BILL ANALYSIS Ó ----------------------------------------------------------------- |SENATE RULES COMMITTEE | AB 1075| |Office of Senate Floor Analyses | | |(916) 651-1520 Fax: (916) | | |327-4478 | | ----------------------------------------------------------------- THIRD READING Bill No: AB 1075 Author: Alejo (D) Amended: 9/2/15 in Senate Vote: 21 SENATE ENVIRONMENTAL QUALITY COMMITTEE: 5-0, 7/15/15 AYES: Wieckowski, Hill, Jackson, Leno, Pavley NO VOTE RECORDED: Gaines, Bates SENATE APPROPRIATIONS COMMITTEE: 5-2, 8/27/15 AYES: Lara, Beall, Hill, Leyva, Mendoza NOES: Bates, Nielsen ASSEMBLY FLOOR: 45-28, 5/28/15 - See last page for vote SUBJECT: Hazardous waste: enforcement SOURCE: Author DIGEST: This bill creates additional considerations and civil penalties on a person who has multiple violations of the Hazardous Waste Control Act of 1972 (HWCA). Senate Floor Amendments of 9/2/15 clarify that a "violation" or "noncompliance" for purposes of this section, creates a significant risk of harm to the public health or safety of the environment resulting from acute or chronic exposure to hazardous waste or hazardous waste constituents. ANALYSIS: Existing law governs the disposal of hazardous waste, under the federal Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA) of 1976: AB 1075 Page 2 1)Sets standards, through regulation, for the treatment, storage, transport, tracking and disposal of hazardous waste in the United States. 2)Authorizes states to carry out many of the functions of the federal law through their own hazardous waste laws if such programs have been approved by the United States Environmental Protection Agency (US EPA). Existing law, under the HWCA: 3)Establishes the Hazardous Waste Control program; 4)Regulates the handling, transport and disposal of hazardous waste and authorizes the Department of Toxic Substances Control (DTSC) to deny, suspend, or revoke any permit, registration, or certificate applied for, or issued to, a person or entity if that person or entity engaged in specified activities in violation of the Hazardous Waste Control Law or other laws. 5)Authorizes the DTSC to temporarily suspend any permit, registration, or certificate prior to a hearing if the department determines that action is necessary to prevent or mitigate an imminent and substantial danger to the public health or safety or the environment. 6)Requires the DTSC, upon receipt of a notice of defense to the accusation from the holder of the permit, registration, or certificate, to set the matter for hearing within 15 days and to hold the hearing as soon as possible, but not later than 30 days after receipt of the notice and requires the hearing to be held without delay and completed as soon as possible. 7)Requires a petition for judicial review of a final decision of the department to grant, issue, modify, or deny a permit, registration, or certificate be filed no later than 90 days after the date that the notice of final decision is served. 8)Provides for the imposition of civil and criminal penalties upon persons who violate the requirements of the hazardous waste control law or take other actions with regard to the AB 1075 Page 3 handling of hazardous waste. This bill establishes standards for what constitutes a repeat, serious hazardous waste facility violation and specifies the enforcement action to be taken by the DTSC. Specifically, this bill: 1)Requires the DTSC to consider, except under specified circumstances, three or more violations of, or noncompliance with, specified provisions for which a person or entity has been found liable or has been convicted, with respect to a single hazardous waste facility within a five-year period, as compelling cause to deny, suspend, or revoke a permit, registration, or certificate applied for by, or issued to, that person or entity. 2)Authorizes the DTSC to temporarily suspend any permit, registration, or certificate prior to a hearing if the DTSC determines that conditions may present an imminent and substantial endangerment to the public health or safety or the environment. This bill repeals the requirement that the hearing be held without delay and completed as soon as possible. 3)Imposes upon a person who is subject to the imposition of those civil or criminal penalties, an additional civil penalty of not less than $5,000 or more than $50,000 for each day of each violation, if the person has been found liable for, or been convicted of, two or more previous violations of certain of these hazardous waste-related provisions within any consecutive 60 months. Background 1)Permitting hazardous waste storage, treatment, and disposal facilities: The DTSC is responsible for the review of RCRA and non-RCRA hazardous waste permit applications to ensure safe design and operation; issuance and denial of operating permits; issuance of post-closure permits; approval and denial AB 1075 Page 4 of permit modifications; issuance and denial of emergency permits; review and approval of closure plans; providing closure oversight of approved closure plans; issuance and denial of variances; providing assistance to regulated industry on permitting matters; and providing for public involvement. There are currently 118 DTSC permitted hazardous waste facilities in California. These facilities include: 44 storage sites, 43 treatment facilities, 3 disposal sites, and 28 post-closure sites. 