BILL ANALYSIS
SENATE LOCAL GOVERNMENT COMMITTEE
Senator Dave Cox, Chair
BILL NO: AB 2754 HEARING: 6/30/10
AUTHOR: John P?rez FISCAL: Yes
VERSION: 6/23/10 CONSULTANT: Detwiler
GOVERNOR'S OFFICE OF PLANNING AND RESEARCH
Background and Existing Law
The Governor's Office of Planning and Research (OPR) is the
state's comprehensive planning agency (AB 2070, Wilson,
1970). Located within the Office of the Governor, OPR
coordinates state agencies' planning activities. OPR is
also responsible for helping regional and local officials
with land use planning.
In June 2009, Governor Schwarzenegger called OPR "a total
waste," adding that "The Office of Planning and Research
should be about planning and research to come up with great
policy answers, which this office doesn't do." The
Governor's Budget for 2010-11 called for OPR's elimination,
reassigning some of its functions to other state agencies.
In May 2010, the Administration gave legislators its
proposal to eliminate OPR. The Senate and Assembly Budget
Committees did not accept the Governor's recommendations.
On June 9, 2010, the Assembly Local Government Committee
held an oversight hearing to review OPR's duties and
functions. In addition to the Administration's
representatives, planners, military representatives, and
the Legislative Analyst's Office provided comments.
Proposed Law
I. OPR's employees . Because OPR is part of the Office of
the Governor, OPR's employees are constitutionally exempt
from state civil service. Each governor appoints OPR's
director. Most of OPR's staff changes with the election of
a new governor, although some employees who provide core
services have remained even when administrations changed.
The California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) assigns OPR
the responsibility to prepare and develop the "CEQA
Guidelines" which the Secretary for Natural Resources
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formally adopts as administrative regulations. OPR
operates the State Clearinghouse which coordinates state
agencies' reviews of CEQA documents. Implementing a 1982
Presidential Executive Order, the State Clearinghouse is
also California's single point of contact for federal aid
applications.
Some observers worry that the appointive status of OPR's
employees means risking the loss of their professional
expertise and institutional memory when gubernatorial
administrations change. They particularly worry about
losing the OPR employees who run the State Clearinghouse
and advise public officials about land use planning and
development topics.
Assembly Bill 2754 creates a Planning and Clearinghouse
Unit within OPR under the direct control of a Director of
the Planning and Clearinghouse Unit who reports directly to
the OPR director. AB 2754 allows the OPR director to
employ and fix the compensation of the Unit's director and
employees. The bill requires the State Department of
Personnel Administration to begin preparations for
converting employees to civil service status, but prohibits
OPR employees from attaining civil service status within
the Unit before July 1, 2011. [See 1, 2, & 3 of the
bill.]
II. OPR's duties . Current law assigns OPR several duties,
including serving the Governor and his or her Cabinet as
staff for long-range planning and research. More
specifically, state law tells OPR to:
Formulate long-range land use goals and policies.
Help state departments with their functional plans.
Resolve conflicts among state agencies.
Help the Department of Finance integrate state
plans and the Budget.
Coordinate federal grants to carry out state
environmental goals.
Coordinate statewide environmental monitoring.
Coordinate environmental reviews of development
projects.
Coordinate state research on growth and
development.
Coordinate state departments' technical planning
assistance.
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Manage state planning grants.
Develop long-range growth and development policies.
Encourage local and regional planning.
Assembly Bill 2754 assigns most of these specific duties to
OPR's new Planning and State Clearinghouse Unit, but
repeals the requirements to coordinate federal grants to
carry out state environmental goals and coordinate
statewide environmental monitoring. [4]
By January 1, 2012, AB 2754 requires the Unit to:
Annually review state departments' functional plans
for consistency with the statutory state planning
priorities. If the Unit determines that a
department's plan is inconsistent with those
priorities, it must recommend changes to the
department and the Legislature.
Biennially report to the Governor and the
Legislature on its efforts to formulate, evaluate, and
update long-range goals and policies.
Develop long-range policies for growth and
development every five years.
The bill directs the Unit to follow the statutory statewide
planning goals when coordinating state departments'
technical planning assistance.
AB 2754 assigns the Unit two new duties:
Assist the State Air Resources Board in providing
technical assistance to local governments regarding
their statutorily required sustainable communities
strategies or alternative planning strategies.
Work with the Strategic Growth Council to assist
with planning sustainable communities and meeting the
California Global Warming Solutions Act's goals,
including technical assistance to local governments
which are eligible for grants and loans under
Proposition 84.
