BILL ANALYSIS Ó
SENATE COMMITTEE ON APPROPRIATIONS
Senator Ricardo Lara, Chair
2015 - 2016 Regular Session
SB 209 (Pavley) - Surface mining: inspections and financial
assurances.
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|Version: May 12, 2015 |Policy Vote: N.R. & W. 7 - 2 |
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|Urgency: No |Mandate: No |
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|Hearing Date: May 26, 2015 |Consultant: Marie Liu |
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This bill does not meet the criteria for referral to the
Suspense File.
Bill
Summary: SB 209 would establish the "State Mine Inspector" as
the head of the Division of Mines (division) within the
Department of Conservation (DOC) and would establish new
criteria for mine inspections.
Fiscal
Impact:
Minor and absorbable costs to the Mine Reclamation Account
(special) for the SMGB to develop a standard for reclamation
plans.
Minor and absorbable costs to the Mine Reclamation Account
(special) for the DOC to offer inspection training
opportunities.
Background: The Surface Mining and Reclamation Act of 1975 (SMARA, PRC
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§2710 et seq.) regulates surface mining operations to minimize
environmental impacts and to provide for the reclamation of
mined lands to a usable condition while encouraging the
production, conservation, and protection of the state's mineral
resources. SMARA applies to the mining of hard metals minerals,
and sand and gravel. SMARA generally requires a surface mining
operation to obtain a mining permit, to have an approved
reclamation plan, and to have secured financial assurances.
Financial assurances are surety documents that can be used to
pay for any mine reclamation costs in the event that a mine
operator defaults on its obligation to reclaim a mine at the end
of its useful life.
1.The role of lead agency: SMARA is administered by the DOC's
Office of Mine Reclamation and the State Mining and Geology
Board (SMGB), but allows local entities to operate as the lead
agency and issue mining permits if the local entity has
adopted an ordinance governing mining activities that meet
specified requirements. However, reclamation plans and
financial assurances must be submitted to the director DOC for
review (§2774). Mines are required to be inspected annually,
and are the basis for establishing financial assurance
amounts.
2.Oversight of local agencies: Existing law establishes the
procedures by which the director can submit comments to a lead
agency regarding its pending approval of a reclamation plan
and financial assurances and the lead agency's required
response to such comments. Individuals may appeal specific
lead agency actions, including denying approval of a
reclamation plan, to the SMGB (§2770(e)).
3.Revoking of local agency responsibilities: Existing law
enables the SMGB to assume the role of the lead agency, except
for local permitting authority, if the lead agency is failing
to fulfill its statutory obligations, including if the lead
agency approves a reclamation plan and financial assurances
that are not consistent with SMARA (§2774.4). The SMGB is
required to restore powers to the lead agency within three
years if the lead agency takes corrective actions.
4.Reporting fees and lead agency fees: The owner of a mining
operation must annually report to the DOC with specified
information including, among other things, contact
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information, the location of the mine, the approval date of
the operation's reclamation plan, proof of annual inspection
by the lead agency, proof of financial assurances, and total
production for each mineral commodity produced in the previous
year. Under §2207(d), the SMGB is required to collect an
annual reporting fee on each active or idle mining operation.
These reporting fees must be at least $100, but no more than
$4,000, and they must cover the DOC's costs in implementing
SMARA. The actual fee amount is based on the total assessed
value of the mine, the acreage disturbed by mining activities,
and the acreage subject to the reclamation plan. Existing law
also caps the total revenue generated by the reporting fees at
$3.5 million. The fee minimums and maximums are adjusted
according to the California Consumer Price Index. Fee revenues
are deposited into the Mine Reclamation Account.
Lead agencies may also impose a fee upon each mining operation
to cover its reasonable costs under SMARA (§2207(e)).
5.Other provisions: Existing law outlines the process by which a
mine would be declared abandoned without commencing
reclamation, at which point the financial assurances can be
forfeited to conduct and complete the reclamation.
Proposed Law: This bill would declare Legislative intent to
modernize the Surface Mining and Reclamation Act, including in
regards to the fee structure, compliance with inspection
requirements, training, and adequacy of financial assurance and
reclamation plans. To this end, this bill would do the
following:
Establish a State Mine Inspector that would lead the Office of
Mine Reclamation, which would be renamed the Division of
Mines, within the Department of Conservation.
Require the SMGB to develop forms for the filing of
reclamation plans and amendments to those plans instead of the
lead agency though lead agencies would be authorized to
request additional information.
Require that the reclamation plan contain a schedule of time
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limits for completing reclamation.
Define "financial assurances" as the combination of approved
current financial assurance cost estimate and a financial
assurance mechanism that is equal or greater than the current
financial assurance cost estimate.
Add geophysicist as an eligible qualification to preform
inspections.
Prohibit a former employee of a lead agency from conducting an
inspection on a mining operation operated by a lead agency for
12 months following their employment with that lead agency.
Require the Department of Conservation to offer continuing
educational opportunities for lead agency employees to become
certified to inspect surfacing mining operations beginning
January 1, 2018.
Related
Legislation:
Ab 1142 (Gray) would make a number of substantive changes to
SMARA. AB 1142 is currently in the Assembly Appropriations
Committee.
SB 1270 (Pavley, 2014) would have created the Division of
Mines within the Department of Conservation, which would be
responsible for the DOC's role under mining laws, and would
amend the roles of the SMGB so that it is an appeals and
rule-making body. SB 1270 was held under submission by the
Senate Appropriations Committee.
Staff
Comments: Under existing law, lead agencies are responsible for
establishing their own reclamation plan form for mines within
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its jurisdiction. This bill would instead make the SMGB
responsible for creating a unified form for all reclamation
plans in the state, though the local lead agencies would be
authorized to require additional information. DOC believes that
the SMGB can complete the regulations necessary to develop the
standard form within existing resources as the DOC was able to
recently undertake a major update the inspection form using
existing staff.
This bill would also direct the renamed division to offer
"continuing educational opportunities" for lead agency employees
for mine inspections. DOC notes that they currently offer SMARA
inspection workshops two times each year since 2011 to help
surface mine inspectors understand and identify site conditions
that should be noted on the inspection form. The DOC interprets
these workshops as fulfilling the educational opportunities
required by this bill and therefore will not incur additional
costs as a result of this bill. The DOC notes that it has no
authority to actually certify inspectors as that responsibility
lies with the Board for Profession Engineers, Land Surveyors,
and Geologists. Staff recommends that the training language be
clarified should the bill move forward to avoid confusion
regarding certification authority.
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