Senate Standing Committee on Environmental Quality

Are we good? Yeah. Good morning. The Senate Committee on Environmental Quality is now in order. Welcome, everyone. Thank you for your patience. We are excited to get our author here today, one of our authors here today, Senator Cortese, on SB 1375. This is item number six on the agenda of nine. And we will invite you to come forward and begin when ready.

Thank you, Chair Blakespear and Members of the Committee. I appreciate very much the opportunity to present here first thing this morning. I'll start by accepting the committee amendments and expressing gratitude, sincere gratitude to you and your staff for the work on this bill.

It's been a lot of work done on it, on the bill, and it's all been necessary work. The bill is a narrow and targeted solution for situations where major transit and rail projects have already completed extensive environmental review through multiple adopted plans and prior environmental documents.

In those cases, repeating the same analysis does not improve environmental protection, it only adds potentially years of delay and millions of dollars in cost. SB 1375 allows qualifying projects to avoid that duplication so those resources can be invested directly in delivering public projects that improve mobility, reduce emissions, and strengthen communities.

In my own district, the Diridon Station Modernization Project in the heart of San Jose is one example where years environmental work have already been completed by several partner agencies. The modernization effort there will connect multiple rail and transit systems, reduce greenhouse gas emissions, and enable transit oriented housing and economic development.

SB 1375 keeps all other environmental laws, permits, and community commitments fully in place. That includes protections for water and habitat, historic resources, construction impacts, and continued public engagement, to name a few.

The committee amendments strengthen this balance as they reinforce our commitment to community engagement and environmental stewardship while recognizing the environmental and mobility benefits of these transit and rail projects. SB 1375 responsibly saves time and public funds to enable the delivery of key statewide mobility, climate, and economic development projects.

With us, here today to testify, we have Sergio Lopez, who is a Campbell City Council Member and Chair of the Santa Clara Valley Transportation Authority, and Jessica Zenk, the Deputy Director of San Jose's Department of Transportation. At the appropriate time, I'd respectfully request your aye vote.

Thank you, Chair Blakespear and all the Committee Members, for having us here today. My name is Sergio Lopez, and as was mentioned, I serve on the Campbell City Council and I'm here in my capacity as Chair of the Santa Clara Valley Transportation Authority.

I wanna thank Senator Cortese for his leadership and unwavering commitment to bring critical projects to life in our region and across the state. I'm here to express strong support for Senate Bill 1375, which thoughtfully reduces duplicated reviews and saves public funds to enable the timely delivery of critical transit projects.

And as the author said, grateful for this committee's amendments. SB 1375 helps our communities deliver public transit projects that will create a cleaner, more connected transportation system and support our regional economy. Across Santa Clara County, we are actively working to build a world class multimodal transit system.

The Diridon Station Modernization Project in San Jose is a leading example of the type of public project that will benefit from SB 1375. It will bring together multiple systems including Caltrain, VTA, Capitol Corridor, ACE, and eventually BART. And I wanna stress the strong partnership that VTA has with each of our partner agencies and with the City of San Jose to allow this collaboration.

This will create one of the most connected hubs in the state and a true regional gateway for residents and visitors. This kind of investment will support thousands of good paying jobs. It opens the doors to new housing near transit and drives economic development in the heart of our communities.

And all this while reducing greenhouse gas emissions by making transit the more reliable and attractive option for all riders. As demonstrated in SB 1375, we are equally committed to strong public engagement, protecting our local environment, and ensuring that growth around these projects creates good jobs and expanded housing opportunities.

Thank you again, Senator Cortese, for championing this effort, and thank you, Chair Blakespear and committee staff, for your thoughtful work. And I would respectfully ask for your aye vote.

Thank you. And good morning, Chair Blakespear and the committee. As Senator Cortese mentioned, I'm Jessica Zenk, Deputy Director for the City of San Jose Department of Transportation. I've been working with our partners on this program since 2018, in the case of the Diridon Station project specifically, and really appreciate your time and consideration of this general bill. And I'm here for any technical questions that you have. Thank you.

Okay. Well, thank you very much for your testimony. If there are others in the room wishing to come forward and express support, please come to the microphone and state your name, the organization you represent, and your position on the bill.

Good morning. David Tran on behalf of San Jose Mayor Matt Mahan in strong support. Thank you.

Jim Lights on behalf of the San Francisco Bay Area Rapid Transit District. BART has not had a chance to take a position on the bill yet, but we're pleased to see this bill come forward and look forward to supporting it soon. Thank you.

Madam Chair. Duncan McFetridge on behalf of the Metropolitan Transportation Commission in strong support.

Good morning, Madam Chair. Matt Robinson on behalf of Caltrain. Echo the sentiments of BART. We don't have a position yet, but we will be taking it to our board for support as soon as possible. And I would just note we are the fully electric railroad that serves the Diridon Station.

Glen Garfunkel on behalf of Climate Reality Silicon Valley in support.

Okay. Thank you. So now we do have a quorum, so we're gonna pause for a moment and have our Committee Assistant call the roll to establish the quorum.

[Roll Call]

Okay. Thank you. So if there's any opposition witnesses who would wish to come forward, now is the time. No opposition witnesses? Okay. Anyone in the room wishing to express opposition to the bill can come forward. Alright. Not seeing anybody. Everybody in this room is here for a different bill apparently. Not to oppose this bill, Senator.

Alright. So we will bring it back to the committee. Any committee questions or comments? I'll just make a couple of comments about this bill. And I appreciate the Senator's interest in this topic. And also just recognizing that he had a very moving tribute for Mr. Diridon on the Senate floor, who recently passed away.

And so it's there's a synchronicity to dealing with the station that's named after him right now. So I'm a huge proponent of clean transportation, and I find that the Diridon Station project is a really exciting, clean transit project because it connects high speed rail, BART, and regional and local transit all in one hub in downtown San Jose.

And I think this is why the Mayor of San Jose reached out to me about this bill and this project to make sure that it can move forward. This is really the type of development that we want to see more of in California if we want to see that abundant and clean future that we talk about. But it's also important to recognize that when we're doing really large projects, we have to make sure that we're accounting for environmental impacts and community impacts.

And so this, the original proposal was just to have a straight CEQA exemption for the Diridon Station. But what we added as part of the committee amendments, which I appreciate that you're accepting the committee amendments.

And I think it's a really good example of what we're doing here because we're actually creating a new category of exemption that doesn't just refer to the Diridon Station, but it also allows other rail projects that meet these stringent criteria to be able to move forward more quickly.

So it's trying to find this path around how do we, how are we protective of the environment and our communities while also allowing these big projects to be built. So some of the things just to mention or highlight what we were doing with the committee amendments is there's now a requirement of a displacement plan.

Because there are already people who are living in the housing there. So to fully replace all the housing that's impacted by the project and requiring that the city provide legal services to residents who who would be displaced by this construction project.

There's also a requirement of a plan to mitigate the construction impacts and also a requirement for a natural resources management plan that identifies and considers how to protect the natural resources that are affected by the project.

So there already is this plan in effect, but there might be some tweaks associated with that. So recognizing that this is a big project and it is in a conservation easement. It's near or related to a wetland, and there's also a historic structure. So there are multiple different things that are happening with this project that are really impactful.

But figuring out a way to shave two years off of the construction and move it forward faster is important and an example of here in the legislature trying to do that important work where we can. So I'm happy to support this bill.

And I'm really glad that the author has brought it forward for our consideration. Alright. So I'll turn to my Committee Members to see if anyone has any other comments on it. Okay, okay great. We have a motion by Senator Hurtado. But first, but we'll turn to you to close first.

Thank you, Madam Chair, for all of your comments and for acknowledging the late Rod Diridon. It is very timely to be doing that still today. We haven't even, you know, concluded his memorial services yet. So I'm sure in a world where he could be proud of this, he would be because he's all about efficiency and getting things done without sacrificing environmental standards in any way, shape, or form.

He was probably the most notable person I've known who was an absolutely significant leader on environmental issues through institutions that we're all aware of and transportation in the same way. And I think this bill reflects that.

And I think it reflects it honestly because of the work done by the committee to say there's a path here only because certain conditions already exist with this site and certain work has already been done, and we're gonna go ahead and try to make that work. So we appreciate it, and hopefully others will see that as the bill moves along if it gets out today. I respectfully ask for your aye vote.

Okay. Well, thank you very much. We have a motion from Senator Hurtado. And so, Committee Consultant, please call the roll.

Motion is to pass as amended to Transportation. [Roll Call]

Okay. It's 5-0 and we'll keep that on call. And not seeing any other authors here, I think I'll present my bill, SB 1031 to the committee, and we'll hand it over to the Vice Chair to, with the gavel to run the meeting.

Thank you. We'll now move to file item number nine, SB 1031, and Senator Blakespear is recognized when she's ready.

Okay. Well, thank you, Vice Chair and colleagues. I'm here presenting SB 1031 and I gladly accept the committee's amendments. SB 1031 establishes a science based framework to ensure that compostable plastics support and do not undermine California's circular economy goals.

Specifically, SB 1031 will require clear and standardized labeling so consumers and composters can easily distinguish compostable plastics from conventional plastics.

It will reduce contamination in both recycling and composting streams and direct the Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment to study how compostable plastics break down, including their toxicity and environmental impacts, so that we have a better understanding of it.

California has been a national leader in reducing waste and advancing a circular economy, recycling or composting approximately 31,000,000 tons of material annually with a statewide recycling rate of about 41%.

Under SB 54, whose author is here today to my left, single use packaging must be recyclable or compostable by 2032. Compostable plastics have been promoted as a promising alternative, but our current systems are not equipped to handle them, unfortunately. Today, most composting facilities do not accept compostable plastics.

So composting facilities do not accept our compostable plastics. And they immediately attempt to sort these plastic out of their compost piles and take them to the landfill. One major reason is simple. Compostable plastics are nearly indistinguishable from traditional plastics.

This creates confusion for consumers and composters who struggle to identify compostable plastics and therefore treat it as traditional plastic that is sent to landfills instead of composted. At the same time, there are still unanswered questions about the environmental and public health impacts of these materials.

Without action, compostable plastics risk contaminating recycling streams and disrupting composting operations rather than advancing our climate and waste reduction goals. SB 1031 aims to eliminate the confusion about compostable plastics and help the state get the most mileage out of its recycling efforts. With me in support, I have Kayla Robinson on behalf of Californians Against Waste.

You're recognized for two minutes.

Thank you. Good morning, Vice Chair and members. Kayla Robinson with Californians Against Waste here in support of SB 1031. California has long been a leader in preventing deceptive environmental marketing, going back to Byron shares land landmark truth in environmental advertising law in 1990.

These policies protect consumers and the waste stream while ensuring a level, a level playing field for companies investing in truly sustainable products. When items are falsely labeled as compostable, it misleads the public, undermines trust, and creates a real challenge for our waste stream.

SB 1031 would strengthen California's commitment to truth and environmental labeling and build on the progress made by AB 1201 in 2022 by improving labeling clarity and consistency. This is critical for reducing contamination in compost streams, which can lower compost quality, increase processing costs, and ultimately send more materials to the landfill.

SB 1031 would also clarify that the misleading label compostable except in California, which you may have seen on products here, is not allowed under under existing law. There is a long standing legal understanding that disclaimers cannot cure any otherwise misleading claim, but this makes it abundantly clear.

