BILL ANALYSIS
Senate Appropriations Committee Fiscal Summary
Senator Christine Kehoe, Chair
994 (Price)
Hearing Date: 05/03/2010 Amended: As Introduced
Consultant: Maureen Ortiz Policy Vote: ER&CA: 5-0
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BILL SUMMARY: SB 994 requires the state to reimburse counties
for the costs of special elections to fill vacancies of State
Senator, Member of the Assembly, United States Senator, or
Representative in Congress.
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Fiscal Impact (in thousands)
Major Provisions 2010-11 2011-12 2012-13 Fund
Election reimbursement $500 $1,000
$1,000 General
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STAFF COMMENTS: This bill meets the criteria for referral to
the Suspense file.
Costs to hold a special election to fill a vacancy vary and
depend on the size of the county, but the average costs are
approximately $1 million.
SB 994 requires that all expenses authorized and necessarily
incurred in the preparation for and the conduct of elections
proclaimed by the Governor to fill a vacancy will be paid by the
state. When such an election is consolidated with an already
scheduled local election, the state will pay only those
incremental costs directly related to the election proclaimed by
the Governor.
Since the enactment of AB 37 (Johnson), Chapter 39, Statutes of
1993, the state has reimbursed counties for the cost of special
elections held to fill legislative and congressional vacancies.
That measure, however, contained a sunset which repealed the
reimbursement requirement January 1, 1996. Legislation
extending the sunset date has been enacted several times as
follows:
a) AB 1709 (McPherson), Chapter 1102, Statutes of 1996 extended
the sunset date for the reimbursement to January 1, 2000.
b) AB 547 (Longville), Chapter 790, Statutes of 1999 further
extended the sunset date to January 1, 2005.
c) AB 183 (Longville) of 2001 which would have removed the
sunset entirely was vetoed by Governor Davis who indicated that
California's economy was in decline, and that there was ample
time to extend the sunset before the reimbursement requirement
was repealed in 2005.
d) AB 783 (Jones), Chapter 714, Statutes of 2005 reinstated the
reimbursement provision and extended the sunset date to January
1, 2006.
e) AB 1799 (McCarthy), Chapter 727, Statutes of 2006 extended
the sunset date until January 1, 2007.
SB 994 (Price)
Page2
Special elections that are called by the Governor to fill a
vacancy place a tremendous financial burden on counties that
likely had not budgeted for the unanticipated additional
expenses of such an election. Often times, resources must be
taken from other essential programs to pay for these elections.
AB 1769 (Tran) which is pending on the Assembly Appropriations
Suspense file will require reimbursements to counties for
special elections held to fill vacancies between January 1, 2009
and December 31, 2010. During 2009, special elections were
held to fill seven vacancies including three Assembly seats, two
Senate seats, and two seats in the House of Representatives, at
a cost of approximately $9.3 million. Two elections are
scheduled in 2010 for vacant seats, one in each of the Senate
and Assembly with estimated costs of about $2.7 million.