Senate Standing Committee on Rules

The Senate committee on rules will come to order. Before we begin today's agenda, can we please establish quorum?

Limon? Here. Limon here. Grove?

Grove here. Laird? Here. Laird here. Ochoa Bogue.

Here.

Here.

Reyes?

Reyes here. Quorum. Quorum has been established. If there are no objections, I would like to take up first on today's governor's appointments not required to appear, starting with item two c, the appointment of Jay Bradshaw as a member of the Transportation Commission. Do we have a motion?

Thank you, vice Chair Grove.

Can we please call the roll? Limon? Aye. Limon, aye. Grove?

Grove, aye. Laird? Aye. Laird, aye. Ochoa Bogue.

Aye.

Reyes? Aye. Reyes, aye. Four votes.

Alright. That is four to zero. We'll leave that open for members to absent members to add on. Next item for governor's appointments not required to appear, we have item two d. Kylie Bolser for the Central Valley Flood Protection Board.

Do we have a motion? Thank you. Motion made by Senator, Grove. Can we please call the roll?

Limon? Aye. Limon, aye. Grove? Aye.

Grove, aye. Laird? Aye.

Laird, aye. Ochoa Bog? Reyes?

Reyes, aye. Four votes. Alright. That item is, four zero. We will leave that open for absent members to add on.

Aye.

Next item is governor's appointments not required to appear. Item two e. Justin Doring for the Commission on Peace Officers Standards and Training. Do we have a motion? Thank you, vice Chair Grove.

Can we please call

the roll? Limon? Aye. Limon, aye. Grove?

Grove, aye. Laird?

Aye.

Laird, aye. Ochoa Bogue? Reyes? Aye. Reyes, aye.

Aye.

Four votes.

Alright. That has four votes. Next item, we and we will leave that open for absent members to add on. Next item is governor's appointments not required to appear. Item two f, Kelly Gordon for the Commission on Peace Officer Standards and Training.

Do we have a motion? So moved. Thank you, vice Chair Grove. Can we please call the roll?

Limon? Aye. Limon, aye. Grove? Aye.

Grove, aye. Laird? Aye.

Laird, aye. Ochoa Bog? Reyes? Aye. Reyes, aye.

Four votes.

Thank you. That we will leave that open for absent members to add on. Next item is governor's appointments not required to appear. Item two g Jacob Johnson for the Commission on Peace Officer Standards and Training. Do we have a motion?

So moved. Thank you, vice Chair Grove.

Can we please call the roll? Limon. Aye. Limon, aye. Grove.

Aye. Grove, aye. Laird? Aye.

Laird, aye. Ochoa Bogue? Reyes?

Aye. Reyes, aye. Four votes. Alright. That item has four, votes.

We will leave that on call for absent members to add on. Next item for governor's appointments not required to appear, item two h, Jeff Long for the Commission on Peace Officer Standards and Training. Do we have a motion? No. Thank you, vice Chair.

Grove, can we please call the roll?

Limon? Aye. Limon, aye. Grove? Aye.

Grove, aye. Laird?

Aye.

Laird, aye. Ochoa Bogue. Reyes? Aye. Reyes, aye.

Four votes. Alright. That item is four zero. Next item for governor's appointments not required to appear is item two Aye, Tina Nieto for the commission on peace officer Standards and Training.

Madam Former Madam Chair.

Oops. Sorry.

The former secretary of natural resources has requested to make a statement and make a motion on this. Alright.

Well, my statement is the motion. I am pleased to move Monterey County Sheriff Tina Nieto to be a member of the post commission.

Thank you very much, Senator Laird. With that motion, can we please call

the roll? Limon? Aye. Limon, aye. Grove?

Aye.

Grove, aye. Laird? Aye. Laird, aye. Ochoa Bogue.

Reyes? Aye. Reyes, aye. Four votes.

Alright. That is four votes. We will leave that open for absent members to add on. Up next, for governor's appointments not required to appear, we have item two j, Benjamin Carryall, for the Commission on Peace Officer Standards and Training. Can we please, have a motion for that?

Thank you, vice Chair. Grover. Can we please call the roll? Limon. Aye.

Limon, aye. Grover. Aye.

Grove, aye. Laird. Aye. Laird, aye. Ochoa Bogues.

Aye. Reyes, aye. Four votes.

Alright. That is four zero. We'll leave that absent open for absent members to add on. Last item for governor's appointments not required to appear is item two k, Monique Moyer, for the San Francisco Bay Area Water Emergency Transportation Authority Board of Directors. Do we have a motion?

So moved. Thank you very much, vice Chair Grove. Can we please call

the roll? Limon. Aye. Limon, aye. Grove,

aye. Laird? Aye. Laird, aye. Ochoa Bogue.

Reyes? Aye. Reyes, aye. Four votes.

Alright. That is four votes. We'll leave that open for absent members to add on. Next, I'd like to take up item three, reference to bills, two committees. I will entertain a motion.

Thank you, vice Chair Grove. Can we please call the roll?

So moved.

Limon. Aye. Limon, aye. Grove. Aye.

Grove, aye. Laird? Aye.

Laird, aye. Ochoa Bogue. Reyes? Aye.

Reyes, aye. Four votes. Alright. That is four votes. We'll leave that open for absent member to add on.

Next on the agenda, we have Senate rule 26 request to change the authorship of bills by former Assemblymember James Gallagher. Items four and five, leadership in both houses are in agreement with these author to authorship changes. Do we have a motion?

May I make a statement before we have a motion? So I'll make the motion to move these, but just aware for public, the only thing before this committee is the authorship change. Amendments have gone to the subsequent committee that's gonna happen in when it's set in a few weeks or next week, and then the amendments will be taken at that committee. Thank you. And so moved on the motion.

Thank you. And thank you for that clarification, Vice Chair Grove. That is accurate. Can we please call the roll?

Limon? Aye. Limon, aye. Grove? Aye.

Grove, aye. Laird? Aye. Laird? Aye.

Ochoa Bow. Reyes? Aye. Reyes, aye. Four votes.

Alright. That is four votes. We'll leave that open for absent members to add on. We will now turn to governor's appointees required to appear. We're going to start with item one a, the appointment of Megan Hertel as director to the Department of Fish and Wildlife.

Director Hertel, you're welcome to join us. Hi. You will have one to two minutes for your opening testimony to the committee. In your opening, you're welcome to include any introduction of guests that you may have here with you today. And we will keep time of your opening and prompt you when you approach that time.

You may begin when you are ready.

Wonderful. Good afternoon, President Pro Tem and senators. Thank you for the opportunity to appear before you today and for your consideration of this nomination. I wanna begin by thanking Governor Newsom for the trust he has put in me in taking this role and also to all of you and your staff for meeting with me before this hearing.

I'd also like to recognize my husband, Matt Hertel, who is sitting in the second row back there, along with my many colleagues from the department and agency departments who join me today and online and for the support they've given me every day in this role.

And I want to thank the many organizations that have submitted letters and that have met with me in my first four months. For the department to achieve its mission of taking care of California's plants, fish, and wildlife, we have to work across boundaries. And I'm grateful for people who show up, even when we don't agree, to talk through things and find collaborative solutions. So a little bit about me, I have spent a lot of time outside.

I was raised by a single working mom, so nature was usually my babysitter.

I grew up in Florida and over the course of a decade watched our beaches developed into hotels and private parking lots, which restricted access. It destroyed habitat for animals like sea turtles, and ultimately took away the buffer that protected our communities from storm surges and hurricanes. This has greatly informed my commitment to conservation and the way I approach it because I see people as part of the solution.

If we don't find a path forward where we balance the needs of people and we balance the needs of nature, nature is often what loses. And so it's an incredible privilege to be considered and to do this role for the department, the department that is responsible for taking care of California's nature for the benefit of our people now and into the future.

So California is home to more people, more agriculture, and more economic activity than anywhere in the country. It's also home to more biodiversity. That means more plants, more animals than almost anywhere else in the world. And it is the responsibility of the department to care for that. That biodiversity that defines California, it's what you think of when you think of our home.

Right? It's the iconic redwoods, our coasts, our amazing desert that also underpins our economy and our community health. And so we have a great responsibility to protect that and conserve it in a way that works for people. My job as director of this department is to lead the department to be science focused, outcome oriented, to be collaborative, committed to our mission, and pragmatic.

So you've got my commitment to an open door policy to work through issues and to do my best to make sure that we continue to serve California's nature for all people.

It is the privilege of my career to be here today so thank you for this opportunity. And a massive thank you to all the department staff who every day inspire me with their commitment and their excellence. It is a privilege to serve alongside them. Thank you.

Thank you. Members, questions, comments? Oh. Oh. Who would like to begin?

Sure. Vice Turgrove. Thank you, madam, pro tem. Thank you, miss. Thank you, Director Hertel for being here.

Okay.

And thank you for meeting. Thank you for taking my calls. Thank you for engaging in everything that we kind of, you know, throw at you from the Central Valley and the North States perspective. I really appreciate your willingness to, like you said, be an open door and to, you know, engage in the conversation and look at it from both sides. I appreciate that much, very much about you.