Lastly, we support that this bill will also take a forward looking approach by directing OEHHA to evaluate the health impacts of compostable plastics as they break down.

As these materials become more common, we need to ensure they are not only effective in our waste systems, but also safe for our environment, soil, and public health. And for these reasons, I respectfully urge your aye vote on SB 1031 today. Thank you.

Great timing. So we'll now move to anyone else in the room that would like to express their support. Please state your name, your position, and your organization.

Noah Melra on behalf of the California Compost Coalition in support. Thank you.

John Kennedy, Rural County Representatives of California in support. Thank you.

Thank you. We'll now open it up to any key witnesses here in opposition. Please state your name, your organization, and you're recognized for two minutes each.

Great. Thank you. Good morning. Dawn Koepke on behalf of the California Manufacturers and Technology Association in respectful opposition unless amended to SB 1031. Unless it is amended to solve the severe crisis facing compostable products and packaging.

In plain terms, a ban of such materials by 2027. For years, California has pushed manufacturers to be more sustainable, more environmentally friendly, to innovate towards less persistent materials, and more.

Manufacturers have heeded the call, but continue to encounter policy roadblocks at every turn despite significant investments to meet California's goals. Unfortunately and respectfully, SB 1031 institutes new roadblocks that will accelerate the ban and create barriers that will inappropriately affect these materials viability in other states and internationally, much less in California.

SB 1031 prohibits labeling certified compostable products with any language indicating that the product is compostable except in California.

With the goal of ensuring accurate labeling is understandable, the fact of the matter is, however, that these materials are indeed compostable and being composted elsewhere in the nation and internationally.

Amid California's overly stringent standard for compostable materials, responsible manufacturers have already begun labeling their products compostable except in California to stay in legal compliance with California's labeling laws and that of other jurisdictions.

Such labeling is not deceptive. It is transparent. By prohibiting accepting California language, SB 1031 ultimately doubles down on the ultimate ban of compostables.

This will not only affect compostable manufacturers, but also tools that help divert our organic waste to meet our climate goals. We appreciate the engagement of the Chair and staff over the past year and a half on this, critical issue, but the accepting California label is a reaction to the underlying problem, not the problem itself.

And between this truth, this truthful labeling restriction and the inclusion of the OEHHA study, what benefit do either provide if these products are ultimately banned in a year anyway? For these reasons, we respectfully oppose SB 1031.

Thank you. You're recognized for two minutes.

Hi. Good morning, Madam Chair and members of the committee. My name is Jeanette Hannah. I'm the senior advocacy and sustainability manager for the biopolymers business at BASF, and I'm also a board member at the Biodegradable Products Institute, also known as BPI.

BPI is the leading third party certification body for compostable products in North America, and BPI certification builds on requirements and ASTM standard specification that compostable products meet for biodegradability, disintegration, and ecotoxicity in California statute today.

I'm here representing BPI to respectfully oppose SB 1031 unless it is amended. Our core concern is straightforward. SB 1031 does not fix the actual problem facing California. AB 1201 tied California's compostable labeling standard to the federal National Organics Program, or NOP, a program never designed to regulate compostable products.

Because the framework at USDA does not include these products, virtually all certified compostable bags, service wear, and food contact packaging will not be able to be labeled compostable in California starting 07/01/2027.

SB 1031 does not address this NOP requirement, and the resulting contents of this bill cannot save a market that will effectively cease to exist once this prohibition takes effect. A future without compostable products directly threatens California's ability to meet the goals of SB 1383 and SB 54. Certified combustible products are the bridge between those two mandates.

They allow consumers to divert food waste from landfills while giving California businesses a viable path to meet their 2032 packaging targets. If these products are driven out of the market, businesses that could have used compostable packaging will be forced to pivot to conventional.

If you could wrap up your comments.

Thank you. Plastic alternatives and both organics diversion programs and environmental targets will suffer for it. We appreciate the intent of this bill and look forward to working with the the author and their office on a fix for the NOP requirement. Thank you.

Thank you. We'll now move to anyone else in the room here to express their opposition. Please state your name, your organization, and your position.

Good morning. My name is Ismat Yassin. I'm a senior government affairs manager at BPI, also a long born and raised resident of California, and I respectfully request that we, you oppose this bill unless amended. Thank you.

Hi. Lauren Scott with CJ Biomaterials, respectfully opposed unless amended.

Good morning. Jacob Brint with the California Retailers Association with a respectful oppose unless amended position.

Thank you. We'll now move to the committee. Senator Menjivar.

Thank you. Madam chair, I appreciate what the, what you're looking to address here if we're not composting it. I think the analysis talked about farmers having to go in themselves and separate. I get that part. My question is one of the things the opposition mentioned.

If other states are composting this and they're looking to, like a better term, you know, do a standardized product and they're covering by telling consumers don't compost this in California, why are we not allowing the businesses to move forward with that phrase still?

Do you mind if my witness answers?

Sure.

I think from our oh.

Through the vice chair.

You're recognized. Go ahead.

I think from our perspective, it's a bit misleading. I can't speak necessarily for every other state, but I know that not every state is composting these materials. I think we are fine if for other states they want to claim compostability, but here in California, we've been really clear that we don't want these products saying compostable.

It's misleading. Consumers could still end up putting them in the compost bin thinking that they're compostable, and it creates a lot of confusion for our compost stream.

I will say right now there are materials that can use the compostability claim until 07/01/2027, and we're hoping that we can find a solution with this NOP issue that will allow more materials to be labeled compostable in the long term. But for now, I think the FTC has been pretty clear in terms of you can't caveat a claim. Right? You can't say this is compostable except insert thing here in California.

So those products can be sold elsewhere, but here in California, we want a really clear standard that doesn't confuse consumers and ultimately punish composters.

I would you know, I, I saw an example, I saw a couple examples. I did a go Google search on all of them. It's pretty clear. It's not like in super small fine print compostable except in California. I don't see the confusion in that.

I know we're asking a lot of companies to help us meet the goals and I will always be on the side and often on the other side of companies asking for us to do this.

But I also wanna recognize that as we request for a lot of these things, allowing a little bit of leeway on things that are still meeting our goals and for them to adjust. I would say if there's opportunity to continue those conversations, because they must be composting in other states if that's why they're putting it there. That was my only concern of the bill. So if through the Chair's willingness to still engage at least in that part.

Senator Allen.

Can I get clear? Are they actually getting composted in other states? Is there is, there in a, in a systematic way?

Who's that directing once, Senator?

Can we, I mean.

I, I can't speak to other states. I know that all 24 composters that were contacted in California, none of them are accepting these products. And so they're what's happening is it's essentially really it's composted, but it's expensive landfill because the composters are sorting it out, and then it's getting its way back to the landfill.

In other states, I mean, we're concerned about, the quality, the composters are concerned about what they can sell to farmers. And if it has plastic forks in it, then the farmers don't want it, basically, or plastic bags.

So if it's not composting within the time period that composters need it to, then they're not considering it compostable. But, I mean, I would, I'm open to others' comments on what's actually happening in other states. Yeah. Do you mind if my, if my witness and then we, opposition witness? Go ahead.

Go ahead. Sure.

And my understanding was that AB 1201 back in 2022 was a direct response to Washington State, composters saying that they were going to not accept any compostable plastics. And so our composters came together and said, we'd like to strike a compromise, and 1201 is what came out of that was my understanding.

So I, I think it's, I mean, a little misleading to say that every state is composting them, but, I mean, I've, you know, defer to others if they, you know, can, can say that with certainty.

Yeah. Who's, who do you think is the gold standard on industrial composting of these kinds of materials?

So perhaps, my colleague and I, through the Vice Chair, can both, speak to the elements that we know. So while I'll defer to my colleague about what's happening in other states, I would just say there are composters here in California that are taking these materials and composting them. There are obviously complexities to that, but to suggest that they are not being composted and accepted here in California is not the case.

The issue really comes down to those that are focused on organic compost, that being kind of where, you know, the crux of the issue lies. But I'd love to turn if the Vice Chair.

So you know I mean, you know the challenge we've always had is that so many of these products are theoretically recyclable or theoretically compostable, and they and they can be composted or recycled under perfect conditions.

But then in the real world, when we're trying to scale these operations, we're not whatever amount is actually getting composted or recycled at a minuscule level, so it's not worth us writing policy around that possibility. We have to look more big picture. I mean, I, I assume that's the theory behind the case with this bill.

I would just argue for other states are allowing these materials to be composted and labeling requirements with those other stable, states because of that and international requirements.

So who's got the gold standard from your perspective on really operationalizing these kinds of products and making it work on a mass scale, not just in a niche market?

You can pull that forward if it makes a little more comfortable for you.

Yeah. Thank you. Yeah. In particular, the city of Minneapolis, Saint Paul, is doing quite a lot of large scale composting. Also the city of Seattle has also, done quite a lot. I will say, the implementation of SB 1383 has put a lot of pressure on jurisdictions and, composters alike.

They've been been hustling to, create a diversion and pathway for all the residents in California and there's a myriad of challenges that come with that that really haven't been sorted out frankly. I know the report that was issued prior to the implementation of 1383 indicated California had only half the capacity, for the the organics that were going to be diverted under 1383.

And when you consider the length of time it takes to permit a facility, seven to ten years, perhaps, it's been published, but that's about the ballpark. We won't even in California have enough capacity until it's 2032 or so or even beyond that.

The other thing is that 1383, put a lot of pressure on the ability of programs to be implemented, which includes all the elements that we all know are important, like education, feedback loops, etcetera, to build these programs up. So that's what's led to a lot of the pressure, I think, that we're seeing in this space in California, and it's part of the growing pains that hopefully leads us to a more sustainable future.

So is your, is it is your suggestion that in Minneapolis and Seattle, because they don't have a 1383 system, there's less, they, they don't have to, there, there there's less pressure on on on creating a a really systematic scaled system. So they're able to take these products and it doesn't screw up a broader composting operation?

Yeah. It's actually an interesting question. In North America, most, composting programs have scaled from the bottom up rather than top down, which is more the model for Europe, for example. And so when we see really successful programs, in particular those that use compostable products, they're typically in opt in programs and they're also in programs that are more medium scale. Right?

So to take a statewide view with so much, such a diverse state, it's a it's a big lift and it's really important that we have it to drive us.

But see, that's the challenge. Right? So I, this is always the problem here. Right? I think, you know, if if in a perfect world, everyone would be sorting everything really nicely and then bringing them directly to the spot where it can then be properly composted into the right conditions.

But we know we're just single streaming well, at least we're single streaming our green waste now and and our, you know, we've got this massive system that we're trying to work with, and, and we're having all these people on the composting side who are finding that this is contaminating their, their material given their 1383 requirements.

But I guess what you're saying is these other folks don't have the 1383 requirements. It's a much more niche program, so they're able to work effectively with the people who really wanna compost these materials.

Exactly. And that just builds strength of the program.

Yeah. Okay. Alright. But there's no, there's no place, there's no place in the world that has the kind of the, the comprehensive ambition of 1383 that somehow found a way to effectively compost these materials within that kind of.

Yeah.

More systematic approach.

I'm not sure of any place in North America that has a mandatory organics diversion at the scale of 1383 with the corresponding capacity constraints, I guess.

Yeah. Okay. Alright. Appreciate, appreciate the dialogue very much, and, you know, we're always trying to find solutions.

I would just also offer, Modesto, is ramping up their operations to accept and receive compostable materials, for composting.

