BILL ANALYSIS Ó
Senate Appropriations Committee Fiscal Summary
Senator Kevin de León, Chair
SB 1261 (Jackson) - Hazardous materials: business plans.
Amended: April 21, 2014 Policy Vote: EQ 5-2
Urgency: No Mandate: Yes (see staff comment)
Hearing Date: May 12, 2014 Consultant: Marie Liu
This bill meets the criteria for referral to the Suspense File.
Bill Summary: SB 1261 would require the California Environmental
Protection Agency (CalEPA) to develop a system to electronically
transmit information it receives from businesses regarding
hazardous materials and waste inventory and management to
emergency response personnel, the Office of Emergency Services
(OES) and CalEPA to develop specific regulations, and make other
updates to the unified hazardous waste and hazardous materials
management regulatory program.
Fiscal Impact:
One-time costs of $720,000 from the Unified Program Account
(special) to CalEPA to develop an emergency business plan
and inventory system. CalEPA would be authorized to recover
these costs from an increase in fees.
On-going annual costs of $268,000 from Unified Program
Account (special) to CalEPA to maintain the emergency
business plan and inventory system.
One-time costs of $200,000 from Unified Program Account
(special) to CalEPA to develop regulations regarding the
treatment of trade secrets.
Background: Existing law requires CalEPA to implement a unified
hazardous waste and hazardous materials management regulatory
program (unified program), including a statewide information
management system. A city or local agency that meets specified
requirements is authorized to apply to the secretary of the
CalEPA (secretary) to implement the unified program and be
certified as a certified unified program agency (CUPA).
Existing law requires the immediate reporting of any release or
threatened release of a hazardous material to the unified
program agency.
SB 1261 (Jackson)
Page 1
Existing law requires unified program agencies to require a
business that handles a hazardous material to establish and
implement a business plan, including an inventory of specified
information that would necessary for a response to a release or
threatened release of a hazardous material. These business plans
are required to be reviewed annually. If a business believes
that the inventory involves the release of a trade secret, it
must provide this information to the CUPA and notify that belief
on the inventory form. The CUPA is required to follow a
specified procedure if there is a request for the public release
of information that the business believes is a trade secret.
Section 25404 of the Health and Safety Code, requires CalEPA to
establish a statewide information management system to receive
all data collected by the unified program agencies and reported
by the regulated businesses. This system, called the California
Environmental Reporting System (CERS) is required to allow the
transfer of data from CUPAs and to make available
nonconfidential data available on the internet. All regulated
entities must submit their business plan and inventory
information electronically to CERS. Under §25504, unified
program agencies are required to provide access to information
collected in CERS to emergency response personnel.
Existing law (HSC §25404.5) requires CUPAs to institute a single
fee system, which is required to include a surcharge to cover
the necessary and reasonable costs of the state agencies in
carrying out their responsibilities in the unified program. The
surcharge amount is determined by the secretary annually.
Currently there are three fees that make up the surcharge - $35
for oversight, $270 for the California Accidental Release
Prevention Program, and $15 per tank for the underground storage
tank program (only assessed on those businesses with underground
storage tanks) This fee and surcharge is assessed on
approximately 144,000 businesses throughout the state.
Proposed Law: This bill would require the secretary to develop a
system to electronically provide emergency business plan and
inventory information to emergency response personnel. The
development of this system would be funded by an increase in the
surcharge assessed by CalEPA pursuant to §25404.5. This bill
would require the secretary to increase the surcharge by no more
than $15 per year between 2015 and 2018.
SB 1261 (Jackson)
Page 2
This bill would require OES to develop regulations by January 1,
2016 regarding the reporting of any release or threatened
release of a hazardous material.
This bill would require CalEPA, by January 1, 2016, to develop
regulations regarding the treatment of information that
businesses consider a trade secret.
This bill would also makes a number of updates and
modernizations of the unified program including revising the
information required in a business plan, revising the parties
responsible for submitting information, and modifying
requirements for businesses in unstaffed remote facilities
located in isolated, sparsely populated areas.
Staff Comments: Regarding the creation of the emergency business
plan and inventory system - CalEPA anticipates one-time costs of
$720,000 to develop this system. Once the system is developed,
CalEPA will incur annual data center costs of $128,000 and
staffing costs to maintain the system of $140,000 for 1.2 PYs
for a total of $268,000 annually.
Regarding the requirement for OES to develop regulations on the
reporting of hazardous material releases- According to OES,
under its Accidental Spill Release Prevention Program (CalARP),
it is currently developing such regulations, thus this
requirement will have no cost impacts to OES. Staff notes that
the bill simply requires these regulations be developed without
specifying required content. As such, the regulations being
developed under CalARP should satisfy the bill's requirement.
Regarding the requirement for CalEPA to develop regulations
regarding the treatment of trade secrets- CalEPA estimates it
would have one-time costs of approximately $200,000 to develop
such regulations.
This bill is marked as a state-mandated local program as it
modifies the definition of a crime. However, this mandate is not
reimbursable.
SB 1261 (Jackson)
Page 3