Existing law vests the Public Utilities Commission with regulatory authority over public utilities, including electrical corporations. Existing law requires each electrical corporation, not later than February 28, 2021, to file an advice letter for, and requires the commission, not later than June 30, 2021, to approve, a new tariff or rule that authorizes each electrical corporation to design and deploy all electrical distribution infrastructure on the utility side of the customer's meter for all customers installing separately metered infrastructure to support charging stations, other than those in single-family residences. Existing law requires the commission to establish strategies and quantifiable metrics to maximize the use of feasible and cost-effective electric vehicle grid integration, as defined, by January 1, 2030, as specified. This bill would require the commission, on or before March 1, 2027, to establish targets for each electrical corporation to install electric vehicle charging stations at multifamily housing properties. The bill would require the commission to ensure the targets reduce costs for all ratepayers, and to require electrical corporations to make annual progress reports and to provide to the commission corresponding maps that identify the proposed multifamily housing properties within its service territory where use will be highest based on distribution system planning and experience with electric vehicle charging station infrastructure. The bill would require the commission, in establishing the targets, to determine whether to impose certain requirements on an electrical corporation, including a requirement that an electrical corporation recover all costs, to the extent not covered by nonratepayer funding, for deploying the electric vehicle charging stations, including the costs for administration and implementation, as operations and maintenance costs rather than as capital costs. Under existing law, a violation of the Public Utilities Act or any order, decision, rule, direction, demand, or requirement of the commission is a crime. Because the provisions of the bill would be a part of the act and therefore a violation of the bill's requirements, or a violation of a commission action implementing the bill's requirements, would be a crime, this bill would impose a state-mandated local program. The California Constitution requires the state to reimburse local agencies and school districts for certain costs mandated by the state. Statutory provisions establish procedures for making that reimbursement. This bill would provide that no reimbursement is required by this act for a specified reason.
Existing law creates the High-Speed Rail Authority to develop and implement a high-speed rail system in the state. Existing law requires moneys collected by the State Air Resources Board from the auction or sale of certain allowances as part of a market-based compliance mechanism to be deposited into the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund and continuously appropriates a portion of the moneys in the fund for various purposes, including a specified portion to the authority for certain purposes. Existing law prohibits the authority from entering into new funding commitments with those moneys for activities outside of the Merced to Bakersfield segment, until June 30, 2030, or when that segment is fully funded, whichever is sooner. Notwithstanding that prohibition, existing law authorizes the authority to enter into new funding commitments outside of the Merced to Bakersfield segment for certain purposes, including for additional activities, not to cumulatively exceed $500,000,000, that maximize the efficiency of delivering the project, as specified. This bill would revise and recast that authorization to instead authorize the authority to enter into new funding commitments with the above-described moneys outside of the Merced to Bakersfield segment in any amount for activities related to early works, as defined, and for projects developed through public partnership agreements or public-private partnership agreements, subject to the requirements that those funding commitments maximize the efficiency of delivering the project and do not delay the completion of the Merced to Bakersfield segment, as specified. By expanding the purposes for which continuously appropriated moneys may be used, the bill would make an appropriation.
Existing law prescribes the procedures by which a proposed ordinance may be submitted to the governing board of a district by an initiative measure. These procedures do not apply to specified districts, including a district formed under a law that does not provide a procedure for elections. This bill would authorize the voters of any district that has authority to impose a transactions and use tax for transportation purposes to impose a retail transactions and use tax by an initiative measure. The bill would prohibit the initiative tax from exceeding the maximum authorized rate for a tax imposed by an ordinance enacted by the governing body of the district, and the bill would require the initiative measure to contain all spending limitations and substantive accountability standards applicable to a tax imposed by an ordinance enacted by the governing body. To the extent the bill would increase the duties of county elections officials, the bill would impose a state-mandated local program. The California Constitution requires the state to reimburse local agencies and school districts for certain costs mandated by the state. Statutory provisions establish procedures for making that reimbursement. This bill would provide that, if the Commission on State Mandates determines that the bill contains costs mandated by the state, reimbursement for those costs shall be made pursuant to the statutory provisions noted above.
SB 117 is a procedural bill that formally declares the Legislature's intent to later enact statutory changes to the Budget Act of 2025. It does not implement any specific budget policies, funding allocations, or changes to existing law at this time. The bill simply sets the stage for future legislative action on the state budget framework. It passed the Senate unanimously (28-10) and was referred to the Assembly's Budget Committee for further consideration.
AB 117 is a placeholder bill expressing the Legislature's intent to enact statutory changes concerning the Budget Act of 2025. This bill is an initial step in the annual state budget process, signaling that specific financial and policy adjustments will be detailed in subsequent legislation.
The Safe Drinking Water, Wildfire Prevention, Drought Preparedness, and Clean Air Bond Act of 2024, approved by the voters as Proposition 4 at the November 5, 2024, statewide general election, authorized the issuance of bonds in the amount of $10,000,000,000 pursuant to the State General Obligation Bond Law to finance projects for safe drinking water, drought, flood, and water resilience, wildfire and forest resilience, coastal resilience, extreme heat mitigation, biodiversity and nature-based climate solutions, climate-smart, sustainable, and resilient farms, ranches, and working lands, park creation and outdoor access, and clean air programs. The act makes $135,000,000 available, upon appropriation by the Legislature, to the Office of Emergency Services for a wildfire mitigation grant program to provide, among other things, loans, direct assistance, and matching funds for projects that prevent wildfires, increase resilience, maintain existing wildfire risk reduction projects, reduce the risk of wildfires to communities, or increase home or community hardening. The act provides that eligible projects include, but are not limited to, grants to local agencies, state agencies, joint powers authorities, tribes, resource conservation districts, fire safe councils, and nonprofit organizations for structure hardening of critical community infrastructure, wildfire smoke mitigation, evacuation centers, including community clean air centers, structure hardening projects that reduce the risk of wildfire for entire neighborhoods and communities, water delivery system improvements for fire suppression purposes for communities in very high or high fire hazard areas, wildfire buffers, and incentives to remove structures that significantly increase hazard risk. This bill would include in the list of eligible projects grants to the above-mentioned entities for improvements to public evacuation routes in very high and high fire hazard severity zones, mobile rigid dip tanks, as defined, to support firefighting efforts, prepositioned mobile rigid water storage, as defined, and improvements to the response and effectiveness of fire engines and helicopters. The bill would also include grants, in coordination with the Public Utilities Commission, to local agencies, state agencies, special districts, joint powers authorities, tribes, and nonprofit organizations for backup electrical generators for water reservoirs.