Oh, cool.

Recently just announced, kind of their efforts to, grow, their capacity there as well. So even here in California, that is happening.

Sounds like a field trip. Let's go to Modesto. Okay. Thank you. I'd love to check that out. I'd love to check that out. Thank you.

So I have a a really, you know, simple question here. I'm very sensitive to our affordability crisis right now. So if manufacturers have to retool, relabel, obtain additional certification, What will that potential cost could that look like on their actual grocery shelves? Could this increase costs?

Thank you for the question, Vice Chair. Ultimately, if manufacturers are ultimately between a rock and a hard place and either have to manufacture and label products solely for the California market in kind of a different way based on the constraints of 10/31 and other prior compost related laws, yes, that will inevitably drive up costs.

It also begs the question, do they decide to just ultimately abandon compostables here in California amid these challenges and the fact that as of July of next year, because of all of the comp compounding effects of all these different factors, they'll be banned in effect anyway, and so it definitely does have an impact with the cost to focus on just the California market.

Thank you. Senator Blakespear, would you like to close?

Yes. Thank you. Well, I appreciate the wide ranging discussion here. And I think just to frame what this bill is and also what was being discussed and, you know, Senator Allen was the former chair of this committee for six years, and so really was able to dive into this topic in the same ways that I've tried to dive into it. And what you realize is that it is legitimately a mess.

In some ways, California is ahead because we, we do have a really good composting system for the green waste that's produced. And then there, there's composting that's happening with fiber products. And then what we're talking about with this bill is particular, is around composting for bioplastics. So that's basically some version of a fossil fuel.

So, essentially, what this bill is aimed at is we're happy to look at the other best practices and gold standards for composting in general, but this bill is really aimed at a truth in labeling requirement.

So it's recognizing that we are having a greenwashing problem with products because a lot of things that are are being sold as compostable, and they are just, they're, they are not being composted by the composting facilities we have in California.

So we're, what we're doing is requiring that products have this uniformly green and labeled with the word compostable on one side of the product with the lettering being at least one inch in height, and that they can only use that if they fall into certain categories that the product is actually considered compostable. So what we're trying to do is weed out the things that are clearly not gonna be compostable and are also being confused.

So, like, for example, I saw a product on the market that was those Styrofoam packaging peanuts, and it says that they're compostable. But when those Styrofoam packaging peanuts end up in the compost and they look just like the white ones that are made Styrofoam that's not compostable, not recyclable, you know, it's something that a composting facility doesn't know what to do with.

So we need to have, we need to have standards around what is considered compostable, and then we also, and we need it to be clearly communicated to the public so that when people are buying something they think is compostable, it actually is. And so getting back to the relative narrowness of this bill, it's it's dealing with that. And then also, it's this, part about the, California office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment.

So they have to study the breakdown, toxicity, and long term impacts of compostable plastics. Because what you get into is a, a difficult science discussion of is this really good for the environment? Is it additives to soil? Is it just a neutral? What should we do about these products?

And so trying to figure out what we're doing with the composting industry in California is something that's really important, and we need to get our arms around it. So this is the beginning of that, and we're happy to continue working with the opposition to make it work, to make it not more expensive for consumers.

But really, we want the system to work, and right now, it really isn't working that well. So with that, I respectfully ask for your aye vote.

Thank you. Do I have a motion, Senator Allen?

Yes. So moved.

Secretary, please call the roll.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you.

Senators, the motion is do pass as amended to Appropriations. The motion, sorry. [ROLL CALL]

3-1, and that is on call, and I will hand this back over to the Chair.

Okay. Well, we have our file item number, Weber Pierson, is first. If Reyes is in a rush because she's been here a lot longer, do, is it, are you okay to wait for Weber Pearson? Okay. Senator Weber Pierson, would you like to present?

This is file item number 1, SB 958. Please proceed when ready.

Thank you. Good morning, Chair and Members. Sorry for my tardiness. I was presenting with the diversity caucuses in Senate Education. But this morning, I will be presenting SB 958 and would like to begin by stating that I am accepting the committee amendments and would like to thank the staff of this committee and the Chair of this committee for working with me and my staff and sponsors on this bill.

SB 958 in its current form provides a pathway to allow the City of San Diego's Midway Rising Redevelopment Project to proceed following years of extensive planning, environmental review, and two voter approved measures.

The City of San Diego faces an acute housing shortage, with the median home price exceeding $1 million. As of December 2024, the Regional Housing Needs Assessment found that San Diego will need over a 100,000 new housing units by 2029 to meet the demand of all income levels.

The City of San Diego has advanced the transformative Midway Rising Project for several years to address the region's acute housing shortage while revitalizing a centrally located but underperforming public asset.

In 2021, the city initiated a formal process to lease approximately 49 acres of surplus city property at the San Diego Sports Arena site in the Midway District to facilitate development of what may soon become one of the largest affordable housing projects in western United States.

The project replaces an aging obsolete arena and expansive surface parking lots with climate resilient transit oriented community that prioritizes housing production, active transportation, and high quality public spaces while maintaining the site's long standing role as a regional entertainment destination.

More specifically, the project will create at least 4,250 residential units of which at least 2,000 will be affordable, a modern 16,000 seat multipurpose sports and entertainment venue that will achieve LEED gold certification for a new construction within one year following completion.

And over 14 acres of parks and public space and a mixed use entertainment arts and cultural district. The Midway Rising Project is projected to generate 285 million in local economic impact, including thousands of permanent jobs, new businesses, and new tax revenues for the City and County of San Diego.

Based on committee and community feedback, the commitment the amendments will shift the bill away from a full CEQA exemption and instead clarify CEQA law so that impacts related to increased building height are properly accounted for within the project's future environmental impact report. The amended bill will simply provide a guided perspective to the courts.

SB 958 helps ensure that our environmental review process remains focused, consistent, and predictable, so that agencies, courts, and stakeholders are all operating with a shared understanding of the law. Joining me today is Moira Topp representing the City of San Diego, as well as Heidi Vonblum, the City Planning Director, who is our technical expert and can answer any questions needed. Thank you.

Thank you, Chair and Members. Again, Moira Topp on behalf of San Diego Mayor Todd Gloria, the sponsor of the measure. Again, this Midway Rising Project is proposed to use city owned land that, as the Senator described, is a vast land of old, decrepit, black asphalt and an aging sports arena.

It really truly will revitalize the community. Not only adding a tremendous amount of housing desperately needed for the city, but including commercial space, green space, parks and parklets, walking pedestrian pathways, and a rebuilt sports arena that will bring also much needed economic development and jobs to the area.

As noted, this proposal and this project has been put before the San Diego City voters twice in the last seven years, and yet seven years later, here we are without having broken ground. SB 958 will provide the city and the developer with some certainty as the project moves forward.

We have been continuing to do significant environmental review and mitigation of the project. The city is poised to certify an EIR in the coming weeks and months. And again, this bill as proposed to be amended will provide us guidance and certainty as we move forward. From the city's perspective, this is exactly the kind of housing development that we have heard from the state in terms of the types of projects.

It's infill. It's taking unused space. We've used the Surplus Land Act to further this project, and we're actually building almost twice as many affordable housing units than are required by the Surplus Land Act. We're very proud of this project. On behalf of the Mayor and the many San Diegans who hope to call Midway Rising their home, we ask for your aye vote today. Thank you.

Thank you. Did did you wanna testify? No.

She's here for questions, if you have any.

Okay. Great. Anybody else in the room wishing to come forward and express support, please come to the microphone. State your name, organization, and position on the bill.

Judy Yee, [unintelligible] in support.

Okay. Thank you. Anybody opposed to the bill lead opposition witnesses, please come forward. Not seeing any. Anybody wishing to express opposition to this bill, please come to the microphone.

Express your name. Is that somebody standing? No. Okay. Wow.

Alright. Great. We'll come back to the committee, and I'll just make a couple of comments here. So, representing San Diego myself, I also am very what very much aware of the Midway Rising Project because as was stated, it's gone to the voters twice, and it has been an area that is in desperate need of revitalization. As the author said, this is, of course, in her district and she's very much aware of this.

And as she said, it's underutilized and has so much potential to be so much better and to help solve our problems like our housing crisis. So it's it is predominantly a vacant parking lot and an old stadium, so a lot of asphalt, and it will create 42, 4,250 new residential units with 2,000 of them at least being affordable and have a new stadium.

Midway Midway Rising is being held back right now by a court ruling that found that the city did not do an adequate job of analyzing impacts related to building heights in the EIR. But the criteria that the judge used to assess this was it really set an impossible standard for developers because how how are they supposed to do studies on things that have never had to have been studied before?

It's just essentially an open ended question about studying everything under the sun, including peregrine falcons possibility of the buildings becoming an attractant, which is something that would just not be considered by, I I think, an average developer and also shadows and other things.

So this is the kind of thing that discourages confidence in the SQL process, and so we end up with having to deal with it in the legislature. So we we want to have a SQL process that works and to get projects like Midway Rising built. So so I'm happy to support this today.

I understand there's a lot of conversation remaining with the city, the developer, the author's office about what is the best way to manage this going forward, but I'm happy to continue to support it as it moves into different committees. And I just really wanna thank the author for taking this on and helping the city to get across the finish line faster.

So with that, any other comments? Okay. We'll turn it back to the author for close.

Well, thank you, chair. You know, the legislature has pro proven time and time again that, you know, we wanna bolster housing production without being overly burdensome while maintaining the at most environmental review. And this bill balances both of those, and so I respectfully ask for your aye vote.

Thank you. Please call the roll. We have a motion. Oh, I'm sorry. Do we have a motion?

Okay. The Vice Chair moves and the motion is it is do passed to local government.

[Roll call]

It's three to zero, and we will keep that on call.

Have fun presenting your bill, Madam Chair.

Thank you.

We're gonna now move to file item number two, SB 1075, Senator Reyes. You're recognized when you're ready.

Thank you, Madam Chair, Vice Chair, members for this opportunity to present SP 1075, the Clean Air Promise. I would like to start by thanking the committee for their work, for their hard work on this bill. I'm accepting the bolded amendments listed as listed on page 12 of the committee analysis that refers to comments two, three, four and five.

In addition, I appreciate the conversations we've had with our local air district, and I am committed to removing the language that adds an EJ representative on the Air District Boards, removing the language that adds the ability for CARB to audit to take or and take corrective action. And finally, I am committed to continue continuing work on the placement or where we place local community emission reduction plans known as LCERP's throughout the bill.

These amendments will be incorporated in this bill should it move forward to its next committee, Senate local government. SB 1075 bills on the state's promise of clean air for all by strengthening enforcement and ensuring this promise leads to real results. It has been nearly a decade since the passage of AB 617, which as part of the cap and trade negotiations that took place that year, offered the promise of local emissions reductions in our most polluted communities.

As of 2026, there have been 19 communities granted a community emissions reduction plan or CERP designation because of AB 617's community air protection program. Each CERP is documented is a documented plan that requires specific reduction measures and an enforcement plan for impacted communities.

Despite the importance of this program, there is consistently been a fundamental disconnect between program goals and efforts to maximize emissions reductions in impacted communities. Specifically, even when plans are identified in the CERP for implementation, there are no requirements for local governments to comply with the emissions reduction measures identified by state agencies, local air districts, and community members as they put together the CERP plant.

