The California Urban Forestry Act of 1978 has a stated purpose of the promotion of the use of urban forest resources for the purpose of increasing integrated projects with multiple benefits in urban communities, including, but not limited to, the benefit of expanded urban forest canopy and community greening. This bill would also include school greening, as defined, as a benefit of the act. The act requires the Department of Forestry and Fire Protection to implement a program in urban forestry to encourage better tree management and planning in urban areas to increase integrated, multiple benefit projects by assisting urban areas with innovative solutions to problems including, among other things, improved capture of storm water and dry weather runoff, addressing water shortages. This bill would provide improving school greening as a problem to be addressed by the program. The act requires the department to complete a statewide strategic plan, as specified, and to submit the plan to the Legislature on or before June 30, 2025. This bill would require the plan to be submitted to the Legislature on or before June 30, 2026. The act requires the department to provide technical assistance to urban areas with respect to, among other things, improvement and enhancement of local water capture for urban forest maintenance, and requires the department to provide advice and guidance to cities, counties, districts, and other specified entities on, among other things, best practices and metrics for maintaining urban forest health. This bill would require the department to also provide technical assistance to urban areas with respect to improvement of public schools to create tree-shaded, natural school grounds, as specified, and to provide advice and guidance on use of trees in urban areas to promote community resilience and adaptation. The act authorizes the Director of Forestry and Fire Protection to make grants to provide assistance for specified projects, including, but not limited to, tree planting projects and other categories of projects recommended by the director, as provided. This bill would include, as part of that assistance, funding for school greening to optimize tree canopy cover and nature-based learning. The bill would authorize the director to authorize a negotiated indirect cost rate agreement within an approved project that is funded with state or federal dollars. The bill would also make conforming changes.
(1) The California Integrated Waste Management Act of 1989, administered by the Department of Resources Recycling and Recovery, generally regulates the disposal, management, and recycling of solid waste. The act establishes stewardship programs for various products, including, among others, carpet. The act includes a product stewardship for carpet program and a successor carpet producer responsibility program, and requires the product stewardship for carpet program to become inoperative upon the completion of certain conditions related to the implementation of the successor carpet producer responsibility program. Existing law, the product stewardship for carpet program, requires a manufacturer of carpets sold in this state, individually or through a carpet stewardship organization, to submit a carpet stewardship plan to the department, which is required to include specified elements, including achieving specified carpet recycling rates and a funding mechanism that provides sufficient funding to carry out the plan. Existing law authorizes the department to administratively impose a civil penalty of $10,000 per day on any person in violation of the program or $25,000 per day if the violation is intentional, knowing, or negligent, as specified. This bill would instead authorize the department to impose administrative, rather than civil, penalties in those amounts, and to impose an administrative penalty of $25,000 per day if the violation is intentional or knowing. Existing law requires a carpet stewardship organization to include nonvoting board members with representation from, among others, a retailer that sells carpet. This bill would instead require the stewardship organization to create a governing board for the stewardship program, as specified. Existing law requires a manufacturer of carpets sold in this state, individually or through a carpet stewardship organization, to submit to the department an annual report describing its activities to achieve the purposes of the program, as provided. Existing law authorizes a carpet stewardship organization to award grants and subsidies to incentivize the recycling of carpet materials that have the highest recyclability. This bill would require a carpet stewardship organization to include in its annual report specified information related to the grants and subsidies provided pursuant to the program, as specified. (2) Existing law, the successor carpet producer responsibility program, requires producers of covered products to form and join a single producer responsibility organization (PRO) for the collection and recycling of a covered product. Existing law defines a "covered product" as carpet, as defined, and requires the PRO to develop a producer responsibility plan for the collection, transportation, recycling, and the safe and proper management of covered products in the state. Existing law requires, no later than January 1, 2029, a person who removes a covered product as part of the installation of a covered product to transport, or contract to transport, all of the removed covered product to an approved collection site, as provided. Under existing law, an approved collection site is a solid waste facility that has agreed to be a collection site for the PRO. This bill would exempt a covered product from this transport requirement if certain conditions are met, including that it is returned to the producer. The bill would expand approved collection sites to include certain carpet recycling centers, municipal facilities, and retailers. Existing law requires the governing board of a PRO to include 4 nonvoting members, including, but not limited to, a nonvoting member representing a nonprofit organization established to promote a circular economy and to address environmental issues. Existing law requires the PRO to submit an annual report to the department on or before July 1 of each year, as provided. Existing law requires a producer to publish on its internet website, for each of its covered products, an environmental product declaration that identifies a covered product's components, as provided. This bill would instead require one voting and 5 nonvoting members, as specified. The bill would require the