Obviously, you have a strong background in conservation and biodiversity. And how do you see CDFW working with farmers and ranchers? Obviously, biodiversity and the background that you have is vitally important for CDFW's director position, but there has to be a balance. You know, I realize it's a delicate ecosystem that when when individuals, mostly on the opposition side of renters and families, ranching families, see the loss of a baby calf as just an economic loss, it's not. It affects the ecosystem.

It affects the families, of course. But if you've ever watched these videos, and when this beautiful little baby calf drops on the ground and these wolves just rip it apart, it's heart wrenching. So those baby calves deserve protection just like wolves do. So how do you balance that and how do you make sure that both, are all, all individuals associated with this situation?

How do you make sure that everybody's got a seat at the table and everybody's voice is heard, including law enforcement who who want to protect public safety.

And I'll get into a mountain lion issue in a few minutes.

Thank you for that question, Senator, and and for all your passion on this subject and for how much work you've done to try to bring all of us together to find solutions going forward. Just to comment on my background, most of my career at Audubon, California, I spent in the working lands program.

That means I spent a lot of time out on farms and ranches throughout California, sitting at kitchen tables, talking about how farmers and ranchers take care of their land, not just for the product that they're producing for market, but also because they love the land, and they love the species, and they love the environment. And so just know that I bring that appreciation and respect to everything I do at the department.

Also, much of California's natural resources exist in our rural counties and are on working landscapes.

And we have long relied on ranchers and farmers to help take care of those resources. And this example of wolves returning is both a conservation success story, but it's also a really hard challenge, particularly born by folks in your district and in the northern counties who are running ranches and agricultural operations. So a few things about my approach. First, it's important to listen and learn.

That's why in my first five weeks, I prioritize getting up and meeting with sheriffs, boards of supervisors, and ranchers from seven counties in the northern state that have been most heavily impacted by wolves.

Ultimately, it's not just enough to listen and learn. You have to show up with action. And so the department has been very much focused at bringing what tools we can to the counties and to people on the ground to help them respond to wolves once again being back in California. So this includes things like data sharing, allowing counties to see the same data we do so that ranchers can have information to help deter wolves from, predating on cattle.

Really proud to let you know we just signed an agreement with Siskiyou County about an hour ago to have that data go to them.

Also working with sheriffs to ensure that they can have less than lethal tools that allow them to use things like pepper balls on wolves to help deter them again from, encroaching and taking cattle. We also work hard to bring the best available science, share that with partners and folks on the ground while also learning about their real world experience. And finally, convening people.

So with the support of California Natural Resources Agency, over the last several months, we've convened an inter agency task force that's bringing together incredible groups like Wildlife Conservation Board, Cal Fire, and our federal partners to bring as many resources to this solution as possible.

Thank you. Moving on to I don't wanna say a more serious subject, but in El Dorado County, we had a mountain lion drag a teenager off a walk path, take him out in the woods and bury him to come back and eat him later right in front of his brother. This was a loss of life. If you look at ring bell, ring cameras or cameras that are positioned around that community, you see mountain lions walking in and out of school.

School yards where elementary and, preschool children play.

The children are locked up inside When mountain lions are, alerted or there's a mountain lion alert, families, their kids sometimes can't go out and play because mountain lions are after their goats or their their little small farm animals or their dogs and cats.

There was a bill recently a couple of years ago by my colleague in the Assembly Assembly member had, excuse me, the Senator, Senator Alvarado-Gil, that would give sheriffs the opportunity to tree and free and to exercise that seemed like a very common sense solution. Obviously, it didn't remove the authority that CDFW had, but it gave the elected sheriff, the person who was elected by the people in that county, the ability to tree and free mountain lions to keep them.

It's the sheriff's job to keep those communities safe. That's why they elect the sheriff.

They don't elect the sheriff to, I don't know, keep the streets clean, but they elect the sheriff to keep them safe. And so one of the things that you deal with is in this diverse state. You don't have to worry about this in the center of Los Angeles, but in this diverse state, you have a mountain lion issue in our North State.

So what are tools that the CDFW can do and what commitments can you make to make sure that there is some type of cooperation with local authority and sheriffs? Because now we're moving on from baby calves to human beings and teenagers.

And I want your assurances that you're gonna help our North State address the predators that we have, especially when they're coming after our children.

Yeah. Happy to address that. Human wildlife conflict is an increasing issue within California, and please know that we take it very, very seriously. Sheriffs always have the right to declare public safety when they determine there is a risk. Human life is most important.

So I want to start with that. I also wanna acknowledge that we have Chief Arnold in the audience today, who is the head of our law enforcement division, our roughly 500 wildlife officers that work across the state to respond. He's hiding behind the pillar over there. I promise you just can't see him.

him. There he he waved.

I can't see

Who work across the state to respond to incidences of human wildlife conflict. In the last eighteen days, we have had nine incidences where humans have been injured by wildlife, and that is a mix of bears and of coyotes primarily. And for each of those, we send out law enforcement to talk to the victim to gather DNA evidence. We send it to our DNA lab where we are tracking which animals are responsible for human wildlife conflict.

We support homeowners to help educate on deterrence techniques, to keep animals from coming close to their home or into urban environments.

This is a really important topic going forward. The most successful thing we can do is proactive education and partnership with local counties and local officials to get information out on how we keep wild animals wild. The last thing we want is wild animals coming into close contact with humans. That risks both humans and the animals. We are very much committed to working within the resources that we have to do what we can and to working with partners to bring more resource to the table on this.

Okay. Thank you. And I'm sure my colleague, from, the Inland Empire will, address this. But just in case she doesn't, because she's not here, I also represent the Western Joshua Tree. And, people in the High Desert area went to that area because they appreciated the Western Joshua Tree, and they love the desert environment.

They refer to themselves, not me, but a majority of those people re refer themselves as desert rats because they love the desert. They love the sunsets, the environment, the beautiful landscapes that there are. Aye, you know, I like the ranch life. So the desert doesn't do a lot for me, but there are a lot of people that live out there. The frustration I have as a Senator that represents that area is only my constituents pay for the Western Joshua Tree program.

Only my constituents can't hook up to, city sewer and city lines because every house I don't care what house you own, every house in that area has at least one and possibly up to 10 Joshua trees on their property. So to disturb a Joshua tree to get hooked up to city sewer so that your family has water, is almost impossible because the the permits for removal and relocation are so astronomically expensive. A household that makes $47,000 a year on average cannot afford to do that.

When a tree dies or children can't participate in play, I shared that with you that there was somebody that came and filed a complaint that a child was kicking over the a small Joshua tree. It's a succulent, by the way.

And if my colleague from the Natural Resources former secretary, we would argue over that. That it's in their yard. It's their property. There has to be some type of mitigation that is allowable, that does not fall on the only the constituents in this valley. The main opponent of any Joshua tree, tree, removal or any Joshua tree language change lives here in Sacramento.

She spends a lot of time in the desert, but she doesn't pay for one of those trees. She doesn't pay for any of this mitigation, and neither do the people who live up here or in Los Angeles. But we pay for it. And these individuals that I represent, in the Central Valley are individuals that are on a medium to low income, and they can't even afford to be put up to city water when the law is requiring them to be hooked up to city water.

So how are you gonna balance my Joshua Tree issue?

Well, a couple thoughts on that, and I promise I won't bring up the succulent comment when Senator Laird comes back.

I would.

So, you know, Western Joshua Tree Act was created to provide an alternative pathway to a traditional California Endangered Species Act listing. So the species is considered for candidacy right now, which means it has full protection. If people were not to have the act in place, that means that they would have to go through our traditional incident incidental take permit process, which would be much more expensive and onerous on homeowners. This is not to say the Western Joshua Tree Act is perfect.

And we have heard the feedback that the fees are really challenging for small projects and single family homeowners.

So we are in the process right now of a couple things. One, we are executing a programmatic environmental impact report that will cover single family homes and small projects to help ease that burden and speed that pathway up even more than what's being offered under the current Western Joshua Tree Act. We also have the option to give delegated authority to counties. Right now, nobody has taken us up on that offer, but that is another option to try to ease the process for locals.

You know, I I do come across as very scary sometimes, even though I'm trying not to.

And pursuant to the act, we're in a process right now of assessing the fees that are associated with this, and we have heard loud and clear that the fees on small projects are too high. So we are hoping to release the draft document for public comment in the coming months and looking forward to going through that process. I do also want to stress that we are here to work flexibly and in partnership with local counties, cities, and constituents.

We have a great example from High Desert Water and, the town of Yucca Valley where we took a project where they were connecting their local community to sewer and instead of being roughly $20,000,000 worth of fees under Western Josh Rich React, we were able to get that down to under 1,000,000. So we are here to work in partnership with folks to make this work.

Please know we're committed. This is an alternative pathway that is meant to save time and money and make it easier on continue to work on it with you and

others. And I appreciate that. And like I said before, I appreciate your willingness to at least listen to both sides because I've I've evidence, and it's not that you've changed your mind, but evidence giving the conversation that you've had on both sides, which wasn't traditionally happening in the past. Sometimes it did, but not traditionally on a regular basis. And you've really put an effort into that, and you have, been able to solve problems.