In order for AB 617 to reach its goal of significantly reducing air pollution in overburdened communities, statutory changes are needed to ensure the full implementation of CERPs. SB 1075 will bridge this gap and ensure more effective enforcement and implementation of the statewide strategy to reduce emissions. I would like to address some of the concerns from opposition.

I understand the concerns relating to the shift in land use decision making and the deference granted to CERPs. To be clear, developments are still allowed to move if there is no reasonable alternative. I also understand the expansion of enforcement from the Attorney General's Office Environmental Justice Bureau is significant. It is critical that the voice of impacted residents be heard and an avenue for this is through the existing EJ Bureau. Members and staff, let me be clear.

This is not a finished product. The problem at hand is that CERP implementation has not resulted in cleaner air. Land use decisions and local development have not resulted in the clean air outcomes that the state has promised. The solution we need is to protect our most overburdened communities with real guardrails. I recognize that the bill in print is not perfect.

I am asking for the opportunity to continue working on this policy. I invite, as I have, collaboration and input from all stakeholders on SB 1075. The matter at hand is serious. It is critical that we address the air pollution prevalent across California. Cleaner air should not depend on where you live or how hard your community has to fight to be heard.

Impacted communities across California have done the work, identifying pollution sources, developing solutions, and advocating for clean air. SB 1075 fulfills a promise of AB 617 by ensuring more effective enforcement and implementation of the statewide strategy to reduce emissions. Here to testify and support are Dr. Catherine Garoupa, Executive Director for the Central Valley Air Quality Coalition, and Alma Martinez, Policy Advocate for the Center on Race, Poverty, and the Environment.

Thank you. You're both recognized for two minutes each.

Thank you. Dr. Catherine Garoupa with CVAQC. I also serve on the South Stockton community steering committee for AB 617, and our coalition coordinates coalition members on all four selected communities in the San Joaquin Valley and many leading the local community emission reduction plans. More accountability for air districts and integration of plans are two components needed to fully realize the potential power of community grounded planning.

Unfortunately, we have commonly seen the San Joaquin Valley Air District come with pre baked proposals that primarily give money to their existing programs and focus on offering incentives that do not address our largest pollution sources. Strengthening the California Air Resources Board's oversight role could help ensure that community priorities are implemented. Secondly, AB 617 communities are experiencing new polluting sources and expansion of existing sources, taking us backwards while promising that these already overburdened communities are being prioritized for cleanup.

These disconnects are in large part due to a lack of coordination with land use and transportation agencies and plans. For example, in South Stockton and South Fresno, we are seeing a proliferation of warehouse proposals.

More accountability for air districts and alignment of the plans created through the AB 617 process would strengthen the community air protection program. For these reasons, I urge your aye vote on SB 1075 and thank Senator Reyes for her leadership on this issue.

Thank you. My name is Alma Martinez, Policy Advocate for Center on Race, Poverty, and the Environment. SB 1075 is a logical next step to strengthen the Community Air Protection Program or CAPP approved in 2017 by AB 617. Under the CAPP, California Air Resources Board and Local Air Districts provide pollution burden communities throughout the state grant funding towards emissions reductions.

Community steering committees or CSCs made up of local residents, anchor organizations, industry representatives, and others come together to work alongside CARB and air districts to undergo an intensive two-year process to develop an LCERP or a local emissions reductions plan targeting emissions and emissions reductions and mitigations.

LCERP communities are those that consistently experience pollution overburdens as identified by CARB. To complete the LCERPs, local CSC's work diligently mostly on a volunteer capacity to identify emission sources and innovative alternatives to reduce harmful health and environmental effects. In fact, community led LCERP efforts in locations like Delano, California put forth an estimated fifteen hundred hours, collective volunteer hours towards their emission reductions plans. Once an LCERP is completed and reviewed by carbon local air district, the CSC can turn their focus to implementation.

Currently, there is no formal funding for the implementation.

However, some planned strategies are funded through existing air grants and programs. Senator Reyes' SB 1075 keeps the promise to pollution burden communities by strengthening local community emissions reductions plans and ensuring state funding is reaching its intended goal of emissions reductions. Therefore, we urge an aye vote for SB 1075. Thank you.

We'll now move to anyone else in the room that would like to express their support. Please state your name, your organization, and your position only.

Alex Loomer on behalf of the Central California Environmental Justice Network in strong support. Thank you.

Sofia Carrasco. I am a 17-year-old in high school in San Diego, Blake Spears District. I represent Youth Versus Oil and San Diego 350. I am in support.

Hi. I'm Taarika Sati I'm a 15-year-old from San Diego 350 and Youth versus Oil, and I am in strong support of this bill.

Hi. I'm Megan Nguyen. I'm 13. I'm from San Diego, and I support SB 1075.

My name is Miles Wakeham. I'm from Youth vs. Oil. I am 15 from San Diego, and I support this bill.

My name is my name is Maya Shunyan. I'm 16 and going to high school in San Diego with San Diego 350 and Youth v Oil, and I support this bill.

Hi. My name is Frida Vergara. I'm a 17-year-old and senior high school from San Diego 350, and I support this bill.

Good morning. My name is Maricia Barrias, 16-year-old from San Diego representing Youth v Oil, and I support this bill.

My name is Lexi Hahn. I'm from Youth v Oil, and I support this bill.

Hello. My name is Sofia. I'm 18 years old, and I'm from San Diego 350, and I support this bill.

Asha Sharma, on behalf of Leadership Council for Justice and Accountability, cosponsor of the legislation and the Broad Coalition of Environmental Justice Organizations listed in the analysis in support. Thank you.

Raquel Mason on behalf of the California Environmental Justice Alliance, CEJA action. Thank you.

My name is Azul Bey, and I am a senior at Sweetwater High School down in San Diego. I'm here supporting San Diego 350, and I am in support of this bill.

Good morning. Christina Scaringe with the Center for Biological Diversity and Support. Thank you.

Good morning. Guillermo Ortiz with the Natural Resources Defense Council in support of the bill.

Hi. My name is Diego Sandoval, and I'm a senior in high school representing Youth v Oil, and I support this bill.

Hi. My name is Daryn Tarasewicz. I am a sophomore from San Diego. I'm 15 years old, and I support this bill.

Hello. My name is Diana Tapia. I'm a Stockton resident, and I support this bill.

Hello. I'm Kylie Wong. I'm a Stockton resident and I support this bill.

Good morning. I'm Janet Perisado Vargas from Communities for a Better Environment, and we support this bill. Thank you.

Gabriel Tolson on behalf of the Planning and Conservation League in support, also expressing support on behalf of Mothers Out Front Silicon Valley. Thank you.

Hello. My name is Carlos Lopez. I'm a junior in high school from San Diego, and I support this bill.

Good morning. My name is Lisa Tanaka from South Coast Air Quality Management District. And here, while we don't have an official position, deeply appreciative of working with Senator Reyes, and we'll continue to do so to make sure that the bill both reduces air pollution and serves the communities to protect public health. Thank you.

Good morning. My name is Gloria Alonso. I am, the EJ advocacy coordinator with Little Manila Rising, and I served the CSC in Stockton for six years, and I support this bill.

Hello. Jenna Roper with the Central California Asthma Collaborative in support.

Hi. Good morning. Ana Gonzales, Executive Director at the Center for Community Action and Environmental Justice, representing our San Bernardino and Riverside County, diesel dead zones communities. Thank you. Oh, in support.

Good morning. My name is Shazad, Stockton resident in support of this bill.

Thank you. We will now invite our key witnesses in opposition. You're each recognized for two minutes.

Well, Good morning. Thank you, Madam Vice chair and members of the committee. Kurt Kimmelshue here this morning on behalf of the California Building Industry Association in opposition to SB 1075, and this is a measure, obviously, as it's in print, that we have designated a housing killer.

Very much appreciate the senator's willingness to adopt the committee amendments, but until we do have a chance to review the language and exactly how that's gonna line up with a number of our concerns with the bill, We do remain opposed.

A few things I'd just like to highlight, given the dynamic of the amendments that are gonna be accepted is California housing projects are already subject to numerous robust layers of legal compliance on the very issues that this bill seeks to address, air quality, public health impacts, and impacts on disadvantaged communities.

CEQA already provides extensive review, public participation, and private enforcement for these exact concerns. Secondly, projects must independently comply with federal state, and regional air district regs, including strict standards governing criteria pollutants, toxic air contaminants, and greenhouse gas emissions. And finally, every project that our members build must be consistent with the general plan, zoning code, and broader land use laws, all of which already include strong public process and litigation backstops. The reality is the new housing is cleaner than the existing built environment it replaces.

SB 1075, in its current form, challenges our existing housing shortage by layering on new standards and liabilities on top of an already comprehensive framework.

At a time when California faces a severe housing crisis, from our perspective, adding another barrier to housing production is simply not feasible at this time. And for these reasons, we do still urge the committee to vote no on SB 1075 today. Thank you.

Good morning, Chair, committee members. John Kendrick from the California Chamber of Commerce. We oppose SB 1075 as a cost driver.

We're worried and we appreciate the amendments that have been taken, the those were very problematic provisions, but fundamentally, we look at what's left and we feel that SB 1075 actually backfires on the communities that it seeks to help because it makes it significantly harder to invest, build, and create jobs in 876 communities by introducing uncertainty into every stage of the development process.

It undermines local government authority by requiring local land use decisions to align with SERPs and LCERPs developed by unelected community steering committees of elevating them above the general plan and zoning.

Any ambiguity must be resolved toward the most health protective standard with no clear definition or limiting principle. The results are moving target that developers cannot know what standard they need to meet to get a project approved and ultimately built. This turn permitting into a high risk process. It allows individuals to petition the AG for de novo review of local decisions for consistency with the SERP and LCERP. It empowers the AG to stay or invalidate those decisions.

In doing so, it creates a parallel oversight structure that operates outside of traditional planning and judicial review processes. This framework introduces additional uncertainty into already complex permitting processes. Even compliant projects can be delayed, challenged, or stopped after a robust secret process and receipt of local approvals. This drives investment away. When developers cannot predict timelines, costs, outcomes, projects don't move forward.

The capital for building the future that we want will go to other cities in California that do not have SERPs. They'll go to other jurisdictions. And that highlights the fundamental issue here. The communities covered by the bills are the ones that most need sustained investment, jobs, infrastructure, economic activity that support long term improvement. SB 1075 thank you.

SB 1075 makes that harder. It could impact local tax base. Again, we have tagged this as a cost driver, and we request a no vote. Thank you.

Thank you. We'll now move to anyone else here in the room in opposition. Please state your name, your organization, and your position.

Thank you. Faith Conley with Vitamin Group on behalf of the Supply Chain Federation in strong opposition.

Brendan Twohig on behalf of the California Air Pollution Control Officers Association in opposition.

Judy Yee, State Building Trades. Just wanna thank the author for taking the amendments, but we remain opposed in committee today. Looking forward to seeing the amendments in print and looking forward to work with the author. Thank you.

Madam chair, Dominic Demari here on behalf of the Sacramento Metro Air Quality Management District in opposition.

Chris Shimoda on behalf of the California Trucking Association in opposition for the reasons outlined by the chamber. Thank you.

Oracio Gonzalez on behalf of California's Business Roundtable in opposition.

Good morning. Mark Neuburger of the California State Association of Counties with the respectful oppose unless amended.

Melissa Sparks Kranz with the League of California Cities respectfully oppose unless amended.

