communities. We're talking about putting advanced manufacturing projects right next to schools, homes, soccer fields.

These are communities that have already borne the brunt of extreme pollution, and now we're moving these types of projects with no environmental review. Frankly, I'm shocked by it and I'm super disappointed not to see the fact that commitments made were not commitments followed through. Thank you.

Good evening. Michelle Gibbons with CHIAC, representing local health departments across the state, here in support of the provisions in AB 144 to ensure access to vaccines and preventive services. It's an important step to protect the health of Californians. Thank you.

Mr. Chair and Members, Steve Baker, with Aaron Read & Associates, for the Upper San Gabriel Valley Municipal Water District. We just want to thank the Committee and staff for including the golden mussel provisions in AB 149. It's critical to keep delivering water to Southern California. So, thank you for everything you've done.

Good evening, Chair and Members. My name is Sadalia King with UDW AFSCME Local 3930 on behalf of Child Care Providers United. AB 151 will not only ratify the tentative agreement with the state, but ultimately move the state toward expanding affordable child care for working families and a step closer to respecting the profession.

As for IHSS, we want to thank you for protecting overtime pay from the attacks from the Trump administration embodied in AB 156. Your leadership on this will will make a significant difference to thousands of providers, their recipients, and the availability of home care services. We also appreciate the effort to prioritize the streamlining in county bargaining.

AB 156 also streamlines the mediation fact finding process in IHSS collective bargaining to make sure their contacts are reached in a reasonable timeline. In conclusion, thank you for standing with care providers and we urge your aye vote. Thank you.

Good evening. Angela Hill, California Medical Association. We want to thank staff, committee, and the administration for your leadership on protecting access to life saving vaccines. CMA is in strong support in the provisions within AB 144 that ensure California remains and retains access to coverage for vaccines that are known to be safe and effective. And we are really grateful for the state's leadership on this issue. Thank you.

Chair and Members. Kathy Viatella with East Bay Municipal Utility District. I want to align my comments with the previous speaker regarding the golden mussel provisions in AB 149. These will also, in addition to help moving water, they will protect water infrastructure and also our freshwater ecosystem. So thank you.

Kelly Brooks here on behalf of several clients. First, on behalf of the County Welfare Directors Association, we appreciate the set aside funds for counties to assist clients with federal CalFresh work requirements and the $20 million for CalFoods. CWDA supports the funding for CalFresh payment error rate reduction and the housing and homelessness dispute resolution language.

On behalf of the California Association of Public Hospitals and Health Systems and the Urban Counties of California here to voice our support for the vaccine provisions and AB 144. We thank the legislature and the administration for their collaboration on that. And finally, on behalf of the Urban Counties, we're in support of the provisions in the elections trailer bill. Thank you.

Thank you very much. Vanessa Cajina on behalf of the California Academy of Family Physicians, Vision y Compromiso, the statewide network of promotores and community health workers, and CalPACE, the statewide PACE association here in support of the provisions in AB SB 144 to keep immunizations affordable and accessible.

Good evening. Christine Smith with Health Access California. Health Access is a co-chair of the Health4All Coalition, appreciates the Legislature's exemption of immigrant foster youth and former foster youth from provisions related to the freeze on Medi-Cal enrollment, payments of premiums, and elimination of adult dental adopted in the 25-26 budget.

This is a good first step. However, the majority of health cuts for undocumented Californians remain the same, with about a million Californians set to either lose their coverage or face higher Medi-Cal costs. The Legislature can and should do more, especially at a time when our undocumented community needs our state to stand up and fight back against the Trump administration's cruel attacks.

We do appreciate the Legislature's work to authorize Healthcare Affordability Reserve Fund for Covered California health plans to defray the cost of offering gender affirming care and the establishment of Abortion Access Fund to provide funding for abortion services and also the guidance related to provision of immunizations and coverage and delivery of critical preventive health care services. Thank you.

Good evening. Erin Evans-Fudem representing Santa Clara County. The County of Santa Clara supports the vaccine protection access provisions of AB 144 as well as important provisions that are unique to Santa Clara County in SB 162 and AB 162. Excuse me. That resolves some conflicts in state law related to our own special election. Thank you.

Good evening. Kyra Ross on behalf of the City of Burbank here in appreciation for the language on golden mussels in AB 149. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Vice Chair and Senators. Coby Pizzotti on behalf of the California Association of Psychiatric Technicians. We are the largest direct level of care provider for mentally ill inmates, patients, and individuals with developmental disabilities. AB 161 is the MOU ratification of our contract. Hopefully I can win Mr. Niello's support on this one by saying it's very similar to many of the MOU ratification bills that you voted on and approved this year earlier.

