BILL ANALYSIS Ó
AB 296
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Date of Hearing: March 25, 2015
ASSEMBLY COMMITTEE ON APPROPRIATIONS
Jimmy Gomez, Chair
AB
296 (Dodd) - As Introduced February 12, 2015
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|Policy |Privacy and Consumer |Vote:|10 - 0 |
|Committee: |Protection | | |
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Urgency: No State Mandated Local Program: NoReimbursable: No
SUMMARY:
This bill extends the authority of a county board of supervisors
and the state Department of Food and Agriculture (Department) to
charge fees to recover the county sealer's costs related to the
inspection and testing of weighing and measuring devices, from
AB 296
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January 1, 2016, to January 1, 2019.
FISCAL EFFECT:
1.Absent a sunset extension on the fee authority, the state
would incur costs of approximately $650,000 to cover the
Department's oversight functions.
The Department collected approximately $650,000 in
2013-14 to cover its costs of supervision, investigation,
and enforcement of the county programs. The fee is an
annual, per-device fee that ranges from $.10 (submeters)
to $12.00 (scales greater than 10,000 pounds capacity)
depending on the type of device. The majority of devices
are charged $1.10.
1.Counties collected $23.1 million in fee revenue statewide in
2012-13 to defray their costs of the device registration
program. Existing law prohibits a county from charging fees
that exceed its total cost of performing the required county
sealer duties. Absent a sunset extension on the fee authority,
counties would be required to fund this program from other
sources, most likely county general fund.
COMMENTS:
1.Purpose. This bill allows counties and the Department to
continue to charge fees to recover the costs of the county
sealer device inspecting and testing programs by extending the
sunset date for three years. The bill does not change any fees
or fee caps.
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2.Background. Inspection and testing of weighing and measuring
devices is overseen in each county by the County Sealer of
Weights and Measures. In practice, this function involves the
inspection and testing of packaged commodities and all
commercially-used weighing and measuring devices, including
gas pumps, water meters, grocery scales, taxi meters, among
many others. Sealers and their offices enforce the laws and
regulations of the state under the general direction and
oversight of the Secretary of Food and Agriculture. Sealers
protect both consumers and businesses by ensuring that
consumers reliably get what they pay for, and that businesses
are competing fairly.
In 1982, the Legislature authorized county boards of
supervisors to establish fees to partially fund local weights
and measures enforcement programs. Over time, the program has
been amended to add new devices to the registration program
and to adjust the schedule of maximum fees. Based on the
maximum fee schedule, each county and its affected businesses
negotiate specific fees and adopt them by local ordinance.
This authorization has been extended by statute nine times
since 1985, most recently by AB 1632 (Yamada) in 2012, and is
set to expire on January 1, 2016.
3.Previous legislation.
a) AB 1623 (Yamada), Chapter 234, Statutes of 2012,
extended the sunset date on the county board of
supervisor's authority to charge fees to recover the costs
of the County Sealer to perform specified inspections until
January 1, 2016, and established or revised certain device
fee caps.
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b) AB 2361 (Ruskin), Chapter 260, Statutes of 2010,
extended the sunset date on the authority of the board of
supervisors of a county to charge fees to recover the costs
of the county sealer until January 1, 2013.
c) AB 889 (Ruskin), Chapter 529, Statutes of 2005, extended
the sunset date to January 1, 2011, and established a
gradual increase in the fees that may be adopted by a board
of supervisors in order to more fully fund the local
weights and measure device inspection program. The bill
also established a two-tiered fee schedule that provided
both a location fee and a device fee to more effectively
capture the cost of the initial device inspection.
Analysis Prepared by:Jennifer Swenson / APPR. / (916)
319-2081