Lauren Valencia representing the American Planning Association also respectfully oppose unless amended.

Good morning. Skyler Wonnacott, on behalf of the California Business Properties Association, in respectful opposition. Thank you.

John Kennedy, on behalf of the rural counties, oppose unless amended. Thank you.

Good morning. Daniella Garcia Hernandez on behalf of the Western States Petroleum Association in opposition. Thank you.

Hi there. Dawn Kempke on behalf of the California Manufacturers and Technology Association also opposed.

Thank you. I'll now move to the committee. Senator Allen.

Yeah. Obviously, there's a very wide range of opposition. I'm we've got some important business voices here, but I couldn't help but note the local government opposition and also the air board employees. Is that the inspectors? Anyhow, I'd love to get if someone who I'd love to get one of the local government voices, for example, to maybe come up and give us a little bit of a more nuance as to where they're thinking with regards to the amendments that the committee is offering.

Maybe the League of Cities or yeah. Okay. Sorry. I as I saw you walking into the row, I thought maybe I should stop her from disrupting. Yeah.

Anyway, no. I would love to hear your thoughts on the where the amendments are and where and is the league still firmly opposed? Could you walk us through what you're thinking?

Yeah. Thank you. Thank you for the question through the Chair, Vice chair. Thank you. We do have an opposed unless amended position on the bill.

We are concerned about some of the comments raised by chamber as well in this

In terms of economic development in

terms of the connection of LCERPs and SERPs and tying that to compliance, requiring the general plan to have compliance with those emission reduction plans, in particular, I just wanna know, LCERPs are community consensus driven plans. They can have a variety of actions in those plans, and there's no local, regional, or state oversight or involvement or engagement in the development of those plans.

So it's requiring compliance to uphold those l SERPs and SERPs in in both cases and tying land use decisions to those plans that don't have any other involvement from local governments or potentially have any land use information in them. We've talked, with the proponents of the bill and, and they've articulated that those LCERPs may have things like incentive bus programs to become EVs. Right?

There are other emissions reduction activities in those plans that the community wants to see. Those are great decisions for the community that that they should get funding for. And in fact, Cap and Invest has now authorized 250,000,000 for the 617program as of last year. Right? And so we wanna see those SERPs and LCERPs funded, implemented, and those actions move forward.

I think our concern is the compliance and constraint around local land use decision making contingent on those plans, right, that would potentially lead to invalidating land use decisions by citizen petition through the attorney general as structured in the bill. So that's where we can't move forward with land use decision and voiding land use decision based on plans that we're not engaged and involved with from the city perspective, that's tying our hands in terms of approving projects in our communities.

Maybe the author, do you want to give us a sense of how you're thinking about this? I know you care a lot about functioning local government and, love to hear your thoughts.

Specifically with regards through its chair. Specifically with regard to the LCERPS, we've made a commitment and it was something also through the air resources boards that they talked about the LCERPs, and we've made a commitment to continue to work out the placement and role of local the LCERPs within the bill. I think that's a valid concern and something that we absolutely will be looking at.

As to the part regarding the attorney general, that was an amendment that was taken from the committee. So that is no longer in

Okay.

In the bill.

Okay. I certainly you know, we encourage that dialogue because we, you know, we know how challenging it is for a lot of our local governments to address a wide variety of these land use challenges, and so I appreciate your engaging in dialogue with them. I wanted to just hear from the Air Board Employees Association. What's the name of the what's the group?

Up to the exit.

Capco. Okay. Good. Excellent.

Yeah. It's the California Air Pollution Control Officers Association. Officer's the air pollution control officer. We call it CAPCOA.

Okay.

That's the air pollution control officers from all 35 local air districts.

Okay.

So, you know, certainly, we appreciate some of the amendments and there has been dialogue with the author's office. We are, you know, on record to the in opposition to the bill in print.

Give us the crux of your

Well, there's other issues. Well, there was a number of the issues that we were concerned with are addressed in the amendments. However, there are concerns like with the LCERPs as well. Like, we don't have enforceability for that, so how that's structured. And really, I think there's a sense that more work needs to be done.

We're happy to have more conversations with the author's office. There's other structural issues in the bill where you have, like, you tie when you're in a community with the and the SERPs are in a community and you're and the operation of the steering committee and all that to the federal clean air standards. And so it says, like, if you meet the federal clean air standards, then it sort of ends in the your work ends in the community.

But the problem with that is you're you're kind of tying that to the wrong thing. That has to do with regional air pollutants.

A lot of what the work is being done locally is on air toxics, cancer causing air toxics. And you can't really set a standard to meet for that. With this federal administration, they could pull back on on what, what the thresholds are for the standards, what the standards are, and then all of a sudden you're just, you, you end the program in a particular district. And that's a problem.

And so we're really here because, we want to make sure that functionally how you proceed is actually going to be beneficial for the community, and actually get clean air.

And so there's, there's a number of issues just with the structure of the bill. I think there's some positives certainly with looking at, you know, when do you determine when a SERP when you're finished. Right? What do you do after five years and you can look at it and say, okay. Well, how do we wind this down?

And so there's some things, you know, we're willing to engage more and talk, and we certainly appreciate the author's, the senator's work on all of this. But there there's a there's a host of issues that when you get down into it and you look at how it actually works, there's some real problems, in our opinion, but of course we wanna talk more.

Okay. Thank you. Do you have any comments on this particular

Not specifically, but with the Air Resources Board, as was noted, the conversations have been very productive. And we're very pleased about that. In fact, in in my talking points, I talk about three specific things that came up in our discussions, and we've made a commitment to work on those three

Okay.

Very specifically. So I think what what's important is that we've made a promise to these communities that we're going to do something. We were going to reduce the pollution in the communities, put together the plans, and if they aren't enforced, then those all that money that was invested by the state of California Air Resources Board CARB, AQMD, they all went down to the communities that were selected and spent countless hours putting together these SERPs.

But if the SERP is not followed, then we've wasted all of our money.

Okay.

But nonetheless, I am absolutely committed to working with the opposition and there have been very productive conversations

Good.

With them. And I hope that once that the amendments have been reviewed, which I think were very good amendments, That's not the way I wanted to start my bill, but I think to in order to look at all of the needs of all of the industries, it was important to take those amendments and we did.

Okay. Alright. Well, I I'm have I I know the author's, extraordinarily thoughtful and is, committed to getting this landed in a wise place. So I'd be happy to move the bill when appropriate. Thank you.

Thank you. So Senator, and to the bill sponsors, I can appreciate the intent behind this bill. I think we all want clean air and, healthier communities. But for me, this really does go far beyond that. This bill takes what's supposed to be a air quality planning tool and turns it into a new layer of enforceable land use regulation with state oversight and even, even the attorney general's intervention.

So at a time when Californians are already struggling with cost of housing, of energy, of basic needs, I don't think that more red tape, more uncertainty, and more risk to build anything is really good in as I, again, use this layer of affordability. And this reality is that the costs don't stay with government or with industry. They get passed down onto the very communities this bill is trying to help.

So my concern is pretty simple, you know, from both the opposition and the bill's funds sponsors. How do we strike this balance, right, of not harming the communities we're intending to help?

Are there additional amendments that can be offered? You know, are you open to on ongoing conversations about how we we, achieve our goal here, but also not increase, the cost of everything? So if we can start with the sponsors and then go to the opposition.

I think when we talk about more layers, there should we shouldn't have to have more layers, but the fact that we had a layer that didn't have to become a layer as you're describing it, It was just something that was being proposed and if land use decisions honored that, we wouldn't have to have AB or SB 1075.

But because there is that need to make sure that that promise that was made in AB 617 about giving these communities a better opportunity and better air, that hasn't been achieved. If it hasn't been achieved, then something is still wrong. And if we still have the level of air pollution in these communities and we are still approving land making land use decisions that negatively affects the community, then there's something wrong with this.

Now SB 1075, I hope we're clear, only applies to communities in the AB 617 community air protection program.

It doesn't apply to every single community. When we talk about housing, we talk about the fact that housing is going to be limited. I hope it's not limited. I hope that the housing that is brought in is going to be reviewed and it's not going to cause more air pollution. I can't imagine that it would.

Housing is important. When we hear that this may drive investments away, I hope it doesn't because these communities, just because they're saying, give us clean air, sorry, we're not gonna invest there because it's gonna cost us too much. I think that there are so many so many businesses that do invest in our communities and I'm grateful to them that even with these layers, they know that they are doing something that is good for the community and the community absolutely appreciates it.

You know, I think that point that you just raised of saying that businesses would say, well, clean air is too expensive, so we're not gonna invest here. That's not what we're saying. What we're saying is that this process that you have created that does not provide any sort of certainty for the developer of a project, will make it harder to make the choice to invest in that community.

So without that certainty, right, you can have gone through a full sequel process, you could have gotten your local permit approvals, and still find yourself and, you know, again, it sounds like you've removed

If you can just direct the call.

Oh, sorry. Yes. If the AG portion has been fully removed, that could change the conversation a little bit in terms of moving forward. But again, like, it's the uncertainty that the current structure creates that would drive people to choose not to invest in these communities. It's not clean air.

Thank you.

Madam Cice chair, I appreciate the opportunity to respond, and I think specifically, you know, we really appreciate the senator's commitment to housing production in the state. I think she just highlighted, obviously, the dynamic that she seeks to, you know, can have our ability to produce additional housing units in the state to continue.

The only thing I'd legislature, in the last twenty four months, has taken numerous significant steps that everyone on the dais and the author has supported to really expedite housing production and try to drive down costs. From our perspective, the local land use determinations that are being made around new housing already work, and that there is an absolute opportunity for the community members to engage on housing production, frankly, more than perhaps a lot of other development that takes place.

So from our perspective, we don't think the bill is appropriate to be applied to new housing production, and that those are the part portions of the reasons that were opposed. But as I mentioned, we have a long-standing relationship with the Senator, and she's done a lot of good work for our members.

And so we're absolutely committed to continuing to work with her and the committee staff as if the bill moves to local government, to have more further discussions about kind of the local land use policies and how the bill affects that.

Thank you. And, so just to the author, you know, I appreciate the intent as I mentioned earlier, and there's a lot of different stakeholders from different industry who have concerns. And, again, I think I know we're all on the same page about wanting to address the affordability crisis and not add additional layers of policy that make it even less affordable to live in the state.

So would appreciate if you could continue to work with stakeholders on this bill, because I think we do both share a passion for clean air for our communities. If you would like to close.

You have my commitment to that I will continue to work with the stakeholders. I think the bill is too important to try to work in a silo. We have to be able to work with those who are with us and those who have, not that they're opposed to us, but they have concerns. And you have my commitment to continue working with that. And with that, I would request for the respectfully ask for your aye vote.

We have a motion. Senator Allen move the bill. Secretary would the motion is do pass and actually for clarification you did accept all of the committee amendments that will be taken up in the next committee?

So that we're clear, it is all the amendments listed on page 12 of the committee analysis regarding comments two, three, four, and five.

Thank you. So the motion is do pass to local government. Secretary, please call the roll.

Senators Blakespear? Valladares?

No.

Valadares, no. Allen?

Aye.

Allen, aye. Dahle?

No.

Dahle, no. Gonzalez? Hurtado? Menjivar?

Aye.

Menjivar, aye.

Two to two, that remains on call. And we're now gonna move to file item number seven, SB 1064, Senator Dahle.

