Senate Standing Committee on Rules

Alright. We are going to go ahead and, begin today's, Senate rules hearing. Before we begin today, I'm going to go ahead and call the

roll. Limon? Here. Limon here. Grove?

Grove here. Laird? Laird here. Ochoa Bog? Here.

Here.

Ochoa Bog here. Reyes?

Here.

Reyes here. Quorum. Thank you. We have established quorum. If there are no objections, I'd like to take up first on today's agendas.

Governor's appointments not required to appear starting with item two e, the appointment of Charles Duggan as a member of the Commission on Peace Officer Standards Training. Do we have a motion? Thank you. I have a motion by vice Chair Grove. Can we please call the roll?

Limon?

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

You're on page. Laird? Aye. Laird, Aye. Ochoa Bog?

Aye. Ochoa Bog, Aye. Reyes? Aye. Reyes, Aye.

Continue with the Five votes.

Next, we have next item for governor's appointments not required to appear item two f Michael Moudian, ed, edd, to the Commission on Peace Officer Standards and Training. Do we have a motion? Thank you, Senator Grove, for that motion. Can we please call the roll?

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

Grove, aye. Laird.

Aye.

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

Aye. Reyes, aye. Five votes.

Alright. That is five o. Next item is governor's appointments not required to appear. Item two g, Luis Portillo to the medical board of California. Do I have a motion?

Thank you, Senator Groove, for that motion. Can we please call the roll?

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

Grove, aye. Laird?

Laird, aye. Ochobogue? Aye. Ochobogue, aye. Reyes?

Aye.

Aye. Reyes, aye. Five to zero.

Alright. That is a five to zero vote. Next item for governor's appointments not required to appear. We have item two h Alex Rodriguez to the Water Quality Control Board Central Coast Region. Do we have a motion?

Thank you, Senator Grove. Can we please

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

Aye. Grove, aye. Laird?

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

Aye.

Reyes, aye. Five votes.

Aye.

That is five zero. Next item for governor's appointments not required to appear. Item two, Aye, Dominique Rokos to the Water Quality Control Board Central Coast Region. Do we have a motion?

So moved. Thank you, Senator Grove. Can we please call the roll?

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

Grove, aye. Laird?

Aye.

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

Aye.

Reyes, aye. Five votes. Thank you. Next item for governors, that vote is five zero. Next item for governors appointments is not required to appear item two j, Sabrina Ascien, j d to the Water Control Board Los Angeles region.

Can we No. Thank you, Senator Laird for that motion. Can we please call the roll?

Limon? Aye. Limon, aye. Grove? No.

Grove, no. Laird? Aye. Laird, aye. Ochoa Bog?

No. Ochoa Bogue, no. Reyes? Aye. Reyes, aye.

Three to two. Alright. That, item is approved, three to two. Next item, governor's appointments not required to appear. Item two k, Norma Camacho to the Water Quality Control Board Los Angeles region.

Do we have a motion? So moved. Thank you, Senator Grove, for that motion. Can we please call the roll?

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

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

Aye. Ochobogue, aye. Reyes? Aye. Reyes, aye.

Aye votes. Alright. That is 50. Next item, governor's appointments not required to appear. Item two l, Betty Olsen, PhD to the Water Quality Control Board, San Diego region.

Can we please get a motion?

So moved.

Thank you, Senator Grove. Can we please call

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

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

Ochoa Bogue?

Aye.

Ochoa Bogue, aye. Reyes?

Aye.

Reyes, aye. 5 votes. Alright. That motion is approved. Five zero.

The next item for governor's appointments not required to appear is item two m, Emily Weir to the Water Quality Control Board, San Diego Region. Can we please Thank you, Senator Laird, for the motion. Can we please call the roll?

Limon? Aye. Limon, aye. Grove? No.

Grove, no. Laird?

Aye.

Laird, aye. Ocho Bog?

No.

Ocho Bog, no. Reyes? Aye.

Reyes, aye. Three to two. Thank you. That item is approved, three to two. The next item for governor's appointments not required to appear is item two n, six Sixto l Lopez to the Water Quality Board Santa Ana Region.

Can you please get a motion? So moved. Thank you, Senator Grove, for the motion. Can we please call the roll?

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

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

Ochoa Bog, aye. Reyes? Aye. Reyes, aye. Five to zero.

Aye.

Alright. That item is approved. Five to zero. The last item for governor's appointments not required to appear is item twin item two o, John Scandura to the Water Quality Control Board Santa Ana Region. Do we have a motion?

So moved.

Thank you, Senator Groove. For the motion, can we please

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

Aye. Grove, aye. Laird?

Aye.

Laird, aye. Ochoa Bog?

Aye.

Ochoa Bog, aye. Reyes? Aye. Reyes, aye. Five votes.

Alright. That item is approved five zero. Next item I'd like to take up is item three, reference to reference of bills to committees. I will entertain a motion.

So moved.

Thank you, Senator Groove, for the motion. Can we please call the roll on that?

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

Grove, aye. Laird?

Aye.

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

Aye. Reyes, aye. Five to zero. Alright. That bill is out, five to zero.

Next, item, we will return now to governor's appointees required to appear. Items one a and one b, the appointments of David Silva and Paula Stigler Paula Stigler Granados, PhD as members to the Air Resource Board. We will invite you to come forward and have a seat. Thank you both for being here. Thank you both for being here.

You'll each have one to two minutes. If you have any guests here, you're welcome to make any introductions in your one to two minutes. As you approach the two minutes, we will let you know, and then members will ask you. Welcome. And we can begin, with, Mayor Silva.

Great. Thank you very much. Good morning, Chair well, I guess now good afternoon, Chair Limon, vice Chair Grove, and members of the committee. Thank you for the opportunity to be here today, and thank you to governor Newsom Governor Newsom for the confidence he has placed in me with this appointment. Before I begin, I'd like to recognize a few people who are here.

I am grateful to be joined by my husband, Jason Stone, and my mother, Lynette Silva, who are somehow probably more nervous than I am at this point. And I'm also joined by my dear friend Steve Kochenderfer, who is mostly here to be their emotional support animal and friend to keep them through this hearing. They're also serving as a small but enthusiastic cheering section for doctor Sticker Granados as well because we're big believers in chosen family.

My name is David Silva, and I have the privilege of serving as the mayor of the city of Beelton, as a member of the Santa Barbara Air Resource con con Santa Barbara County Air Pollution Control District, and as vice Chair of the Santa Barbara County Association of Governments. Like many elected officials in California, small and rural communities, my public service is not compensated so I have a full time career outside of elected office working as a fundraiser at UC Santa Barbara.

Thus, I wear quite a few hats. It takes commitment to balance these responsibilities, but I believe it's one worth making because California is strongest when every type of community has a voice in shaping statewide policy. One thing I've come to appreciate is that California strength lies not only in the diversity of its people, but also in the diversity of its communities. Our urban centers, suburban neighborhoods, agricultural regions, tribal communities, and small rural towns all experience state policy a little differently.

When those perspectives are represented at the table, California makes better decisions.

That's one of the reasons I was so excited with a little trepidation, of course to accept this appointment. It gave me a chance to help ensure that a small rural community like Bealton has a voice in conversations for communities our size hasn't always been represented. Before my appointment, many many people in my community had never even heard of CARB. That showed me that this role is about much more than serving as a board member. It's about serving as an ambassador to my community and others.

It's about being a bridge between Sacramento and the communities we represent. Helping people understand not only the decisions we make, but the reasons behind them while making sure those communities have a voice in the process. Serving as mayor has given me a front row seat to see how decisions made in Sacramento create both opportunities and challenges for local communities. It's where state policy truly meets everyday life. In my short time on the board, I've learned how valuable it is to engage communities early and genuinely.

The best policies don't come from science alone. They come from in science, practical experience, and community voices intersect and inform each other. I believe that's how we build stronger policies, greater trust, and better outcomes for California. Since first being elected, that's been my principle I've tried to live by. I never want my cup to be more than 90% full.

I always want to leave room for new information, thoughtful debate, and evidence that challenges what I think I know. I believe the best public servants stay curious, ask thoughtful questions, and are willing to change their minds and the facts support it. To me, that's the best way to represent California's diverse communities. By being honest about what we do not know, seeking out the information we need, and to be willing to learn from lived experiences and realities other than our own.

That philosophy has shaped my service on the Air Resource Board.

I have tremendous respect for the expertise and professionalism of CARB staff. Their work provides the foundation for the board's decisions, but at the same time, I believe the board does its best work when its members evaluate every proposal and make the best call they can with the information they have. My job is to make sure every vote I cast reflects a decision making process I can stand behind, unless the people I represent know I worked to make the best decision I could on their behalf.

If confirmed, I will continue to dedicate the time, preparation, and thoughtfulness needed to be an engaged and effective board member. I'll continue to approach every issue with an open mind, keep listening, and work to help ensure California's policies benefit communities of every size.

Thank you again for your time and consideration. It is an incredible honor to represent not only the people of Gilton, but also bring a perspective of a small rural town that rarely has a seat at the table of statewide policy making. I hope to can do bring that per continue to bring that perspective to the board. I'm deeply grateful for the opportunity to serve all Californians. Thank you and I look forward to your questions.

And my mother and Jason can now breathe, so I appreciate your time.

Thank you. Next,

Paula Stigler Granados. Hi. Good afternoon. That was a really tough act to follow. Everything he said did, I don't know.

Good afternoon, Charlie Wong and, Vice Chair Grove and members of the Senate Rules Committee. I'm very happy to be here. Thank you for this opportunity. I just wanna begin by thanking the governor for his confidence in appointing me and each of you for your time and consideration and also your service as well. I am an academic by training.

I have devoted my career to improving public health. I'm very passionate about that, but, my most important job is being a mom, and I wanna wanted to my family can't be here right now. They're in Texas. I was just there yesterday, flew in, to be here for this and going back because tomorrow is my daughter's birthday. So happy birthday.

She's turning 12. I think she's watching, so I'm waving. I'm really hoping that I hope she's watching. I I want her to see what what, her mom does, but it I you know, being a mom has been a constant reminder for me of why this work matters, and I truly believe that. I think that in the end, every decision we make is about the world we're leaving our children, the air they breathe, the communities they grow up in, the opportunities that they will inherit.

So I just wanna say preface, I believe that our communities only truly thrive when there's three things that come together, a healthy environment, healthy people, and a strong economy. Those aren't competing goals. They depend on one another. And, there's no thriving communities really without a healthy environment and no strong economy without healthy people. They have to go hand in hand.

I have seen firsthand what happens when that balance breaks down. In neighborhoods hit hardest by pollution, people become too sick to work. Children miss school, saw small businesses struggle, and entire communities suffer in both their health and their livelihoods. It's an honor for me to represent San Diego region, and their air pollution control district. San Diego is a remarkable, magical place, but it's not without its air quality challenges.

We have one of the busiest border crossings in the world. We have a lot of heavy goods movement, large military operations, and that brings some pretty complex air quality challenges with it. I am a community based researcher, so I'm not always in the lab with my science coat on. I'm often out in the community doing the research, in the community.

I've spent almost all of my career alongside our AB 617 communities, and these are the neighborhoods, you know, carrying the heaviest environmental health burdens in San Diego from especially from goods movement, border traffic, and I've been very heavily involved in our ongoing Tijuana River, crisis that has released untreated tens of millions of gallons right now as it's as we're speaking of sewage into our communities that's releasing toxic gases like hydrogen sulfide into the air that people breathe.

This comes into their homes at night. I have spent days in a hazmat suit out there collecting samples, and also evenings with the community members sitting and listening to how they're feeling. This work is also very deeply personal for me. During one of our most severe air quality crisis last year along the river, I spent months in the field collecting samples and I became seriously ill from those exposures and I couldn't work for many months.

