BILL ANALYSIS                                                                                                                                                                                                    



                                                                  AB 2746
                                                                  Page  1

          7Date of Hearing:   April 28, 2010

                        ASSEMBLY COMMITTEE ON APPROPRIATIONS
                                Felipe Fuentes, Chair

                  AB 2746 (Blakeslee) - As Amended:  April 8, 2010 

          Policy Committee:                              Insurance  
          Vote:12-0

          Urgency:     No                   State Mandated Local Program:  
          No     Reimbursable:              

           SUMMARY  

          This bill authorizes the California Earthquake Authority to  
          contract for a chief mitigation officer and requires the CEA to  
          establish the duties of the chief mitigation officer. In  
          addition, this bill authorizes the CEA to accept grants and  
          gifts related to residential retrofit programs from federal,  
          state, and local government and private sources.

           FISCAL EFFECT  

          No direct fiscal impact for the staffing provisions of this  
          bill. The California Earthquake Authority (CEA) is a privately  
          financed, publicly managed agency with 25 civil service  
          positions and a handful of temporary and exempt positions. 

           COMMENTS  

           1)Rationale.  This bill is sponsored by the author to provide the  
            CEA with greater staffing flexibility and to specify the  
            duties of a chief mitigation officer. The CEA is administered  
            under the authority of the Insurance Commissioner (IC) and is  
            privately financed by more than 700,000 insurance policies and  
            capital of more than $2 billion. CEA is authorized to sell  
            policies of basic earthquake insurance in conjunction with  
            policies of residential property insurance issued by insurers  
            that have transferred their earthquake risk to the CEA.

           2)Related Legislation . AB 43 (Blakeslee) in 2009 also addressed  
            CEA staffing. AB 43 was vetoed due to concerns about  
            eliminating the 25 staff person civil service cap in place at  
            CEA. AB 2746 does not address the elimination of the civil  








                                                                  AB 2746
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            service cap on employees. 

           Analysis Prepared by  :    Mary Ader / APPR. / (916) 319-2081