III. Military liaison . In 1994, Governor Wilson's
executive order created the Office of Military Base
Retention and Reuse within the State Technology, Trade &
Commerce Agency in anticipation of another round of
military base closures. When the State Technology, Trade
and Commerce Agency was abolished, the Legislature renamed
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the Office of Military Base Retention and Reuse as the
Office of Military and Aerospace Support, moved it to the
State Business, Transportation and Housing Agency (SB 926,
Knight, 2004), and then extended its operations until
January 1, 2009 (SB 1698, Ashburn, 2006). In 2006,
Governor Schwarzenegger's executive order created the
position of the Governor's Advisor of Military Affairs
within OPR to coordinate:
Land use planning to ensure sustainable defense
activities.
Bills to support California's relationship with the
Department of Defense.
State regulatory activities that affect defense
operations.
Administration officials to cooperate with the
military.
Issues important to military personnel and their
families.
Advocacy on policies that affect armed forces based
in California.
Cities and counties must include military installations,
aviation routes, airspace, and readiness activities in
their state-mandated general plans. OPR must provide
guidance to local officials as part of its advisory General
Plan Guidelines (SB 1468, Knight, 2002).
Assembly Bill 2754 designates OPR as the liaison with the
U.S. Department of Defense with responsibility for:
Coordination to ensure sustainable defense
activities.
Bills to support California's relationship with the
Department of Defense.
State regulatory activities that affect defense
operations.
Identifying administration officials to cooperate
with the military.
Issues important to military personnel and their
families.
Advocacy on policies that affect armed forces based
in California.
[7]
IV. Planning Advisory and Assistance Council . Current law
requires the OPR director to appoint a Planning Advisory
and Assistance Council composed of local, regional, and
tribal officials to advise OPR on its statutory duties.
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There are no current appointments and the Council has not
met in years. Assembly bill 2754 tells the Planning
Advisory and Assistance Council to advise OPR's new
Planning and State Clearinghouse Unit about its statutory
duties. [6]
V. Strategic Growth Council . Proposition 84 (2006)
authorized $5.4 billion in state bonds, with $90 million
specifically set aside for planning grants and incentives.
The Strategic Growth Council awards and manages these
grants. The Council coordinates the state's programs to
improve air and water quality, improve natural resources
protection, increase the availability of affordable
housing, improve transportation, meet the goals of the
California Global Warming Solutions Act (AB 32, Nu?ez,
2006), encourage sustainable land use planning, and
revitalize community centers. The Council must comment on
the state's five-year infrastructure plan and OPR's State
Environmental Goals and Policies Report.
The six-member Council consists of the:
The OPR director.
Secretary of the Natural Resources Agency.
Secretary of the Environmental Protection Agency.
Secretary of the Business, Transportation and
Housing Agency.
Secretary of the California Health and Human
Services Agency.
A public member, appointed by the Governor.
The Council's staff must reflect its membership. The
Legislature appropriated $500,000 in Proposition 84 funds
to the Resources Agency for the Council's support (SB 732,
Steinberg, 2008). The State Natural Resources Agency
estimates that it will have spent about $200,000 by the end
of the 2010 calendar year.
Assembly Bill 2754 requires OPR to administer the Strategic
Growth Council. AB 2754 transfers the balance of the
appropriation to OPR to administer the Council. [8 & 9]
Comments
1. Slip sliding away . Lacking gubernatorial focus or
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direction, OPR drifted through the Davis and Schwarzenegger
administrations. Talented and hard working staff continued
to run the State Clearinghouse and grind out advisory
reports on state, regional, and local planning topics, but
neither administration used OPR as a think tank to
anticipate policy problems or solutions. The 1970 Wilson
bill conceived of OPR as the hub of a figurative wagon
wheel, with the state departments' functional plans as the
spokes, and the State Environmental Goals and Policies
Report at the rim, holding the parts together. But when
these arrangements didn't produce the intended results,
legislators created new entities such as the Strategic
Growth Council. AB 2754 reacts to this institutional
malaise by protecting OPR's core functions from future
gubernatorial whims. Conferring future civil service
status on the State Clearinghouse employees and planners
institutionalizes OPR's status as the hub in the planning
wheel. Without this protection, decades of hard work could
just slip away.
2. Other options . If legislators wanted to implement
Governor Schwarzenegger's recommendation to eliminate OPR,
they have at least three options:
Dismantle and distribute. This alternative most
closely follows the Governor's recommendation. OPR
would disappear and other state departments would take
over its functions. The State Clearinghouse would go
to the California Air Resources Board or its
organizational parent, the California Environmental
Protection Agency, because CARB and CalEPA are
responsible for implementing AB 32 (Nu?ez, 2006) and
SB 375 (Steinberg, 2008). The General Plan Guidelines
and general plan extensions would go to the State
Department of Housing and Community Development which
already reviews local housing elements. The statute
requiring an Environmental Goals and Policy Report
would be repealed.