It's a very scary time while I was recovering from that, but that inspired me to continue this work and that experience changed me literally and figuratively.

It gave me an even deeper respect for the families who don't have the option to leave, who live with these conditions every single day. When they tell me what it's like to wake up with burning eyes, headaches, the smell of hydrogen sulfide in their homes, I don't just hear them as a scientist. I understand that human experience behind those words. Those experiences have reinforced something I believe throughout my career.

The people living with these challenges and the community based organizations that serve them are the experts in their own communities.

My role is to listen, bring sound science to the table, and help translate those lived experiences into evidence that informs good policy. If confirmed, I'll bring that public health perspective that is so close to me and to my heart, a unique border region perspective that hasn't always been represented on the board and a commitment to that thoughtful evidence based decision making. I know that CARB's decisions touch people's lives in deeply personal ways, and I don't take that responsibility lightly.

The best decisions are made when we listen first, respect different perspectives, and let sound science guide us towards those solutions. So thank you for having me and, I look forward to your questions.

you. Thank you both. Now, members, we're gonna open it up for questions or comments. Would anyone we'll we're going to start with Viceroy Group.

Thank

Thank you. Thank you both for being here. I apologize for not being able to meet with you yesterday. But I figured, I'd be able to ask the questions that I had for today. So, just a question for both of you.

Given the recent closures of two refineries and the current demand for gasoline, with the six meeting refineries in California, what other options of meeting demand for gasoline, importing gasoline from foreign countries, or your thoughts on this model? And the reason why I'm asking you, I realize that CARB doesn't oversee that. The CARB is responsible for air and air mitigation and reduction of carbon fuels.

And each ship we bring here from a foreign country produces a 126,000,000 metric tons of carbon emission in order to get it here. And CARB only counts 12 miles off our coastline, so you're not taking into account anything that comes from a foreign operator.

Actually, take a a letter from a foreign operator that says this is how many emissions we burned. So there's no testing, there's no anything. So that to me is like, exporting your carbon guilt because it's still polluting over our ocean waterways. It's still bringing fossil fuels here that we need, which we could produce here. So what are your thoughts on additional imports that the legislature is talking about from India and other locations, in Venezuela compared to the reduction of actual carbon emissions?

And the reason I say that is I represent the top oil producing county in the world. K? Anyways, former secretary of natural resources is really, taking notes right now. But,

If Kern County were a state, it'd be the fourth largest, oil producing state in The United States, just for your reference.

K. So, back to this. The reason why I say that is because if we produced and you produce from a field, you put it in a pipeline, it never sees the light of day, goes to a pipeline to local refineries. There's almost zero carbon emissions, including the mitigation factors under an EIR that we have. But yet, the state makes policy that brings oil in from other countries, and there's higher volumes of emissions.

So has CARB even looked at that? And why are you only counting four miles or excuse me, 12 miles off our coastline, for the emissions that are actually brought into our state?

I'll try first. Sure. So I appreciate bringing that up and I I wanna share. I've joined the board around April, May. So some of this historical context, I appreciate the chance to be able to look into further.

But I do wanna share the same concern that I don't agree with the idea of green washing. I do not like inconsistencies in policy and I do not like kind of do you know rules for the not for me elements to it. So I do find I like

you. I like you.

So but I do find though that I agree that with when we deal with environmental policy, it needs to be grounded in reality and that we should not be looking for ways to make things seem like they're working, but we need to make sure that they are authentically working. I believe that climate change is a problem, and if we act as if the factors creating that problem are being solved but they aren't, there's an objective truth to it not being dealt with.

So I think when we deal with air pollution control, we need to be talking about authentically controlling air pollution. I don't have a solution for you. I do not want to act like I have a silver bullet.

It's a much more complex issue. But I do want to say that I agree that we need to be thoughtful of where those emissions are coming from and ensuring that we are dealing with a real problem. Future generations don't get to live off of, you know, slogans. They have to live off of the actual results.

Thank you. Ma'am? Yeah. I feel like I can just say what he said. He's such a it's I'm I feel the same way.

This is about a balancing act. I do think that we should be, you know, like you said, thinking climate change from a holistic perspective, and it's really important that we think about, what our carbon footprint really is and how that's actually functioning.

I'm also very new to the board, so, again, appreciate the historical context and and sort of learning now what what, what carb is, able to do and what they're not able to do, but I think it's important that, like like, Mayor Silva said is to think about this holistically and understand how one policy impacts another policy and how those work together and how do we balance this out.

So Thank you. On the July 23 CARB hearing that was just recently took place, there was actually a motion made regarding requiring farmers to replace tractors that are perfectly fine, perfectly running well, but they would have to replace I think they were three years old or older, four years old or older.

So somebody farmer, again, top three food producing counties in the entire world that I represent and you would have a tractor that's three years old that has to be replaced by something else, because it doesn't meet the state standard anymore, which is a $500,000 piece of equipment is gonna last a lot longer than three years. Two things that creates a negative, resale value for us because other states realize that they, you know, we have to sell it. We can't use it here.

So they're not gonna offer you top dollar. So you're not even gonna get even in an auction. My question is is that, this concerns me obviously because of the the district, because we produce food here. It's not regulated in any other country like this or any other state, as a matter of fact. And, how does carb there there was actually a motion made, and then there was a recess, and then you came back and the motion was withdrawn.

So, that's what happened on the twenty third as far as I can tell on the hearing. Do you think and what's your thoughts about requiring farmers to replace perfectly good equipment without without any reimbursement? I know there's a small program that allows some type of reimbursement. When if you look at the data that goes back historically, farmers are reducing emissions continually through, cleaner equipment, less agriculture burning. They don't burn anything anymore.

They have the chippers come out and then chip it up. They use dust control measures. So they're meeting higher air quality standards, but CARB is still threatening or motioning to impose stricter tractor and equipment requirements on them that are completely unattainable. So what's your thoughts on that? And who's gonna grow your food?

So I think a little I am a sense of this as well. My family randomly was farmers in South Dakota at one time. And so I've seen what small town families have to go through to be able to survive in big agriculture. But they don't have these rules. Oh, no.

I I know but I I know like I I saw my grandfather try to understand what even just South Dakota policies were like and how it's not a a simple system to engage with. Within the sense of California, I I would say to this I wanna be thoughtful of perfectly good is a subjective concept and so making sure that what we're looking for in terms of I'm in an agricultural community. I have ag land that's around me.

We have a lot of layering of different chemical in inputs that are coming to we are talking about how do we have a rural community have a safe breathable environment. I would say with these tractor discussions taking place to ensure that the data is objectively standardized.

So that if three years in working with your community or with any community is saying that is an unattainable option that is not that is not feasible for it for either from a financial standpoint or that the science doesn't support that, then we need to relook at what that policy looks like. I would just say that it would take more outreach on my end to understand the nuances to what is a tractor and ensure that it's backed up with that decision making process.

I agree with you that just saying pass a rule and then hope farmers can swallow that fee is not an acceptable solution and that we need to make sure that the policy we live in that reality for these farmers. So it's not just high high income farmers who can survive in these times. And then we don't wanna have policies that are driving out small farmers to be able to stay in California where we do need our food to be grown locally.

We do have policies like that and there are large farmers just gobbling up small farmlands, throughout the state. Do you buy a car every three years?

I have one car that I'm allowed to purchase and we own it for a few years and we share it. So I get how you can make one vehicle work for one family when you have an income that doesn't support changing it all the time. So I'm very sensitive to that, which I agree with you. You need to make sure that, someone can afford to do the policies we're asking them to do.

Okay. Just curious. Okay. And then, doctor Granados, you made a you, voted to remove manufacturing decarbonization incentive from Carbs Cap and Invest amendments and then later supported the overall package. What concerns led you to oppose MDI?

Just curious. What concerns and, were those concerns not sufficient enough to oppose in the final regulations? If you changed your mind.

Yeah. Thank you for that question. That was a really tough meeting. One of our my first, or so I think it was my second, maybe second meeting as a CARB board member, and, I was hearing think it was the public testimony, especially in engaging with a lot of the communities that came out to talk about their concerns, especially with the greenhouse gas, reduction funds and how their communities would be impacted.

And I really felt strongly that we needed to take a hard look at what the community members were saying.

And so I did vote to take a pause and go back and look at, how we can improve, the the the this going forward. And, in the end, though, I think it was, again, a very tough decision. I felt that, there was some resolution language that was added that was sort of put in to help, support not hopefully removing all of the funds, from some of these, tier two and tier three options.

And so I I feel like like we have to, we have to be able to, like I said, I'll use this word again, thrive. And, you know, this was I don't know.

This was just a really tough decision, but, I'm okay. I made the vote that I made, and moving forward, you know, I want to look to CARB to, make sure staff is informing us of all of the things that are going on with this, program going forward and that we're monitoring that really closely, and I have engaged with multiple, community groups since that vote to talk about that and to, strategize how we can all inform each other of how does this look moving and going forward.

Okay. And then the last few questions I have were a little different enough, that subject matter, but, you recently were a faculty member at Texas State University. Yes? Yes. Yes.

And you currently hold an adjunct affiliation there?

I have one remaining project that is lingering. Yes.

Okay. And your family is there now? Correct. Okay. Do you have residents in Texas?

You have residents in San Diego?

I do not.

Correct. Okay.

Just curious. Thank you, madam Chair.

Thank you, vice Shargrove. Senator Laird.

Thank you very much. Thank you for meeting with me. And if I'd have known your grandfather was a farmer in South Dakota, I would have asked whether he patronized my grandfather's grain elevator in South Dakota. So we'll we'll figure that out at a later date. I appreciated it at the meeting and we we had a good conversation.

Let's just start with some of the questions of things that that we talked about. And and and I think the high level one is sort of how you balance things. And you have the responsibility sort of really shepherd programs that lower greenhouse gas emissions. Shepherd programs that actually deal with air quality, which is the reason CARB came there originally. And then now we have different requirements through AB 617 and other things with regard to disadvantaged communities.

When you're having to do a policy or you're dealing with this, how do you balance all this? And and maybe we'll start with Mayor Silva and then go to the number of granolas.

Thank you for that question. And yes, we'll have to talk about Watertown and Aberdeen and see if we line up at all South Dakota.

There were Norwegians in Aberdeen as well of mine. But they were probably in that case their minister. So we'll do that. Yes.

I'm a small town mayor and it's something that when you're dealing with small town issues, you see very much the impact of every vote, the impact of every decision in real time and in a very granular level. From my own personal experience, at the end of the day, CARB is a an agency charged with preserving and ensuring public health. We really need to always come back to this as a health based decision making policy that is at our charge what we need to be doing.

From a personal experience, I always share my my husband had non Hodgkin's lymphoma and he's doing well now but it was something that we had to go through of is it an environmental impact? Is it not?

It didn't matter. He had cancer and we had to get through that. But we needed insurance to get us through the cancer treatment and we needed a job to provide that insurance to get us through the cancer treatment. So seeing the treatment. So seeing the connection that takes place between public health and the economics of it and the job security of it is critical in weighing all those decisions.

And I feel that from a lens that just was radicalized me to that. That when we make these decisions about public health, we need to make sure that we're looking at it from a full experience of that person and what they go through. Families don't have the luxury of knowing that it was ozone or it was pesticide or what led to the issue. They just are dealing with how do I survive and how do I keep the things most precious to me going.

But I needed the job security to ensure that I could survive us through that time of treatment as well.

So when dealing with balancing things, I think I have the unfortunate luxury of knowing how you have to balance those choices. How do I get someone to chemo, but how do I make sure I keep my job? When you have to make those choices in a day to day, it bleeds into your decision making process and making sure that we don't just view people as kind of a caricature of it's either this or the other.

