BILL ANALYSIS Ó
Bill No: AB
1420
SENATE COMMITTEE ON GOVERNMENTAL ORGANIZATION
Senator Roderick D. Wright, Chair
2011-2012 Regular Session
Bill Analysis
AB 1420 Author: Assembly Governmental Organization
Committee
As Introduced: March 21, 2011
Hearing Date: June 14, 2011
Consultant: Paul Donahue
SUBJECT : Emergency Management Assistance Compact
SUMMARY : Deletes a March 1, 2012 sunset date for the
operation of the Emergency Management Assistance Compact
(EMAC). The purpose of EMAC is to provide mutual aid among
the states in responding to any emergency or disaster.
Existing law :
1) Establishes the California Emergency Services Act (Act)
and charges the California Emergency Management Agency (Cal
EMA) with responsibility for overseeing and coordinating
emergency preparedness, response, recovery, and homeland
security activities.
2) Ratifies, approves, and sets forth the provisions of the
Emergency Management Assistance Compact (EMAC), an
interstate agreement that provides for mutual assistance
between states responding to emergencies and disasters. The
compact becomes inoperative on March 1, 2012, and as of
January 1, 2013, is repealed by operation of law.
This bill deletes provisions specifying that the compact
becomes inoperative on March 1, 2012, and is repealed as of
January 1, 2013, thereby making the compact operative
indefinitely.
COMMENTS :
1) Purpose of the bill : The bill repeals the current
AB 1420 (Assembly Governmental Organization Committee)
continued
Page 2
sunset applicable to the EMAC. The EMAC statute becomes
inoperable March 1, 2012, which would make it difficult for
California to receive or provide aid to other states during
disasters. EMAC is an interstate compact, ratified by
Congress, which provides for mutual aid among the states in
meeting any emergency or disaster, whether natural or
manmade. EMAC has now been adopted by all 50 states, as
well as the six U.S. territories.
2) Background : In the 1970s, California played a major
role in creating the Interstate Civil Defense and Disaster
Compact (ICDDC), which was eventually adopted by nearly all
other states and ratified by Congress. The compact enabled
states to share emergency management resources during times
of disaster and encouraged the coordination of emergency
preparedness activities between states.
In 1992, a group of southern states initiated a project to
update the ICDDC. That project resulted in EMAC, which was
ratified by Congress in 1996 and has now been adopted by
all 50 states, including California. Upon adoption of
EMAC, many states rescinded the older ICDDC, but California
did not rescind it.
In 2005, California enacted urgency legislation (AB 823,
Nava, Chapter 233, Statutes of 2005) to adopt EMAC. This
provision became effective September 13, 2005. In 2007,
legislation (AB 1564, Nava, Chapter 414, Statutes of 2007)
extended the EMAC sunset date for a period of five years.
However, unless a new provision is enacted to either extend
the sunset date or make the compact permanent, EMAC will
cease to be operative on March 1, 2012 and will sunset on
January 1, 2013.
The California Professional Firefighters Association (CPF)
had initial concerns with the adoption of EMAC. Their
concern stemmed from the EMAC requirement that emergency
responders be considered agents of the receiving state for
tort liability and immunity purposes. CPF argued that
California firefighters and other emergency personnel
should be protected by California law when they are sent to
other states in emergency situations. A compromise,
however, was reached near the close of the 2005
legislative session that, despite these liability
provisions, requires California to make whole emergency
personnel injured or killed in another state.
AB 1420 (Assembly Governmental Organization Committee)
continued
Page 3
EMAC allows states impacted by a disaster to request and
receive assistance from other member states quickly and
efficiently. Each year, California sends resources, such
as firefighting equipment, rescue aircraft, search teams,
emergency managers, and other specialized personnel and
equipment, to assist other states during disasters.
Similarly, California has received emergency assistance
from other states over the years when facing disasters such
as earthquakes and firestorms. The EMAC mutual aid system
has worked successfully and has benefitted both California
and other states in numerous situations; some examples of
EMAC resource sharing are outlined below.
In 2005, California sent a wide assortment of emergency
personnel to New Orleans and Biloxi, Mississippi to assist
with their response and recovery from Hurricane Katrina.
The resources sent included law enforcement officers from
the California Highway Patrol, personnel to help staff the
State Operations Centers, fire personnel and equipment,
various aircraft, care and shelter workers, building
inspectors, California National Guard troops, and various
medical teams.
During 2007 and 2008, California sent Swift Water Rescue
Teams and emergency management personnel to Gulf States
affected by hurricanes Rita, Ike, and Gustav.
When southern California experienced catastrophic wild
fires in 2007, the state requested EMAC assistance. A
total of forty-three (43) states sent aid to California.
Over 27,000 out-of-state firefighters were deployed to
California to help with firefighting and fire prevention
efforts. This is the largest and most significant instance
of California receiving aid through the EMAC. Without the
EMAC aid, California would not have been able to fight the
large firestorm effectively.
The quick, legally established EMAC process allows for
relative ease in sharing emergency resources between the
states that adopted EMAC. Prior to adopting EMAC, sharing
resources between states, as seen in the examples above,
would have been much more difficult. California had few
options - it could either share resources through some
federal legal mechanism, or it could create an ad hoc
agreement with the other state(s) needing or providing
AB 1420 (Assembly Governmental Organization Committee)
continued
Page 4
assistance, but only as permitted by existing law
(Government Code Section 8619).
If California allows EMAC to sunset, no established process
beyond ad hoc state-to-state agreements will be in place to
allow California to receive assistance should another large
scale event occur. Although the ICDDC still exists in
statute, there is a provision in the law stating that it
shall be in effect only among those states that have
enacted or adopted it.
Because all the other states have adopted EMAC and no
longer use the ICDDC, this compact would not provide the
protection California needs to receive aid from other
states during an emergency.
Continuation of EMAC will allow uninterrupted sharing of
resources between California and the rest of the country.
Because the EMAC statute will become inoperable on March 1,
2012, legislation must be enacted immediately to repeal
that date and permanently establish EMAC in statute.
3) Related legislation :
AB 1564 (Nava), Chapter 414, Statutes of 2007 extended from
January 1, 2008, to January 1, 2013, the operation of the
EMAC. In addition, the bill prohibits the
state from giving or receiving assistance for any condition
resulting from a labor controversy.
SB 548 (Hollingsworth), Chapter 127, Statutes of 2007
extended the July 1, 2007 sunset for the Disaster
Response-Emergency Operations Account (DREOA) to January 1,
2009 and declares an urgency.
SB 1102 (Hollingsworth), Chapter 561, Statutes of 2005
extended the sunset date applicable to the DREOA within the
Special Fund for Economic Uncertainties from January 1,
2006 to July 1, 2007.
AB 823 (Nava), Chapter 233, Statutes of 2005 enacted a
modified version of the EMAC however, it became inoperative
on March 1, 2007.
SB 1102 (Budget Committee), Chapter 227, Statutes of 2004.
Among other things, this measure continued until January 1,
AB 1420 (Assembly Governmental Organization Committee)
continued
Page 5
2006 the DREOA within the Special Fund for Economic
Uncertainties and allocated $1 million to the Account at
the beginning of each fiscal year.
SUPPORT:
California Emergency Management Agency (source)
California Military Department
OPPOSE:
None on file
FISCAL COMMITTEE: Senate Appropriations Committee
**********