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 23, 2014 Consultant: Marie Liu SUSPENSE FILE. AS AMENDED. 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 (as approved on May 23, 2014): Minor and absorbable to CalEPA 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. 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 SB 1261 (Jackson) Page 1 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. 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. SB 1261 (Jackson) Page 2 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. Author Amendments: Deletes the requirement for CalEPA to develop the emergency business plan and inventory system (§5) and ability to collect the related fee surcharge (§1) Deletes the requirement for CalEPA to develop regulations regarding the treatment of trade secrets (§9)