The Legislature adjourned at Midnight on September 11. The following are highlights from the final days of the 2015 session in addition to key achievements this year. The Governor has until October 11, 2015, to take action on all bills on his desk.
End-of-session legislative highlights of importance to counties include:
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Marijuana Regulation: Three medical marijuana regulatory bills (SB 643-McGuire; AB 266-Bonta; and AB 243-Wood) made their way through the Legislature on the last night of session. While these measures were not perfect, they did include many aspects that county organizations requested, including various local control protections, explicit county taxation authority, mechanisms for funding environmental clean-up, employer protections for workplace use of medical marijuana, and a strict licensure scheme involving a requirement for both a state and local licenses, with a local license being required first. These bills were packaged together and the passed by the Legislature in the final hours of session.
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Local Governance Authority Maintained: SCA 8 (Mendoza) sought to increase the number of supervisors in the most populous counties, following statewide voter approval. CSAC successfully lobbied against this measure as it was taken up in the final hours of session. CSAC opposed SCA 8 due to the significant new cost pressures on counties and loss of local control. The measure failed passage in the first house.
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Local Government Finance and RDA: SB 107 (Budget Committee) was the final iteration of a redevelopment agency dissolution proposal that represented a compromise between the Administration and the Assembly leadership. This bill was very similar to CSAC supported AB 113 that included several key local government finance clean-up provisions for specific counties including ending negative bailout, correcting tax equity allocations, and forgiving ERAF calculation errors. SB 107 was signed by the Governor.
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Medicaid Waiver: SB 36 (Hernandez) was passed after a unanimous vote on the Senate Floor in the waning hours of the session. Originally a vehicle for authorizing the terms and conditions of a new Section 1115 Medicaid public hospital waiver, it was amended to allow the state to request extensions of the existing Bridge to Reform Waiver since negotiations on the new waiver have not yet concluded. CSAC supported this bill.
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Continuum of Care Reform: AB 403 (Stone) was passed by the Assembly today to concur in Senate amendments and was sent to the Governor. The bill is a landmark piece of legislation regarding the Administration’s Continuum of Care Reform effort to revamp the State’s foster youth group home system. CSAC worked with county affiliates and the Department of Social Services to add clarity to the bill. However, it remains a work in progress and the implementation phase – which will take years – will begin this fall. CSAC maintained a Support in Concept position.
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Climate Change: SB 350 (de León) passed in the final hours of the Legislative Session and is expected to be signed by the Governor. The measure will enact the Clean Energy and Pollution Reduction Act of 2015 which establishes targets to increase retail sales of renewable electricity to 50% by 2030 and double the energy efficiency savings in electricity and natural gas uses by 2030. The bill was amended earlier this week to strip the provision that would have established a statewide goal to codify the Governor’s Executive Order to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by reducing the state’s petroleum use from cars by 50 percent. Despite SB 350 passing, the Legislature failed to pass an expenditure plan for cap and trade revenues for FY 15-16.
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Groundwater: SB 226 (Pavley) and AB 1390 (Alejo) both won final approval in the Legislature and are aimed at improving the groundwater basin adjudication process. SB 226 now includes related and necessary changes to the Sustainable Groundwater Management Act (SGMA) and provides for state intervention in groundwater adjudications. AB 1390 addresses all the procedural aspects of an accelerated adjudication process. CSAC and RCRC were opposed to SB 226 and AB 1390 but succeeded in obtaining amendments to both bills that resulted in the two organizations removing their opposition.
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Drone Liability: SB 168 (Gaines) was a last minute bill that moved quickly through the legislative process that would provide immunity for first responders who damage a civilian drone directly interfering with ambulance services, firefighting-related services, and search and rescue operations. CSAC partnered with UCC and the League of Ca. Cities to support this measure.