Shrink and focus. This alternative retains OPR in
a smaller, more focused form. The State Clearinghouse
would go to the Secretary for Natural Resources who is
already responsible for adopting the CEQA Guidelines.
OPR would remain in existence, focusing on the General
Plan Guidelines, general plan extensions, and the
Environmental Goals and Policy Report. The State
Department of Finance would absorb all of OPR's other
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duties, such as analyzing bills and being the liaison
to the Pentagon.
Restore and rebuild. This alternative sends OPR
back to its pre-1970 structure. The State Department
of Finance would operate a restored State Office of
Planning and inherit OPR's duties for the General Plan
Guidelines, general plan extensions, and the
Environmental Goals and Policy Report. The
reconstituted State Office of Planning would mesh with
the Department's existing Demographic Research Unit
and its Economic and Financial Research Unit. The
State Clearinghouse would go to the Secretary for
Natural Resources who is already responsible for
adopting the CEQA Guidelines.
3. A new window of opportunity ? OPR is only as good as a
governor wants it (or allows it) to be. OPR and the new
Strategic Growth Council are merely the current
incarnations of the state government's earlier failed
attempts to promote long-range planning. The first State
Planning Commission appeared in 1934, followed by a
separate State Planning Board in the Department of Finance
(1935), combined into the State Reconstruction and
Re-Employment Commission (1943), and abolished in 1947. A
new State Office of Planning within the Department of
Finance had its own Planning Advisory Committee (1959),
followed by a Coordinating Council on Urban Policy (1963),
an Intergovernmental Council on Urban Growth (1965), the
California Council on Intergovernmental Relations (1969),
and the re-named Planning Advisory and Assistance Council
and the Governor's Office of Planning and Research (1970).
By assigning OPR the task of administering the Strategic
Growth Council, AB 2754 may allow the next governor to use
these assets more effectively to influence growth and
development patterns.
4. Pay attention . U.S. Marine Corps Major General Anthony
Jackson submitted written comments for the Assembly Local
Government Committee's recent oversight on OPR's
activities. General Jackson's letter sketched the recent
institutional history of state-military activities and then
noted that in military spending in California in 2008 was
about $51 billion. He concluded that the "presence of a
formalized military liaison in state government, even of a
very limited scope, could have many mutual benefits." AB
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2754 codifies part of Governor Schwarzengger's 2006
executive order, designating OPR as the state government's
liaison with the Department of Defense for six topics
related to land use planning and development.
5. No little plans . Every four years, OPR is supposed to
prepare a State Environmental Goals and Policies Report, a
20- to 30-year look ahead at state growth and development.
The State Environmental Goals and Policy Report must be
consistent with the state's planning priorities to promote
infill development and equity, protect environmental and
agricultural resources, encourage efficient development
patterns (AB 857, Wiggins, 2002). State agencies must
conform their functional plans to these priorities. In
1972, Governor Reagan issued the first State Environmental
Goals and Policy Report. Governor Brown issued his
version, An Urban Strategy For California in 1978.
Governors Deukmejian and Wilson issued none. In November
2003, a month after the recall election, OPR released a
State Environmental Goals and Policy Report; Governor Davis
never endorsed it. The Schwarzenegger Administration has
not prepared a State Environmental Goals and Policy Report.
If legislators want OPR to take a leadership role on
sustainable development in the next administration, the
Legislature should insist on having an Environmental Goals
and Policies report and be prepared to pay for it.
6. Related bills . Earlier this year, the Senate Local
Government Committee heard and passed two other bills
relating to OPR. SB 959 (Ducheny) restores some of the
duties of the former Office of Permit Assistance to OPR.
SB 1445 (DeSaulnier) increases the state's vehicle license
fee by $1 to pay for an expanded Planning Advisory and
Assistance Council and for regional planning efforts. Both
bills are in the Assembly Local Government Committee. In
addition, AB 153 (Ma) allows regional agencies to increase
the VLF by up to $4 to pay for planning programs and
expands the Planning Advisory and Assistance Council. The
Senate Transportation and Housing Committee will hear AB
153 on June 29.
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Assembly Actions
Assembly Local Government Committee: 6-3
Assembly Appropriations Committee:12-5
Assembly Floor: 49-27
Support and Opposition (6/24/10)
Support : Association of Environmental Professionals.
Opposition : Unknown.