And I I like that you are you're not somebody who's that's a roadblock. We can't go there. You're like, okay, let's figure out how we can make this work. So you're that person, and I appreciate that.

Where, I think that we need a little more work, and not to make you work harder than you are, but, mining, facilities like cement mines, cement cement plants, they already have a reclamation permit that they fill out and apply for, which means they have to return the land, which which it was before if they abandon the mine.

But they're still required to pay for in a tremendous amount of money to provide cement, or cement, if my colleague next to me was here, cement, to produce cement. Otherwise, we get it from Japan and China and overseas, or the Green River Valley in Wyoming. So my question is is that 95% of the cement provided to build SoFi Stadium in my colleague of Los Angeles' area, SoFi Stadium, came from my district.

But the Western Joshua Tree, again, two hours from the national park, not talking about the national park, I'm talking they really are succulents and they sprout up wherever those little seedlets drop. So, two hours from the national park, they are in jeopardy of closure because of the Western Joshua tree and not being able to mine for cement and expand their mine on the property they already own that's already under our original reclamation permit when they open the plant.

Have you been meeting with them? And is there anything that you would like to offer me to make me feel better about that situation? Because it affects cement for the entire state and region, but affects jobs in my district.

We have quite a few different large projects that are undergoing, looking at whether they wanna proceed through the traditional permitting process or use the Western Joshua Tree Act and happy to follow-up with you to understand more about which project that is and where it is in the process.

Thank you. Yeah. Absolutely. I'd like to go over to your confirmation. You have been a breath of fresh air.

Not that Chuck wasn't, but you have been a breath of fresh air, and I I appreciate your hard work on these issues that we deeply care about. California is a diverse state. Different people care about different things. My colleague from Santa Monica, he gets mad every time I say this. He cares deeply about solar ice that he could take my 6,000 acre acre solar plants and put them on his beach anytime he wants.

But so we're a diverse state and, we care about different issues and I appreciate you taking, opportunity to learn both sides of those issues. Thank you. Absolutely.

Thank you. Senator Reyes?

Thank you. It was such a pleasure to meet you just a week after you had, first started on the job back in February. And appreciated all the the work that you did with us under our budget subcommittee too. And providing the input that we needed. One of the areas and for Joshua Tree, I'm gonna wait to see if my colleague does return and that some of the questions were already asked regarding that.

But I'd like to talk about the the invasive species program and specifically the golden mussel. Just recently in September of last year, the CDFR c CDFW confirmed the presence of the invasive golden mussel in Silverwood Lake, which is located in San Bernardino County. But of course, this concerns all of California. But my question is, how are you working across agencies and with the local jurisdictions to address this mussel infestation in our waterways?

Thank you for that question. And also, I just want to compliment you on your bud butterfly pin. It's very appropriate for my nomination discussion.

I've done it just just for you

then. No. You know, golden mussels is an incredibly serious issue. So we are the first state in the country to have golden mussel occurrence. It started in the Bay Delta, but of course, that is the hub of much of the water distribution of the state.

And once it is in there, it is almost impossible to fully remove. So for I places that are connected to the Bay Delta through water distribution and water supply, at right now, the effort is really to treat and contain it and then to keep it from getting into water bodies that are isolated. So the department immediately sprung into action when golden mussels were detected. And we have many different ways that are we working on it. One of the primary ways is the golden mussel task force.

So this task force is co led by the department, includes state and federal agencies working to bring cutting edge science to how do we respond and treat this, working to understand what are the best containment mechanisms, and how do we better support and best support the folks on the ground that are having to deal with this. We are also, we have a regulation, not a regulation, we have a framework that guides our strategy associated with it that's been published.

And we are also looking to invest money, in our staff to provide technical assistance to help local water managers create the plans for how they manage and control this. So those are just a few of the key ways that we are engaging in. But we have quite a few staff working on this.

Wonderful. And I was going to ask about the team, but thank you for responding, in anticipation. Clearly, the state of California recognizes what a serious problem this is. And I think that that was reflected in the discussions during the budget hearings. So I look forward to continuing that that conversation, and that work.

Another area was, regarding your wardens. We know that there's, you just don't have enough. You don't have enough, and I think during testimony, there was a 2.64 gap. You need another 1,500 wardens in order to really do the work that that that you do. Knowing that your law enforcement staffing remains stagnant and below what is needed, how are

you dealing with that? How how are you how is the department taking care of the needs of the state? Great question. And again, Chief Arnold is here. So really thrilled to have our wardens represented in this room.

The You did

a great job during the during the hearings.

The 500, men and women people that represent us do some of the most incredible work in California. But like you said, the department underwent a process called service based budgeting. So, in 2021, we released a report that we worked on with Deloitte Consulting, which is a world renowned external consulting firm that allows us to look at our mission mandated mission level against the hours of staffing that we've got.

And so every year we're able to go and look across eight different areas to understand how much staffing do we have versus what we're required to do as part of our mandate and our role as trustee of fish, wildlife, and plants in California. And you're right.

We are at about one third of what we need to actually meet our mandate. Now there's multiple different ways we try to address this gap. The first is prioritization. So we look across each of those areas and part of service based budgeting so we can be transparent about where we have gaps and where we're fully staffed. So that allows us to prioritize across all of them.

Second thing that we're doing is we are looking at technology that can help improve our processes. Where we can find efficiencies, we try to get them. We are looking at new science that can help us do our jobs better. A great example of this is parental based tagging or PBT tagging of salmon that allows us to tag the baby salmon before they go out. We take genetic material.

When they come back, we know where they started. It helps us improve our management. When it comes to law enforcement, looking at things like infrastructure or equipment approval. We were actually able to buy a new patrol boat that increases the amount of area that we can patrol off the coast, allows us to do more with that patrol boat looking for those types of efficiencies and improvements. Of course, eventually at some point you need capacity, And so that is always something we're talking about.

We also are trying to tell our story better. So folks understand what it is the department does day in and day out. And we're always interested in having more public private partnerships to help achieve our mission.

Thank you. Thank you. I appreciate the, your strategy, your plan to to take care of the issue because it is a serious issue. When law enforcement, when you're you're working at one third your, your capacity, it is a problem.

Thank you. Thank you. I appreciate the, your strategy, your plan to to take care of the issue because it is a serious issue. When law enforcement, when you're you're working at one third your, your capacity, it is a problem.

But to be able to put together a plan is extremely important and I applaud you for that.

On the issues of the the the mountain lions and the the wolves, it was something that was brought up during our committee hearings and it was good to have the California Cattlemen's Association come to the hearing also. And it was clear to me that that was not the first time you had met them.

That you had in your short time on the job had already spent time with them and that is something that I sincerely appreciated because it is important as my colleague said to to understand both sides to any issue and to be able to come to a solution. Doesn't mean that everybody will be happy, but to when we know that we have been heard, and that the opinions have been taken into consideration, that is extremely important. So I do applaud you for that.

And with that, I would yield back.

Thank you, Senator Reyes. We will go to Senator Laird. Just a point of clarification, we've already discussed that it's a succulent and not a tree.

And just for the record, when we had a chance to meet and I appreciate the meeting, I showed you the framed picture of the Joshua tree I got for my birthday in my office and I got it from the person that insists it's a succulent.

Respectfully, I'm not going to get in the middle of this one.

Then that really recommends you. And I appreciate the chance, to meet with you. We've met on multiple occasions. I obviously have some history and look forward to working together. And I'd like to ask about maybe two or three things we talked about just as much to have everybody hear the conversation than the fact that I know what the answer to the question is.

And one of them, one of the things we talked about was your operating style in the sense that many times you will, you don't hear from a legislator or you'll hear on some of the issues you've been asked about already.

And and as I told you, like when I worked with your predecessor, I would never necessarily direct him to an outcome, but I would ask if he would put his eyes on it because I was confident if he looked at it that if he saw there was a problem he'd go fix it. And I wanted to sort of check and see how much of that was your ethic and how you intend to operate when you deal with those kinds of things.

Conservation can be really complicated. And what I mentioned in my opening remarks is that to reach durable conservation outcomes, you have to have people part of the conversation and decision making. So for me, it's incredibly important to base it on science, get the best available science that we can, understand where various stakeholders are on the position and what it means for them when that, decision is made or when we work for a conservation outcome.

How is it gonna impact the people on the ground that live with this every day? Work, of course, with the administration and elected officials to understand what you're hearing from constituents and what you're seeing on the policy landscape, and then work to weigh all of that to come to the most durable outcome that we can get to.

Thank you. I really appreciate that. And inevitably, I'll be calling you because of some constituent that that has an issue. Then I wanted to ask you about marine protected areas. And the marine protected area process actually was the result of a lot of private philanthropy.

And one of the interesting things is is that for the the wardens or wildlife officers now that were out there in the Marine District, they couldn't even tell if somebody had been cited for a similar thing and private philanthropy bought iPads for every wildlife officer. So if somebody had just been poaching in an adjoining area, they could pull it up and they would understand that that it was connected to what they were seeing.