(1) Existing law, the Bergeson-Peace Infrastructure and Economic Development Bank Act, establishes the California Infrastructure and Economic Development Bank (I-Bank) in the Governor's Office of Business and Economic Development. Existing law, among other things, authorizes the I-Bank to issue bonds, make loans, and provide financial assistance for various types of projects that qualify as economic development or public development facilities. This bill would enact the Community Stabilization Act. The bill would require the I-Bank to develop and administer a program to issue a security, and to cease issuing a security on January 1, 2030. The bill would specify that the purpose of the program is to help stabilize property values in disaster-affected areas by allowing qualified investors, as defined, to purchase tradable securities, with the funding allocated to qualifying investment entities that purchase and manage residential land until it can be resold at fair market value. The bill would require profits from the land investments to be shared among investors and the I-Bank according to certain percentages, with qualifying investment entities being reimbursed for their administrative costs. This bill would establish various requirements for the security, including that it be tradeable, comply with specified municipal bonding requirements, and that it be funded by investments made by qualified investors using funds available pursuant to the federal Community Reinvestment Act of 1977. The bill would require the security to repay the investment upon a liquidity event and within 7 years of the purchase of an investment property, and would describe a liquidity event as the refinance or sale of the investment property. This bill would require funds raised from the purchase of the security to be deposited in the Community Stabilization Fund, which would be created by the bill, and would require all moneys in the fund to be continuously appropriated to the I-Bank. The bill would require the I-Bank to allocate moneys in the fund to qualifying investment entities to be invested in the Counties of Los Angeles and Ventura and in those areas that are covered by a state of disaster declared by the Governor. The bill would require a qualifying investment entity to meet prescribed requirements, including that it be a specified entity, including, among others, a nonprofit organization, as provided. The bill would also impose various requirements on the qualifying investment entity relating to the purchase, maintenance, and sale of the investment property, including, among other things, limiting the purchase of property to residential property that has been damaged or destroyed by the wildfires that began on January 7, 2025, in the Counties of Los Angeles and Ventura, as specified. The bill would require the I-Bank to submit a final report on the program to the Legislature, the Governor, and the Department of Finance no later than January 1, 2034, as specified. By establishing a new continuously appropriated fund, the Community Stabilization Fund, this bill would make an appropriation. (2) This bill would make legislative findings and declarations as to the necessity of a special statute for the Counties of Los Angeles and Ventura. (3) This bill would declare that it is to take effect immediately as an urgency statute.
Existing law prohibits a person, a state or local governmental agency, or a public utility from substantially diverting or obstructing the natural flow of, or substantially changing or using any material from the bed, channel, or bank of, any river, stream, or lake, or depositing or disposing of debris, waste, or other material containing crumbled, flaked, or ground pavement where it may pass into any river, stream, or lake, unless prescribed requirements are met, including written notification to the Department of Fish and Wildlife regarding the activity. Existing law requires the department to determine whether the activity may substantially adversely affect an existing fish and wildlife resource and, if so, to provide a draft lake or streambed alteration agreement to the person, agency, or utility. Existing law prescribes various requirements for lake and streambed alteration agreements. Existing law also establishes various exemptions from these provisions. This bill would, until January 1, 2027, exempt from these provisions, subject to certain requirements, projects to repair or reconstruct a bridge 30 feet long or less or a culvert 70 feet long or less within the County of Sutter that has been damaged or destroyed as a result of fire, flood, storm, earthquake, land subsidence, gradual earth movement, or landslide, between January 1, 2022, and December 31, 2024, inclusive, except as specified. This bill would make legislative findings and declarations as to the necessity of a special statute for the County of Sutter.
Existing law establishes the State Transportation Infrastructure Climate Adaptation Program, administered by the Department of Transportation, for purposes of planning, developing, and implementing projects adapting state transportation infrastructure to climate change. Existing law requires the department, in consultation with, among others, the Transportation Agency and the California Transportation Commission, to develop a program of its top priority climate adaptation projects and to submit projects in this program to the commission for adoption. Existing law requires the department, in developing the program of projects, to consider specified criteria, including, but not limited to, the benefits of the project to preserving or enhancing regional or statewide mobility, economy, goods movement, and safety, and other benefits associated with protecting the asset. This bill would require the department, in consultation with the commission and the agency, and on or before July 1, 2026, and annually thereafter, to create a prioritized list of projects of statewide and regional significance, as defined, to better prepare the state for extreme weather-related events, with priority based on specified criteria. The bill would require the department, on or before January 1, 2027, and annually thereafter, to submit to the Legislature a report containing the prioritized list of projects.
Existing law establishes the Department of Transportation and vests it with full possession and control of the state highway system. This bill would require the department to prepare a report evaluating current efforts and potential opportunities to streamline the processes and procedures for the delivery of safety enhancement projects on the state highway system, as specified. The bill would require the department to submit the report to the Legislature on or before January 1, 2027.
