BILL ANALYSIS
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THIRD READING
Bill No: AB 737
Author: Chesbro (D), et al
Amended: 8/17/10 in Senate
Vote: 21
PRIOR VOTES NOT RELEVANT
SENATE APPROPRIATIONS COMMITTEE : 7-3, 8/12/10
AYES: Kehoe, Alquist, Corbett, Leno, Price, Wolk, Yee
NOES: Ashburn, Emmerson, Wyland
NO VOTE RECORDED: Walters
SUBJECT : Solid waste: diversion
SOURCE : Californians Against Waste
DIGEST : This bill requires the Department of Resources
Recycling and Recovery to report to the Legislature on the
current diversion rate in the state and potential
strategies to increase the diversion rate to 75 percent,
and report information on the costs of the strategies
identified in the report. This bill requires certain
businesses to arrange for recycling services and requires
local governments to implement a commercial recycling
program. This bill also makes a number of technical and
procedural changes to the laws governing solid waste
facility regulation.
NOTE: This bill contains similar provisions contained in
AB 479 (Chesbro), 2009-10 Session, which was held in the
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Senate Appropriations Committee.
ANALYSIS : Under current law, local governments are
required divert 50 percent of solid waste through source
reduction, recycling, and composting. The Department of
Resources Recycling and Recovery (CalRecycle) is required
to determine whether local governments are in compliance
with this requirement. Local governments that are not in
compliance or are not making a good faith effort to come
into compliance are subject to fines.
Current law authorizes the CalRecycle to designate local
enforcement agencies to permit solid waste facilities and
enforce permit or other requirements. Current law requires
local governments to adopt and submit non-disposal facility
elements to CalRecycle. These non-disposal facility
elements must include a description of new facilities and
expansions of existing facilities and all solid waste
facility expansions that recover for reuse more than five
percent of total disposed volume.
This bill:
1.Requires local governments to update existing
non-disposal facility elements as conditions change and
provide that information to the CalRecycle.
2.Requires CalRecycle, on or before March 1, 2013 to report
to the Legislature on the current diversion rate in the
state and potential strategies to increase the diversion
rate to 75 percent, and report information on the costs
of the strategies identified in the report.
3.Requires businesses that contract for solid waste
disposal and generate more than four cubic yards of solid
waste and recyclable materials per week to arrange for
recycling services. Such businesses are required to
either separate recyclable materials from solid waste and
arrange for their collection or to contract with a
recycling service that provides mixed waste processing
services.
4.Requires local governments to implement a commercial
recycling program, unless a jurisdiction already has
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established such a program. Requires CalRecycle to
review such local commercial recycling programs.
5.Provides that a local agency may charge and collect a fee
from a commercial waste generator in order to recover the
agency's cost incurred in complying with this bill's
provisions.
Prior/Related Legislation
SB 25 (Padilla), 2009-10 Session, increases the required
diversion rate to 60 percent by 2015, and also generally
requires businesses to contract for recycling services. SB
25 is in the Assembly Natural Resources Committee.
SB 1020 (Padilla), 2007-08 Session, would have required the
Waste Board to develop a plan to achieve a 75 percent
diversion rate by 2020. That bill was held in the Assembly
Appropriations Committee.
AB 479 (Chesbro), 2009-10 Session, is substantially similar
to this bill. AB 479 was held in the Senate Appropriations
Committee's suspense file.
FISCAL EFFECT : Appropriation: No Fiscal Com.: Yes
Local: Yes
SUPPORT : (Verified 8/17/10)
Californians Against Waste (source)
OPPOSITION : (Verified 8/18/10)
California Chamber of Commerce
ARGUMENTS IN SUPPORT : No letter on file.
ARGUMENTS IN OPPOSITION : The Chamber of Commerce
contends that the recycling mandate contained in this bill
is unnecessary. The Chamber points out that CalRecycle is
already engaged in developing regulations to implement a
mandatory commercial recycling program which must be
adopted in 2011. The Chamber contends that this bill
imposes its mandate only on the private sector, rather than
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ensuring a greater diversion rate through the inclusion of
all state and local government facilities - such as
schools, hospitals, and more. In contrast, CalRecycle has
committed to including these state and local government
facilities in its mandatory commercial recycling program.
The Chamber contends that the state's goal of greater
statewide waste diversion would be achieved more
cost-effectively and with greater environmental gains by
following the more inclusive approach envisioned by
CalRecycle. The Chamber is opposed to the fees imposed on
businesses by local governments to pay for the commercial
recycling program, and this added cost would be on top of
what businesses would already be required to pay for
recycling services just to be compliant with the new
mandate.
TSM:kc 8/19/10 Senate Floor Analyses
SUPPORT/OPPOSITION: SEE ABOVE
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