Senator Dahle, you're recognized when you're ready.

Hi. How are you? Thank you, Chair and members. First of all, I want to thank the committee staff for working with my office. I will take the committee amendments. SB 1074 brings common sense to ARB Clean Truck Checks. AB-- no, A-- 64-- 1064 affects the all used vehicles.

These are vehicles driven less than 1,000 miles a year. This-- the bill applies on road use-- on-road heavy use of vehicles, off-road diesel equipment, and the special equipment vehicles. This bill does not change admission standards. Under SB 1064, these vehicles will not-- will be tested no more than once a year. These vehicles must still meet all clean air rules.

According to air-- ARB, less than 1% trucks fail their clean air test. Low use exemption already exists, the state regulations. This is a practical adjustment. Here with me, Kathie Muse and Dennis Albiani. Thank you.

You're both recognized for two minutes each.

<inaudible>. Forward if that helps. Is that better? Yeah. Want me to start over?

Yeah.

Good morning, Honorable Chair and members. Thank you for the opportunity to be a witness on SB 1064. I'm a proud owner of Muse Trucking, family-owned and founded in 1993. We have more than 31 years of experience in the trucking industry. Trucks move what our economy depends on: cattle, livestock, logs from Siskiyou Forest to local mills, farm equipment across fields in Glenn County, gravel and aggregate for all of our rural roads, heavy equipment and fire supplies for fire recover and rebuilding.

These are work trucks. These are essential trucks. Many are low-use, limited to 1,000 miles a year. Many run limited miles each year. Muse Trucking operates one low-use vehicle enrolled in the Clean Truck Check Program, but the story is bigger than just one company.

As someone who has experience in trucking, I know many ranchers and farmers. They rely on these low-use trucks and equipment. These trucks are not driven every day, but they're critical when they are needed. Replacement cost is high. Warranties and repairs are very costly.

Many cannot afford the new equipment. They maintain what they have, they use it carefully, and they use it when the job calls for it. Current rules require frequent smog testing, even for low-use trucks in rural areas that can mean very long trips just for the compliance testing. This costs time and money and pulls people away from what they should be doing at their work.

SB 1064 makes a simple change: smog check them once a year for low-use heavy-duty trucks, on-road and off-road, and including special equipment. This keeps the strong air quality standards, no change to the emission standards. It's about balance and it's about common sense when my industry is also facing many challenges. Less downtime, lower costs, same clean air. If we want to keep California working, we need to make sure the rules work too. I respectfully ask for your A vote and am happy to answer any questions. Thank you.

Dennis Albiani, on behalf of the California Grain and Feed Association, the Pacific Egg and Poultry Association. As agriculture-- well, first of all, she said it all. She's a great witness. You may wanna change curves if you have to. So as agricultural interests, and especially using the grain and feed as an example, we're really logistics folks.

We're moving animal nutrition ingredients all throughout the state, but not only on road; we're also moving them with yard carts and those things within the operations, as Kathie mentioned. And so the agricultural industry, we have lots of small-- vehicles that do low running, and then you would have to take these.

Sometimes it's 50, 80, 100 miles to the closest certification facility, so-- and that's not only trying to get that equipment there--and it's supposed to be low-mile equipment--then you're also taking-- you know, a professional has to leave work and doing the job that they're supposed to, wait for the certification, and drive it back. Or if it's specialized equipment, load that onto another lowboy truck, have that truck take it to the certification facility.

So you can imagine that-- I think-- I would bet that this-- if you really do the calculations, this is actually a net gain in emissions when you look at all the different times you're going back and forth-- the net gain in emission reductions, excuse me. And so, I think we should look further at these. I think the bill as originally-- how can we do these-- think more practically about getting these certifications, but getting them at an appropriate time, place, and location. With that, we appreciate your support and encourage an aye vote.

Next, I will have-- ask anyone in the room if you'd like to come up in support of the bill. Please state your name, your organization, and your position. Seeing none, we'll move to any key witnesses here in opposition. Thank you, and you're recognized for two minutes.

Thank you. My name is Will Barrett. I'm the Assistant Vice President for Nationwide Clean Air Advocacy with the American Lung Association. The Lung Association and our colleagues at the Coalition for Clean Air sponsored Senate Bill 210 to address a major gap in air pollution control in California. Over the course of several years, the Legislature debated the development of the policy.

The Air Resources Board held a multi-year process with public engagement to develop the Clean Truck Check Program with the goal of eliminating excess emissions caused by trucks that had failing, tampered, or otherwise malfunctioning pollution controls. Similar to the smog check program for passenger vehicles, this is designed to identify and correct excess emissions to protect public health.

Why is the frequent test important, and why is it different from the smog check for cars? Californians breezed the most difficult air pollution challenges in the United States. Trucks represent approximately 3% of all the vehicles on the road but generate more than half of the smog and particle-forming pollution.

Traffic pollution is deadly. It causes asthma attacks, new asthma cases, respiratory infections in children, and other health harms. The program is set to avoid 7,500 premature deaths by 2050. The health benefits are projected to top $75 billion. The program is easily the most impactful program that I've worked on in 17 years at the American Lung Association.

It's cost-effective and health-protective. We're concerned that the committee amendments would expand the opportunity for vehicles that are the oldest, probably most dirtiest vehicles to go longer periods of time. Even though they are low-use, they are very heavy polluting, and we think that that needs to be understood before any decisions are made as far as the excess emissions and what that will mean to the erosion of that 7,500 premature deaths avoided. That's what's at stake here: the health benefits of this program being reduced, being weakened, and being eliminated.

You can wrap up your comments.

With that, we urge a no vote, and we ask you to hold this in committee.

Thank you. I'll open it up to anyone else in the room here that would like to express their opposition. Please state your name, your organization, and your position.

Good morning. Sofia Rafikova with the Coalition for Clean Air, in opposition.

Thank you. We will now move to the committee. Any questions from-- Senator Allen.

Trying to get some clarity about some of the amendments that were taken. Yeah. I mean, I-- well, I'll support the bill with the amendments, but I do-- I wanna make sure we're not opening up-- I get-- well, let me ask the witness or the author, whoever wants to-- just to speak to some of the concerns that were raised by the opposition about-- I-- obviously, the bill is narrowed, so I understand it's an expansion, but within a narrowing, but if you've got some comments or response to the concerns raised?

Through the Chair.

Okay. Thank you very much. I think-- so, this has always been an interesting dynamic. Frankly, I did a lot of this in a former life and a former administration, for instance, that had the-- the cars, they book a certain amount of emission reductions. Doesn't necessarily mean-- they come when they, you know, develop the regulations.

These vehicles are so low that it's a thousand miles, and frankly, you're-- so that's the total they can drive in a year. And often, obviously, in Miss Dahle's district, but throughout, there-- your-- you know, if you're in the Central Valley on the west side, you might be 30 miles away from a certification center. So you're-- you know, that's each way, and then with some of this equipment, you have to put actually on to a vehicle and bring it to the certification standard.

So you're already making emissions to reduce emissions, and so while that's good once a year, this requirement, as my understanding, was twice a year before, and so, you know, we're still making sure-- you still have to meet the standards. You still have to have a vehicle-- you mentioned these are the lowest-- highest polluting. They still have to meet their standards and requirements. It's just one less opportunity per year where they have to travel the extended distance, put miles on, also have emissions while they're doing that, and then get the truck certified.

And, again, when you look at the benefit versus bargain here, the emission reductions, I think, are-- for these, they have been booked. For these ones just for a second test each year is challenging, and I think this is to offset the emissions that you're having for those vehicles that are very-- again, very low emission and very low-traveling vehicles.

Okay. Thank you.

No? Thank you. We have a motion to move the bill. I'll just say before I ask the author to close, my uncle's a trucker, an independent trucker, and I get, you know, every call once a month with every new regulation, or frustration with registration, or sort of-- you name it. And what I also know is our truckers are really hurting right now with the price of diesel just the highest I think we've seen it ever, if not recently, and this is common sense.

If any of us had to go get our cars smog-checked every six months, there'd be a lot more people in this room supporting this bill. I think it's common sense. We're not-- we're actually, I believe, reducing emissions by not requiring that vehicle to travel, you know-- if you've ever driven across California, you know how far it is, especially in the Central Valley, to get your vehicle from one area to another. So it's common sense. I'd love to be a co-author on this bill if you would have me, and please, would you like to close?

I respectfully ask for an aye vote.

Thank you. I have a motion by Senator Menjivar. The motion is do pass to Transportation. Please call the roll.

Amendments will be taken in the next committee. [Roll call].

That's four to zero and will remain on call. So we're gonna move to File Item Number Five: SB 1258. Senator Wiener, you are recognized when you're ready.

Okay. Thank you, Madam Vice Chair. I'm here to present SB 1258. I accept the committee's amendments, and the analysis. The committee amendments, replace the contents of the bill with a different, approach around remediation of hazardous waste sites on the Cortese List.

I do just wanna say though that, the even though the committee did not agree with us on the approach to the bill, I think it is important to, to make sure that we are actually facilitating the remediation of these sites. And when we have systems in place where the remediation has to happen before you even get a permit, which is currently the law with SB 423, that can mean that the project never happens and so the site is unremediated.

And so our goal when we introduced this bill was to say, how do we ensure the housing gets built, it gets remediated, and it's done in an efficient way so that, developers can actually get financing to do it, so it can be integrated into the construction instead of viewed as a separate issue. They can be done together, and I think it was a good approach. Obviously, the committee disagreed, and that's life in a democracy.

So we are accepting the committee amendments, but I do wanna say that we, you know, we intend to just continue in general, to, to work on this issue because, we wanna make sure we're remediating these sites, keeping people healthy, and building the housing that we so desperately need. So I accept the committee amendments, and I respectfully ask for an aye vote. And with me to testify is Meea Kang, the chair of the Council of Infill Builders, and David Grunat, the, with, Path Forward Partners, a principal geologist.

Thank you. You're both recognized for two minutes each.

I'll go first. Good morning, chair and members. My name is Meea Kang, Council of Infill Builders, in support of 12, SB 1258. I've been a practicing developer for more than twenty years developing more than 3,000 units of affordable housing, all in infill areas. And from a developer's perspective, we often come, come across sites that require some level of environmental analysis and mitigation. The analysis and mitigation itself can be pretty straightforward.

However, going through the process of the regulatory efforts make it very complicated. And there are many proven mitigation methods like vapor barriers, sub slab depressurization systems, soils management, and capping strategies that work, and this work is typically done during construction and are accepted practices and signed off by regulatory agencies. However, under current law, requiring site suitability before a project as entitled creates significant risk and uncertainty. Developers are not in a position to invest in re, in remediation costs prior to securing land use approvals and financing.

As a result, many Cortese sites don't move forward, and they don't get cleaned up.

Environmental mitigation and remediation of these sites is absolutely tied to redevelopment. If a new project can't move forward, the cleanup just doesn't happen, and sites can sit idle for years, if not decades. SB 1258 addresses this by aligning the timing of site cleanup and site suitability with how projects are actually financed and built, allowing projects to move forward while still requiring sites to be safe before occupancy. From a developer standpoint, this alignment is essential.

SB 1250, 58 strikes the right balance, protecting public health by enabling cleanup and housing to move forward together.

For these reasons, we are respectfully asking for the committee's aye vote.

