Williamson Act: subvention payments: appropriation.

The Williamson Act, also known as the California Land Conservation Act of 1965, authorizes a city or county to enter into contracts with owners of land devoted to agricultural use, whereby the owners agree to continue using the property for that purpose, and the city or county agrees to value the land accordingly for purposes of property taxation. Existing law sets forth procedures for reimbursing cities and counties for property tax revenues not received as a result of these contracts and continuously appropriates General Fund moneys for that purpose. This bill, for the 2020–21 fiscal year, would appropriate an additional $40,000,000 from the General Fund to the Controller to make subvention payments to counties, as provided, in proportion to the losses incurred by those counties by reason of the reduction of assessed property taxes. The bill would make various findings in this regard.