And now with 30x30 where the marine protected areas had been based entirely on science, now sort of 30x30 says: Let's set a numeric goal, and a lot of us are worried that the science that has been the basis will will get lost in the numeric goal and now here you are. You have to enforce, you have to raise the money, you have to decide what the next steps are. What's sort of your world view about marine protected areas?

Well first I just want to brag for a moment because our marine protected area network has been recognized by the IUCN which is an international organization as part of their green list network. It's the first network of sites worldwide to be recognized for the environmental benefits that it's having. The establishment of these 124 sites was challenging.

It took many years, many people coming to the table to talk about impacts to fishing, to communities, to all the ways people use and love our coastal resources, and to bring cutting edge science. We just underwent a decadal management review.

So basically a ten year look back at how are these marine protected areas functioning. And the good news is they're working. So we are seeing some fish species be bigger and more abundant in various marine protected areas. And after a heat wave that happened in 2012 and 2014, we found that some of the MPAs actually recovered faster than areas outside of those MPAs. Now MPAs make up about 16.2% of the 30x30 objective.

And right now, the Fish and Game Commission, which is an independent but sister agency to the Department, is going through a review process to determine if there should be additions to the Marine Protected Area. Department provides scientific advice to the Commission so we are in the process. We've given some of our recommendations. We're in the process of completing the rest of them, but then there'll be public comment on how to grow them. For 30x30, what I will say is this is an international effort.

Scientists have pointed to the extreme loss of biodiversity to call for protection of potentially 50% or more of our land or ocean areas. There have been papers calling for the 30% as a rallying cry. What's great about this is that it provides a transparent framework by which we can track our progress. We can show what counts and what doesn't count toward reaching, that 30% goal. Is it the end all be all? No. But does it provide us a goalpost to to drive to? It does.

And one of the key parts of this have been the relationships with tribes in the marine protected areas. How have you related to tribes and how do you see them just as part of the whole mix on this?

Like the director before me, I strongly support tribal partnerships whether that be access, co-management agreements, or ancestral land return. Tribes in the state of California have stewarded this landscape since time and immemorial. It was not long ago that we thought to conserve a piece of property meant that you remove people from it. You set it aside. You stop all good fire from happening.

And we are now dealing with the consequences of that when tribes have long told us that people are part of nature and part of the landscape. So we have a lot to learn from tribes. And while it is an honor to get to lead the Department, which is one of the oldest wildlife agencies in The United States Of America, it also means we have a long legacy of doing harmful things for tribes and we need to make that up. We've done one ancestral land return. I'm looking forward to doing more of them.

And we have lots of opportunities to look at co-management or access in a way that can bring tribes back to their ancestral lands. I was just up, in Crescent City on Monday talking to Elk Valley Rancheria. So I'm really trying to get out and create those relationships and make sure we continue to advance the work we have in progress.

Well, I know that that you mentioned, co-management and it seems like there's broad support across the spectrum for that and yet not a single person seems to define it the same way as the next person. So everybody's for it, but nobody knows what they're exactly for. And I just wish you luck because I know that's been at the heart of this.

The other thing just as an observation, when we negotiated to bring the tribes into marine protected areas, part of the deal was they had to prove they had a historic take for subsistence purposes or ceremonial purposes. And I thought, oh no, they're gonna hate this.

And they said, no, we've been waiting for people to ask. We have centuries of documentation on how we've been tied to the waters. And that was a surprise to me, but it was central to them proving that they deserve the rights that were extended to them in this. And then lastly, I apologize for him to be out to present a bill but I heard Senator Reyes talk to you a little bit about the service-based review.

And I just know historically, the mission of the department hasn't been fully financially supported and you're always struggling to make sort of priorities out of that. How are you gonna try to tackle that in this job?

Well, I've spent my first four months spending a lot of time listening to external partners, spending time meeting with elected officials, understanding where the priorities lay within the stakeholders and with elected officials, and also time out meeting with staff. So my priorities as they're shaping up right now.

That sounded like they had to be on a time out. Hope that's not what was happening.

No time outs. You know, my number one priority is making sure that we can meet our mission of plants, fish, and wildlife and do that in a way that still lets essential infrastructure, housing, renewable energy get done. That's that fine balance that we have to walk with the department in this role. I'm also very much focused on our lands. We manage over 1.2 million acres of land across 700 different properties.

Some of that is open to the public. Many of it is in your communities. Senator, we were just talking about one that you go to. And so really finding ways to help deferred maintenance and help our lands be stellar examples of what California represents from a landscape. Also working to tell our story better.

This one relates back to ensuring that we can get resources to help meet our mandates. How do we tell the story to a broader set of constituents across, the State of California? And then finally, working within the Department to make sure we're a modern department that supports the incredible staff that we've got. So those are my early priorities. I reserve the right to change them as I continue to work with you across the next year plus.

And then I will just say, you know, there are a variety of tools that we can use to address our budget shortfalls. This is not unique to California. States across this country, their departments of fish and wildlife, many of them face issues like we do with respect to funding. Missouri is the gold standard in that they take, one eighth of 1% of their sales tax goes to fund, their department of fish and wildlife.

There's other innovative techniques like taking a portion of, outdoor sporting-goods tax, or Oregon just passed one where they're taking part of their hotel tax to fund their Department of Fish and Wildlife, including their work on human-wildlife conflict and wolves.

So we are always looking at what other states are doing and assessing that. And then, of course, the same tools that we just talked about, thinking about how do we better use technology like the iPads you just referenced to further stretch the capacity that we've got. And then how do we do more public private partnerships? Your example of philanthropy coming in to help create the MPA network. Right?

We can do that across all kinds of issues. So there's a variety of tools that we can access.

Well, thank you. I really appreciate your responses to the questions and look forward to partnering with you on many of those issues. Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you. Thank you and thanks for, the variety of questions. I also had, some questions, related to just the human and wildlife, you know, interface and how we navigate that. Certainly, I think in the legislature, there have been a lot of examples of our attempts to try to keep both wildlife and humans, and the people in our community safe. And so that has been, a bit of a challenge.

But I think you've answered, some of that, in terms of, you know, farmers, livestock, and that interface. I also, you know, wanted to piggyback just a little bit on Senator Laird's comments related to resources.

To the department's credit or the agency's credit, we have heard year after year the importance of resources, in particular, for the farmers and livestock challenges in in terms of monitoring, in terms of being able to assess the situation, but also being able to mitigate some of the the challenges that we see, whether it's bears, wolves, or other animals.

I just wonder, as you look at the long term needs of the agency, how do you grapple with a situation where the resources may not be there to the extent that you fully need them, but the demand for your time for the, you know, individuals are? What what is the thinking and how we balance that?

Yeah. It's a great question. It is the challenge of running a large department in a state that is currently facing budget challenges where you have to make tough choices across not just natural resources but health and human services, infrastructure, all of those things. A couple of thoughts on that. One, recognizing that we will even win better funded and with more capacity likely not be at the level we would like to be.

It's incredibly important that we look at prioritization, using different technologies and science to make sure we're targeting the right techniques. And then particularly for human wildlife conflict, outreach and education is so important. Getting people the information and the tools they need to prevent human wildlife conflicts in the first place is leaps and bounds the most successful thing that we can do.

During the general fund surplus, we had $5 million that we invested into human wildlife conflict and that represented having people out in every county working with local officials and communities to help educate them on how to be aware of bears and mountain lions and things they may come into contact with. We were also able to fund equipment that was able to go out, like bear canisters, secure trash cans to help prevent animals from coming into the human spaces.

We also invested in more permanent things. So we have a wildlife incident reporting system online where people can go online and actually report to us when they're seeing wildlife or interacting with them. So there's a variety of tools that we can use, to get the information out there that ultimately, hopefully, will create permanent education and changes in the way people live in communities that can help prevent wildlife conflict. Thank you.

And, shifting gears just a little bit, one of the concerns that our district has faced, and certainly your department, has been following this, is the issue of, pipeline safety. And, I I wanted you to to speak a little bit in terms of what, you know, the department does to ensure that we have pipeline safety issues and how you work with other entities to try to make sure that communities are safe.

And in particular, want to just recognize it's a big deal in my district, and I'm grateful for the work you've done thus far.

I am really proud that the Office of Oil Spill Prevention and Response sits within the Department of Fish and Wildlife. This is roughly 200 people that are focused every day, not just on responding when there's an oil spill in coastal waters or inland, but in making sure they don't happen in the first place.

So they spend a lot of time working, with the companies that are either moving oil or creating oil within California to make sure they have prevention plans, make sure they've got the funding in place to actually respond should there be a spill. Just this week, I was supposed to go out with Chevron, have them do a boom deployment. They're practicing to make sure they're ready in case there is a spill.

Unfortunately, I wasn't able to make it. But these are happening all of the time. Our Office of Oil Spill Prevention and Response receives something like 800 reports of oil spills, big and small, that they respond to. A great example is a spill that just happened in Los Angeles where drilling for fiber optic cable actually hit an oil line and roughly 24,000 gallons of oil went out in the storm drain and hit the LA River.

But because of the response of our office in coordination with local entities, we were able to prevent that from reaching the marine environment.

So we're really proud of that response, which is just wrapping up now. So in addition to prevention in the first place, this office also does quite a bit of research on what are the new and best technologies to respond when spills do happen or to help prevent them. And then, of course, when there is a spill, we are out there responding to it.

