BILL ANALYSIS Ó
AB 2253
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Date of Hearing: May 4, 2016
ASSEMBLY COMMITTEE ON APPROPRIATIONS
Lorena Gonzalez, Chair
AB
2253 (Grove) - As Amended April 25, 2016
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| |Judiciary | |10 - 0 |
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Urgency: No State Mandated Local Program: NoReimbursable: No
SUMMARY:
This bill requires the Department of Veterans Affairs (CalVet)
to apply to the DMV to sponsor a the following historic state
and federal motto license plate programs to support the Veterans
Housing and Homelessness Prevention Program (VHHP), and the
development of supportive services for veterans living in units
funded by that program:
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1)E Pluribus Unum
2)Liberty
3)In God We Trust
4)We the People
5)Eureka! I have found it!
FISCAL EFFECT:
1)Potential one-time special fund costs of approximately
$440,000 to DMV to establish the specialized license plate
program, including computer programming changes and updating
forms. Pursuant to current law, DMV will make computer
programming and form changes only after program applications
meet a 7,500-application threshold. Therefore, the DMV will
incur these costs only if it receives enough applications to
require the DHCS to implement the program. The DMV will incur
minor ongoing costs to continue issuing specialty license
plates and renewals under the program. All of the DMV's
initial and ongoing costs will be covered by a portion of the
additional $50 fee paid for original specialized license
plates and the additional $40 fee to renew such plates.
2)Minor costs to CalVet to submit the program application and
license prototype to DMV, design and print the license plate
application, and collect and hold applications and fees until
7,500 applications are received. The bill specifies that the
license, to the extent feasible, should be identical to the
license plate design used by DMV between 1982 and 1987, as
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described.
3)Potential ongoing revenue to the VHHP, subject to
appropriation by the Legislature.
4)Current law requires that specified additional funds related
to personalizing a specialized license plate must be deposited
into the Environmental License Plate Fund. This bill instead
directs all revenues to the VHHP, after deducting
administrative costs. This would result in the diversion of
any revenues associated with personalization from the
Environmental License Plate Fund to the new account.
COMMENTS:
1)Specialized License Plates. Prior to 2007, any new special
interest license plate required specific legislative
authorization. This practice was held to be unconstitutional
in that the Legislature approved some of the plates, and
rejected others, using no standardized or objective criteria
for those decisions. Pursuant to AB 84 (Leslie)/Statutes of
2006, the DMV will issue specialized license plates when
sponsored by a state agency, the plate's message and resulting
revenues support that agency's program, and at least 7,500
paid license applications have been received. The
7,500-application threshold attempts to assure that DMV's
startup costs are fully covered, by the portion of the
registration fee surcharge directed to the department, and to
avoid a proliferation of different types of plates, which can
be troublesome from a law enforcement perspective.
2)VHHP. In June of 2014 voters approved Proposition 41, which
provides $600 million to fund the VHHP, for the development of
new affordable housing for veterans and their families. The
VHHP requires an emphasis on developing housing for veterans
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who are homeless or have extremely low income.
3)Related Legislation. Currently there are six other bills in
the legislative process that would direct a state agency to
sponsor a specialized license plate for a specific cause.
Three bills were all held on Suspense last year in Senate
Appropriations: AB 63 (Bonilla) to raise money for school
safety, AB 270 (Nazarian) to raise money for diabetes
awareness, and AB 932 (Daly) to raise money for local parks
and recreation grant programs. AB 1884 (Harper) to raise
money for mental health awareness was passed by this Committee
on March 14, 2016, with a 16-0 vote, and is currently awaiting
a hearing in the Assembly Appropriations Committee. AB 2131
(Maienschein) on today's committee agenda, would raise money
for local food banks. AB 2303 (Holden), also on today's
committee agenda, would raise money to assist food banks.
4)Prior Legislation. Since 2011, 12 bills have been introduced
establishing specialized license plate program, of which four
have been chaptered: Salton Sea restoration [AB 1096
(Nestande), Chapter 353, Statutes of 2014], kidney disease
research [AB 2450 (Logue), Chapter 359, Statutes of 2014],
breast cancer awareness [AB 49 (Buchanan), Chapter 351,
Statutes of 2014], and domestic violence prevention [AB 2321
(Gomez), Chapter 358, Statutes of 2014].
Analysis Prepared by:Chuck Nicol / APPR. / (916)
319-2081
AB 2253
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