BILL ANALYSIS
SB 286
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Date of Hearing: July 1, 2009
ASSEMBLY COMMITTEE ON APPROPRIATIONS
Kevin De Leon, Chair
SB 286 (Aanestad) - As Introduced: February 24, 2009
Policy Committee: Water, Parks and
Wildlife Vote: 11-0
Urgency: No State Mandated Local Program:
Yes Reimbursable: No
SUMMARY
This bill authorizes the Department of Fish and Game (DFG) to
issue a permit to an organization for the scientific collection
of plants or animals. Specifically, this bill:
1)Authorizes DFG to issue a permit for the scientific collection
of plants or animals to a California-certified small business,
an accredited aquarium, or other appropriate institution.
2)Authorizes DFG to approve temporary employees or volunteers to
work under the permit.
3)Makes it a misdemeanor to allow a temporary employee or
volunteer to work under such a permit without DFG approval.
4)Authorizes DFG to charge a fee of a specified amount for the
issuance of such a permit.
FISCAL EFFECT
Decreased revenue of less than $100,000 per year resulting from
DFG issuing fewer permits, thereby collecting less permit fee
revenue, without a coincident reduction in permitting-related
workload. (Fish and Game Preservation Fund) This is because
those organizations authorized by the bill to apply for
organizational collection permits will likely do so rather than
applying for individual collection permits for each employee, as
it will cost organizations less to receive one organizational
collection permit than to receive several individual collection
permits.
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DFG, however, will still review each individual nominated to
work under the organizational collection permit. Therefore,
permitting fee revenue will decrease but permitting workload
will not. The result will be additional pressure on the FGPF in
an amount less than $100,000-the current amount of scientific
collection fee revenue.
COMMENTS
1)Rationale. According to the author, DFG's existing process
for permitting collection of plants or animals for scientific
purposes results in detrimental delays to scientific projects.
This is because it may take 3 to 4 months for DFG to issue a
scientific collection permit to an individual, but
organizations planning to undertake such collection typically
hire temporary workers only when field collection is ready to
begin. In addition, temporary employees sometimes resign
before field collection is complete, obligating the
organization to apply anew for a collection permit for any
replacement temporary employees. According to the author, this
bill avoids such delays by allowing temporary employees and
volunteers to be approved by DFG to work under an
organization's permit, issued in the name of the principal
scientific investigator.
2)Background. Existing law authorizes DFG to issue permits to
individuals for the collection of plants or animals for
scientific and educational purposes. Those permits are valid
for 24 months. The cost of such a permit is set in law and
periodically adjusted for inflation. Currently, a collection
permit costs $61.25.
Current individual scientific collection fee revenues are
insufficient to cover DFG's cost of issuing those permits, and
this bill would likely exacerbate that revenue shortfall. In
2008, DFG's cost to issue about 1,600 individual permits was
about $540,000. Issuance of those 1,600 permits generated
about $100,000 in revenue. DFG covered the remaining $440,000
in permitting costs with revenues in the Fish and Game
Preservation Fund (FGPF), which is largely supported with fees
paid by hunters and anglers.
The committee may wish to consider authorizing DFG to charge
an amount for scientific collection permits that covers more
of the costs to issue such permits, thereby reducing the cost
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pressure on the FGPF.
3)Supporters of this bill include organizations, such as Sea
World, that collect plants and animals for scientific and
educational purposes. There is no registered opposition to
this bill.
Analysis Prepared by : Jay Dickenson / APPR. / (916) 319-2081