annual report to be submitted on or before September 1 of each year, instead of July 1 of each year. The bill would instead require a producer to publish on its internet website, for each of its covered products, the components that constitute more than 1% of the product's weight and any component that is a hazardous chemical, as specified. Existing law requires the PRO to submit to the department an annual report, as specified, and to make the report publicly available on the PRO's internet website. Existing law requires the PRO to provide annual grants to apprenticeship programs for training carpet installers in proper carpet recycling techniques, as provided. This bill would require the PRO to include in its annual report specified information related to the grants and incentive payments provided pursuant to the program, as specified. Existing law requires a producer responsibility plan, among other things, to explain how producers will use standardized stamping or some other means to provide a visual mark on the back of a covered product that is a synthetic material to allow expeditious sorting of the carpet, as provided. Existing law requires the department to adopt regulations to implement the program with an effective date no earlier than December 31, 2026. This bill would instead require a producer responsibility plan to explain how producers will use standardized stamping or some other means to provide a visual mark on the back of a covered product that provides the name of the producer, the date of manufacture, and a listing of the types of face fibers and backing materials contained in the product. The bill would instead require the department to adopt the regulations no later than December 31, 2026. Existing law requires a producer responsibility plan in effect as of January 1, 2025, to continue in effect, as provided, until it expires or is revoked, except that the PRO is required to submit an amendment to conform the producer responsibility plan to certain requirements. This bill would eliminate the requirement to submit an amendment to the producer responsibility plan.
Under existing law, the Department of Toxic Substances Control generally regulates the management and handling of hazardous waste and hazardous materials. Existing law authorizes certain entities to operate household hazardous waste collection facilities, as defined, under permits issued by the department. A violation of the hazardous waste control laws is a crime. This bill would, until January 1, 2029, require the department to evaluate opportunities to increase safety and convenience related to the management and disposal of vape pens confiscated from students by a school, as provided, and identify any recommendations that require future legislative action. The bill would authorize a household hazardous waste collection facility to conduct physical treatment activities involving the disassembly of household hazardous waste to separate batteries, valves, electronic components and other parts containing liquids or gases, including, but not limited to, the disassembly of vape pens, in a manner that does not result in the unauthorized release of hazardous materials. Existing law authorizes a public agency, or its contractor, to conduct a materials exchange program at a household hazardous waste collection facility to make reusable household hazardous products or materials available to recipients, as a part of its household hazardous waste collection program, if the public agency, or its contractor, complies with specified requirements. The bill would prohibit a public agency, or its contractor, from including vape pens in a materials exchange program. Because a violation of these provisions would be a crime, the bill would impose a state-mandated local program. The California Constitution requires the state to reimburse local agencies and school districts for certain costs mandated by the state. Statutory provisions establish procedures for making that reimbursement. This bill would provide that no reimbursement is required by this act for a specified reason.
The California Global Warming Solutions Act of 2006 establishes the State Air Resources Board as the state agency responsible for monitoring and regulating sources emitting greenhouse gases. The act authorizes the state board to include the use of market-based compliance mechanisms in regulating those emissions. The implementing regulations adopted by the state board provide for the direct allocation of greenhouse gas allowances to electrical corporations pursuant to a market-based compliance mechanism. Existing law vests the Public Utilities Commission (PUC) with regulatory authority over public utilities, including electrical corporations. Existing law requires the PUC to continue a program of assistance to low-income electric and gas customers with annual household incomes that are no greater than 200% of the federal poverty guidelines, as specified, which is referred to as the California Alternate Rates for Energy (CARE) program. Existing law also requires the PUC to continue a program of assistance to residential customers of the state's 3 largest electrical corporations consisting of households of 3 or more persons with total household annual gross income levels between 200% and 250% of the federal poverty guideline level, which is referred to as the Family Electric Rate Assistance (FERA) program. Existing law, except as provided, requires revenues received by an electrical corporation as a result of the direct allocation of greenhouse gas allowances to be credited directly to residential, small business, and emissions-intensive trade-exposed retail customers of the electrical corporation, commonly known as the California Climate Credit. This bill would exclude residential customers from receiving the California Climate Credit if they are not enrolled in the CARE or FERA program and their total electricity bills for the previous year were less than $300. Under existing law, a violation of the Public Utilities Act, or of an order, decision, rule, direction, demand, or requirement of the commission, is a crime. Because the provisions of this bill would be part of the Public Utilities Act, and a violation of a commission action implementing its requirements would be a crime, the bill would impose a state-mandated local program. The California Constitution requires the state to reimburse local agencies and school districts for certain costs mandated by the state. Statutory provisions establish procedures for making that reimbursement. This bill would provide that no reimbursement is required by this act for a specified reason.
