Existing law, the California Safe Drinking Water Act, requires the State Department of Public Health to administer provisions relating to the regulation of drinking water to protect public health, including, but not limited to, conducting research, studies, and demonstration programs relating to the provision of a dependable, safe supply of drinking water, enforcing the federal Safe Drinking Water Act, adopting and enforcing regulations, and conducting studies and investigations to assess the quality of water in domestic water supplies. Existing law establishes the Safe Drinking Water State Revolving Fund, which is continuously appropriated to the department for the provision of grants and revolving fund loans to provide for the design and construction of projects for public water systems that will enable suppliers to meet safe drinking water standards. Existing law requires the department to establish criteria for projects to be eligible for the grant and loan program. This bill would authorize the department to take specified actions to improve access to financial assistance for small community water systems and not-for-profit nontransient noncommunity water systems serving severely disadvantaged communities, as defined. Under existing law, not less than 15% of the fund is required to be expended for providing loans and grants to eligible projects by public water systems that regularly serve fewer than 10,000 persons. This bill would require small community water systems or nontransient noncommunity water systems, owned by a public agency or private not-for-profit water company, serving severely disadvantaged communities to be eligible to receive up to 100% of eligible project costs in the form of a grant, to the extent the system cannot afford a loan. By authorizing additional uses for moneys in a continuously appropriated fund, this bill would make an appropriation. This bill would incorporate additional changes in Section 116761.23 of the Health and Safety Code proposed by AB 938, which would become operative only if AB 938 and this bill are both chaptered and become effective on or before January 1, 2012, and this bill is chaptered last.
Sponsored bills
Existing law requires the Department of Food and Agriculture, headed by the Secretary of Food and Agriculture, to promote and protect the agricultural industry of the state. This bill would, until July 1, 2017, create the California Healthy Food Financing Initiative. It would require, by July 1, 2012, the Secretary of Food and Agriculture to prepare recommendations, to be presented upon request to the Legislature, regarding actions that need to be taken to promote food access in the state. The bill would establish the California Healthy Food Financing Initiative Council and would require the council to implement the initiative, as specified. The bill would require the department to establish an advisory group, as specified. The bill would create the California Healthy Food Financing Initiative Fund in the State Treasury, to be comprised of federal, state, philanthropic, and private funds, for the purpose of expanding access to healthy foods in underserved communities and, to the extent practicable, to leverage other funding, as specified. Moneys in the fund would be expended upon appropriation by the Legislature.
The Personal Income Tax Law and the Corporation Tax Law, in modified conformity with federal income tax laws, provide for particular treatment of regulated investment companies, as specified, including particular treatment regarding capital loss carryovers, income and asset tests, dividend designation and allocation rules, the determination of earnings and profits, the passthrough of exempt-interest dividends and foreign tax credits, spillover dividends, return of capital distribution, distributions in redemption of stock, preferential dividends, deferral of late-year losses, holding period requirements, and sales load basis. This bill would, under both laws, provide additional conformity with federal income tax laws by adopting specified provisions of the Regulated Investment Company Modernization Act of 2010 relating to regulated investment companies, as specified, including the imposition of a tax upon those companies that fail the above-mentioned asset test. This bill would declare that it is to take effect immediately as an urgency statute.
