Air pollution: schoolbus idling and idling at schools.

Existing law designates the State Air Resources Board as the state agency charged with coordinating efforts to attain and maintain ambient air quality standards. Existing law also designates the state board as the state agency with the primary responsibility for the control of vehicular air pollution. Existing law requires the state board to identify toxic air contaminants that are emitted into the ambient air of the state, and requires the state board to establish toxic control measures for toxic air contaminants. Existing regulations adopted by the state board establish toxic control measures to limit schoolbus idling and idling at schools. Those existing regulations require drivers of schoolbuses, transit buses, school pupil activity buses, youth buses, general public paratransit vehicles, as those terms are defined in the regulations, and specified transit buses and commercial motor vehicles to, among other things, turn off the bus or vehicle engine upon stopping at or within 100 feet of a school, prohibits those drivers from turning the bus or vehicle engine on more than 30 seconds before beginning to depart from a school or within 100 feet of a school, and prohibits those drivers from causing the bus or vehicle to idle for more than 5 consecutive minutes or 5 aggregate minutes in any one hour at any location greater than 100 feet from a school. Those existing regulations provide that any violation of those requirements subjects the driver or the motor carrier to a minimum civil penalty of $100 and to criminal penalties. Those existing regulations authorize the state board, peace officers and the authorized representatives of their law enforcement agencies, and air quality management districts and air pollution control districts, to enforce those provisions. This bill would increase the minimum civil penalty for a violation to $300 and authorize additional civil penalties.