As doctor Granados said, they're intrinsically linked and families need us to make decisions that recognize that link. So that's how I feel the balancing act.

It's more of a a gut that has developed over that lived experience versus an ideology. You can't learn it. You have to live it.

Thank you. Doctor Crononas.

Yeah. I was just thinking about, the balancing act, and Aye, was gonna clarify too. My family's in Texas right now because, we, are spending a month there to help care for a loved one that was in a motorcycle accident. And so balancing, having this summer in Texas, which, like, I know it gets hot here, but it's it was a 112 the other day. It's not a joy.

I'd rather be in San Diego where, our home is, but it's being a mom. I've learned how to balance, you know, my kids turning 12. Do I buy her a phone? Do I not buy her a phone? She's gonna eventually get one, but how do I keep her safe?

And I feel like it's constantly juggling, technology, constantly juggling making good decisions, worrying if, you know, am I making the right decision and having to live with those. And so I I feel like I've spent pretty much the majority of my life, as a working mother being, this, work life balance, and I feel like this also is sort of what this feels like too. We have to balance hard decisions with the reality check of how this impacts people in their daily lives.

And I'm very conscious of that, and and that means a lot to me.

Let me ask a a follow-up question to that because also you have such a public health background in your academia and other stuff. How are you gonna reflect those issues that you care about and you work on on carb where those are big issues? How are you gonna do that?

Yeah. I think, already starting to try to do that at the last, couple of meetings. I've asked CARB staff, to come back to me with some public health modeling to understand the actual impact. I need numbers. I wanna know, like, how many lives are saved, how many lives are lost, what's the rates of asthma, and how is this being impacted.

I don't just wanna see, like, an atmospheric model that tells me reductions are down. Great. Reductions are down, but what has that actually done? How has that actually helped people? And I think that taking into consideration not just public health, like my actual physical health, but also my livelihood, well-being, all of those things.

And so I'm hoping, with this deep public health community based lens that I have to take into consideration all the factors that impact people and their lives, and ask CARB to reflect on the fact that our charge is to protect public health. And within that, again, falls those other elements. It's not just the physical health of our bodies, but it's our livelihood and our well-being.

Thank you. And then a last question for both of you. I sort of mentioned it earlier in the balance question, but CARB has to deal with Assembly Bill 617 with regard to disadvantaged communities. And I know the legislature enacted it to have a focus that that they felt didn't exist before. How do each of you take that in terms of what your role is and how you're gonna implement it?

Whoever wants to go

Okay. Six seven six one seven communities and what's that intended for. It fit really felt of a a promise to be made and kept for communities who were identified or concerned about being left behind. And I think that it was created with the understanding that there are systemic issues that create access to clean air that has been either by blinders or by environmental just historical context has led them to need these extra support systems and we need to preserve that.

for it.

I also want to recognize that our six one seven communities are critical that we have now, but we have so many who are also waiting and desperate need of being identified and brought into that program.

And so, when thinking about our six one seven communities, it's not just how do we fulfill the promise made to them, but how do we also recognize that there are a number of six one seven qualified communities who still are not identified and in need of that support. So it's the expansion of the services. It's the outreach to them, but also even in those ones I think of at my home community area.

We have the community of Guadalupe which should be in need of greater support for that and they are going through or working through how we can get them. They need answers now and so how can I as a board member be hearing what their concerns are even though they are not identified as a full six one seven community?

How can we be addressing that because they don't have the luxury of waiting whenever they get put onto that community. So it's not just solve for our current and support our current ones, it's expand and be looking for solutions we can create for those communities who are in desperate need of that support and ensuring that we are not creating barriers of bureaucratic entry point for them while we try to help them out in the current life that they're living.

Thank you.

And just, I'm going to reflect on this a little bit differently and say that, I feel saddened that we have all these communities that are sort of, waiting to be on this, this AB617 list. My hope is that this list gets reduced and that we have fewer and fewer communities that have to be designated as AB 617 communities because they do have the resources that they need and they have the support.

And I'm very, happy that we have, finally defined geographic boundaries and this idea that there are these communities that exist. That is incredibly important work that's been done, to just acknowledge the fact that people are disproportionately impacted. And so I feel that my hope is that we have fewer.

We do have the right communities getting the right resources but in the future we don't have as many communities that need it. I know that that's a big dream, but I will keep pushing for that and pushing it, especially in our district, that we help those communities and that we continue to provide them the resources. But most importantly, we protect them from any more egregious pollution exposures than they already currently have, and we just keep making it better and better for them.

Thank you very much. I really appreciate your responses. I think both of you are really well positioned to be good Board Members. Thank you, madam Chair.

Thank you, Senator Laird. Senator Ochoa Boke?

You both here, and especially, particularly intrigued and excited to have Mr. Silva here as a Gaucho himself. So I'm also a UCSB graduate in religious studies as well.

I-- you're the-- we are the two. I've never met someone in the wild who was a religious studies major. This is so exciting. Hello.

I know. I saw that on your flyer and I thought, oh. Oh. So, we have a lot in common, so would love to just meet one on one with you at some point and talk.

Oh, yes.

At-- from UCSB. So based on that, as you probably understand, your job in this role is incredibly important and it has such an amazing great impact on personal and professional lives for Californians, and from daily lives to transportation to energy, on how we build our homes. So it's probably, in my opinion--humble opinion--along with our-- when it comes to the regulatory cost, it's probably one of the most impactful ones when it ones when it costs.

So for me, the focus will be today on affordability and that lens with your role in this position. So with that, a recent poll from the Public Policy Institute of California found that 63% of Californians say that the cost of energy, including gasoline, natural gas, and electric utility bills, is a big problem, and that over 60% said that they would not be willing to pay more for electricity even if it came from renewable sources such as wind, solar, and energy.

And though, as mentioned earlier, you know, the health of folks is very, very important, we also have to consider that fact that people have to live and afford to feed their families and provide a roof for those in their household. So, question. Are you provided with information like an economic analysis on regulations that gives you an idea on how much additional costs will be borne by Californians for a specific product or service if that regulation is adopted? Is that part of the assessment evaluation of policy that you are considering to implement?

I've had three board meetings, and in that time, economics and affordability has always been layered into that with staff conversations, presentations, and briefings. So yes, that is something that is very much at the forefront of any of those discussions taking place with the staff when we have our briefings with them about any of the topics coming before us.

So cost for what it would cost an average person and what it would--

In working with scientists, you sometimes have to help them understand the framing of it that way, but yes. No offense to you, Dr. Granados. But yes, it's a-- you know, you have to-- you do-- I like to say operate in Snapple facts and that's really what it is. It's-- you can have a big study that just-- you know, here's all the things, but really drilling down to and how does the average everyday Californian get impacted, that provided there, but just with working with some academics who need a little bit help with bringing it down to my level of comprehension, but we get there.

Okay. Perfect. Thank you.

I'm not sure if I fall into that category or not, but I work with Snapple facts too. I have students that I deal with. No. I-- we do get briefed, and I have asked a couple of questions about that as well. I was, like, how much would this cost? How would it impact our-- just an average family? I personally struggle sometimes with that bill, and it's-- you know, it's not easy to pay that. And I don't-- I think that everybody should be able to afford their electric bills, and so I think that's important. But we do get information from staff on these things. They do brief us.

They have multiple times. And then I often ask that question, like, also, how do we balance, you know, paying electrical bill and also taking care of our kids' asthma if they're living in a place where they have a lot of asthma? So I'm always trying to think about long-term public health, environmental health benefits, even though I understand acute versus chronic. Acute-- you know, I gotta pay this bill, but the chronic is, like, my kid is also often sick.

So I feel like we have to-- we have to be able to balance that. And I'm grateful to the staff, the very smart scientists and others at CARB. I do ask them hard questions about that, like, how many lives will be saved? How many people will have less asthma? But also, how much is that going to cost? Because that's important too.

Okay. So, I'm curious. When you're deliberating that, do you have a set number or cost level that you would-- that would make you pause in or possibly cause you to oppose a regulation that adds extra costs on everyday Californians, especially when we know those costs will show up in California monthly utility bills, increase the cost of a gallon of gasoline, or add cost of delivery of their purchases, say, via Amazon?

I don't have a set level. I think that one thing I've learned since-- so we just recently had to deal with a water sewer increase within my city. Hadn't been dealt with for about 20 years, and that was the first thing when elected mayor, I had to be like, well boy, what a great entry level into the-- entry experience for that.

What I learned with that though is that you will never know what everyone's breaking point is and how much to one person $20 extra a month is; a drop in the bucket, but for another person that's the choice between feeding a child, feeding my pet, feeding-- you know, we saw that a lot with it. And so, it took a lot with us when even dealing with that if I-- even if we delayed the implementation to get closer to a Social Security COLA, that was the level of margins that would make it work for them.

And so that sensitivity of implementation is something that needs to be implemented in all of our decisions while also understanding that with a 20-year infrastructural deficit we were on, that we were-- like more expensive than that will be if we have a full failure of our water system and what that means.

Similarly for cost, I know that, for me, the margins of what I can afford for my monthly bill versus the $50,000 a session of chemo that I got to receive the bill from and then submit to insurance and hope they covered, sometimes we can get a little bit offset with how do I protect a family from this acute increase monthly bill, but also, how does the family who then is dealing with a serious medical crisis, how are they going to afford that?

And so, you have to really accept that you can't fill everything everywhere all at once, but you need to accept that that exists and that I should be always ensuring there's a seat left open for the person not in the room. Politics inherently is for the privileged who have time to engage and talk to, and we should always leave that seat open of who's not able to be here right now and am I making sure there's space for that perspective. So that's kind of the balancing act within that.

Thank you.

It's really hard to follow him sometimes. He's so eloquent in his-- I feel like-- you know, I also don't sort of have a set point, but I do understand when bills get tight what it feels like to not be able to afford those bills. And so I do think that, you know, as Mayor Silva said, we have to think about the balancing act, engage also with our community members to find out what is that set point.

Recently in our communities, in our South Bay communities at the border, we've been distributing air purifiers because of the serious air quality problems we're having from the river pollution. And a lot of people are like, they're great, they're getting these free air purifiers, but they have to run them 24/7 and it's increasing their bill. And one of the things I brought up at one of our Air District meetings was, like, can we provide them with vouchers for their electricity bill because it is going to go up? And I sat down, and on the back of an envelope calculated this is gonna be about 18 to $20 a week extra for people.

And like you said, for some people, that's no big deal, but for others, that's huge. That might mean the difference between being able to pay for their kids' lunches that month or not. And so I think it's important that we take all of these things into consideration as we're making policies or as we're making changes because everybody has a different point and we have to take everybody's perspective in.

I think that's important, and I appreciate your comments, which, you know, kinda triggered my mindset on, you know, how do you-- and I do mean it because we talk theory really, really well. We're very good about theory and goals and ideals, but every single decision that you make has a real impact on the ground, right?

And what's interesting to me, sometimes when I look at many of these regulations and the ripple effect that it has on everything else on edge, here's the one area where I think most people don't think is-- we talk about families a lot, right? Families taking care of kids, feeding, and so forth. But when we talk about our seniors on fixed income, right, we have to think about the impact.

So to me, that is the base. That is a base. How much of an increase do they get on their Social Security check every month on fixed income? Because those are the constituents that I have met who eyes well up and share, you know, I have to choose between housing, medicine, and food. They have no other choices.

And so these impacts that you have, you have to look and say, well, how much who our seniors or folks with disabilities that are also on fixed income are entry-level wage workers? But they have more of a flexibility because they can get two, three jobs. But our seniors and our folks with disabilities, or-- they don't have options. That's it. So when I look at legislation-- you know, as you said, some folks will say, oh, it's only $0.15 here, $20, a dollar here.