2)CPS HR Consulting Audit. The DTSC has undertaken a review of permitting and enforcement processes for hazardous waste facilities. To do this, the DTSC contracted for an outside program evaluation by CPS HR Consulting which provided a review of the DTSC permit process in order to develop a standardized process with decision criteria and corresponding standards of performance. The DTSC evaluation included a review and assessment of the current timeliness of decisions, and evaluates the adequacy of program staffing. It will make recommendations for process improvement. The program analysis of the DTSC carried out by CPS HR Consulting of DTSC permitting process found that there has been significant dissatisfaction with the performance of the permitting office, due to the cost and length of time in completing the permit process and a perception that the office does not deny or revoke permits as often as it should to address community concerns. The stakeholders included in the review identified the following major concerns: The need to create clear and objective criteria for making denial and revocation decisions that are based on valid standards of performance and risk; A clear standard for violations that would lead to a denial or revocation; The need for the DTSC to document and measure a "scorecard" of attributes that would be perceived as a "good result" for the permitting program; AB 1075 Page 5 The need to identify and measure appropriate permitting process timelines; and, The need to document, maintain and implement effective financial assurance standards to ensure that facilities can meet their permitted obligations. The CPS HR Consulting report recommended that the DTSC develop a new system of categorizing violations that reflects whether they present an immediate and direct threat to human health and safety, versus a less urgent threat that can be mitigated or resolved through further actions of the DTSC. The current definition of "Class I violations," although mandated by law, includes both violations that pose immediate and direct threats along with many that are relatively low- or long-term threats. Until the DTSC has a system to assess violations that can distinguish between significant threats to human health and safety and lesser threats, it will not be able to provide an objective standard to guide its own staff actions and to inform the public that the significant threats have been mitigated through actions such as permit modification, denial or revocation. Comments Purpose of Bill. According to the author, "AB 1075 establishes a bright regulatory line for permit denial and revocation. The key feature of AB 1075 is to strengthen the authority of the DTSC by specifying that three or more serious violations during a five-year period results in a clear obligation on the DTSC to revoke a hazardous waste facility permit. AB 1075 was developed based on the information gathered at the Environmental Safety and Toxic Materials oversight hearing in September of 2014, where community groups came forward to report on issues in their neighborhood." FISCAL EFFECT: Appropriation: No Fiscal Com.:YesLocal: No According to the Senate Appropriations Committee, minor if any AB 1075 Page 6 costs to the HWCA (special) for the DTSC to administer the additional considerations and civil penalties for persons with multiple violations. SUPPORT: (Verified9/3/15) Asian Pacific Environmental Network California District Attorneys Association California Environmental Justice Alliance Center for Community Action & Environmental Justice Center for Environmental Health Center on Race, Poverty & the Environment Clean Water Action Communities for a Better Environment Concerned Neighbors of Wildomar Environmental Action Committee of West Marin Environmental Working Group Pesticide Action Network North America Physicians for Social Responsibility - Los Angeles Physicians for Social Responsibility - San Francisco Bay Area Sierra Club California Teens Against Toxins The People's Senate and Leadership Institute Worksafe OPPOSITION: (Verified9/3/15) None received ASSEMBLY FLOOR: 45-28, 5/28/15 AYES: Alejo, Bonilla, Bonta, Brown, Burke, Calderon, Campos, Chau, Chiu, Chu, Cooley, Cooper, Daly, Dodd, Eggman, Frazier, AB 1075 Page 7 Cristina Garcia, Eduardo Garcia, Gomez, Gonzalez, Gordon, Roger Hernández, Holden, Jones-Sawyer, Levine, Lopez, Low, McCarty, Medina, Melendez, Mullin, Nazarian, Perea, Quirk, Rendon, Rodriguez, Salas, Santiago, Mark Stone, Thurmond, Ting, Weber, Williams, Wood, Atkins NOES: Travis Allen, Baker, Bigelow, Brough, Chang, Chávez, Dababneh, Dahle, Beth Gaines, Gallagher, Gatto, Hadley, Harper, Irwin, Jones, Kim, Lackey, Linder, Maienschein, Mathis, Mayes, Obernolte, Olsen, Patterson, Steinorth, Wagner, Waldron, Wilk NO VOTE RECORDED: Achadjian, Bloom, Gipson, Gray, Grove, O'Donnell, Ridley-Thomas Prepared by:Rachel Machi Wagoner / E.Q. / (916) 651-4108 9/3/15 18:28:56 **** END ****