BILL ANALYSIS
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| SENATE COMMITTEE ON NATURAL RESOURCES AND WATER |
| Senator Fran Pavley, Chair |
| 2009-2010 Regular Session |
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BILL NO: SB 1350 HEARING DATE: April 13, 2010
AUTHOR: Kehoe URGENCY: No
VERSION: March 24, 2010 CONSULTANT: Katharine Moore
DUAL REFERRAL: No FISCAL: Yes
SUBJECT: Public Lands: records and uses.
BACKGROUND AND EXISTING LAW
The SLC has jurisdiction and management control over certain
Californian public lands received by the state from the United
States. These lands are of two distinct types - sovereign and
school lands. The sovereign or public trust lands are tide and
other submerged lands, including navigable waterways, within the
state's borders. The state's power and authority to control
these lands when acting in the public trust is absolute. The
legislature may grant administrative authority to manage tide
and submerged lands to local entities, such as cities and ports.
However, the lands remain subject to the public trust and to the
oversight authority of the state through the SLC.
The school lands were granted to the state by an Act of Congress
on March 3, 1853 (c. 145, 10 Stat. 244) for the specific purpose
of providing support to public education. Approximately 470,000
acres of school lands - typically isolated and primarily in
desert and forested areas - remain. In the1980s, the Legislature
(School Land Bank Act, c. 879, Stats. 1984) placed the school
lands into a statutory trust and designated the SLC as the
trustee. The legislature declared that the school trust lands
inventory was depleted and that it was in the best interest of
the state for the remaining lands to be fully developed and
proactively managed to provide an economic base for the public
school system. Currently about 25% of the total school land
acreage is leased for revenue-generating purposes. All net
revenues from the school trust lands are credited to the
California State Teacher's Retirement System (c.1213, Stats.
1983).
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The proposed bill addresses two areas of concern to the State
Lands Commission (SLC).
Real property reporting requirements
In 2009, the legislature passed ABX4 22 (Evans, c. 20, Stats.
2009, 4th extraordinary session). Among other provisions, this
legislation facilitated the identification of the state's
surplus real property. It directed select responsible state
agencies to provide additional detailed information about the
state's real property - including specific programmatic use,
current utilization status (i.e. fully or partially utilized or
excess), and projected future uses - to the Department of
General Services (DGS) annually. DGS already maintains a central
inventory of the state's real property holdings in part to
identify surplus property for disposal.
However, the state's sovereign lands cannot generally be sold
(see California constitution, Art. X, 3 and Illinois Central RR
Co v. Illinois, 146 US 387 (1892)) with the exception of land
exchange agreements available under very limited circumstances
(see PRC, 6307). School lands cannot be declared surplus
according to the SLC's interpretation of the School Land Bank of
1984.
On-going SLC jurisdiction over public trust lands
In 2008, a local initiative - Proposition B in San Diego - was
used in an attempt to circumvent the oversight authority of the
SLC by directly amending the Port of San Diego's Master Plan to
permit development of the 10th Avenue Marine Terminal in a
manner inconsistent with the public trust. The validity of the
initiative was challenged and the Court found that the on-going
oversight authority of the SLC was not completely clear. While
Proposition B was overwhelmingly defeated at the polls, it is
possible that subsequent initiatives may be attempted.
PROPOSED LAW
Real property reporting requirements
This bill modifies the SLC's real property reporting
requirements imposed by ABX4 22 to provide sufficient, but not
extraneous, information to DGS in order for an appropriate
inventory to be maintained. Specifically, this bill would:
Exempt reporting of public trust land information to
DGS.
Require the SLC to provide the following information
to DGS for non-public trust lands:
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o The location of the property and additional
relevant property-related data
o The date of acquisition (if available)
o How the property was acquired and cost (if
available)
o A description of the current and projected future
uses of the property (if available)
o A description of each major structure on the
property
Require the SLC to report the location and size of the
property alone for school trust lands
Require that SLC report all relevant real property not
previously identified to DGS by July 1, 2011 with annual
updates reported every July 1 thereafter.
On-going SLC jurisdiction over public trust lands
This bill further explicitly declares the SLC's jurisdiction
over the state's tide and submerged lands, and the SLC's ability
to grant lands, subject to the public trust, to local and
regional public entities. The bill declares that this affirms
existing law.
ARGUMENTS IN SUPPORT
According to the author, "The State Lands Commission is unique
in that it manages millions of acres of public trust lands and
school trust lands that cannot be declared surplus. Because of
the nature of the Commission's lands, many of the reporting
requirements cannot be ascertained without expensive title,
survey and boundary work. This work will inevitably become
obsolete as the tides, accretion, and erosion change boundary
lines. This bill would tailor the Commission's reporting
requirements so that the state can maintain a central inventory
of the state's real property holdings without costing the state
additional money."
"With regard to the state's public trust lands, the legislature
has granted these lands to over 80 cities, counties and harbor
districts. Granted lands are managed by the grantee pursuant to
statute and common law, much of which is not codified. This bill
would codify several common law principles."
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ARGUMENTS IN OPPOSITION
None received.
COMMENTS
What does the July 1 reporting update date apply to? The
proposed bill requires that "any changes" be reported by July 1
of each year. There is no reporting cut-off date for the July 1
update in the proposed bill. Members of the Committee may want
to consider adding one for clarification. [See amendment 1]
Potential conflict - SB 455 : Both SB 1350 and SB 455 (April 16,
2009 version) modify the definition of "agency" in Section
11011.13 of the Government Code. This conflict may need to be
resolved depending on the final status of each bill. SB 455 is
currently on the "in-active" file in the Assembly.
SUGGESTED AMENDMENTS
AMENDMENT 1
On page 3, lines 18 - 19:
replace "reflecting any changes, by July 1 of each year."
with "reflecting any changes occurring by December 31 of
the previous year, by July 1 of each year."
SUPPORT
California Association of Port Authorities
State Lands Commission
Pacific Merchant Shipping Association
OPPOSITION
None Received
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