But overall, I'm going, okay, how does that add up this past year with everything that we passed and impact our seniors and our folks with disability? Those are our most vulnerable populations in my personal opinion that I have met with on the ground. So you also mentioned that you folks meet with folks in your communities. How have you engaged in really having access to folks? What have you done to talk about the consideration of your proposals in relation to the impact cost-wise as far as reaching out to your community members?

You can go first. I just wanna say, I really appreciate that comment about people on fixed income. I have my parents and my in-laws, who I hope are watching right now, on fixed incomes. They're seniors, and I can appreciate the fact that any changes, even small changes, really does impact them. And so I feel, you know, that we have to-- we have to be able to address that.

And I think that we've been reaching-- I know David and I both, we've been-- as new board members, we're like, we want to talk to as many people as we can, reaching out to different organizations, asking them, you know, what are things that you're concerned about and how is this going to-- or like, what we were talking about is, you know, what's the next thing that's going to come up on the agenda in three months, six months, 12 months?

What are we looking at in the future and what are you concerned about? And writing these things down and taking them into consideration, and I think, again, understanding who are the people living in your community, because, again, I work a lot in the AB 617 communities, and many of the elders are on fixed income and that's a critical issue for them too. So I wanna hear what they are telling us and come up with solutions, practical solutions.

How do you do that? What formats do you do that to ensure that you're getting that feedback from those constituents?

I mean, right now-- well, I personally go to community meetings quite regularly, like, in the evenings down in the South Bay communities where I work, and we get to hear people talk about some of these issues, especially with regards to air quality and electricity generation and things like that. And so-- but we've also been having Zoom calls with different organizations that are working within those communities, and I look forward to reaching out to more organizations and listening to their issues. We're still new, and trying to-- I tried to squeeze in a bunch during the summer because my academic year gets a little bit busy, but.

For-- what I learned, especially having my first board meeting being the May one, it was a really great-- a great stress test of the system of how communities feel CARB is engaging with it, and it gave a great feedback to how we can improve that immediately. And one of the big pieces was, who are the community groups that are not meeting with CARB board members and how are their blinders on by maybe just the, here's the usual ones we meet with?

Our usual suspects, our frequent flyers. Actively reaching out to stakeholders who felt like there were people missing from that conversation and then saying, please can we meet, it's something I think that helps with-- you know, you host office hours in your city hall and no one comes to that because no one wants to go to City Hall. So you do it in a coffee shop, but which is a good hour for it?

Where I've gotten the best feedback is when I just knocked on people's doors. Doing it right now. That's how you hear what people are, but it's when you have removed every barrier of entry and you've sought them out. It's not enough to just say, I'm leaving open hours up. If you wanna talk-- it's the same as, like, we'll get drinks eventually. You never get drinks with the friends you say you're gonna get with drinks with eventually. You have to set a date and a time with a purpose.

That's how you get the feedback from the communities that feel most sensitive but least accessible to us. And so we've been meeting with the groups and it's a big thing that we learned from wildfire protection. If you start early on, you have more options for how to correct and contain the fire. The further back you get in the burn, the less you can do to solve for that. So our big one with these meetings has been, we have to get through what we're dealing with right now.

There's a board meeting tomorrow. This is not the time to have community input brought in is at the board meeting tomorrow. It's six months from now there will be a staff report or scoping activity taking place. We need to embed the most vulnerable communities' perspective into those pieces so that their concerns are reflected in what's being brought before the board, not as a afterthought. We've already baked the cake 90% of the way, now we're just doing the frosting.

We need to let them be involved at the initiation of that recipe and make them feel like, oh I actually see my concerns in what the staff is presenting and what the board's talking about, not as a add-on to it. And so we've been trying to say, what do you wanna talk about a year from now and what are your concerns there? Proactive governance is quite a better way to deal with things than reactive responses to it. And so we're really trying to embody that being new board members for that.

That's great. Okay. Perfect. And then one last area. In 2018, the Legislative Analyst's Office did a review of the state's major climate policies. One of its recommendation was for CARB to facilitate more consistent evaluation of climate policies, such as requiring retrospective evaluation of its policies. Do you think it would be helpful to you as a board member voting on updates to old programs and regulations if you were able to see some retrospective evaluations of their effectiveness and impacts on the state, especially in communities of color--and a second question from that perspective--or maybe even to help you when voting and creating new programs as a way to better inform you on how to best to or not design and implement them?

I don't mean to oversimplify what I think you just asked there, but I'm just gonna say, I agree that we should not just do a set-it-and-forget-it policy. I think that we need to adopt policies and then have the, did that work? Could it be better? I know that there's-- because, like, in your family, you get lifestyle creep.

You can have policy creep where you just kind do things and then you're building off of this reality without knowing if the original building blocks are founded in what you intended it to do. We just recently had a conversation about will be the report back in our last board meeting of, when this is adopted, when will we be able to report back of its impacts and if it's doing what we intended it to do? And I think that's with any good governance that you don't just assume that there is this, you know, inspirational-- this solved the problem, and you know what? Done. Never need to look back on that.

I think we need to have some humility that decisions we make are with the information-- the best information we had at this moment, but then if that information changes, we're okay to say we need to tweak, we need to adjust and make sure it's working. So I would assume and I hope for that that's kind of how we all would look at things is that we made the best decisions with information at the time.

When that changes, I might be able to make a better decision now, and that's okay to do. And it's not a sign that the policy failed. It just means we are being willing to adjust and make accordances to what the reality and implementation are. So I would look forward to that in all of our conversations and it should just be part of our everyday normalization. It's okay to try and not have it be the way we wanted it to. Let's just make sure we fix it and move forward.

Thank you.

Again, great response, and I feel like the academic nerd comes out in me where I'm-- unlike some of my colleagues, I love evaluation. Like, I put my heart and soul into it sometimes. I develop these evaluation questions before I even go to the research question, and understanding, like, is this working? Like, we're, you know, giving out this intervention.

Is it working? And if it's not, how do we fix that? And so, I actually worked for a foundation, the San Diego Foundation for a long time, and one of the things I implemented there was an evaluation program. They were giving out all this money for these great projects but nobody was tracking if they were actually doing good.

And so I put that into the proposal, like, how-- what are the metrics you're gonna be looking at for making sure that what you did said that you did and it worked? And then if it didn't, what's your plan to do something different and how would you change that? And I think that that's important in all of the decisions that we're making is making sure we have evaluation metrics. We're keeping an eye on them.

We're asking staff to report to us what are-- you know, what are those metrics and what is happening, making sure that we're telling them what the metrics we think should be by listening to the community members and then making sure we follow up if we need to change those.

Okay. I think that is all for me. Thank you, Madam Pro Tem.

Thank you. Senator Reyes.

I appreciate the time. Thank you both for meeting with me yesterday. I did appreciate the time that we spent. I know your new members and Aye, in our discussion we talked about decisions that are made and how, we we are held accountable for our decisions, good or bad, and we get to evaluate them. I know you you were being asked some questions about retrospective evaluation.

Trying to figure out did what you did the regulation you put into effect, did it work? I I do want to read a statement as to what carb is, and you tell me if that's the purpose of carb. CARB is the lead agency for climate change programs and oversees all air pollution control efforts in California to attain and maintain health based air quality standards. Is that you under your understanding of what CARB is about?

With about 17 other sentences of humanity into it, yes. That is a good distillation for me.

Thank you. Yes. I also agree with that.

Very good. So the the the purpose is to figure out what's best for the health of the community as opposed to how much is it something going to cost. Is that accurate?

I'm sorry. Could you repeat it one more time for a summary?

What what is important then for as a carb member not as a human being because we're all concerned with every aspect of everything. But as as a carb member, is your responsibility to look to see how you're going to improve the health of Californians?

Yes.

Yes. I a 100% agree with that. And I I think I mentioned in our meeting that I feel like the carbs charge is to protect public health, and that's through the climate change and and all the operations that they do.

Thank you. Thank you. I Aye, there were some, questions asked about AB 617, in San Bernardino where, my colleague, Senator Rosalicia Chia Bogue and I both, represent. We have two communities that are AB 617 communities. And these are disadvantaged communities.

So they had to be, they had to be vetted and selected. And then there were thousands of hours put into putting together a plan, a SERP for with the community, AQMD, car personnel, and those plans are finally put together. After the plans are put together, what is the purpose of that SERP? What is it to be used for?

To me that's a really great scoping identification and here are the issues that this community is faced with. It's actually capturing the nuance of a community that is informed about what this place needs. And then to the best of the ability of various agencies who take charge of serving that community should be used as a guiding principle and document for improvements that could be done to make the people's lives in that community better. So it's

And before you answer doctor Granados, then should local communities consider those SERPs knowing that all this time has gone into it to to to to help them, inform them where the communities are hurting the most and what they can do to make the communities better?

Oh, I would absolutely love that. To have someone much smarter than me tell me ways I can make my community better and then I get to implement that. That would be such a relief because we don't have that level of resource resources or expertise. I'm a religious studies major from UCSB. I don't know the best way to make that happen.

So if someone else was able to take the science, the time, the engagement, and provide me a road map of what I can do to make my community's life better, it should it would be almost irresponsible for me not to take charge and implement that or to the best of my ability with my limitations implemented, but that would be wonderful. So if you have one available, I'd be happy to take one from you.

I don't think you've been selected yet.

I also I I think it's a guidebook, and, my hope is that it was built on community input because that's the authentic way to do, any type of planning, and my, again, my my focus has been on community based participatory research, and it's exactly what it sounds like. It's working side by side as a scientist, as a health researcher, involving the community at every step, so they're making the decisions. Because I don't think you can build it and they will come.

I think it's important that it gets built because the people that need it the most are the ones helping to build that. And if we have the resources to support them to do that, that's a critical piece of this.

So I think it's a really important plan to do together. And if you do it together, it's going to be more effective. And also, there's more buy in. If something goes wrong, those community members can say, okay, we made some decisions. Let's let's pivot.

Let's adapt and figure this out together.

Wonderful. Well, as you know, California has nineteen eighty six seventeen communities. So 19 l l SERPs, reports that have already been prepared. We do have some local, or l SERPs, and that would be questions for another day. Question was asked about the MDI, the manufacturing decarbonization incentive to be funded by an estimated $4,000,000,000 in allowances added above the programs cap.

I recognize that you you are new to the board. That this was a big big decision that was made that affects our communities, provides multibillion dollar incentives to those who pollute to to make things better or to pay to pollute. The biggest complaint that I have heard is the fact that it removed $2,000,000,000 from our g g r f money. When you take out $2,000,000,000 out of a $4,700,000,000 fund, you've taken out almost half of it. As you know, tier one is almost always always covered.

Tier two includes high high speed rail and should have included incentives or or or legislator priorities. We spent a lot of that money for Cal Fire. Tier three is for clean water, clean air, transit. With the removal of $2,000,000,000, clean water, clean air, and transit would get zero. In some of your comments, you said there are many AB 617 communities that are waiting to be on that AB 617 list.

I want to ask this in the nicest way possible. If the decision you made, the vote that you took, removes any money for AB 617, how will we ever add more six seventeen communities that desperately need to be included, so that they can receive the resources, get the input, get the community involved, get AQMD, get CARB to send their personnel, to help them put these plans together, to help them with their air quality, to improve their air quality.

So if we've removed $2,000,000,000 and now we get zero for AB 617 communities,

how are

we ever going to fund them? It may be an unfair question, but if you have ideas, I do want to hear.