Existing law establishes the Shared Habitat Alliance for Recreational Enhancement (SHARE) program to encourage private landowners to voluntarily make their land available to the public for wildlife-dependent recreational activities, as specified. Existing law requires a cap on financial compensation offered to a private landowner of $30 per acre, or $50 per public participant per day. Existing law authorizes the Department of Fish and Wildlife, as part of the SHARE program, to make grants to, or enter into agreements with, nonprofit organizations, governmental entities, or any other entities for purposes of carrying out the SHARE program. This bill would require, rather than authorize, the department to make those grants to, or enter into agreements with, the above-described entities, including a nonprofit conservation organization, when the department finds the grants or agreements are necessary for carrying out the purposes of the SHARE program. The bill would increase the required cap on financial compensation offered to private landowners pursuant to the SHARE program to $52 per acre, or $87 per public participant per day, and would require those figures to be adjusted annually for inflation, as provided. The bill would authorize the department to reimburse a nonprofit organization, a private landowner, or other entity for its services related to the implementation of the program. The bill would repeal these provisions on January 1, 2031. This bill would require the Director of Fish and Wildlife, on or before October 1, 2029, to submit a written report to the Legislature that evaluates the effect of changes to the SHARE program, as provided.
Existing law requires the State Energy Resources Conservation and Development Commission (Energy Commission) to biennially adopt an integrated energy policy report, as specified, and to make the reports accessible to state, local, and federal entities and to the general public. This bill would require the Energy Commission to establish a process for the owner of a data center, as defined, to submit the power usage effectiveness ratio, as defined, for the data center to the Energy Commission on a biannual basis, and require the owner of a data center to submit this information for the data center in the manner and timeframe specified by the Energy Commission. The bill would require the Energy Commission, as part of the 2027 edition of the integrated energy policy report, to include an assessment of electrical load trends for data centers, as provided. Existing law vests the Public Utilities Commission (PUC) with regulatory authority over public utilities, including electrical corporations. Existing law authorizes the PUC to fix the rates and charges for every public utility, and requires that those rates and charges be just and reasonable. This bill would require the PUC to assess the extent to which electrical corporation costs associated with new loads from data centers result in cost shifts to other electrical corporation customers, as provided, and require the PUC, on or before January 1, 2027, to submit the assessment to the relevant policy committees of the Legislature and to publicly post a copy of the assessment on the PUC's internet website. Existing constitutional provisions require that a statute that limits the right of access to the meetings of public bodies or the writings of public officials and agencies be adopted with findings demonstrating the interest protected by the limitation and the need for protecting that interest. This bill would make legislative findings to that effect.
Existing law requires the Department of Transportation (Caltrans) , for any project on the state highway system in a connectivity area that adds a traffic lane or that has the potential to significantly impair wildlife connectivity, to perform an assessment, in consultation with the Department of Fish and Wildlife (DFW) , to identify potential wildlife connectivity barriers and any needs for improved permeability, as specified. Existing law requires the implementing agency to remediate barriers to wildlife connectivity in conjunction with the project if any structural barrier to wildlife connectivity exists or will be added by the project for target species in the connectivity area, as provided. Existing law authorizes Caltrans to use compensatory mitigation credits to satisfy this requirement if DFW concurs with the use of those credits. This bill would require a lead agency to incorporate appropriate wildlife passage features into a transportation infrastructure project in a connectivity area, as specified. By requiring a lead agency to expand the scope of its transportation project, the bill would impose a state-mandated local program. The bill would exempt a project on the state highway system from this requirement if Caltrans is the lead agency. The bill would authorize a lead agency to use compensatory mitigation credits to satisfy this requirement, as specified. The California Constitution requires the state to reimburse local agencies and school districts for certain costs mandated by the state. Statutory provisions establish procedures for making that reimbursement. This bill would provide that, if the Commission on State Mandates determines that the bill contains costs mandated by the state, reimbursement for those costs shall be made pursuant to the statutory provisions noted above.
