BILL ANALYSIS Ó
SB 203
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Date of Hearing: July 1, 2013
ASSEMBLY COMMITTEE ON TRANSPORTATION
Bonnie Lowenthal, Chair
SB 203 (Pavley) - As Amended: July 3, 2013
SENATE VOTE : 36-0
SUBJECT : Ventura County: local transportation funds
SUMMARY : Modifies provisions governing Ventura County's use of
local transportation fund (LTF) funds. Specifically, this bill :
1)Repeals provisions that uniquely govern Ventura County's local
transportation funds.
2)Imposes reporting requirements, until September 1, 2018, on
Ventura County Transportation Commission (VCTC) on specific
issues related to transit operations in the county.
EXISTING LAW :
1)Earmarks -cent of the state sales tax for transit and directs
the revenue to the LTF in each county.
2)Vests regional transportation planning agencies (RTPAs) with
the responsibility to allocate LTF funds, generally to cities,
counties, and transit districts by population.
3)Requires urban counties (those with populations over 500,000)
to use their LTF funds for public transportation and community
transit purposes.
4)Authorizes rural counties (those with a population under
500,000) to use their LTF funds for purposes other than public
transportation and community transit services, such as local
streets and roads, but only after the RTPA for county holds
public hearings and makes a finding that all reasonable
transit needs in the county have been met.
5)Provides that, for counties that were rural at the time LTF
funds were first established (in the 1970's) but have since
grown and are now considered urban, these counties will be
required, as of July 1, 2014, to use LTF funds for public
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transportation and community transit services in urbanized
areas of a county (i.e., cities with populations over
100,000). LTF funds can be used in non-urbanized areas in
these counties for local streets and roads, provided that
there are no unmet transit needs in the area. These
provisions do not apply to Ventura County.
6)Provides that the VCTC may submit to the legislative policy
committees a report analyzing options for organizing public
mass transportation services in Ventura County and expending
LTF revenues. VCTC may also submit a legislative proposal to
implement a plan based on recommendations of the report.
7)Provides that, because VCTC did not secure legislation to
implement its proposed plan by the end of the 2011-12 Regular
Session, its LTF revenues are available solely for public
transportation or community transit services, even in the
county's rural areas, beginning July 1, 2014.
FISCAL EFFECT : Unknown, this bill passed out of Senate
Appropriations Committee pursuant to Senate Rule 28.8.
COMMENTS : In 2009, SB 716 (Wolk), Chapter 609, Statutes of
2009, updated counties' designation as either rural or urban for
purposes of using LTF funds, based on the 2000 (and subsequent)
census rather than the 1970 census. For those counties whose
designation changed, SB 716 provided a sort of hybrid use of the
LTF funds-urban cities within the county would be required to
use LTF funds for public transportation or community transit
services and rural areas of the county could continue to use LTF
funds for other purposes, assuming certain conditions were met.
The operative date of these changes was postponed until July 1,
2014, to give the counties an opportunity to adjust to the new
LTF requirements.
SB 716, however, set forth unique provisions for Ventura County,
one of the counties whose designation changed from rural to
urban. For Ventura County, SB 716 provided an opportunity for
VCTC to submit a plan to the Legislature (and to secure
subsequent legislation) that would set forth an alternative
means of distributing LTF funds throughout the county. VCTC had
until December 31, 2011, to submit the plan and until the end of
the 2011-12 Regular Session to secure subsequent legislation to
implement the plan, otherwise all of the county's LTF funds
would be directed to public transportation or community transit
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service as of July 1, 2014. Neither of these two conditions was
met.
There are 10 cities within Ventura County, 4 of which exceed a
population of 100,000, according to 2010 data. The other 6
cities have populations well below 100,000. All of Ventura's
cities, large or small, however, will be required to use their
LTF funds for public transportation and community transit
services as of July 1, 2014. This is in stark contrast to the
other counties whose population grew over 500,000 after 1970 and
who will have the option to use LTF funds for purposes other
than public transportation and community transit services in
rural areas of the county (assuming there are no unmet transit
needs).
According to the author, Ventura County's difficulties in
developing an integrated transit system are due, in part, to
differences between the east and the west cities of the county,
including size, ridership demographics, and commuter trends.
Furthermore, the author asserts that the county's expansive
farmlands, mountains, and large open space demands make it
difficult for transit operators in the county to maintain fare
box return ratios that are required to be eligible to receive
state transit assistance funding.
The author has introduced SB 203 to grant Ventura County the
same flexibility to meet its transit and local roads needs that
other counties enjoy that also grew from rural to urban since
1970.
SB 203 is intended to complement efforts already undertaken by
VCTC to improve the quality and quantity of transit in Ventura
County, specifically including a comprehensive review and
re-evaluation of its unmet transit needs process.
By striking provisions that restrict the use of LTF funds in
Ventura County's smaller cities, SB 203 generally treats Ventura
County the same as other counties that grew to urban size since
1970 with regard to the use of LTF funds. However, the bill
continues to single out Ventura County in that it imposes
detailed reporting requirements on Ventura County alone. For
example, VCTC is required to post on its internet site a report
on transit route changes, changes to service levels on transit
routes, and ridership numbers for transit routes. Presumably,
this information will allow interested stakeholders to assess
the county's progress toward developing more fully its transit
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services. However, no other transit district is required to
provide anything like this detailed information.
REGISTERED SUPPORT / OPPOSITION :
Support
Ventura County Transportation Commission (sponsor)
City of Camarillo
City of Moorpark
City of Thousand Oaks
Ventura Council of Governments
Opposition
None on file
Analysis Prepared by : Janet Dawson / TRANS. / (916) 319-2093