This is politics. Unfair questions are expected and ready to go. So, I wanna, that that conversation in that line of thinking is the exact thing that I spent the entire day of Thursday and Friday digesting, wondering, figuring out exactly that that how do you solve an impossible. How do you solve a problem like Maria? I'm sorry I couldn't help it was already right there.

But how do you solve an impossible problem like that? What I found with it is I going into that discussion was having the biggest debate about what do we do to preserve a system that by the time for me and my arrival with it was that here's where we are and delays have implementations and and a domino effect of so many other items taking place. The affordability conversation with the utility credits that were being part of our allocation discussion.

If things didn't move forward in appropriate time, that many Californians would experience that burden that would go through because of x, y, and z. I am frustrated by the process.

I shared the frustration with the community members, and it felt like the board was having to negotiate this impossible element of a system that does not move forward could create chaos and other ramifications. And the biggest issue I had with it was, I don't want to make a vote that I do not know the consequences of longitudinally.

Once we were brought forth with the MDI portion that it would be paused, that for me was enough to say one, we have a means of correcting and and pivoting that gives greater time for both community members, staff members, and the board to see if we can create a more perfect union in this discussion.

But two, it was important to me that I wanted it that to me felt symbolic that community members who showed up, who brought up, who raised very valid concerns were heard in that. We recognize that there is no community buy in to what this program is and thus we need to return to the conversation.

One of the reasons I also felt better was in talking with staff prior to that, I had raised concerns about what this looked like and how could MDI be integrated into a removal of our free allowances available and what that would look like long term. And they kind of brought up like this is a more systemic longitudinal conversation and I'm continuing that with staff about where I would envision this being a better process.

But I wanted to ensure that in making the tough call, you need to make the best of the situation you're you're dealing with. But that I did not want to create an agent of chaos that could create greater ramifications and consequences by not having a system that moved forward and it was adopted at the time. And so based on the rule making policies that were provided to us, that seems like the best choice in the moment for what we could do.

I still am not settled on where we are with all the things at that point. I've already emailed staff about when do we get a report back about that. And the number 1 thing has been in all these meetings too is, with this time that we have for implementation, how can we make it better with meeting with community members and what that looks like? And I'm very passionate to show that this isn't just a dog and pony show pause.

That there's actually something that comes from that that we show that we've listened and we can present what is our best solution as in our best foot forward.

So I still agonize about it. So thank you for providing that further. I'll think about this later tonight as well. But it's not something that has been settled and we we need to revisit it.

It hasn't been settled for me because I the communities came to me. And it seems like a decision was made before the communities were engaged. It doesn't appear as though there was a whole lot of community engagement until that last meeting, and that was very unfortunate. There was engagement from industry, but there wasn't engagement from the community. And although it could be said that the community should have come to us, oftentimes the community is working, taking care of their children, suffering through getting to doctor's appointments.

It is our responsibility to engage the community and I I have always felt that way even before I was elected. And the fact that my community happens to be one of those tells you that it is a disadvantaged community, and they absolutely deserve to be heard before decisions made. So here's my question, and then I'll ask you the same question. If you had more time to make this decision, What else would you request before accepting if you're told there's a timeline, it's a domino effect.

If you don't make this decision now, then this might happen or that might happen, because that's pressure on a new member.

If you're told, you've got we've got until this particular date, otherwise, the regional, decision can't be made, I hear you. I get you. What could you at this point now in hindsight, what is it that you could have that you would request now, having gone through this and having gone through questions with me And spent time with me about the importance of this community that begs to be heard. They beg to be heard. And it isn't just the AB 617 community.

It's the clean water community. It's a transit community. We're hearing from all of them. We're all hearing from them. Because there's no money in g g r f where they had been used to this.

I unfortunately think what I would request is not something that would be necessarily feasible because what this really has taught me is the fragility of our funding sources for these programs. The fact that these sources are these programs require these market based funding pieces that can be so much based upon market pressures. That can be based upon an economic situation to that is very concerning. It's the same as it feels like your retirement in the stock market in some degree with that.

And so when you have that level of inherent chaos by the nature of pricing, it lends to a little how do we say that transit is so connected to something that moves up and down so so drastically.

So for me, what has been leading me most pause has been how do you separate the fact that as we have our allocations by the nature of mandate decreasing taking place. You have these economic pressures for industry and maintenance of industry within that. It left me thinking, I am concerned that transit and clean water and all these other programs are contingent upon something that I can't control control.

But There was one thing you could control and that was the MDI $2,000,000,000 allocation to industry. So, doctor Granados, thank you so much, mayor Silva.

I think that that was a vote, a meeting that was really tough, and I think I've told you this too. It was a hard decision. I did vote yes to pausing, you know, the MDI to go back, and I wanted more time to address this to eliminate this huge, deficit that was going to occur in the funding situation. I also agree that it's, you know, a very fragile funding situation. I think that our communities deserve better than that.

I mean, we all need clean air and clean water. Every single one of us in this room needs that. And I think that we have a duty to make sure that our communities are protected, especially again the most vulnerable populations. And so I think if I could go back and, you know, change something, it would it would be going to the community members and saying, what is going on? How can we have a plan?

If this happens, what can we do next? Or, how do we prevent this from happening? I feel like I I don't know. I don't know if I got blindsided, but I all of the community coming out to talk about this really, struck me. I mean, we had, what, eight hours of public testimony.

I've never sat through something like that before. I'm not an elected official, so this is very new for me. But to hear those stories and thinking, like, why are we hearing this now? And so I know Mayor Silva and I have both actually trying to tag team on this, so it's not a burden to the community members to have to meet independently with every single person. We've been calling the community groups and saying, we want to meet with you and we don't want to wait.

And I think that that's what I hope moving forward we continue to do is is not the day before, not even the month before, but like, hey, this is coming down the pipeline. How do we address this? And hopefully, we can find the sources that we need that are stable, and sustainable for our communities.

Thank you. Just one more area, if I may, madam. The Inland Empire, my community already has over 1,000,000,000 square feet of warehouses. That's according to a report three years ago that I mentioned to you. We have at least a 125,000,000 square feet of warehouses that are going to be built or that are have already been built or in the process of being built.

What do you think are ways we can help to mitigate the proliferation of warehouses or data centers? That's the newest thing that's going to be coming in. And what would be the role of carb in this?

I've, I think recently in our in our district, we, had a vote for this ISR rule to help with our warehouses. We have a little bit of a different situation where we have a bunch of smaller warehouses, but they're embedded in our our communities, and definitely a lot of goods movement coming through because of the border.

And so while we don't have these giant warehouses like the South Coast does, we still have a lot of impacts on the health in our communities, and so I voted to pass this ISR. It was not, taken up, and instead, they're going to be doing an incentive based program.

I requested that our district come back to me and tell me how's that working, and if it's not working and what are those metrics, what are those evaluation metrics, to show that the health is improving and and that the warehouse, you know, are actually working through this, incentive program, and I want and if it's not working, we need to go back to looking at that ISR.

And the CARB itself, I mean, I am supportive of a statewide, ISR, because I think that that would be something that would be a really great step to help these communities and, maybe we'll get there. I feel like each community is a little bit different and we have to take that into consideration because not a a, you know, South Coast is not San Diego and vice versa.

So it does have to be tailored to the own their communities, but I I look forward to hoping that that comes down the pipeline. Thank you.

I will I understand better of how to approach that problem from a local government agency than from CARB at this point. So I look forward to if there's suggestions of how CARB can be a better partner in it. I just know that from the ownership I take from my own community, we've had a big reckoning with we're dealing with just the implications and some of the redlining that can occur for community based housing that is always located in the most vulnerable and toxic areas.

High density housing is often next to a freeway. Affordable housing has an overlay in some of our industry industrial zoning for it.

So we've had to have a reckoning within ourselves of just these kind of policies that we've been building off of that you've even forgot to go back and audit and realize that you're reinforcing some of these economic and environmental issues within each other saying that where there's industry, industrial zoning, let's put affordable housing overlays there to reach some of that.

So in terms of CARB becoming in someone to educate and support and help small rural agencies especially who maybe don't even realize that's in place or things about the educate education of a problem often helps in government only a washed pot boils. So for me that has been how we've been taking as personal ownership. If there was a means for statewide support for that to help people kind of be more creative or just make sure we're auditing, that'd be very helpful.

Because I don't know how many people are aware within some some of these rural areas that that's just happening by the nature of it.

But if there's a means for CARB as a CARB board member, I'd love to connect with you more about how you see we can be doing better from this space as well. And when we switch our hats back and forth.

Thank you. And I agree with Senator Laird. You you both are clearly well qualified and you have the commitment to try to do something that is good for the community. I think you'll be great members. Thank you.

In the interest of time, I'm just going to ask you a couple questions. And I think, you know, as I've listened to this conversation and quite the range of questions, that have come forward. I want to know what you want to be known for as members of carb. And that's the first part of the question. And the second part of the question is, do you think you're on your way for being known for the things that you wanna accomplish as CARB Board Members?

Thank you for that question. I'm still trying to figure out who I am and what I wanna be when I grow up most of the time, but I feel like, I was just saying how I never I actually never imagined myself to be where I'm at right now in this position, and I take that with great honor to be here. And I I hope that I can bring that public health pragmatic voice, to CARB.

Again, I'm I'm steeped deep in community based research and public health, and so I hope that I can continue to, ask staff for, that element that I don't always hear. Sometimes I hear the science, but I don't always hear how does that reflect on people every day in their lives and their health.

And so I hope that that's what I am known for. Am I well on my way? I have a lot to learn, and I've been talking to other Board Members, talking to staff, talking to community members, just trying to figure out, you know, who I am. But I do see myself as being, this voice of what is our goal here. Our ultimate goal is to protect public health and the policies that we make.

And I hope that that's what I become known for.

In referencing a little bit with my religious studies background, I'm hoping for a bit of a Vatican two energy for the the carb board. We need to open up the windows and let in some fresh air and some new ideas and new perspectives.

And I'd like to be able to say that when I'm done with whatever this is, if confirmed and however long that is with it that there's people who are engaged with CARB, who are aware of what those decisions are and feel empowered to advocate for themselves as well, but know the avenues to do that. Every meeting we've had with any agency has been, do you know how to navigate within this complex system?

Do you feel like you have a means of reaching out to other Board Members?

Do you feel like you know the staff context for that? I should serve as a conduit to communities who don't feel engaged or connected to this board, and that they feel like even after my time's done, there's more means of entry points into the CARB board and the CARB staff to get their concerns elevated and addressed in a meaningful and actually, enacted manner. And that's the best way I can do it.

Is that somehow after I'm done, those connections live long beyond me and communities don't wonder, how do I get in touch with the people making these decisions? There's a big deficit between community engagement and understanding of this board and there's so much opportunity to be able to do that.

So that's what I'm hoping to do and I think slowly we're moving in that direction.

Great. And and the reason I ask that is because I think you heard just based on the line of questioning. We're all coming at this from a different lens, from different districts. And even in the line of questioning, you probably see that we're not all on the same page. But car there is one carb, not one carb per district.

One carb for the whole state. But there also tends to be, and I think no matter where our districts are, this feeling, this thread and a feeling in the legislature that our constituents aren't being heard. And I appreciate that your answer for both of you included doing something that was reflective of the districts and the Californians that we represent. And, I think that that's something, that I hope that you will take with you, through this experience.

And, that we're talking about the things that are still problems today.

Less than twenty four hours ago, a group of members were talking about what happened in Boyle Heights and the air quality there. And the fact that even today, we have folks who don't understand the system that you are in, the system that you are a voice to, and how that system works for them. Not just how it works for the state, but for them.

And this is, a community that is surrounded by freeways, communities that is industrial, all topics that will touch, I think, the areas, and the decisions you make. And it is our sincere hope, that those, are are are not districts, that are not people, that are not communities that will be left forgotten, in in the wake of a of a decision.

