AB 22, as amended, Rodriguez. Office of Emergency Services: oil-by-rail spills: firefighters.
Existing law establishes the Office of Emergency Services within the office of the Governor and under the supervision of the Director of Emergency Services and makes the office responsible for the state’s emergency and disaster response services for natural, technological, or manmade disasters and emergencies. Existing law requires the office to serve as the central point of state government for the emergency reporting of spills, unauthorized releases, or other accidental releases of hazardous materials and to coordinate the notification of the appropriate state and local administering agencies that may be required to respond to those spills, unauthorized releases, or other accidental releases. Existing law also establishes the Curriculum Development Advisory Committee to provide advice on the development of specified course curricula and response training.
This bill wouldbegin delete requireend deletebegin insert require, upon a specified appropriation by the Legislature,end insert the Curriculum Development Advisory Committee to review the curriculum and courses of instruction offered by public and private programs that train firefighters in response methods for oil-by-rail spills, require the Office of Emergency Services to compile a list of those curriculum and courses of instruction and make that list available to all fire departmentsbegin insert,end insert and establish a program to reimburse fire departments for costs incurred by those departments in sending firefighters to trainings, as provided.
Vote: majority. Appropriation: no. Fiscal committee: yes. State-mandated local program: no.
The people of the State of California do enact as follows:
The Legislature finds and declares all of the
2following:
3(a) Fracking and other developing oil extraction technologies
4employed in Canada and the United States have significantly
5increased oil production. This source of new oil has created a
6problem in the transportation and delivery of crude oil. There is
7currently not enough pipeline capacity in North America to
8transport these increased volumes to refineries and distribution
9points. As a result, rail is becoming the primary way to move inland
10crude oil and hydrocarbon gas liquids to the West Coast. California
11like the rest of the nation is experiencing dramatic changes in the
12amount of oil being transported by rail.
13(b) As oil-by-rail shipments have dramatically increased in
14recent years, there has been a resulting increase in the number of
15incidents involving crude oil spills by rail.
16(c) The danger from a major oil spill is exacerbated by the type
17of oil that is being spilled. Oil from the Bakken Shale Formation
18is high quality, light, sweet crude. It is precisely because this crude
19oil is so energy dense that it is both valuable and hazardous. Its
20light nature and high density under the right circumstances makes
21it volatile, highly flammable, and toxic.
22(d) Crude oil trains travel through some of the state’s most
23densely populated areas, as well as some of the most sensitive
24ecological areas, since rail lines frequently operate near or over
25rivers and other sensitive waterways in the state.
26(e) There are wide
disparities in training and equipment for
27oil-by-rail spills in the following instances: between volunteer and
28nonvolunteer fire departments; between rural and urban fire
29departments; and between small and large fire departments. Large,
30urban fire departments tend to receive more training and are better
31equipped than smaller rural fire departments. Volunteer fire
P3 1departments have almost no independent ability to respond to large
2scale oil-by-rail spills, relying instead upon regional mutual aid
3or upon railroad personnel and assets.
4(f) Many small and some medium-sized fire departments do not
5have the budget to send firefighters for training even if the costs
6of that training are subsidized or paid for with grants or other
7assistance. When a firefighter is sent for training, another off-duty
8firefighter must be called in to cover the shift and maintain
9coverage for services. This requires paying the firefighter his or
10her salary during his or
her training and also paying an off-duty
11firefighter to cover the shift. Railroads provide free training for
12local first responders in California in localities that are convenient
13to the fire departments, yet volunteer and small rural fire
14departments frequently do not attend or participate in such training
15classes.
Section 8574.9 is added to the Government Code, to
17read:
(a) The Curriculum Development Advisory Committee
19described in Section 8588.10 shall review the curriculum and
20courses of instruction offered by public and private programs that
21train firefighters in response methods for oil-by-rail spills.
22(b) The Office of Emergency Services shall compile a list of
23the curriculum and courses of instruction specified in subdivision
24(a), shall make that list available to all fire departments, including
25in that list information regarding the availability and cost of the
26curriculum and courses of instruction, and shall facilitate and
27encourage fire departments to send firefighters for that training.
28(c) begin delete(1)end deletebegin delete end deleteThe
Office of Emergency Services shall establish a
29program to reimburse fire departments for costs incurred by those
30departments in sending firefighters to trainings identified by the
31Curriculum Development Advisory Committee and the Office of
32Emergency Services pursuant to this section, upon application by
33the fire department for reimbursement. Volunteer fire departments
34may also receive a per diem of one hundred dollars ($100) per
35volunteer firefighter, upon application, to be paid to a volunteer
36firefighter who attends such training.
37(2) The Office of Emergency Services shall use funds received
38from grants or general funds appropriated to the Office of
39Emergency Services by the Legislature for this program.
P4 1(d) The duties and authorizations set forth in this section shall
2only apply upon an appropriation by the Legislature of revenues
3derived from fees charged for the reasonable costs to the state of
4preparing to respond to oil-by-rail spills, including, but not limited
5to, appropriate fees deposited into the Regional Railroad Accident
6Preparedness and Immediate Response Fund, as established in
7Section 8574.44.
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