The reason for the delay in getting this ratified is we don't have the ability to do a work from home provision, so we had to find other ways to negotiate for something. And what we came on was a reduction in the days in which we were forced to work overtime per month. So we went from four days to three days and from five days to three days in DDS. So with that, we strongly urge your support for AB 161. Thank you.

Hi. Justin Garrett with the California State Association of Counties. We're grateful for several items in the budget trailer bills. First, we want to highlight the augmentation for county CalFresh funding for county workload to manage the increased workload that result from HR 1.

And counties are committed to working together on whatever else is needed to support the increased cost from HR 1 and protect safety net services. Also grateful for the goal for HHAP 7 funding to get out the door by September 1, 2026. Counties are committed to working together to ensure this funding which is critically needed for homelessness efforts can get out as quickly as possible.

Also grateful for the proposition for appropriations as well as the clarifying changes in the election trailer bill that will allow counties to effectively administer the statewide special election. Finally, CSAC is opposed to the changes to the IHSS fact finding process. These shortened timelines could actually be detrimental to reaching agreements, so we don't think they're needed at this time. Thank you very much.

Good evening, Mr. Vice Chair and Members. Beth Olhasso on behalf of WateReuse California. Here to say thank you for getting Prop 4 allocated as Senator Allen did. Thank you, Ms. Andolina, for all her hard work. We were a little disappointed to see the APA language. We had been talking all year about exemptions for existing programs.

At the very least the water recycling funding program is adopted by guideline, not by regulation. So projects that have gone through the competitive process in LA, Irvine, Paris, Carpinteria, Sacramento, and I'm missing one but... And San Francisco are all going to be delayed in getting those water recycling projects going because this whole new process we already have something that we do in public.

It's adopted guidelines. It's just not gone through APA. So it's a little frustrating that this got dropped on us. But we appreciate the Prop 4 allocations. On behalf of the Inland Empire Utilities Agency, really appreciate the golden mussels trailer bill. Thank you.

Good evening. Julia Hall with the Association of California Water Agencies. Just want to express our gratitude for the appropriation for Proposition 4. We look forward to continuing to work with the Legislature since there's more money there that we need to get out. And we heard some of that conversation today about the conveyance funding.

We also really appreciate the authority for state agencies to use the emergency regulatory process, which is what my colleague was just talking about. But I think all of the discussions in the subcommittee were about an APA exemption and we would support that moving forward. So we hope to continue to have that conversation. And then finally, just to support AB 149 and the golden mussel solution. Thank you very much.

Ryan Spencer on behalf of the American College of OBGYNs District IX and the California Podiatric Medical Association in support of the provisions in AB 144, the health trailer bill. Specific to California's policies on immunizations, basically to ensure the administrations are vaccines are evidence based and follow science. Thank you.

Brian Shobe on behalf of the California Climate and Agriculture Network. We support the Prop 4 allocations for the ag chapter and the trailer bill language in AB 149 for the new cooperative equipment sharing program at CDFA. And on the topic of mysterious Prop 4 earmarks.

We oppose and want to flag for your attention the Prop 4 earmark for lab grown meat research at the UC Davis Center for Alternative Meat. The Legislature rejected a similar proposal last year in SB 867 and it's unclear how this is remotely bond eligible under the Natural Resources Agency. Thanks.

Good evening, Chair and Members. Rebecca Marcus on behalf of the California Certified Organic Farmers as well as American Farmland Trust speaking in support of several Prop 4 allocations, specifically CDFA's farmers market program, Healthy Soils, and SWEEP. We also want to thank you for the work done in SB 149 to create the farm equipment sharing program. We also share the same concerns that were just voiced by the last speaker on the alternative meat program. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Vice Chair, Members. Mark Fenstermaker here for the Bay Area Air Quality Management District supporting AB 105, particularly the investments from the GGRF and 617 implementation as well as for the Clean Cars 4 All program through the Air Districts. Our program has been very successful, which is why we've exhausted those funds.

In addition, here on behalf of the Salinas Valley Basin, Petaluma Valley, and Sonoma Valley Groundwater Sustainability Agencies. Want to express gratitude for the funding from Prop 4 for small GSAs pumping less than 10,000 acre feet. They struggle financially to implement the Sustainable Groundwater Management Act and this will really help small GSAs across the state.

And lastly, on behalf of Sonoma Water, want to express our gratitude for support for funding in the Potter Valley Project, that is a very complicated project up on the Eel River. As well as express support for AB 149, the trailer bill on golden mussels. Thank you so much.