And I think that the reason you heard from us, again, different perspectives, different lens, is because there is still a feeling in the legislature that, you know, perhaps some of our, agencies have not quite, been able to reach, the communities that we, all hope to serve. So thank you for going through You make hard decisions. They're not easy. And the process is also not easy. And so I appreciate the work that you do.

With that, and no more questions, we are going to now, open this up to, members of the public. And we'll begin with any members of the public who are here to speak in support of, the, appointees that are before us. I'm going to invite you to come forward, share your name, your affiliation, and your position.

Good afternoon. Bill McGavin with the Coalition for Clean Air in support of both Mayor Silva and Doctor Stigler Granados. They both bring valuable experience and thoughtful perspectives to the board.

Steve Hansen here on behalf of Heirloom Carbon in support of both nominees. And, on a personal capacity, I've known mayor Silva for a few years as a former local elected official Chair of an air board. I've been impressed with his heart and brain as we've seen today. He's pretty quick witted. Watching him in the board meeting was impressive.

So I'm looking forward to watching you, doctor Silva, hopefully, with confirmation in hand soon. Thanks, members.

Good afternoon. Erin Arlingenet, Air Pollution Control Officer for Santa Barbara County Air Pollution Control District. I'm also here in support of both of the candidates before you today. I just wanna highlight the importance they have of fulfilling the role from a local air district perspective that definitely needs to bridge the local constituents not only to the local and regional government but up to the state. Thank you.

Good afternoon, madam president Pro Tem and members of the committee, Gus Corey. On behalf of the Santa Barbara County Association of Governments, also president of the, Mayor Silva fan club, here in support of, confirmation for both, Mayor Silva and doctor, Granados. You know, I I've had the fortune of working with Mayor Silva. Really appreciate his thoughtfulness, his, compassion, his energy, and working on complex issues, and really appreciate, doctor Granados' comments, during the, AirBoard's meeting back in May.

That was a very incredibly difficult, conversation, but the silver lining is we think that there is a solution.

Thank you. Seeing nobody else here speaking in support, is there anybody in this room here to speak in opposition of our appointees? Alright. Seeing no one, here to speak in opposition, we are going to go, and move this forward. I'm going to go ahead and begin, with, a motion for David Silva as member, to the Air Resources Board.

We could talk offline about that. But in the meantime, we ask for your confirmation for both, candidates. Thank you so much.

Do we have a motion? Okay.

Oh, you wanna do it? Yeah. Go ahead.

So moved.

Alright. From one religious studies major to the other, we have, the motion made by Senator Ochoa Bog. Can we please

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

Aye. Grove, aye. Laird?

Aye.

Laird, aye. Ochoa Bogue?

Ochoa Bogue, aye. Reyes? Aye.

Aye.

Reyes, aye. Five votes. Alright. That is a five o vote. Congratulations.

The appointment was approved and it will move to the full Senate floor for confirmations. Next, I'll entertain a motion for Paulus de Gallegos, PhD as a member to the California Air Resources Board. Do we have a motion?

So moved.

Thank you, Senator Laird. Can we please call

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

No. Grove, no. Laird?

Aye.

Laird, aye. Ochoa Bogue? No. Ochoa Bogue, no. Reyes?

Aye. Reyes, aye. Three to two.

Congratulations. That appointment has been approved to move to the full Senate floor for confirmation with a three to two vote. Congratulations to the both of you. Thank you. For our final items, we will return, we will turn to the governor's appointees required to appear.

We have item one c and one d, the appointments of Joseph Ito and Alice Reynolds, JD, as members to the independent system operating operator governing board.

We have item one c and one d, the appointments of Joseph Ito and Alice Reynolds, JD, as members to the independent system operating operator governing board.

Thank you. Thank you for, for, being here. You will each have one to two minutes for your opening remarks, and we'll, as you get close to that time, we, we will flag that for you. And you may introduce anyone you have in this room here today.

Thank you.

Good afternoon, Madam President Pro Tem, fellow committee members. I've met some of you for my PLAAFPs confirmation. I've not met all of you. I'd like to reintroduce myself.

I had a 40-year career at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory working on public interest issues related to electricity. Most of that time I spent developing advanced transmission technologies. Several of which I demonstrated at the California ISO and a number of which are in controls across the country including at the ISO. I also supported the Department of Energy and participating in the US Harabedian investigation of the two thousand and three blackout.

And it was also commissioned by FERC to undertake a number of technical studies around the integration of very renewable energy sources in support of changes to the NERC reliability rules for integrating those types of resources.

I'd like to use the time that I have available to sort of summarize what it is we do with the ISO and what we have done for you lately. I view our job, and our primary job, our job number one is to keep the lights on. And we do that by operating the transmission grid 24/7, 365 days a year. We operate through COVID. We had ways of getting the shifts run.

These are highly dedicated, highly organized organization focused on keeping the lights on. I'm very pleased to report that working with our sister agencies at the California Energy Commission and at the Public Utilities Commission, we've onboarded an enormous amount of new generation in the last four or five years up about on the road of 34 gigawatts. That's 34,000 megawatts. And as a result, we have not had to call a flex alert since I was appointed to the board in 2023.

So three years without flex alerts, yay for us.

I'm very, very, very pleased about that. That is I think our number one accomplishment. The second thing that we do is we try to we contribute to the affordability of electricity, which we know is growing in its cost these days. And we do that by operating a competitive wholesale market for the trade of electricity. Many of you have heard us report about the energy imbalance market which is a real-time balancing market that encompasses 22 entities across the 11 Western states.

This has already produced 9 billion dollars in savings for consumers. More recently, we've just opened our extended day ahead market. This is sort of the day-ahead counterpart to the real-time market. It went off without a hitch after two years of very, very hard work. The Energy Commission has commit undertook a study a couple of summers ago which forecasts that when it went at full scale that market produce an additional billion dollars in savings for consumers through its operations.

Key to achieving those savings is the AB 825 legislation. That legislation allows us to partner with an independent governance entity representing the entire region to both oversee and operate this market. This has been the key to bringing more members into that market. And that is something I'm very focused on currently and will be for the for the next year and a half. Our final job is to support achievement of California's clean energy policies.

And our role in that process is to plan the transmission system and to onboard new generation. I'm very pleased to report we've had a very robust building program over the last five years on the order of 28 billion dollars worth of new transmission. We've also undertaken major interconnection reforms that are allowing us to onboard six to seven gigawatts of new generation every year keeping us on pace with the S&P 100 goals that we were set out to meet.

In summary, the California ISO is a world-class organization. We are leading the world in integration of air renewal generation.

We have delegations come from around the world that come to see how we go about doing it. We're very pleased to work with them to show them the tricks of the trade, so to speak. If I am reconfirmed, I pledge to do my best to continue to improve the reliability of the California grid, increase its affordability, and accelerate progress for our state's clean energy goals. Thank you very much.

Thank you. Thank you. Miss Reynolds.

Good afternoon, Chair Limon, Vice Chair Ochoa Bogh, and members of the committee. I wanted to start by, introducing two people who are here today who are very important to me. My son, Oscar, who is currently studying chemical engineering at UC Davis, and my daughter, Ruby, who is gonna be a freshman next year at University of Washington studying history and political science. So hopefully, her education is beginning today watching this hearing. The I'm really grateful for their support in being here today.

I'm also pleased to be here today to speak with you all about this appointment. I really appreciate the opportunity to continue my public service career in a position on the board of the Cal ISO. As we all know, electricity is essential for, every Californian, and it's also central to decarbonizing our economy. California's electricity generation is getting cleaner every year, and we're firmly on the path to meet our climate change reduction requirements for the energy sector. At the same time, affordability is critical.

Californians need reliable, clean power at the lowest cost possible. I recognize the CAISO's important role in electricity services. CAISO must operate the state's wholesale energy markets efficiently and dispatch available generation resources to reliably meet demand every day and ensure that we're operating and planning for a transmission system that meets the needs of today and is ready for tomorrow. I'm pleased to see that many initiatives are already underway. Chair Edo mentioned a few.

I look forward to helping to strengthen the energy markets, prepare for the clean energy future, and continue coordination with regional partners to harness the benefits for customers across the entire West. My appointment to CAISO follows four years as president of the California Public Utilities Commission and previous roles in the administration for two governors and also at the attorney general's office.

And across each of these roles, my focus has been the same: to make evidence-based decisions according to legal standards, to adapt to changing conditions, and most importantly, to serve the public interest. I hope to bring that same focus to the Kaiso board, with a goal of reducing ratepayer costs, improving reliability, and continuing our progress towards California's climate goals as cost effectively as possible.

So thank you very much for devoting your time to be here today and to consider my appointment, and I welcome your questions.

Thank you. Members? Senator Grove?

Thank you. Thank you both for being here. I was part of your confirmation last time. And I can say that after sitting on this committee through, I think, three pro tems and a very lengthy time on rules, you are by far overqualified. And I appreciate you being at Cal ISO and the extraordinary experience that both of you bring to it.

And I think you are vastly underpaid. So I'm just gonna say that, and then I'm gonna ask you a few questions. So thank you both for being here. This is gonna probably set the former secretary of natural resources off and, but he gets to go next. So it's okay.

So there's been concerns raised about Diablo Canyon and, the opera you know, their operation beyond 2030. I often tell my colleague that, you know, I get the fact that, you know, I think it's 32% of the electricity that comes from Diablo Canyon. Could be wrong. You guys have the numbers. But I have a huge concern that not extending Diablo Canyon's operational capacity out so that there's certainty so you can keep those incredible engineers, those individuals that work there, the, the people who operate that system.

I mean, if we just keep doing this two-four-year thing or just, you know, extending it for brief amounts of time, I think we have the opportunity to lose those people to just like the oil industry when they chase the Permian to Texas because they wanted certainty to provide for their families. So I have a concern about that. But from Kai Calysso's perspective and the independent perspective, what is the modeling show about the reliability, transmission, and system cost consequences of retiring Diablo Canyon?

And can it be retired, and you still maintain, like in your words, keeping the lights on? And I'll start with Chair Eto.

In the theme of keeping the lights on, or, I was chastised by my CEO. It's really keeping the air conditioning on. That's half of our load on the hot summer days that we're concerned about. Capacity always has value. And I want to emphasize that I would never look away from capacity when my job is to keep the lights on.

The same time, the question that I don't get to answer. I operate the system as for me. The system that is given to me by the decisions that are made by the California Public Utilities Commission in the case of the resource portfolio. So I also have to plan for a worst case. And so currently our transmission planning is geared around the resource portfolios that the California public utilities has given to us, which assume a retirement date for Diablo Canyon.

So we are planning transmission. They are giving us resource portfolios that assume that Diablo Canyon will not be there. Those decisions are decisions that they will make and that the legislature will make in terms of what resources are available. I would ask that you consider not only the capacity as value but that it has a cost. And so what is the right balance of cost vis-à-vis the alternatives if Diablo Canyon is or is not there.

And those are decisions that thankfully the PUC is going to be making it with the guidance provided by the legislature. I hope that's helpful.

Let me phrase that a different way. If the decision is made to shut down Diablo Canyon, can you do your job and keep the lights on with the with the keep the lights on or the air conditioning running, or not have blackouts, brownouts, or fluctuations? Can you do your job if Diablo Canyon disappears for the people of the state of California?

I can do my job, but I cannot predict the future. And that's why I say capacity always has value. And so I would never turn away capacity that is available. I leave it, and I plan on the assumption that that, that capacity from Double K will not be available. That is the proven approach to ensure that we are covered in whichever outcome emerges.

And we are looking to the legislation into the decisions made by the PUC to tell us what will be the system that we will operate. And we will operate that system as reliably as we possibly can.