And then once a spill is done, we do the natural resource damage assessment to make sure that the polluters or the people that are at fault end up paying for the repair of it. So it is incredibly comprehensive.

In my first few weeks, I actually sat at a tabletop exercise to walk through what happens when there is a spill off the coast of California and was amazingly, impressed at just how professional it is, the technology we've got, and the systems and structures, including existing MOUs with federal partners that allow us to respond and be in co-leads in these situations.

Thank you. So this is the moment that, we turn to the public. If there are individuals who are here to speak in support of the appointee, we welcome that you come forward. Please just state your name. There is a big group. Just state your name, your, affiliation, and position. You're welcome to go first. Assemblymember Hadwick.

Thank you. I'm happy to wait in line. I just wanted to thank Megan for coming and spending so much time in my district and happy to support her today.

Thank you, Assemblymember.

Good afternoon. Staci Heaton, Rural County Representatives of California, representing 40 rural counties statewide. Our counties deal with a number of issues that intersect with the Department of Fish and Wildlife, including lake and streambed alteration permitting for emergency management, incidental take permitting for development of housing and other things, and of course, wildlife-human coexistence, which is a big issue for our counties right now. Megan came and met with our folks, I think, before she even got appointed to the position. She has reached out.

She has brought a refreshing spirit of collaboration between the department and our member counties. And she even came up a couple weeks ago and spent a few days in Yosemite with about 35 elected county officials, just hearing their concerns and, being communicative and collaborative with them. So we are proud to be here today to support her appointment and to urge your aye vote. Thank you.

Thank you. Just a reminder, just name, affiliation, and positions.

Good afternoon, committee members. I'm Pamela Flick, the California Program Director for Defenders of Wildlife, in strong support of Ms. Hertel for Director. We urge you to confirm her. She brings a wonderful set of skills and experience to this position as you've heard, and we really look forward to continuing our work together. Thank you.

Good afternoon, Madam Chair and members. Jennifer Fearing on behalf of a number of our firm's clients, the Wildlife Crossing Fund, Oceana, the Surfrider Foundation, the Wildlife Conservation Network, Wildlands Network, the California Wildlife Officers Foundation, the Monterey Bay Aquarium, Occidental Arts and Ecology Center, and the National Wildlife Federation also asked to share the support for the Director of the Animal Legal Defense Fund and the California Wolf Foundation. And I just like to say how thrilling it is that while Meghan is the second woman to lead the Department.

She is the first woman to lead the Department of Fish and Wildlife, so renamed several years ago. So we couldn't endorse her confirmation more. Thank you.

Good afternoon. Kim Delfino with Earth Advocacy on the behalf of a number of clients, the California Native Plant Society, Catalina Island Conservancy, Sonoma Land Trust, Golden State Salmon Association, and CalTrout. But also speaking for EDF, Pacific Forest Trust, Resource Renewal Institute. Oh, and I forgot my other client, the California Association of Zoos and Aquariums. And in strong support of Megan, whom I've known for many years and is very well qualified for this.

Hi. Good afternoon, Chair and members. Julianna Tetlow on behalf of San Diego Humane Society. We are one of the largest licensed wildlife rehabilitators in the state, often receiving baby wildlife, including two little bear cubs that we're rehabilitating right now. We really look forward to working, with Meghan as the Director and and continuing our partnership with the Department. So, encourage the aye vote. Thank you.

Good afternoon. Jake Schultz on behalf of the California Habitat Conservation Planning Coalition and the Land Trust of Santa Cruz County and 10 other environmental organizations detailed in our letter in support. Thank you.

Hi. Good afternoon. Michael Chen with Audubon California in strong support. Thanks so much.

Good afternoon. Ellen Wehr on behalf of Grassland Water District and Ducks Unlimited, representing waterfowlers in California, in strong support. Thank you.

Amaroq Weiss, senior wolf advocate with the Center for Biological Diversity, in very, very, very strong support for this candidate and already existing incredible leader. It's such a privilege to have her. Thank you.

Good afternoon. Tim Carmichael on behalf of the California Council for Environmental and Economic Balance, in strong support.

Pro Tem, members, Steven Fenaroli with the California Farm Bureau, in strong support of Director Hertel today, and just appreciate her, showing up from day one, willing to listen and and lead, by example. So thank you.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Mark Fenstermaker on behalf of the California Association of Resource Conservation Districts, Sustainable Conservation, and the Big Sur Land Trust in strong support of Megan's confirmation today.

Thank you. Good afternoon. Tasha Newman on behalf of the California Council of Land Trusts, The Wildlands Conservancy, Coachella Valley Conservation Commission, and the Bolsa Chica Land Trust, all in strong support.

Good afternoon. Noa Banayan, government affairs at Keep Tahoe Blue, and a member of the California Tahoe Alliance, in strong support. Thank you.

Ashley Walker on behalf of Nossaman. We are representing Santa Clara Valley Water District and Coachella Valley Water District in strong support of this confirmation. Thank you. Thank you.

Good afternoon. Erin Norwood on behalf of the Almond Alliance, representing 7,600 growers and over 100 processors of almonds in the state, in strong support. Thank you. Thank you.

Madam Chair and members of the committee, Bill Gaines, on behalf of several wildlife organizations including the California Bowmen Hunters/State Archery Association, the California Deer Association, California Chapter of the Wild Sheep Foundation, California Houndsmen for Conservation, and also the support for the California Rifle and Pistol Association. Thank you.

Hello there. Mark Hennelly with California Waterfowl Association. We're very proud to support Ms. Hertel in this nomination, and we know she will do a great job. So really appreciate her being here. Thank you.

Thank you. Good afternoon. Jason Bryant on behalf of the California Cattlemen's Association in strong support. Ms. Hertel has been collaborative, engaging, and thoughtful, communicative with the association's leadership, and we're proud to support her. Thank you.

Juan Altamirano, Director of Government Affairs with Trust for Public Land. Extremely excited about having Meghan be the Director of this program. As a former colleague, at Audubon California spending almost nine years with her. She's undoubtedly the most qualified individual in this room to be nominated for this position. And as a friend, she is one of those most kindest and incredible human beings.

You know, everything that you have heard today from your questions, she's somebody who undoubtedly has a lot of empathy for everyone and willing to listen to everyone at the table. Thank you.

Mark Smith on behalf of Smith Policy Group. All of my clients were so excited to support Meghan's nomination. They came themselves. So I'm gonna do this in my personal capacity. I support Meghan.

Thank you. Alright. Seeing no individuals, other individuals to speak in support, do we have any individuals here, in opposition? Alright. Seeing none, we are going to bring it back to the dais members. I will entertain a motion. Vice Grove?

Yes. Thank you. It's my privilege to move you to the full Senate floor for a vote and to make that motion. And I've been sitting on this committee for a long time, and I don't wanna I'm not not against anyone else, but you are one of the very few qualified, completely qualified people. The last one I remember completely in this situation with the same collaborative kindness and humility such a high powerful position was Siva Gunda. So thank you very much.

Thank you. Alright. We have a motion. So I will go ahead and call the roll.

[Roll Call]. Four votes.

Alright. You have four votes. Congratulations. We will leave that open for absent members to add on. Thank you.

We will now turn to Governor's appointees required to appear. We have Item 1B, the appointment of Caroline Thomas Jacobs as Director to the Governor's Office of Emergency Services. And as folks are exiting, we will welcome Ms. Jacobs here and just ask folks to take conversations outside, please.

Thank you, for being here, Director Jacobs. And so, you may begin when you are ready.

Thank you. Good afternoon. Very impressive. Madam, Pro Tem, Senators, thank you, for the opportunity to appear before you today. As you mentioned, my name is Caroline Thomas Jacobs, and it is my honor to be appointed, to serve, by the Governor as the Director of the Governor's Office of Emergency Services.

And today, I'm I'm joined here by my wife, Renee, in the gallery and my two children, Cora and Chloe, online. It is only because of their love and support that I am able to be here with you today. Renee, Cora, and Chloe, I love you. I accepted this appointment because I am deeply committed to the Cal OES mission, the safety, and the, of all Californians, and most importantly, the responsibility to lead an organization that must perform at its best on California's hardest days.

From 2021 to 2026, I served as the director of California's Office of Energy Infrastructure Safety, where I oversaw the state's landmark utility wildfire safety regulatory program.

In that role, I worked to advance statewide safety standards, to improve oversight of utility wildfire risk, and strengthen the accountability for infrastructure operators serving tens of millions of Californians. Prior to that, I led the Wildfire Safety Division at the California Public Utilities Commission, guiding the development of the state's initial regulatory framework for utility caused wildfire prevention.

I previously served at Cal OES from 2014 to 2019, including as Chief of Headquarters Response, supporting the State Operations Center, during the North Bay Fires, the Thomas Fire, the Camp Fire, the Montecito Mudflows, the Ridgecrest Earthquake, and the first large-scale responses to the public safety power shutoffs. Across these roles, I have gained firsthand experience managing some of California's most complex emergencies and helping advance critical safety reforms.