The California Endangered Species Act prohibits the taking of an endangered, threatened, or candidate species, except as specified. Under the act, the Department of Fish and Wildlife (department) may authorize the take of listed species by certain entities through permits or memorandums of understanding for specified purposes. Existing law requires the State Fire Marshal to identify areas in the state as moderate, high, and very high fire hazard severity zones based on consistent statewide criteria and based on the severity of fire hazard that is expected to prevail in those areas. Existing law requires a local agency to designate, by ordinance, moderate, high, and very high fire hazard severity zones in its jurisdiction within 120 days of receiving recommendations from the State Fire Marshal, as provided. This bill would authorize a city, county, city and county, special district, or other local agency to submit to the department a wildfire preparedness plan to conduct wildfire preparedness activities on land designated as a fire hazard severity zone, as defined, that minimizes impacts to wildlife and habitat for candidate, threatened, and endangered species. The bill would require the wildfire preparedness plan to include, among other things, a brief description of the planned wildfire preparedness activities, the approximate dates for the activities, and a description of the candidate, endangered, and threatened species within the plan area. The bill would require the department to impose a fee on a local agency for the cost of reviewing a wildfire preparedness plan submitted by that local agency, as specified. The bill would require the department, if sufficient information is included in the wildfire preparedness plan for the department to determine if an incidental take permit is required, to notify the local agency within 90 days of receipt of the wildfire preparedness plan if an incidental take permit or other state permit is needed, or if there are other considerations, exemptions, or streamlined pathways that the wildfire preparedness activities qualify for, including, but not limited to, the State Board of Forestry and Fire Protection's California Vegetation Treatment Program. The bill would require the department to provide the local agency, in its notification, with guidance that includes, among other things, a description of the candidate, endangered, and threatened species within the plan area and measures to avoid, minimize, and fully mitigate the take of the candidate, threatened, and endangered species, as provided. The bill would require the department, on or before July 1, 2026, to make a standard wildfire preparedness plan submission form publicly available on its internet website. The bill also would require the department, commencing January 1, 2027, to annually post on its internet website a summary of the wildfire preparedness plans submitted and include specified information in that summary.
(1) Existing law requires facilities that generate, treat, or store hazardous waste to obtain a permit or other authorization from the Department of Toxic Substances Control or a unified program agency. Existing law specifies that a hazardous waste facilities permit or other grant of authorization is not required for the treatment of laboratory hazardous waste generated onsite if, among other things, the laboratory hazardous waste is treated in containers using specified procedures and quantities for treatment of laboratory waste, as provided. This bill would specify the priority of those specified procedures. If those specified procedures do not exist, the bill would authorize the use of the manufacturer's written procedures if they are not in conflict with applicable rules or regulations. Existing law requires generators of hazardous waste to provide various notifications and certifications regarding compliance to the department, and to other specified entities, in person, or by certified mail, as provided. This bill would additionally authorize those notifications and certifications to be made into the statewide information management system. (2) Existing law provides for the regulation of underground storage tanks by the State Water Resources Control Board and defines "underground storage tank" for those purposes. Existing law excludes certain tanks from the definition of "underground storage tank," including, but not limited to, a tank holding hydraulic fluid for a closed loop mechanical system that uses compressed air or hydraulic fluid to operate lifts, elevators, and other similar devices. This bill would instead exclude from that definition a tank holding hydraulic fluid or dielectric fluid for a closed loop mechanical system that uses compressed air, hydraulic fluid, or dielectric fluid to operate lifts, to operate elevators, to act as an electric cooling or insulation system, and other similar devices.
The Used Mattress Recovery and Recycling Act, administered by the Department of Resources Recycling and Recovery, authorizes a mattress recycling organization to be established by a qualified industry association to develop, implement, and administer a used mattress recycling program in the state. The act requires the organization to develop and submit to the department for approval a plan, including an annual budget to implement the plan, for the recovery and recycling of used mattresses. The act requires the plan to include, among other things, providing outreach efforts and education to consumers, manufacturers, and retailers, for the purpose of promoting the recycling of used mattresses and options available to consumers for the free dropoff or collection of used mattresses. The act requires the organization to set the state mattress recycling charge, which is added to the purchase price of a mattress, at an amount sufficient to fund the program. The act requires the charge to be clearly visible on the invoice, receipt, or functionally equivalent document by the seller to the consumer as a separate line item. This bill would authorize the distributor, retailer, or seller to pay the applicable charge to the mattress recycling organization on behalf of the consumer or ultimate end user if the distributor, retailer, or seller enters into a written agreement with a mattress recycling organization to pay the charge directly to the mattress recycling organization, as provided. The bill would make a distributor, retailer, or seller responsible for educating the consumer or the ultimate end user of the mattress in the state on the recycling of used mattresses and options available to consumers for the free dropoff or collection of used mattresses.
