BILL ANALYSIS �
AB 666
Page 1
Date of Hearing: March 22, 2011
ASSEMBLY COMMITTEE ON BUSINESS, PROFESSIONS AND CONSUMER
PROTECTION
Mary Hayashi, Chair
AB 666 (Jeffries) - As Amended: March 8, 2011
SUBJECT : Public lands: State Public Works Board.
SUMMARY : Authorizes the transfer of 30 acres of the Jurupa
Area Recreation and Park District (District) to the Department
of Toxic Substances Control (DTSC). Specifically, this bill :
1)Authorizes the State Public Works Board (SPWB) to acquire the
30 acres of District land that is a portion of Riverside
County in the Jurupa Mountains and adjacent to two state-owned
parcels that are part of the Stringfellow Acid Pits
Contamination Site, for transfer to DTSC.
2)Makes legislative findings and declarations relating to the
District transfer and a related land purchase by the District
for which escrow is scheduled to close in July 2011.
3)Takes effect immediately as an urgency measure.
EXISTING LAW :
1)Requires that all land and other real property to be acquired
by or for a state agency, other than specifically listed
agencies, be acquired by SPWB.
2)Requires that the jurisdiction over real property acquired by
SPWB remains with the Department of General Services until the
property is needed for the purpose for which it was acquired.
FISCAL EFFECT : Unknown
COMMENTS :
Purpose of this bill . According to the author's office, "The
Stringfellow Acid Pits (Pits) is a project under DTSC where they
have taken legal responsibility to clean up a former toxic
disposal site in the Jurupa Mountains in Riverside County. DTSC
currently owns only a portion of the land for which is
AB 666
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responsible for, and they operate on lands which they have no
legal right to be operating on. The District is currently
purchasing a parcel of land which includes 30 acres which have
been contaminated and where DTSC currently operates. The
District has no interest in keeping this land and wants to gift
it to the State for DTSC's uses.
"This bill is necessary to ensure the SPWB has the authority to
accept this land within the time period of the transaction. In
the long term, if the gift is not accepted the land would likely
need to be purchased by the State, at a cost to the State, in
the future due to DTSC's legal responsibility to clean up the
land."
Background . The Pits are located in Riverside County in the
Jurupa Mountains, five miles northwest of the City of Riverside
and one mile north of the community of Glen Avon. The
Stringfellow Quarry Company first operated the site as a rock
quarry, and then as a hazardous waste disposal facility from
August 1956 to November 1972. In its 16 years of operation, the
Pits had approximately 34 million gallons of industrial waste
deposited into its unlined evaporation ponds. Over the years,
the contents of these ponds seeped through the soil and
fractured bedrock, and contaminated the groundwater migrating
into the Glen Avon community.
In 1972, the waste disposal facility was closed after
groundwater contamination was discovered and the title of the
land passed to the State of California. In the 1980s, the
federal Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) designated the
Pits as a Superfund site and a national priority to clean up the
uncontrolled hazardous waste; the Pits were listed as
California's most contaminated site. In the 1980s, the federal
and state governments filed suit against Stringfellow and the
companies that used the Pits as a toxic waste disposal facility.
Under the terms of a 1999 settlement agreement, DTSC assumed
sole responsibility for future cleanup at Stringfellow.
While DTSC owns two land parcels within the Pits, it is
responsible for decontamination and management of a larger area
of land. The District is purchasing 162 acres of land for
$500,000 from the Standard Dredging Company in order help
conserve the Jurupa Mountains as open space and provide trail
access to the public. The parcel includes the 30 acres of
contaminated land that is part of the Pits and on which DTSC has
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23 extraction and monitoring wells. The District has no purpose
for these 30 acres and wishes to donate them to DTSC.
It is unclear whether legislation is necessary to complete the
donative transfer of land from the District to DTSC.
Support . According to the Riverside Land Conservancy (RLC),
"The District is purchasing a parcel of land in the Jurupa
Mountains in Riverside County. The RLC is working with the
District to preserve the Jurupa Mountains as an open space and
expand accessibility to the public. A small portion of the
parcel being purchased is a part of the Pits. This land has
been contaminated by toxins and the DTSC has the legal
responsibility to handle the cleanup. DTSC already operates
extraction and monitoring wells on the 30 acres soon to be
purchased by the District. The District has no interest in
owning the portion of land associated with the Pits and intends
to donate the land to the State to further their cleanup
process."
Double-referred . This bill is double-referred to Assembly
Environmental Safety & Toxic Materials Committee.
REGISTERED SUPPORT / OPPOSITION :
Support
Riverside Land Conservancy
Jurupa Area Recreation and Park District
Opposition
None on file.
Analysis Prepared by : Joanna Gin / B.,P. & C.P. / (916)
319-3301