Cal OES plays a crucial role in protecting life and property by ensuring the state is prepared to respond to, recover from, and mitigate disasters and emergencies of all types.

As Director, I take seriously the responsibility to maintain the operational capabilities, the partnerships, the resources required to execute that mission requires us to be prepared for requires us to be prepared for a wide range of threats at any given moment. As you may have heard, just today, we had a magnitude 5.6 earthquake in Mendocino County. Additionally, climate-driven disasters are becoming more frequent and more severe, and California continues to face an increasingly dynamic all-hazards environment involving wildfires, floods, earthquakes, cybersecurity attacks, infrastructure disruptions, and of course, major planned events, including the current 2026 FIFA World Cup and the upcoming 2028 Olympic and Paralympic Games.

At the same time, diminishing, federal resources, and preparedness resources present challenges that require proactive planning, strong collaboration, and strategic leadership. Wildfires remain one of our state's most persistent threats, and my experience dealing with these disasters and their cascading impacts has given me a broad perspective and a clear understanding of the systems and partnerships that are required to keep Californians safe.

As director, I am focused on ensuring Cal OES has the capabilities and resources to meet California's evolving all hazards environment so that we stay ahead of these increasing threats.

My priorities include strengthening statewide partnerships and preparedness and resilience, advancing a modern and reliable next generation 911 system, supporting ongoing recovery to the Los Angeles fires, ensuring California is prepared through the World Cup and the upcoming '28 Olympic Games, and deepening the collaboration with local governments, tribal nations, our community-based organizations, and our state and federal partners so that California remains ready for whatever challenges lie ahead. And above all, emergency management is about keeping people safe, and serving California communities before, during, and after disasters.

And my approach in leading Cal OES is, and, will be firmly anchored in these principles. So I thank you again, for the opportunity to appear before you today, and I am grateful for your consideration and look forward to answering your questions.

Thank you. Members, questions or comments? Yes, ma'am. Alright. We will start with, Vice Chair Grove, then go to Senator Laird, then Senator Reyes.

Thank you, director, for being here today. I appreciate, very much the opportunity to have time with you. I apologize that we couldn't schedule time before. We did try. We did try.1

So, you were appointed the Director in March 2026. And with the background of leading the Emergency Infrastructure Safety Office, how do you draw from your previous experience to the new role that you've been holding since March?

Yeah. Thank you for the question. I really appreciate it. So, you know, as I mentioned, I did work at Cal OES for many years prior to the getting the opportunity to be the Director and stand up Energy Infrastructure Safety. And I had the unique opportunity in that role to create the Department.

So in that effort, I learned a ton about not just the, let's call it, operational implementation of whatever the regulatory role we were playing, but the key, elements of supporting and building a team and nurturing that team to ensure that we are driving to meet the mission that we have, as well as working with our stakeholders and our legislators to make sure that we're ultimately meeting the mission of what our, regulatory mission was in that particular role.

So what do I take that take to bring here at Cal OES? For me, I fundamentally I'm excited to be back at Cal OES because I had been, like I said, been there before. So I know the I know the work. I've done the work.

But I'm really excited about being able to invest in the team and build out the capabilities to ensure that we keep evolving the organization, again, to meet that evolving threat that we have in California. Because it is we live in a complex time with complex issues. And ultimately, when it comes to responding to emergencies, we need to make sure that we are always ready to be able to respond to those in a thoughtful way and with the capabilities that the state can bring.

Thank you. In 2025, Los Angeles wildfires, there was a lot of question raised about, what was determined as fire-damaged properties and for families to return and to rebuild. And there was a lot of questions about delays and not having the families go back onto the properties for what was labeled as safety issues. And I get that. You've just had, you know, not just wood burns in a fire.

Right? Boats, fiberglass, metal. I mean, there's a lot of contaminants, and I get that. So, given Cal OES' role in coordinating disaster recovery, what standard should California put forward or use so that property can adequately be cleared and make sure that there's no contaminants that would be harmful to human health without, again, the emphasis on without, necessarily delaying the family's return to to build to inhabit if it wasn't burned down or to rebuild.

Yeah. Thank you again for the question. I appreciate it. So, I mean, obviously, I wasn't here during the LA 2025, but it was a big focus coming into this position because the recovery continues. Right?

So there's been, you know, I know that it was a massive response in terms of being able to quickly clear. I think it was over 10,000 properties in six months. In that particular case, it was the Federal Government. We coordinated with the Federal Government, and they did the clearing.

And I think there's always opportunities for us to learn from each disaster to ensure that we're seeing what are, process changes we can have, how we can bring more to the to the response to be able to get people back in their homes as quickly as possible.

I was leading the State Operations Center during the Camp Fire. That, at the time, was, the biggest debris operation that we had. It was 18,000 different, properties in that particular case. And we always wanna be able to get people back into their homes quickly while safely. And I think that we have opportunity to continue working with our state partners and our local partners to ensure that we avoid any process delays in doing that.

And I have my commitment to ensure that we do have those collaborations to make sure that we do that.

Thank you. How will Cal OES work with utilities to make sure that wildfire prevention decisions in, the PSPS events don't, leave rural communities and residents' farms, food processors, all of us. Right? We feel--I represent a rural community, and I feel like PSPS shutoffs are a daily thing. It's just so annoying.

And, and I realized that there's a while there was a bill that passed that made utilities responsible for wildfires. And so they are very overly cautious about making sure that there's not a spark or anything, especially on hot days. But when you shut off and have a PSPS shut off for a full city, without notice and, or they say there is notice, but there's, like, ten minutes notice. You can't shut down a wastewater treatment plant in ten minutes.

There's gotta be a better solution than what we're operating in now and have been operating in the last few years. What are your thoughts on that?

Yeah. So I was at Cal OES when sort of PSPS, Public Safety Power Shutoffs, were invented. So actually was the lead with the utilities when we were designing how should we as a state make sure that we're coordinating with our locals to be able to respond to exactly those cascading impacts, right, of the power shutoffs.

So at the time, what we did is we set up, rules for the utilities in terms of the level along with our Public Utilities Commission (PUC partners to ensure that there were rules in place that the utilities were required to coordinate with locals and make notifications. And to this day, at the state, at the Warning Center, within Cal OES, we have communication with the utilities when they're going to be doing that.

Actually, we literally just got notified this morning that Edison has one, planned for, in a couple of days here. And so we begin that coordination early, and then we hold consistent calls with our state partners and with the utilities to ensure that they're getting the information to the locals and being very clear about when and where those shutoffs would be, to ensure that the community can respond appropriately and and support its its, residents.

In terms of what are the rules in place to try and drive the reduction of the use of Public Safety Power Shutoff, because I think you're absolutely right. It was originally they say it's a in a motivate or in mitigation of last resort. But because the utilities, you know, five, six, seven years ago didn't necessarily have these other wildfire mitigations, it was the one tool they had in their toolbox.

The good news is through the work that I did with Energy Safety, the prior Department I was at, we we have invested with the utilities, a lot of work on requiring them to build up different types of wildfire mitigation so that it reduces the number of times they need to do it and that it's more surgical, smaller and narrow and shorter, in the places where they do need to do it.

To your point though, it's still--it's still a tool that they have in their toolbox that they have that they have to pull out when when they feel like there's no other way to keep the the community safe, from a potentially utility-caused ignition. But the goal needs to be to continue to reduce that as a tool that they use.

Thank you. Last question, then I have a comment. But Californians, California taxpayers have already spent $456 million on a 911 system that Cal OES was a part of and that they were directing. But they've now moved away from that to a statewide program. What governance oversight are you gonna make sure that's in place that the constituents that all of us represent are on the hook for another costly, ineffective, necessary, but ineffective tool, like this 911, the NG 911 program that that was scrapped?

Yeah. Thank you for that question. I think it's a really important question. It was obviously a primary focus area for me as soon as I came into Cal OES was to make sure that I got a lot of information on what had been done, what where are we currently at, and how do we make sure, most importantly, that we're moving forward to building a modern, reliable, Next Gen 911 (NG911) system for the residents of California.

So I think there's a number of lessons that can be learned from the past, and we are making sure that we're incorporating those and applying those to everything we're doing to move forward.

And to your point, I think governance is really an important one. And we are very, engaged with our, 9-1-1 advisory board to make sure that we can have true collaboration with them on the advice that we get from them. So we're enhancing that engagement with them, working with our stakeholders to make sure that we're hearing with them.

I've already been out to several of our dispatch centers to hear directly from the users because at the end of the day, I think the most important, people in this equation are the person who's making the call and the dispatcher who's receiving that call to make sure that they can get the information to the right place and ultimately dispatch that call.

So we're we're definitely making sure that we have the right, team in place as well as the governance structure over that team so that we can be moving forward and with a successful rollout of it.

One of the other things that, I implemented right away that actually she's gonna be starting in in just a couple weeks here is bringing in a dedicated project director, program director for the implementation of that project so that we have dedicated resources on it to ensure a successful rollout. Thank you.

I have not had the opportunity to work with you. Don't take offense to this. I don't want the opportunity to work with you because I have worked with two of your predecessors, Mark and Nancy. Incredible, thoughtful, caring, responsive. But I've had the opportunity to work with them in times of disaster in my district like the Creek Fire and Camp Fire other other fires and disastrous situations that we've had.