Good morning. My name is David Grunat. I'm a California licensed professional geologist and certified hydrogeologist with over twenty years of experience investigating and remediating contaminated properties for beneficial use. I'm the president and cofounder of Path Forward Partners, an environmental consulting firm dedicated to providing practical, cost effective, and health protective solutions for contaminated properties while upheld, upholding scientific integrity and prioritizing community well-being. We regularly assist clients throughout the property redevelopment life cycle from pre acquisition due diligence and entitlements to remediation, construction, and post construction maintenance.

While we have helped advance critical housing projects, we've also seen many promising sites abandoned due to their inclusion on the Cortese List. Often, our clients are prepared to remediate these properties, but the uncertainty in qualifying for streamlining makes investment too risky. It's important to note that being listed on the Cortese List does not necessarily reflect a site's current contamination status. In urban infill areas, many properties are listed even after remediation of regulatory case closure.

Currently, there is no practical process for removing sites from the Cortese List that aligns with the acquisition and entitlement timelines.

Even with approved mitigation approaches, regulatory agencies require implementation before the project is safe, deemed safe for the intended use. Many of the mitigation measures are typically implemented during construction of the project. Moving the compliance point for streamlining from prior to entitlements to prior to occupancy is consistent with non streamline projects with, which undergo full CEQA evaluation. Common practice under CEQA is to either have a mitigation plan for contamination before construction or demonstrate site safety before occupancy.

Extending this approach to streamline projects ensures equal environmental scrutiny and safety.

Streamlining offer, offers an opportunity to advance housing construction, but without a contaminant, properties often remain undeveloped and unremediated. California faces a housing deficit and our clients struggle to redevelop sites for much needed housing. SB 1258 provides a sensible pathway to safely move housing projects forward at urban infill locations by aligning compliance timing with established practices.

Thank you. We'll now move to anyone else in the room here in support of the bill. Please state your name, your organization, and your position.

Good morning, chair and members. Catherine Charles on behalf the Housing Action Coalition, SPUR, Abundant Housing LA, Circulate San Diego, and Prosperity Action, all in support.

Thank you. We'll now move to any key witnesses here in opposition of the bill. Thank you. You are recognized and you'll have two minutes.

Hi. My name is Jubilee Martinez Brumbaugh, and I'm here on behalf of Communities for a Better Environment, or CBE. Many of our residents relied on top of, or next to contaminated sites. We oppose SB 1258 as published, which would lead to the development of housing on hazardous waste sites without guaranteeing adequate cleanup. However, committee amendments proposed likely remove our opposition and move us to a neutral position. We wanna really thank the author and the chair for their work to improve this bill, and we thank the committee.

Thank you. Is anyone else in the room in opposition? Please step forward, state your name, your organization, and your position.

Good morning. Raquel Mason with the California Environmental Justice Alliance and CEJA Action. I'll align our comments with CBE's and are thankful for the author, the chair, and all the work on the committee amendments. Thank you.

Echoing that for the California Coastal Protection Network. Thank you.

Asha Sharma on behalf of Leadership Council for Justice and Accountability, echoing comments of Communities for a Better Environment, and thank the author and the chair for progress on this bill. Thank you.

Gabriel Tolson with the Planning and Conservation League. Like other groups, we appreciate the work of the chair and the author to improve this bill. We're currently reevaluate, reevaluating our position and are likely to move to neutral. Thank you.

Thank you. Grecia Orozco with the Center on Race, Poverty, and Environment, thanking the chair and the author for the work on bill. We would like to echo the sentiments by Communities for a Better Environment. Thank you.

Benjamin Henderson with the Western Center on Law and Poverty. We will likely reevaluate our position on this bill.

Hello. Michael Rincon with Physicians for Social Responsibility Los Angeles. We thank the chair and the author for the positive amendments on the bill, and we are going to reevaluate our position. Thank you.

Thank you. Seeing no others in the room, is any we'll bring it back the committee. Anyone in the committee have any questions? No. I just wanna, thank the author for bringing this forward.

In my district, we have a Whittaker-Bermite contamination site that it was on the Cortese List for for decades. Our city worked very closely in, participating in that cleanup. And seven years later, we're still in the early development phases, which is a big economic, has a big economic impact on my community. So I appreciate your work on this issue. Do I have a motion to, or would you like to close?

Respectfully ask for an aye vote.

We have a motion to move the bill by Senator Menjivar. The motion is do pass as amended to the committee on housing. Secretary, please call the roll.

[Roll Call]

Four to zero. That will remain on call. We're gonna move to the consent calendar file item number three. We have a motion by Senator Dahle. Secretary, please call the roll.

[Roll Call]

Four to zero. That bill is on call. We're gonna take a really short recess for about five minutes. Thank you.

The committee on environmental quality is reconvened. We're gonna go ahead and open up the roll here. We're gonna move to file item number one, s B958, Weber Peirson. Secretary, please call the roll.

[Roll Call]

So now We'll now move to file item number four, SB 1097. Senator Wiener, you are recognized when you're ready.

If she's, like, momentarily,

Committee is gonna recess for three minutes.

Okay. We are on AB 1097. Senator Wiener.

Thank you very much, Madam Chair. I'm here to present Senate Bill 1097 to move California more expeditiously towards a clean energy transition and towards our ability to electrify everything. In terms of fighting climate change, clean energy and electrification are essential. The number one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight and nine and ten most significant threats to habitat are climate change, and so that's the goal of this bill.

The bill has two pieces. The first is shifting for clean energy generation, making the CEQA process less rigged against actually moving those projects forward in terms of being able to use a negative declaration, which right now, it's essentially impossible to defend a negative declaration in court if there is anyone who has the ability to hire an attorney. And so we wanted to shift that standard so that cities could actually expeditiously site clean energy.

I do wanna say that Texas and Florida generate more clean energy than California. That should be mortifying to all of us. They have governments that do not believe in climate change, and they are smaller states, and yet they both generate more clean energy. And our permitting system is part of that problem, and so we were attempting to start addressing that in this bill. The committee has indicated that it does not want that piece of the bill to proceed, and so that will not proceed. We're not going to give up working on this issue.

I am very sensitive to the need to protect habitat, and I am very respectful of those who fight very hard every day to protect habitat, but I also-- we need to remind ourselves that climate change is a much, much bigger threat to habitat than clean energy installations. And so I do hope that we can continue to move towards very quick permitting of clean energy so that we can scale clean energy with the sense of urgency that is needed, given the climate crisis.

So we're accepting the amendment to remove that from the bill, and we will pursue different permitting issues separately. The other piece of the bill, which is also very important, is creating a new CEQA exemption for advanced reconductoring, and advanced reconductoring is when we take our grid and we increase the capacity of the transmission line so they can carry more electricity and so that we can electrify more things.

It's very important work, and this will help get that done more quickly. And so I appreciate the Chair and the committee working with us on this, and I'm very proud of this piece of the bill that will move forward.

I also appreciate our ability to come up with an agreement on the form in which it will move, and I wanna state my understanding of the-- and the Chair can agree or tell me where I'm off-- that projects in habitat-- or projects like the pieces of advanced reconductoring that goes through habitat for protected species, conservation easements, or HCPs or NCCPs would be eligible to take advantage of this exemption as long as the infrastructure that touches the ground does not expand by more than 10% footprint. Up to that in an existing right of way for the transmission, up to that 10% footprint expansion could still utilize the exemption.

And projects in state and national parks, monuments, wilderness and recreation areas would be able to use the exemption if they expand the ground footprint by up to 10% and if there was already-- CEQA was applied to it in some form or another at some point in time. Outside of these areas, it's a clean exemption as already in print in the bill. With all this set-- and Madam Chair, did I state that correctly? Okay. I got a thumbs up.

Yes.

Okay. Now the one thing I do just wanna say, because this all came together quickly at the end of the day yesterday and we've been vetting it with our coalition partners, and we of course wanna make sure that everything technically works, what I would ask is that as we move forward, if we have technical changes that we would like to make, that we'd be able to come to the committee to work with the committee on that.

Of course. Yes.

Okay. Thank you very much. Okay. So with that said, we accept the committee amendments, as I have articulated, and we appreciate the committee working with us, and we're gonna keep working on this bill and other bills to make sure that we are expanding our clean energy generation profoundly and that we are moving towards broad, efficient electrification of our energy system. I respectfully ask for an aye vote.

Thank you, Senator Wiener. And your witnesses-

Here to testify is Lillian Mirviss with the Large-Scale Solar Association and John Kennedy with the Rural County Representatives of California.

Thank you. Good morning, Chair Blakespear and members of the committee. I'm Lillian Mirviss with the Large-Scale Solar Association, here in today for strong support for SB 1097. LSA's member companies are responsible for developing much of California's existing solar and storage capacity, as well as the future projects that will be necessary to meet the state's climate goals.

California needs to bring online additional 134,000 megawatts of clean energy by 2045 to meet our state goals, and more specifically, the Public Utilities Commission is calling for an additional 61,000 megawatts in the next five years alone.

That means that we need to bring six to 8,000 megawatts of clean energy online every year in the next five years. Building that clean energy abundance is the environmental imperative. Every year of delay is a year that we burn more fossil fuels and risk our reliability targets. It's also an affordability imperative. Projects must come online by 2030 to capture the federal Investment Tax Credit, a 30 to 50% credit for large-scale clean energy.

Missing that deadline means additional costs flow directly to ratepayers. SB 1097 helps remove a specific concrete barrier to that build out: reconductoring. Transmission constraints are the leading cause of renewable projects sitting stranded in California's interconnection queue.

Advanced reconductoring or replacing aging cables with high-performance conductors within existing rights of ways can nearly double a transmission line's capacity at a fraction of the cost of building new infrastructure. The barrier is not the technology.

It is that routine reconductoring work within existing easements is still subject to CEQA review, adding delay and cost to upgrades that cause no new environmental disturbance. SB 1097 removes that barrier. California has set the most ambitious clean energy goals in the nation. To meet them, we have to be willing to ask whether our systems are actually delivering the outcomes we want and fix them when they're not. This bill does that. I respectfully ask for an aye vote. Thank you.

Good morning. John Kennedy with RCRC, on behalf of 40 rural counties. We're happy to be here today as one of the joint sponsors on the bill. I will limit my testimony just to the aspects of the bill dealing with advanced reconductoring in light of the committee amendments.

So as Lillian and the author mentioned, California has really ambitious clean energy goals to derive 100% of its energy from clean energy, electricity from clean energy, to electrify its vehicle fleets and to shift buildings from natural gas to electricity.

To achieve these goals, we must significantly increase transmission and distribution capacity. Beyond that, California must already increase capacity to meet general economic development growth needs in our communities. In many areas, we struggle to get power in a timely manner to new homes, to vehicle charging stations, to hospitals, and so we think this bill will help in those respects. SB 1097 will help achieve those goals by providing a CEQA exemption for advanced reconductoring. To clarify, we support CEQA.

We support the information disclosure, the mitigation requirements, but it can sometimes pose a significant barrier for project delivery, which is why we supported the changes to the fair argument, which are no longer part of the bill. SB 1097's exemption isn't really anything new or wild. In some ways, it can be viewed as leveling the playing field and plugging holes in existing exemptions. Under existing law, the California Public Utilities Commission governs investor-owned utilities and how they proceed with transmission and distribution projects, General Order 131-E sets forth that framework.