Miss Reynolds? Sorry.

I, I agree with Chair Eto's response, and, and let me just emphasize a couple of things. I think the, the point on capacity is a really important one at the case when we're operating the system, for us, more capacity is always better. Of course, more capacity comes with a cost. And when you have resources that have that must show up into the market, they have obligations to to bid into our wholesale market. There's a cost to that on ratepayers.

The planning, so we've done modeling, showing that the system is reliable under current reliability standards, and then we rely on largely the PUC's modeling, and also do some of our own to look into the future. And as Chair Eto said, we're making certain assumptions in that modeling. So what is demand going to look like? What are the worst times of the day, and what are the worst worst times of the year? And do we have enough generation available for those times into the future?

If Diablo Canyon is not available, other resources would need to come online to meet the, the ongoing reliability standards. The agencies are currently planning for those other resources, and all of our load-serving entities are planning for other resources. And so, if the the, the retirement dates were changed, there would be some replacement and shuffling as we move forward into the future.

Thank you. You know, as a legislator, we as legislators, we get to, we get invited to do all kinds of things, like a tour to USS Dennis, you know, out in the Navy Yard in San Diego, or you get to go to Disneyland on a special pass, or, like, different things. Right? The best trip I ever took was Cal ISO. I, I really say that, and I'm being genuine about it.

When you walk into that one big room with all those screens and then the electricity is moving, and you see it drop, and then you see all those people on that trying to move energy into another place so we don't have a fluctuation in power to a wastewater treatment plant or whatever it is, I think that's incredible. It really was an incredible learning experience to see how California's power is managed in that one location. And I, I, I really say that not lightly.

When I said you were underpaid and overqualified, you are. And I hope the governor's office is listening because you guys should get more than what you get.

I, I do have one more thing just to share with you. We are we're working on something since 2017 with California Department Energy or with, with excuse me, CalGEM and the water board and some different things, and then the DOI in in, in Washington, DC. And we will have, hopefully, an approval at the end of September, through what we need through CalGEM in the state of California that will deliver 1,600 gigawatts of power instantly to the grid. It's synthetic geothermal.

It's transitioning oil fields and depleted wells.

It's we use solar panels to heat up the water. It gets dispatched. It's actual energy. It's synthetic geothermal. Five national labs have said it will deliver it at six cents a kilowatt.

So I think with the governor's help pushing this project forward once he found out about it, I think it's gonna move forward, and, you know, he'll be able to take clear of it for six cents a kilowatt energy. We'll have to deal with PG&E because they wanna charge us a wheeling charge, which I don't think is really acceptable.

But I think it, it provides a really state-of-the-art power available in oil-fill transition jobs for not-in-use oil fields would, you know, they those jobs would transition to that. So it creates an economic advantage there too. I wanna thank you both for being here.

I look forward to your confirmations. And I think you like I said, you are both overqualified and underpaid. And I appreciate you looking out for all of Californians and taking on this role.

Thank you, Vice Chair Grove. Next, we have Senator Laird.

Thank you. I appreciate you meeting today. And I know during that discussion, we did talk about Diablo Canyon or at least I did. And I did point out that while there is the issue that was raised by Senator Grove, there's about 10 ancillary issues about protecting the lands, making sure the cost is okay. The 650 million dollars outstanding loan is repaid, and whole host of issues.

And so those issues need to be resolved as well if we're gonna deal with the extension, and that's what the conversation will be when we get there. Just one question. And, and we actually did talk about it today, so I'm sorry. Usually, I I follow-up on when we talk about. But, but last year, we adopted Assembly Bill 825 on the regional grid.

The regional grid give that bill gives a role to, to Cal ISO. And it would be good to hear both of you just talk about how you think that's gonna work, what you're gonna have to do as a piece of it, any advice you might have to us because we enacted it and of course we want it to work and I just thought I'd get each of you to comment on that and maybe I don't know who wants to start.

Thank you. I'd be happy to start. We look forward to the work involved with AB 825. I think it's a very thoughtful bill. It has very appropriate safeguards that I think are really, really important for the state.

The public participation, transparency, consumer protection, and in particular one of the key deals was to respect states independent energy policies. And so, for this activity to move forward let me back up. The legislation gives us gives us the opportunity through a tariff filing it for it to transfer governance for the market rules to this independent body. Provided that we as a board, can certify that these 13 conditions are met.

And we are working very hard to sort of work out what, what we need to see as a board to confirm that those conditions have been met.

And we are very, very laser-focused on that. There are some other things in the bill. There's an annual report that was requested to tell us what was going on in the market. So you have an ongoing check-in of how the market is evolving starting with the baseline of this year. We just reported out in February of our filings at FERC, our stakeholder initiatives, actions as the board has taken, how is the market performing, how are we doing transmission planning.

And so we're establishing this baseline that you can watch as we evolve this market over the coming years. Another activity was a job study that's well in progress right now. I understand we're gonna have a public webinar on this in September and deliver it to you all by the end of the year.

But as a board, I'm very, very focused on these certification conditions, which I think are terribly important and essential if the to for the legitimacy of what we want to establish as an independent governance activity representing the interest the collective interests of the West. Thank you.

I, again, agree with, Chair Eto's comments and, and just note that we are, as a board, tracking the processes that are underway that will lead up to our decision on certification. We're focused on the language of the statute and understand and appreciate the provisions on consumer protection, on transparency, on preserving the state's ability to further its policies as the governance transitions.

And I'll also note that one thing that's important about the implementation of the bill as written is that the CAISO board would continue on even if the decision is made to transfer governance of the markets to this new independent entity.

The board would continue to govern the CAISO balancing authority, would govern the California's transmission planning processes, and we have the ability to continue to watch that market and any FERC filings that are made by the new entity or through the new process, and so California can make sure that it's working for for California customers and that we're really harnessing the benefits that we we see the potential, and the legislation reflects the potential for the entire West to save money for rate payers and to increase reliability throughout the Western interconnection.

Thank you. I appreciate both your responses. And, and I know that in the construction of the legislation, there was a lot of precarious balancing. That's more policy balancing than the kind of balancing you might do. And I think it's good to hear from you at times, even if it's informally if that balancing didn't work or it inhibits you, or it does different things so we know that we can make it better or that the balancing we were trying to do is not really balanced.

And so, you know, I don't want this to be trial and error, but there's a chance that there's a piece of that. And I just look forward to partnership with you so that we can deal with those issues if they come up. Appreciate your response. Thank you, Madam Chair.

Senator Ochoa Bogh.

Pleasure to meet both of you in my office and I agree with my colleague, Senator Grove, in the sense that you are incredibly both well qualified to serve in this position. I look forward to, supporting your nomination. So my questions are the following. There are reports that the Western energy imbalance market has provided the state with over 8 billion in gross benefits since November 2014.

Given the energy affordability problem we have in California, can you tell us what benefits are, what these benefits are and how they are measured? Are the the are the direct energy savings to state rate payers? Are they infrastructure cost avoidance savings to the rate payers? How is this number calculated?

Thank you for that question. I want to sharpen the number first. The it's now $9 billion, but this is shared across the footprints of the 22 entities that are participating in the market. We are by far the largest of those entities. So we're getting over a third of those.

So I want to just clarify for California it's about 3 billion over these years that we've been operating. The way that these benefits materialize is that prior to these markets, everybody was operating essentially in a silo. And where they were using their captive generation to meet their loads. And everybody does it sort of the same way. You look at the cheapest ones, you dispatch them first.

Then you dispatch the next most expensive one. And then finally, you know when you have no other choice you dispatch the most expensive ones. So what these markets do is they basically pool the resources across all the footprints. And so you look at the collective load that could be served, that needs to be served. And you draw from the cheapest resources across the entire footprint.

And by doing that, are you able to preserve the same amount of load? I wanna comment on reliability separately at lower cost because you're basically stacking up a much broader resource base to meet the same load. And so you're not destroying from your local generation. Some of which might be quite expensive and which might in fact be idle because you can get that power from your neighbor at a lower cost. And so that's kind of where the savings come.

The savings come from electricity costs that you do not have to pay for. Because through the market you've been able to meet your needs at a lower total cost. Both within your footprint and for every adjacent footprint that participates. Everybody wins in this in the way that this market works. And I don't want to leave this without emphasizing that I meant to emphasize earlier.

You talked about visiting the control room and the hard work of the folks. These markets are the most powerful reliability tool we have in the west. Because in the absence of these markets I said, you know, people individually stacking up their generators. When things are tight back in the old days, reliability is managed by calling your neighbor up and saying what have you got? Can you send it over?

And it's uncoordinated calls between neighbors seeing what you could piece together to try to keep the lights on. Now we have a system that looks at all the generators that are participating, knows exactly where they're positioned at, knows how much each of them can give. And from a reliability balancing perspective, we have complete visibility of the west.

And so to see when systems have gotten tight, and it's shown by the way the prices move around the region, generation just automatically flows. You know, you don't have to call up. They know where the need is and they know what the prices are. They can move the cheapest ones to meet the load lowest cost while keeping the lights on. So that has been an enormous tool for operators across the west.

And it it just compounds the monetary benefits just from being able to pay for cheap electricity.

Thank you, sir.

I'll just add the benefit of avoiding curtailment.

And so at times when load is low within the CAISO footprint, and solar is producing, you know, hot day, middle of the day, there are times when our load is not high enough to use all of the solar that we have available, and the expansion of the market can help with getting that solar easily without having to enter into you know, we know what's available at in real time and can get the solar where it's needed and and provide benefits in that way.

Wonderful. I'm debating on this one.

A couple of questions. I had a little question, but I'm trying to be very cautious and on time. What challenges or risk to the state? What challenges or risks to the state that still need to be considered as you implement AB 825? And what benefits do Californians with the regional organization provide beyond those from the current regional cooperation activities, such as the Western Energy Imbalance Market and the extended day ahead market?

I'll start. I think, one benefit of the way the process has unfolded is that it has been iterative, and so the CAISO markets started and grew and then the western energy imbalance market started and grew, and then the extended day ahead market was launched in May. And so we've seen what the market is going to look like as it evolves.

And in that sense, we know what we're gonna get when when the the regional market becomes more people join in the extended day ahead market and it changes to regional governance. And so, you know, to answer your question, I guess I'm saying we we we know some of the we know what we're there aren't a lot of unknowns, but there's always, so the it it the the challenge is gonna be watching those next steps and make sure to make sure that it continues as we expect.

So we've put a process into place to build market rules. We have the tariff that is existing, that governs the markets. And so we're going to need to make sure that what we have now works in the same way once governance is transferred in that it is providing those benefits to the customers and providing those reliability benefits. And so it's it's a matter of of of course, there are many, many technical details.

So I think the challenge is that many people who are working very hard on this are are gonna be sorting through how do you revise a tariff, how do you move to different types of governance.

But from an overall kind of policy perspective, from where we sit in in governing and and from your perspective in kind of making sure that your intent in in passing ABA 25 is met, is that do we do we like what we see and is is the new governance going to be consistent with what we know now in terms of how the market is functioning and providing benefits?

Thank you, ma'am.

Alice has a little bit of an advantage because she and Siva Gunda when he at the commission wrote the letter to the western regulators saying what we would like this market to look like. What is really the blueprint for what became the legislation. And really what they were responding to was a recognition that all the states have a common interest in this larger market. And you know, if we can't accommodate all those interests, we can't we won't realize all those benefits.

So the challenge is for us to be able to roll this market out smoothly and increase participation, secure more benefits sooner rather than later.

And as I said the AB 825 election has been critical in saying the signal to the west that we're ready to play ball. We're ready to make this a regional market. And you know, there's a lot of made about this independent governance. The governance will involve an enormous number of California stakeholders. It's not us and then them.