And so, so you're very qualified. I'm gonna support your nomination, but I really hope I don't ever have to have work work with you. And and I know you'll be don't take that wrong. But you know what I'm saying? Like, whenever I have to work with you, it's gonna be a disaster. Not with you, but because of the situation.

I totally understand. And I often say to my colleagues, I really hope I never have to call you. But if I do, please pick up the phone.

Yes. Exactly. That's exactly what I say. You are very qualified. I have total faith and confidence in you. You have big shoes to fill. Your previous the predecessors before you are very complimentary of who you are and your ability and your capabilities. And so I'm very excited that you're taking on this role, but I hope I never hear from you. No excited that you're taking on this role, but I hope I never hear from you. No offense.

I'll try not to call you.

Thank you. No. But if you need to, you do. Okay. Thank you, ma'am. Thank you.

Thank you. We're gonna go to Senator Laird then followed by Senator Reyes.

Thank you very much, Madam Chair. And, thanks for the meeting. And and we did have this conversation yesterday where I said, how's the the Earthquake Early Warning System going? And this morning at 8:10 I was at an appointment when the the alarm went off. Everybody in this office is where I was is trying to figure out if they're feeling the earthquake or if it's coming or if they should duck.

So that that is a good thing, but it's sort of following up. It leads to a question I didn't quite ask yesterday, and that is is is I had the misfortune of being on the city council when we had a 7.1 earthquake that destroyed our downtown. We lost 60% of the square footage in our core downtown. It was closed for three or four years. We we had to completely reconstruct the infrastructure.

We've learned all these things the hard way. And how do you for even state officials try to prepare them to to understand how they might need to think or react when they have a situation like that.

So we do a number of exercise. I'll give you the sort of the formal response in terms of the formal ways that we prepare them.

Cal OES works regularly with our state partners on exercises to a number of different disasters to make sure that we have contacts, or our warning center on a yearly basis or actually even more than yearly, checks up on points of contacts to make sure that we have all the right contacts that we then do exercises with all the different levels within the organization.

Even up to the cabinet, I'll tell you later later this week, I have a cabinet meeting and I'm on the agenda to talk with the cabinet members about, you know, responding to different emergencies and just do a refresher knowing that we're going in to our sort of peak wildfire season. And and the big boss told me when I got this job, don't forget we have earthquakes, and it's clear that we still have earthquakes.

So making sure that we're always in constant communication because I think what to your point, there it's about muscle memory. I learned very early on in my childhood with, my own personal experience with a fire, a house fire, that if you haven't done it and you don't do it regularly, you're not it's not the way you're going to respond.

So we make sure that we have constant communication with our state partners to make sure that we have that muscle memory so that we can respond quickly.

Well, there's certain lessons. I mean, we had the 100-year storm six years before the earthquake and suddenly as the river was about to go over in downtown and redwood trees are battering down one of our main bridges and things are happening. It was realized that every crane was on one side of the river and so frantically it was like, okay, we we need them on both sides. The bridges could be going down.

And and then when the earthquake happened, that was one of the first things people did because we thought here it is happening again.

And when we had the atmospheric rivers a couple of years ago, the emergency director from my home county comes on because of mobile home park floods next to a creek in SoCal and they said, well, we just never thought this would happen. I thought, jeez, it happened in the 100-year storm 40 years ago. Mobile home park, same place.

And it's like and then I realized there was nobody there that had been there during the the previous storm and that that kind of briefing or exercise is going to have people. I actually found where the city manager was retired and had him call in to say here's the things I would think about now, based on what my experience was in the identical situation 40 years before.

So just trying to figure out how to do that I think is a challenge because you people will get it when they're in it but there's some things they should know before they're in it that would really help them respond. The--I was gonna ask about the 911 system and I was beaten to it. I think two other things. There's a--we talked. There's a legislative letter signed by another number of legislators on a a mobile high volume fire suppression water system.

And I think it was addressed to you or the Governor. How are you thinking about that?

Yeah. So I'm aware of the specific suppression system that you're talking about and it's and our fire service right now is evaluating that. We're always looking at what additional capabilities we can build within the state to offer as mutual aid equipment. So right now, we have over 300 different pieces of supporting equipment that we can deploy across the state, including Type 1, 3, and 6 engines, as well as, swiftwater rescue and water tenders.

So what we're looking at is should we be adding to that suite of equipment, additional water suppression tools? And that is one of the ones that's under consideration.

Great. And then lastly, and I apologize because in a minute, I have to leave to present a bill but I will be back to vote. Lastly, I brought up a situation with you, where there was this logjam in the Big Sur River that was about 50 yards outside the Caltrans right-of-way, and it was aimed at a a wall below the highway that if there was a flood, it would have brought down the highway there. And Caltrans said, oh, it's outside of our right-of-way. We can't deal with this.

And yet it was gonna be a $100,000 versus $30,000,000 or something. And OES mission tasked Caltrans to clean up the logjam. It's like get over the fact that it's 50 yards outside of the right-of-way. Are you prepared to deal with those kinds of situations when they come up as as your Director?

Absolutely. I would say one of the things I learned quickly especially when I was overseeing the State Operation Center was the stuff that comes to Cal OES when it gets to my level means that there isn't an easy answer. It's the problems that are really challenging to solve. And we often have to be really creative in the solution because oftentimes, it's a problem that we haven't seen before.

So that is our bread and butter of what we do as an organization is think creatively to ensure that ultimately we're serving that original mission of protecting the people property and the lands of our state.

Thank you. I look forward to working with you. I look forward to supporting your confirmation. Thank you.

Thank you. Senator Reyes.

Thank you. Thank you for meeting with me earlier. It's--it's always good to meet with someone who is highly qualified, who has experience. And I think that reading your résumé, it shows that you just every step of the way you were working towards this very position. And I'm very glad that you're there.

One of the things that, one of your duties, one of your titles is our representative, California's representative to Homeland Security. What does that mean?

Yeah. So the Homeland Security Advisor is an official designation and all 50 states have one. And then oftentimes, the Governors designate their emergency manager or their public safety top official.

So that means that I work at the over the threat landscape of physical, cyber, and, terrorism threat and make sure that I understand what those threats are that potentially can come into California and ultimately have--make sure that we build in the corp--in our, organization the capabilities to respond to that and keep this and keep the Governor smart on those threats.

I also work with our federal partners and my state partners across the nation, and meet with them to make sure that we're also all on the same page with what those types of threats are and that we're coordinating on the response to those threats.

Wonderful. Thank you. Thank you for that. My other question had to do with the mobile high volume water suppression system, but my colleague beat me to it. And thank you for looking into that.

I think that with as many, legislators who signed on to the letter, who are asking for an answer, this is our opportunity to bring it up to you. My next question has to do with our the World Cup that we're going through now and then in a couple of years we're going to have the Olympics. It's going to take lots of law enforcement personnel to make sure that we are taking keeping everybody safe. What is your department-- what are you doing to prepare for--we'll talk about the Olympics.

FIFA is already here. You've already done all the planning. Everything is looks like it's everything looks like it's going well. But what about the Olympics? Sure.

So in the Olympics planning, we're on the, the executive steering committee for the security of the Olympics. So what that means is that we're coordinating with both our local partners as well as our federal partners to understand all of the security needs to ensure that that is a safe event. Right now, because we're still two years out, we're in the collection mode of identifying what those security needs are.

So, for example, the staffing and the equipment and the locations of where they're going to be doing security operations given all of the event locations. And then our job at, at Cal OES is going to be to coordinate to ensure that we can bring that additional, that the locals have the additional staffing and equipment that they need in order to be able to secure those events.

Just to give an example, through the FIFA because you're right, we're in the middle of FIFA right now. The State Operations Center is activated. We work on a daily basis with our locals. And that means that we are coordinating additional law enforcement, to respond, to provide additional security, as well as fire apparatus and our radio technicians to ensure that there's a communication system to ensure that every all of the, responders that are related to security can communicate with each other.

And I understand that by the end of July, you'll have an idea of the number of personnel you'll need. If we don't have enough local law enforcement, what's your next step?

Yeah. So how that works is that we then work with the within the state to look and survey our state local partners to see if they can provide augmented staffing. And then we look at given whatever that footprint is, if there's additional staffing, we'll then work, out of state and work with our local state out-of-state partners, to see what additional staffing we can bring in for our local law enforcement that will actually be conducting the security operations.

So it's going from the State of California to a neighboring state Neighboring state. Opposed to going from the State of California to the feds?

Correct.

Very good. And what sort of training will you require from the law enforcement that comes into California to help out?

Ultimately, the responders will be required to meet California. They'll have to be able to know how to execute California law when it from a law enforcement perspective. So we're still working out exactly the details of how to make sure that happens. But we understand that we wanna make sure that anyone that comes in from out-of-state ultimately understands the rules they need to operate under.

Thank you. And finally, there oftentimes, there is great concern in some of our communities more than others, about the presence of ICE agents. And so I want to ask, is it ICE agents that you're going to be looking to to help, our local law enforcement when it comes to the Olympics?