That framework says, when a permit is required, which triggers CEQA, when a permit isn't required, which would not trigger CEQA. There's already an existing exemption built into GO 131-E for IOUs for advanced reconductoring project. The challenge is municipal-owned utilities, LEDWP, SMUD, others, can't use that GO 131 process, and independent entities who are building projects and transmission lines can't use that process.

So this creates a similar process for those other entities that the IOUs can already enjoy in some capacities. Beyond that, this exemption is similar to existing exemptions for existing facilities or repair and replacement of existing power lines, the main challenge with those being that you can't increase capacity of the facilities or power lines.

So we think advanced reconductoring really is the sweet spot. We minimize environmental impact by replacing conductors in an existing right of way with full remediation on completion. We avoid the impacts of building a new transmission line to serve that capacity. While this isn't the solution, it's an important part of the solution to get us where we need to get at lower cost, minimal environmental impact, and faster.

So on balance, really helps California meet our environmental goals while reducing impacts to ratepayers. We hope we can continue to work with the committee on refining the amends to make sure they're implementable and are pleased to support SB 1097. Thank you for the dialogue and discussion.

Okay. Thank you. Anybody else in the room wishing to come forward to express support? Please come to the microphone and state your name, organization, and position on the bill.

Good morning, Madam Chair and members. Delilah Clay, on behalf of the Independent Energy Producers Association, in support, and also adding support for a colleague on behalf of the California Wind Energy Association. Thank you.

Good morning, Madam Chair. Jason Ikerd, on behalf of the California Municipal Utilities Association. We have a support if amended position on the bill in print, but we hope to see it move forward and appreciate the chance to work with the author and the committee going forward.

Good morning, Chair and members. McKinley Thompson-Morley on behalf of Searles. We are supportive of the bill in print and look forward to reviewing the changes with our members and continuing to work with the author. Thank you.

Good morning, Madam Chair and members. Graciela Castillo-Krings, also in support of the bill in print, here on behalf of the California Energy Storage Alliance and Prosperity Action. Thank you.

Chair, members of the committee, Brandon Garcia, on behalf of Advanced Energy United. Similarly, supportive of the bill in print and look forward to reviewing the amendments. Thank you.

Thank you. And do we have lead opposition witnesses to this bill wishing to come forward? Okay, please come forward, and you'll have two minutes each.

Welcome. You can begin when ready.

My glasses on so I can see. Good morning, Chair and members of the committee. Kim Delfino representing Defenders of Wildlife.

First, I just want to thank the committee and Senator Wiener for the amendments that were offered and taken today. This bill is now much more focused on the issue of reconductoring, but we do appreciate the elimination of the fair argument standard, from the bill. Defenders, unfortunately, still have serious concerns about the amendments that are being authored.

Just to be clear, we're actually not talking about a lot let me just state, we strongly believe in reconductoring and climate change and the need to aggressively move forward with our clean energy economy. My understanding is California actually is a leader in terms of solar and geothermal development among all the other states.

We have worked very hard to try to come up with solutions to supercharge getting projects on the ground by trying to direct them into the most appropriate places that they should go. So it's not easy to get up here and oppose a bill that I think has good intentions. However, the devil is in the details.

And to be clear, when you look at the number of CEQA projects or number of projects, transmission projects subject to CEQA, it's actually quite a few projects that are actually subject to CEQA. The PUC did a study and found that of nearly 700 projects, 90% of them already get CEQA exemptions and only 27 of them had to go through a full EIR. But when an EIR is necessary, it really is necessary.

And for here, I think the concern we have is that while the transmission projects we're talking about are within existing right of ways, the bill as amended would allow CEQA exemptions on state park lands, wilderness lands, national monuments, habitat lands, lands that are conserved under NCCPs and HCPs, and lands that are under conservation easements. Even with the limit of a 10 footprint, it's still broader than any other CEQA exemption we've ever written in state law.

And even, with the caveat of requiring some kind of CEQA that has been done on that property, The problem is that that CEQA document could be for something completely different. It could be for, it could be very old. It could have predated AB 52 consultation.

So when we do these CEQA exemptions, we're basically saying we're not even going to take a look if there's going to be any type of impact. And again, this has implications for sensitive resources and cultural resources.

And we actually don't think what we're asking for really would slow down projects because again, as the PUC looked at it, they didn't see that this was an issue. And also when Assembly Member Wicks did her, permit streamlining report, this was not identified CEQA exemptions were not identified as a way of, of doing faster projects.

So we believe the bill will need further amendments and we really hope to work with the author to try and this well, I guess there's not sponsors, but to work with the author and others to try to narrow, the bill and make it a little more refined. And again, we do appreciate the amendments that were offered and taken and all of the work that went into this bill. And we'll look forward to continuing to work as the bill moves through the process.

Good morning, Madam Chair and members. Jakob Evans with Sierra Club California here on behalf for over half a million members and supporters in California. I wanna begin with a strong thank you to the Chair and the author for the direction of the amendments taken today to move the bill. Sierra California was deeply concerned with the environmental harmful impacts that the fair argument piece in the bill would have had, and we're glad to see it taken out.

While the bill is in a much different state after these very recent changes, we need to review the amended language before reconsidering our opposition. We will likely have concerns about expanding existing rights of ways for transmission projects and leaving sensitive areas like habitat conservation plans and natural community conservation plans and other conservation lands with less protection.

While narrowed, expanding the footprint of a right of way by up to 10% could still create significant impacts on sensitive lands depending on the size of the existing right of way. Furthermore, habitat conservation lands and natural community conservation plans typically identify areas for protection based on existing assumptions about development that will impact them. This exemption could upset those existing assumptions and expose protected species and habitats to harm.

It could also upset conservation easements depending on how they were drafted since they would not have taken into account the impacts that this exemption could create. We look forward to continuing conversations with to address this nuance with the author. Thank you.

Okay. Thank you very much. Anybody else in the room wishing to express opposition, please come forward. State your name, position, or your name, organization, and position on the bill.

Thank you. Gabriel Tolson with the Planning and Conservation League. We thank the Chair and author for the positive movement on this bill and look forward to working with the author on the provisions concerning reconductoring and transmission projects, and we will reevaluate our position once final amendments are in print. Thank you.

Okay. Thank you. So from here on, name, organization you represent, and position on the bill only. Thank you.

Thank you, Chair. Peter Ransoll, California Farm Bureau. Still opposed unless amended.

Good afternoon, chair and members. Martin Vindiola on behalf of the coalition of California Utility Employees and the California State Association of Electoral Workers. Just really quick, we are opposed to the bill in print, but we are looking at the amendments. Thank you.

Good morning. Christina Scaringe, the Center for Biological Diversity. We remain opposed but are in line with the statements by the opposed witnesses.

Alex Leumer on behalf of the California Coastal Protection Network, the California Native Plant Society, Resource Renewal Institute, Green Foothills, aligning our comments the opposition. Thank you.

Raquel Mason with the California Environmental Justice Alliance opposed to the bill in print for reviewing amendments. Thank you.

Shannon Priscilla Vargas from Communities for a Better Environment, and we're currently opposed to the bill, but we'll be looking at amendments. Thank you.

Ada Waelder with Earthjustice opposed to the bill in print and reviewing amendments. Thankful for the work.

Asha Sharma on behalf of Leadership Council for Justice and Accountability, also reviewing amendments. We're opposed to the bill in print, but we really appreciate the direction that the bill is heading and would like to thank the author and the chair. Thank you.

Judy Yee, State Building and Trades. We oppose the bill in print but are looking at the amendments and appreciate the author for taking the amendments and the committee for all the work on it. Thank you.

Hello, Randy Thomas, business manager of Boilermakers Local 549, Pittsburgh, California, stand with the State Building Trades in opposition of this bill unless amended.

Jamie Holland, business agent, Local 92, Boilermakers. We are in opposition.

Gracia Roscoe with the Center on Race, Poverty & the Environment opposed in print but reviewing amendments. Thank you.

Michael Rincon with Physicians for Social Responsibility Los Angeles. We oppose the bill is in print but we are looking at the amendments. Thank you very much.

Timothy Jeffries, International Brotherhood of Boilermakers. We're standing in opposition on this bill as opposed and standing with State Building Trades.

Okay. Thank you. Anybody else? Okay. Well, we'll bring it back to the committee, and I'll just start with a few comments.

So I, I very much appreciate the author, your patience in waiting for for me to be here for this. As you could see, this was a a lot of late breaking information and, decision making. And the author is a legislative heavyweight, and so I'm sure anybody who has been working with him for the last ten years knows this.

And so we were, still working on the details up until the last second. So it, it was really important that I come back here, and I, really apologize for the delay. So thank you for waiting for me to come back for that.

I, I wanna, recognize that I I think this bill has landed in a really good place, and I, you know, to the opposition's concerns, you know, if you want something to be different, you have to do something different. And I guess getting at the point of let's make sure there's environmental review within these sensitive habitats, these various categories of things.

But if they're outside of those, then we should be able to do this advanced reconductoring without having to go through a burdensome process that is that will add delay and make it it there's just no question that we need, if we are going to be electrifying a lot more in our society, we need to be able to get that electricity around.

So figuring out how to do that faster is something that this committee is focused on, and and I know that the author has been very focused on that and has, is a strong believer in the abundance movement and is looking to operationalize that through the legislation that he's introducing.

It you know, clean energy projects are just there it's enormously critical for us to transition away from fossil fuels. So we have to figure out how to get those built faster here in California in order to meet our climate and our clean energy goals.

I appreciate the author for hearing me out on my concerns about the bill and the approach that would have overturned the fair argument standard for clean energy projects and agreeing to take that portion out of the bill.

I think creating a new CEQA exemption for advanced reconductoring, which basically increases capacity of transmission lines for people who aren't, weren't familiar with that term before. This is a great approach to getting clean energy projects moving faster.

There are a lot of benefits of reconductoring transmission lines. The reconductor lines are lighter, which means they have less sag and are less likely to brush tree treetops or other vegetation, and that also poses a huge fire risk today. So we're reducing our fire risk when we do reconductoring.

And in addition by increasing the amount of electricity that can flow through these reconductor lines, advanced reconductoring existing transmission lines reduces the need to build new transmission lines. So that's, of course, would be disturbing more habitat and and, would also just be redundant when we don't need it to be.

So this saves time and it keeps more of our lands pristine. Committee amendments do ask for some of the protections for natural spaces including state and national parks and habitat for protected species, specifying that CEQA exemptions for reconductoring transmission lines on those sensitive areas should not increase the footprint more than 10%. And I appreciate, the suggestion of 10% because I think that's a a good idea and a reality to, to this.

And also just recognizing that, like, for example, if there was a if there is a transmission line that is a wood pole with a with one little line going front to the next wood pole and it becomes a large metal tower that it would need to go through some environment, the environmental review of that. But if it but if it's already a metal tower and it just is going to have lines that don't sag and are stronger, then it wouldn't have to go through that review.

Committee amendments further provide protections for state and national parks, monuments, wilderness, and recreation areas by requiring that the exemption for transmission lines through these areas should only apply if there's been a previous environmental review for those rights of way. And in areas that are outside of that, as the author said, there would not be any requirements.

So with these committee amendments, I am I am excited to support SB 1097, and I think that this bill, if it makes it all the through all the way through the process, will be impactful and will be able to actually, allow us to deliver more electricity more quickly across the state. So with that, I'll turn to my committee members. Anybody wishing to make any comments?

Senator Allen.