The Personal Income Tax Law and the Corporation Tax Law impose taxes on, or measured by, income. Existing law requires the Franchise Tax Board to make available as a matter of public record each calendar year a list of the 250 largest tax delinquencies in excess of $100,000, and requires the list to include specified information with respect to each delinquency. Existing law requires every board, as defined, and the Department of Insurance, upon request of the Franchise Tax Board, to furnish to the Franchise Tax Board certain information with respect to every licensee. This bill would require the State Board of Equalization, quarterly, and the Franchise Tax Board, at least twice each calendar year, to make available a list of the 500 largest tax delinquencies described above. This bill would require the Franchise Tax Board to include additional information on the list with respect to each delinquency, including the type, status, and license number of any occupational or professional license held by the person or persons liable for payment of the tax and the names and titles of the principal officers of the person liable for payment of the tax if that person is a limited liability company or corporation. This bill would require a person whose delinquency appeared on either list and whose name has been removed, as provided, to comply with the terms of the arranged resolution, and would authorize the State Board of Equalization and the Franchise Tax Board, if the person fails to comply with the terms of the arranged resolution, to add the person's name to the list without providing prior written notice, as provided. This bill would require a state governmental licensing entity, other than the Department of Motor Vehicles, State Bar of California, and Alcoholic Beverage Control Board, as provided, that issues professional or occupational licenses, certificates, registrations, or permits, to suspend, revoke, and refuse to issue a license if the licensee's name is included on either list of the 500 largest tax delinquencies described above. This bill would not include the Contractors' State License Board in the definition of "state governmental licensing entity." This bill would also require those licensing entities to collect the social security number or federal taxpayer identification number of each individual applicant of that entity for the purpose of matching those applicants to the names on the lists of the 500 largest tax delinquencies, and would require each application for a new license or renewal of a license to indicate on the application that the law allows the State Board of Equalization and the Franchise Tax Board to share taxpayer information with a board and requires the licensee to pay his or her state tax obligation and that his or her license may be suspended if the state tax obligation is not paid. This bill would also authorize the State Board of Equalization and the Franchise Tax Board to disclose to state governmental licensing entities identifying information, as defined, of persons on the list of the 500 largest tax delinquencies, as specified. This bill would authorize a motor carrier permit of a licensee whose name is on the certified list of tax delinquencies to be suspended, as provided. The bill would require the State Board of Equalization and the Franchise Tax Board to meet certain requirements and would make related changes. The bill would provide that the release or other use of information received by a state governmental licensing entity pursuant to these provisions, except as authorized, is punishable as a misdemeanor. By creating a new crime, the bill would impose a state-mandated local program. This bill would also prohibit a state agency from entering into any contract for the acquisition of goods or services with a contractor whose name appears on either list of the 500 largest tax delinquencies described above. Existing law authorizes the Franchise Tax Board to collect specified amounts for the Department of Industrial Relations and specified amounts imposed by a court pursuant to specified procedures. This bill would authorize the State Board of Equalization and the Franchise Tax Board to enter into an agreement to collect any delinquent tax debt due to the Internal Revenue Service or any other state imposing an income tax, or a tax measured by income, or a sales or use tax, or a similar tax, pursuant to specified procedures, provided that the Internal Revenue Service or that state has entered into an agreement to collect delinquent tax debts due to the State Board of Equalization or the Franchise Tax Board, and the agreements do not cause the net displacement of civil service employees, as specified. This bill would require the Controller, upon execution of a reciprocal agreement between the State Board of Equalization, the Franchise Tax Board, and any other state imposing a sales and use tax, a tax similar to a sales and use tax, an income tax, or tax measured by income, to offset any delinquent tax debt due to that other state from a person or entity, against any refund under the Sales and Use Tax Law, the Personal Income Tax Law, or the Corporation Tax Law owed to that person or entity, as provided. Existing law requires, in the event that the debtor has more than one debt being collected by the Franchise Tax Board and the amount collected is insufficient to satisfy the total amount owed, the amount collected to be applied to specified priorities. This bill would include specified tax delinquencies collected pursuant to this bill. 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.
The Personal Income Tax Law and the Corporation Tax Law allow various deductions in computing the income that is subject to the taxes imposed by those laws. Those laws, in modified conformity to federal income tax laws, disallow any deduction from gross income if that income is directly derived from, or directly tends to promote or further, illegal activities relating to lotteries, gaming, or horse racing, and other specified illegal activities. This bill would instead disallow a deduction for expenses attributable to income derived by a taxpayer from any criminal profiteering activity, specified illegal activities relating to drug trafficking, and insurance fraud, as provided. This bill would include a change in state statute that would result in a taxpayer paying a higher tax within the meaning of Section 3 of Article XIIIA of the California Constitution, and thus would require for passage the approval of 23 of the membership of each house of the Legislature. This bill would take effect immediately as a tax levy.