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Collective Bargaining: CSAC was instrumental in blocking a last minute attempt by unions to introduce legislation that would mandate union representative participation in new employee orientations. The bill would have required immediate reopening of collective bargaining agreements and was a purported preemption to the Friedrichs v. California Teachers Association decision by the United States Supreme Court. That ruling could affect a union’s collection of “fair share” from employees.
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Open Data: SB 272 (Hertzberg) CSAC worked diligently with Senator Bob Hertzberg on his open data legislation, SB 272. After several rounds of amendments, CSAC and a broad coalition were able to remove opposition to the bill, which requires local government agencies to create catalogs of the information systems used to manage data and make that information available to the public under the California Public Records Act.
More Work to Be Done: There were a number of significant issues of importance to counties that unfortunately failed to receive the two-thirds vote necessary for passage. Those include an elusive transportation funding package, a managed care organization (MCO) taxand a Proposition 218 amendment to allow local governments to impose fees for storm water and flood control. Although the Governor called special sessions to tackle both transportation funding shortfalls for the state and local systems and the MCO tax, and despite some last minute negotiations, a compromise was not reached on either issue. Both special sessions are expected to remain open and conference committees were formed to allow for further discussions after the regular session ends. Many believe that a vote on these revenue issues must occur before the end of this year in order to occur at all because of the difficulty of securing tax votes during an election year (2016).
Recently, Speaker Toni Atkins and Senate President pro Tempore Kevin de León announced the appointment of legislators to serve on conference committees formed in the transportation infrastructure and health care special sessions. Readers will recall that while the Legislature could not reach agreement on an extension of the Managed Care Organization tax or new funding for transportation infrastructure during the last week of the regular session, both houses took procedural votes to facilitate the formation of conference committees to continue working on these issues in the special sessions.
In the transportation special session, the Senate appointed Senators Beall (D-San Jose), Leyva (D-Chino), Allen (D-Santa Monica), Cannella (R-Ceres), and Gaines (R-Roseville) to the conference committee. On the Assembly side, the representatives will be Assembly Members Gomez (D-Northeast Los Angeles), Burke (D-Inglewood), Melendrez (R-Lake Elsinore), Mullin (D-South San Francisco), and Obernolte (R-Big Bear Lake). Beall and Gomez will serve as co-chairs. While the timing of any action by the conference committee is unclear, an initial hearing may be held toward the beginning of October.
In the health care special session, Senator Hernandez (D-West Covina) will serve as co-chair. The Senate also appointed Senators Leno (D-San Francisco), Mitchell (D-Culver City) and Nielsen (R-Gerber), leaving one Republican vacancy to be filled. However, unlike the transportation special session, the Assembly did not announce their conference committee appointees for the health care special session.
State Budget: As the Legislature gaveled to close, state revenues continue to surge above adopted budget estimates in the start of the 2015-16 fiscal year. All three main state revenue sources – personal income tax, sales and use tax, and corporation tax revenue – show strong returns that are 5% above anticipated revenues for this time of year. The Administration is already working to develop the Governor’s 2016-17 Budget proposal, which will be released by January 10, 2016.
Looking back to the 2015-16 Budget, counties did well in some significant areas, including full repayment of the pre-2004 mandate debt owed to local governments and the first payment in lieu of taxes (PILT) funds made in twenty years. A total of $765 million in pre-2004 mandate debt will be repaid statewide to local agencies by the end of the 2015, with approximately $533 million going to counties for services already rendered. Payments on the principle were distributed earlier this summer and final interest payments are slated for October 2, 2015. In addition, $9.6 million in Public Records Act mandate reimbursement was included in the budget for local agencies statewide. Further, a number of additional funding priorities were secured as part of the $115 billion adopted state budget including nearly $245 million for county administration of the Medi-Cal program and the creation of a new Earned Income Tax Credit for the poorest Californians. |
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The bills that the Urban Counties Caucus has been actively engaged with are included in Attachment A. The bills that Contra Costa County has been tracking and advocating on are included in a subsequent agenda item. |