We would not be looking to ICE agents. We'd be working with our local law enforcement across the state of California. And then if we need additional staffing, we would look to out-of-state at the local level.

Thank you for that. And my final question is, oftentimes when somebody comes in for confirmation, it's someone for our department that my community in the Inland Empire hasn't had a whole lot of contact with. And my question then is would you be willing to do a webinar that we can organize so that and we, of course, would bring our community in to to learn more about your Office of Emergency services so that the community then learns more about how what they can do to prepare?

Absolutely. I mean, one of the main things we do is work through community based organizations. Always happy to be there as as well. In emergency management, it's really about building relations with people so that you have the lines of communication to be able to coordinate and collaborate in the time of need. So happy to come and and speak with your community.

We'll be scheduling that. Thank you.

Thank you. Thank you so much. And thank you for being here. Thank you for your work. I think a lot of our are very familiar, with emergencies, certainly representing the area that I represent, Santa Barbara, Ventura, and San Luis Obispo Counties.

We have had our, you know, portion of of natural disasters that have greatly impacted. And one of the things that comes to mind, I think, as I think about some of this is just, you know, what are the elements that we do to continue to improve coordination between the local and between the state. And I think we have good coordination. In the moment, it always feels like it's not fast enough that we could do more. It always gets resolved.

But in the moment, I I think that folks feel like the way. I was reflecting on this over the weekend, and watching what happened in Boyle Heights. And certainly, OES was, you know, aware of what was happening on, you know, on the ground. We had the oil spill in LA as you referenced, not long or I think actually, no. It was the Director of Fish and Wildlife. We were aware of it too. We gave him the spill report.

But then Orange County, the month before. And so we have had a a number of situations. And what it feels like on the ground to some of our constituents is how do we get--how do our needs get met faster in a moment that feels uncertain, there's stress, there's high tension, and real concern? So I'm just wondering if you can speak overall to what we need to do in the moment to help folks feel like we're all coordinating in a timely manner?

Yeah. No. I think that's a great, great observation and a great question at the same time. Because I--I it's clear in emergencies. Right? It's the worst day of most people's lives.

Right? When that thing happens. And so it's literally bringing order to chaos. And we need to bring calm and care, and order to that situation. So I think a a few things is one showing up.

When I first came on the Cal OES site, I talked with my team about how fundamentally, at the end of the day, if you were to sum up everything that Cal OES does, it is that we need to be we need to show up when people need us. Right?

So what that means is connecting with those in their time of need, being in the places where they need us to be so that they see that we're working with our local partners and our state partners, and our community partners. So physical presence, I think, is a real key element there, as well as making sure we have the clear lines of communication.

I agree with you that it's oftentimes there's literally multiple lines of communication happening at the same time and making sure that we have processes in place to sort of bring the those threads of communication into a single voice.

So we're constantly looking to try and help do that, and also always welcome feedback if there's ways that people feel like we can do that better.

Great. Thank you. Alright. So, thank you for for being here. This is the moment that we turn to members of the public.

If there are members of the public that are here to speak in support of Director Jacobs, please come forward, state your name, your affiliation.

Good afternoon, Madam Pro Tem and members. Obed Franco here on behalf of the California Fire Chiefs Association and the Fire Districts Association of California, in strong support of Director Caroline Thomas Jacobs. We're confident that Director Jacobs' depth of experience in emergency preparedness, wildfire safety, and California energy and utility regulatory landscape uniquely qualifies her for this critical leadership role. We respectfully ask for an aye vote.

Thank you.

Good afternoon. Caitlin Loventhal on behalf of the California State Association of Counties in strong support of Director Thomas Jacobs' appointment and confirmation. Thank you.

Good afternoon. Mark Smith on behalf of CALNENA. That's the California chapter of the National Emergency Number Association. That's a mouthful, but we are the 9-1-1 dispatchers in the State of California. We're here in support of the nomination today.

911 was touched on briefly with some questions and some answers. It's critically important that we get this project correct. The citizens of California deserve a reliable and robust and totally secure 911 solution. We are confident that the Legislature is engaged in this from both a policy and a budget perspective, but we look forward to having some steady leadership at OES and as you fill out your team in the organizational chart moving forward and finally implementing Next Generation 911. Thank you.

Thank you. Alright. Seeing nobody else, I'll bring it back, to the dais, and I will entertain a motion. Vice Chair Grove?

Yeah. Thank you, Madam Pro Tem. Two incredible women, two incredibly qualified women to take the leadership roles of two very necessity or very much needed state agencies. And I'd be honored to move your confirmation to the Senate floor. We'll vote.

Thank you, Vice Chair Grove. Alright. So with that, we will go ahead and call the roll.

[Roll Call].

Alright. That is 3-0. We will leave that on call for absent members to add on. Congratulations.

So this is--this does conclude, our agenda, but we are going to be waiting for absent members to add on to our votes. And we do have a clarifying statement on one of the prior pieces of, one of the prior votes that we took. This is, specific to authorship changes. And so this is, give me one second. Item--this is Senate Rule 26.

This is the item on the agenda related to number four and five. Senator Grove.

So I believe that the clarification that we're gonna make right now based on the what I said earlier is on Item 5, which is Assemblymember Patterson's request to author AB 2700 for Assemblymember Gallagher. The only thing before the Rules Committee, to make it clear, is the authorship change. We authorize the authorship change. Any other amendments or changes to the bill will be dealt later in whatever manner the author chooses to. But this committee only has the authorship change before us. Is that clear enough?

Thank you. Thank you. So with that clarification, we're going to go ahead and recess as we wait for absent members to join us. Thank you.

Reconvene in thirty seconds. The rules committee is reconvened and we have our absent members here who are going to take up the vote. Members, we're gonna start from top of the file and go down, if that's okay with you.

You know, I was trying to do a favor, but I can start the way we started the committee if you would like.

I'm just gonna go back and kiss my friend Joshua Tree.

Okay. Okay. So the last item that we the last two items that we took up that are at the top of the file are governor's appointments required to appear. Item A is Megan Hertel, Director of Department of Fish and Wildlife. Madam Secretary, please call the roll.

[Roll call] Five to zero.

Thank you. That motion that is five to zero. The next item, governor's appointments required to appear. Item b, Caroline Thomas Jacobs, director of governor's office of emergency services. Madam secretary, please call the roll.

[Roll call]

I would like to thank the Chair for the consideration.

Thank you. Going on to governor's appointees not required to appear. Item 2c. Jay Bradshaw, member of the Transportation Commission. Madam Secretary, please call the roll.

[Roll call]

Thank you. We'll close the roll on that one. Item 2d, Kelly Bosler, member of the Central Valley Food Protection Board. Madam Secretary, please call the roll.

[Roll call] 5-0.

Thank you. We'll close the roll on item d. Item e, Justin Doring, member of the Commission on Peace Officer Standards and Training. Madam Secretary, please call the roll.

[Roll call] 5-0.

That measure is passed and closed. Item two f, Kelly Gordon, member of Commission and Peace Officer Standard and Training. Madam Secretary, please call the roll.

[Roll call] 5-0.

Thank you. That measure is five to zero and passed. We'll close the roll. Item 2g, Jacob Johnson, commission member of Commission on Peace Officer Standards and Training. Madam Secretary, please call the roll.

[Roll call] 5-0.

[Roll call] Five to zero.

And measure is five to zero. Close the roll on that. Item 2h, Jeff Long, member of the Commission of Peace Officer Standards and Training. Madam Secretary, please call the roll.

Thank you. Item two, Aye, the incredible Tina Nieto, who is the sheriff, one of the incredible sheriffs that we have. Member of the Commission and Peace Officer Standard and Training. Madam Secretary, please call the roll.

[Roll call] Five to zero.

Thank you. We'll close the roll on that one. Item 2J. Benjamin Therriault, member of Commission of Peace Officer Standards and Training. Madam secretary, please call the roll.

[Roll call] Five to zero.

That's five to zero. And that, measure is closed. And we'll go on to item 2k. Monique Moyer, member of the San Francisco Bay Area Water Agency Transportation Authority Board of Directors. Madam Secretary, please call the roll.

[Roll call] Five to zero.

Thank you. We'll close the roll on that one. Bill referrals. Item three, reference to bills to committees. Madam Secretary, please call the roll.

[Roll call] Five to zero.

Thank you, Madam Secretary. The next item we have is Senate rule 26, which is item number four. Item number four, between four and five up together or are they separate? Okay.

So item number four is pursuant to code Senate rule 26 Assembly member Lackey request to assume authorship of AB 2676 currently pending referral and authored by former Assembly member James Gallagher in order to pursue the measure. The second item in that group is item number five, pursuant to rule, Senate rule 26, Assembly member Patterson. Request to assume authorship of AB 2700, currently in State Energy, Utilities, and Commissions Committee.

The auth and to be authored by Assembly member, former Assembly member James Gallagher, in order to pursue the measure.

A clarification again. The only thing before the committee is the authorship change. Madam Secretary, please call the roll.

[Roll call]. 5-0.

Thank you. Having dispensed of all of our items, the rules committee is adjourned.