BILL ANALYSIS Ó
SENATE COMMITTEE ON APPROPRIATIONS
Senator Ricardo Lara, Chair
2015 - 2016 Regular Session
AB 96 (Atkins) - Animal parts and products: importation or sale
of ivory and rhinoceros horn.
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|Version: June 17, 2015 |Policy Vote: N.R. & W. 7 - 2 |
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|Urgency: No |Mandate: Yes (see staff |
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|Hearing Date: July 6, 2015 |Consultant: Marie Liu |
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This bill meets the criteria for referral to the Suspense File.
Bill
Summary: AB 96 would modify and expand the prohibition of the
importation, sale, and purchasing of ivory and rhinoceros horn.
Fiscal
Impact:
Minor and absorbable costs to the Fish and Game Preservation
Fund (special/General Fund) for the Department of Fish and
Wildlife (DFW) to update regulations.
Unknown cost pressures, potentially up to $1.2 million
annually ongoing and $1 million in one-time costs, to the Fish
and Game Preservation Fund (special/General Fund) to DFW for
enforcement. These costs may be at least partially offset by
criminal and civil penalties.
Background: Under existing law, a person is prohibited from importing into
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California for commercial purposes with intent to sell, or to
sell within the state, the dead body, or any part of, any
elephant (Penal Code §653o). However, Section 5 of Chapter 692
of the Statutes of 1976 excluded from this prohibition any
elephant bodies or parts that was imported prior to January 1,
1977. This section also placed the burden of proof to
demonstrate the items were imported prior to January 1, 1977 are
placed upon the defendant.
Proposed Law:
This bill would delete the exemption on the importation or
sale of elephant bodies or parts that were imported prior to
January 1, 1977.
This bill would also create a new ban the sale, purchase, and
importation of ivory and rhinoceros horn within the Fish and
Game Code. Ivory would be defined as the tooth or tusk from a
species of elephant, hippopotamus, mammoth, walrus, whale, or
narwhal.
The following would be exempted from the ban:
Law enforcement activity being undertaken by a state or
federal employee;
Activities authorized by federal law;
Ivory or rhinoceros horn that is part of a musical instrument
and is less than 20% of by volume of the instrument if the
instrument was manufactured no later than 1975;
Ivory or rhinoceros horn that is part of an antique and is
less than 5% by volume of the antique, if there is
documentation that the antique is at least 100 years old; or
The purchase or sale of the ivory or rhinoceros horn is for
educational or scientific purposes and the item was legally
acquired before 1991 and it is transferred or sold before July
1, 2016.
This bill would establish specific criminal penalties for
violations of this prohibition.
This bill would also establish the procedure by which civil and
administrative penalties may be imposed.
AB 96 (Atkins) Page 2 of
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Staff
Comments: This bill would not require specific levels of
enforcement, however the bill create cost pressures to enforce
the new provisions. Enforcement costs would depend on the number
of enforcement actions and the nature of those actions. For
example, DFW cites that the investigative costs for violations
can vary between $150 and $150,000 per incident. Higher cost
investigations are for those cases that may require
specially-trained wildlife officers, undercover operations, and
covert surveillance.
Because of this wide variability in investigative costs, DFW
assumes that this bill would require them to develop
infrastructure (staff and equipment) to provide for the greatest
level of enforcement. This would require, according to DFW, four
wardens, one Lieutenant, a wildlife forensic specialist, legal
counsel, and one governmental program analyst to provide
clerical and administrative support for an annual costs of $1.2
million. DFW also estimates needing approximately $1 million in
one-time costs for sampling and analysis equipment.
Staff notes that DFW's estimate does not take into account the
fact that at least some of these enforcement cost pressures, if
not most, are preexisting because of the current Penal Code
prohibitions on elephant bodies and parts. Existing enforcement
cost pressures are significant because DFW does not currently
spend significant resources on enforcement of those provisions.
Instead, DFW has relied on enforcement by the US Fish and
Wildlife Service. DFW believes that the expansion of the ivory
and rhinoceros horn prohibition would make it more likely that
they would have to undertake the enforcement action rather than
the federal government.
Staff notes that this bill could arguably reduce enforcement
cost pressures by deleting the exemption on imports made before
1977. It is very difficult, if not impossible, to verify when a
particular animal part was imported. Thus the existing exemption
has made enforcement very difficult and expensive. The age or
import time of the ivory or horn under this bill is no longer
relevant under this bill (the date requirements for the musical
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instrument and antique exemptions are based on the age of the
instrument and antique piece as a whole, not the ivory part),
thereby potentially easing enforcement actions.
The department notes that it may incur additional costs in the
$10,000 to $30,000 range to implement the exemption for
educational or scientific purposes. However, given that this
exemption essentially expires after July 1, 2016, this would be
a relatively minor one-time cost.
This bill constitutes a state mandate as it creates a new crime.
However, under the California Constitution, costs associated
with this mandate are not reimbursable.
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