We are a quarter to a third of the load of the west. We will be represented on this independent governance front and center in many different capacities. One of the beauties of the way in which the pathways is rolling out is there's much more explicit recognition of the different type of stakeholders that need to be at the table when these decisions are debated and acted upon. And so there's a very explicit role for the state regulatory community, consumer advocates, the generators, the California PTOs.

We will all be at the table.

And so it's not as though, oh now it's going to something besides Cal. We are front and center in driving those discussions and will continue to be so in partnership with our western partners.

Thank you. Thank you, Madam Chair. Senator Reyes.

Thank you. I want to say that what's what's refreshing about your appointments is that this isn't politics. This is about selecting the most qualified and the fact that you are willing to serve in this capacity and to bring all of your knowledge and all of your experience for the benefit of Californians is something that we that I thank you for because it doesn't happen all the time. I do thank you for that.

I I think providing the energy protections that we need for all Californians is extremely important and that's something that that you clearly have shown through the work that you've done and now in this capacity. My my question for Prior Chair Reynolds, given your prior role with the PUC, how do you view the interconnectedness of the three entities outlined in the MOU? And do you have a different view of the roles now that you've served in two of them?

Thank you. It's a great question and something that I've been thinking about a lot. And it has been hard to transition, right? I was so involved for the past four years in the role of the PUC and thinking about rate payers and thinking about residential rates and commercial rates and industrial rates and really that retail side as well as all of the other duties of the PUC.

And then to have to shift to a different position where, you know, as you know, my role is very different.

And it's actually been very refreshing and exciting to me. I've learned a lot. I still get to make a difference and see a difference in people's lives, But I get to do it from a different perspective. And so I feel really grateful and lucky. None of this is easy, as you all know, but being able to sort through that challenge has been very interesting to me.

I've found that my experience at the PUC has been really helpful in that I realize, okay, I have a different hat on now, but I can take what I learned and bring it to board meetings, board discussions, discussions PUC is doing this. How does that fit into what we're doing here in the CAISO? So I I hope that helps answer your question, but I think it's, it's something that I've been thinking about a lot too.

Thank you. And as you know, being on the energy committee and the assembly for so many years, regionalization been brought up a number of times. My biggest concern had always been the role of California and making sure that we remained a leader. We were the largest of the of of the areas that produce the most energy, had the cleaner, the the most regulations for cleaner air, cleaner energy. How do we maintain that leadership?

And I know that there was some discussion earlier, but how do we maintain that leadership role? And is there anything else that the that the legislature needs to do to ensure that we have that leadership role?

Yeah. Another great question. I think one thing is, as AB 825 recognizes that and and all the states are interested in this, is that with the transition to new regional governance, that the states continue to have the ability to implement, fulfill their own policies. And so for us, that is the the cap and trade adders that encourage clean energy.

It's our, of course, planning process that is where we approve transmission projects, but also the PUC in their portfolios and all of our load serving entities procuring clean energy projects.

So all of that is able to continue, even as the markets expand. And and so that component of ABA 25 is a really important one that we're going to be looking out for. We also are, seeing clean energy projects come in at very low costs. And, you know, and of course they have zero marginal cost to run and and with battery storage and the wind complementing wind projects complementing our solar, they've been very effective at ensuring reliability throughout the west.

The west also has in the northwest significant existing hydro projects, and so those can also complement our energy mix.

Essentially, diversity of resources important to all states across the west. And we've seen New Mexico, for instance, move away from coal and natural gas and towards solar and wind and and they're a part of this exercise as we as we continue to talk about regional cooperation.

And so I you know, it's it's happening, and it's something I will continue to watch and make sure we're doing the things that we need to do to see it continue, both from a clean energy perspective but also from an affordability perspective. And so, you know, I think that AB 825 was really important and the guardrails are very important. And so continuing to watch that and be aware of how it's implemented and what we see in the future is is is is really critical.

I have a different question. I know you're ready to answer that one. I have a different question because you you sort of alluded to to your response on that. My question to to to you, Chair Eto. If the western energy imbalance market and the energy day ahead market are successful, why is that not sufficient?

And why do you think a regional organization is needed?

Fair enough. So the the extended day ahead market just opened in May with two entities ourselves and Pacific Court of the North. This fall, Portland General Electric will come on board. Next year, a bank will come on board, LADWP and also Turlock as well as public service in New Mexico. We have commitments from Nevada to come shortly after that, NV Energy and also IID.

So all the California BAs will be in. But a number of the parties, the ones who are in the EIM but not in the EDAM have expressed concerns about the governance structure. And you can kind of understand it, you know, if you were if California were about to enter into a market and the rules were gonna be made up by the state of Utah, we might have concerns.

And so AB 825 was a brilliant piece of legislation in terms of recognizing that we have shared governance over these market functions because we have a shared interest in them. And again, I want to go back to these guardrails.

The most important of which is we can withdraw. And so I'm a trust but verify kind of guy. So if we see things going wrong we will we will if any compromises our leadership in these in these energy goals, that you'll be the first to hear and we will let you know absolutely.

Thank you so much. Thank you both. Thank you, madam chair.

Thank you. We we've discussed a lot of really important issues and, you do incredible and really needed and important work. And there's also emerging issues that are popping up as we speak. Can you tell me your thoughts, and this is a big question, on capacity and data centers particularly? These are very hot topic issues.

I don't expect you to give me a plan with how to deal with them as more as like what should legislators be thinking about as we see legislation go through the play, but also as we see some local communities banning them altogether. And and this is not from the lens of whether you thumbs up or thumbs down, but from the lens of capacity. Right?

Just what are the things that we as legislators should keep in mind as there are emerging technologies, as there are new new items introduced to what we need to use energy for in the world we're living in today?

Thank you for that question. I'll go first and then you can jump in. One thing, I think, to think about is you're right to identify this topic. It is something that we are grappling with a lot at the CAISO. FERC has issued an order, on large loads that we're preparing responses for.

But one thing to think about for all of us is that California is not like all of the other states, and so you hear certain things about the PGM capacity market and those price spikes and or what or Texas. And and it's really important to just remember and recognize the differences from those markets and those electrical structures in California. So California doesn't have a capacity market.

We we ensure that we have capacity through our resources adequacy program and we have load segment entities who have an obligation to make sure that they are able to cover load as predicted to go out into the future. And so we have processes in place that we have plan for whatever comes to California and increases the load, whether that's data centers or transportation electrification, building electrification.

Through the Energy Commission's load forecasting process, they predict what is going to come and how much and when. And then we have the load serving entities provide a contract for generation going out into the future that is there when we need it. The problem is you've identified this with data centers, there's so much uncertainty and so it makes our forward planning harder.

The good part is that the data centers, if they come come with constant load that brings revenue that is that pays for shared system costs and puts downward pressure on everybody's rates.

So the more people who are contributing set amount of costs and then set amount of people who are paying for those costs when data centers come in and add their payment of utility bills, essentially, everybody else pays less for that shared cost of the system.

And so, if we are careful about, working together, I think as planning agencies, and we make sure that we're continuing to build least cost resources, build a transmission system that delivers power in the least cost way in a way that's shared so that if a data center actually doesn't show up, that generation can be used by a charging station for trucks or, you know, whatever it is that comes into the system because we do expect load growth.

We don't know exactly how much, when, whether it's going to be electrification of trucks or housing or industrial development or data centers. So the more that we can and then also, I guess, the final point is that we're careful and we do the process iteratively.

So we're looking closely at. We're part, the CAISO is part of the process that would take inputs from the CEC and the PUC who have talked to the data centers and the investor and utilities, what what data centers are coming, what's the certainty that they'll come, where, how much, and then that all goes feeds into the planning process that the CAISO looks at in in putting together its transmission plan.

And so I think, you know, anything that we can do to minimize uncertainty is good, but also recognizing that we do have systems in place and and and that if we if we if we have some certainty and we plan right, we can actually get a benefit from the new load that's coming on. I guess the final thing is it's not really a CAISO issue. But on the retail side, the PUC is looking at structures and tariffs where the data centers can pay upfront.

So I don't wanna get you know, that's not my role now, but just that's something to think about, that they're working on tariffs to make sure that costs are paid upfront in case the data center isn't there after two years. So there's some certainty.

I'd like to chime in. The first thing I have to say is I'm so delighted to have Governor Reynolds with me from the PUC. You can see how much we have to interact with one another and how much our issues are their issues and the CECs issues. So having that experience basis just really enriched our discussions. I guess my summary of her responses, you know, some I think it was Dwight Eisenhower.

Plans are nothing, planning is everything. And uncertainty is ubiquitous. And the way we manage it is by continuously planning. So every year we are looking to the energy commission to fine tune that load forecast. And one thing I want to emphasize, maybe it's not so well appreciated, it came out in yesterday's hearing when Siva Gunda was speaking.

Over half of the low growth that we're anticipating is not from data centers, it's from electrification of our transportation fleet and of our buildings and industry. And so we are looking at load growth going forward as part of meeting the SP-100 goals. The data centers are an attenuation of that, but they are not the principal driver. They're a large driver and a large source of the uncertainty but not where all the uncertainty is coming from.

And so again, having this inclusive planning process that we're updating regularly, I think is how we stay ahead of that and search or manage it to the best of our ability with with the latest information that we have available to us.

Thank you. I really appreciate that. I think it helps us also think through how you as appointees are thinking about the new technologies, those that we can identify and describe, and those that actually may be coming. And I appreciate, one, the distinction between our state and other states. And secondly, an understanding that the commonality about making sure that there is shared you know, distribution of the cost is something that you are thinking about because that is certainly on the mind of the individuals that we represent.

And we also know that we're California. So this is where a lot of things happen first. And so we have to go through the policy issues and work those out. And I appreciate that you've been thinking about those, which is a reflection to the work that you do, both, you know, in the public, but also in preparation for the votes that you take. So with that, this is the moment where we actually open it up to members of the public.

If there are any members of the public who are here to speak in support, this is your opportunity to speak in support of the appointees. We ask you to come forward, state your name, affiliation, and position.

Hi. Good afternoon. Tiffany Phan with Pima Pappas and Associates. I'm expressing support for both appointees on behalf of three entities, MCE, IPX Power, and the California Efficiency and Domain Management Council. Thank you.

Good afternoon. Meghan Loper on behalf of Western Freedom here. I'm pleased to support the appointment of of both nominees. Western Freedom had the pleasure of working with previous Chair Reynolds in her former roles on the Pathways Initiative and AB 825, and really appreciated the discussion today and the important work that the CAISO and the stakeholders are doing across the West to benefit the region and Californians and think that you have two very qualified candidates in in front of you and urge your support.

Thank you, members. Jason Ikerd on behalf of the California Municipal Utilities Association pleased to support both appointees.

Thank you. Anybody in this room wishing to speak in opposition of the appointees? Alright. Seeing no one here, we are going to go ahead and take a motion. I will begin with a motion for. I'll begin with a motion for Mister Ito. So with that, thank you very much. We have a motion by Senator Grove, and we will go ahead and call the roll.

[Roll Call]

Five votes.

Thank you. That has five votes. That appointment has been approved, and we'll move to the full Senate for confirmations. Congratulations. Next, I'll entertain a motion for Alice Reynolds, JD, as a member to the independent system operating operator governor governing board.

I will go ahead and take a motion.

So moved.

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

[Roll Call]

Five votes.

Alright. That appointment is approved to move to the full Senate for confirmation with a 5-0 vote. Congratulations. Thank you both.

Thank you. Congratulations.

Members, this concludes the end of the agenda for the public portion of this hearing. We are going to ask members of the public to please step outside to begin our executive session.