(1) The California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) requires a lead agency to prepare, or cause to be prepared, and certify the completion of, an environmental impact report (EIR) on a project, as defined, that it proposes to carry out or approve that may have a significant effect on the environment, as defined, or to adopt a negative declaration if it finds that the project will not have that effect. This bill would exempt from the requirements of CEQA the installation of a solar energy system, including associated equipment, on the roof of an existing building or an existing parking lot meeting specified conditions. Because a lead agency would be required to determine whether a project would be exempt under this provision, this bill would impose a state-mandated local program. (2) CEQA requires a lead agency to call a scoping meeting for a project of statewide, regional, or areawide significance, and requires the lead agency to provide notice of at least one of those scoping meetings to specified entities, including a county or city that borders on a county or city within which the project is located, unless otherwise designated annually by agreement between the lead agency and county or city. Existing law requires, prior to action by a legislative body to adopt or substantially amend a general plan, the planning agency to refer the proposed action to a city or county within or abutting the area covered by the proposal. This bill would authorize this referral of a proposed action to adopt or substantially amend a general plan of a city or county to be conducted concurrently with the scoping meeting. The city or county would be authorized to submit specified comments at the scoping meeting. (3) CEQA authorizes the Secretary of the Natural Resources Agency to certify and adopt guidelines to include a list of classes of projects that have been determined not to have a significant effect on the environment and are exempted from the requirements of CEQA (categorical exemption) . This bill would provide that a project's greenhouse gas emissions are not, in and of themselves, deemed to cause the exemption to be inapplicable under specified conditions. This bill would require the Office of Planning and Research, on or before July 1, 2012, to prepare, develop, and transmit to the Natural Resources Agency, and the Secretary of the Natural Resources Agency, on or before January 1, 2013, to certify and adopt guidelines for statewide standards for infill projects that would promote specified goals and priorities. (4) CEQA limits its application, in the case of the approval of a subdivision map or a project that is consistent with the zoning or community plan for which an EIR was certified, to effects upon the environment that are peculiar to the parcel on which the project is located and were not addressed as significant effects in the EIR or if new information shows the effects upon the environment will be more significant than described in the prior EIR. This bill would similarly limit the application of CEQA in the case of the approval of an infill project, as defined, that satisfies all applicable statewide standards established in the guidelines under (3) above if an EIR was certified for a planning level decision, as defined. Because this bill would require a lead agency to determine whether a project qualifies under this provision, this bill would impose a state-mandated local program. (5) Existing law authorizes a county and a city to agree upon a procedure for referral to, and comment by, the city or county concerning the other entity's proposals to adopt or amend all or part of a general or specific plan or zoning ordinance, as specified. This bill would make a technical, nonsubstantive change to this authorization. (6) Existing law vests the State Energy Resources Conservation and Development Commission with the exclusive power to certify thermal powerplants. Under CEQA, the thermal powerplants certification process is a certified regulatory program and is therefore exempt from certain requirements under CEQA. The bill would provide that the thermal powerplants certification process would be applicable to owners of specified proposed solar thermal powerplants who are proposing to convert the facility from solar thermal technology to photovoltaic technology. (7) 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 requires that every person who participates in, or has anything to do with, the racing of horses and every employee of a parimutuel department be licensed by the California Horse Racing Board. Existing law requires the board to set forth requirements for the position of satellite facility supervisor for all satellite wagering facilities operated by the state or on public land. The supervisor is required to monitor the performance of licensees at the facilities. This bill would create an exception from that provision by authorizing a fair satellite facility generating less than $10,000,000 annually in total handle to elect not to be subject to the requirements related to a satellite facility supervisor if the board of directors of the fair satellite facility, after a public hearing, deems those requirements to be not economically feasible, under specified conditions. Those conditions would include a requirement that the fair board notify the California Horse Racing Board in writing of its intention to take that action 30 days prior to the public hearing, and that notice of the fair board's action be provided to the California Horse Racing Board within 10 days of approval by the fair board. The bill would require the fair satellite facility to continue to abide by all laws and regulations pertaining to the operation of a satellite facility, including the responsibilities of the position of satellite facility supervisor. The bill would also require that notice of the fair board's action include the name and contact information of the individual or individuals assuming the responsibilities of the satellite facility supervisor position.
This measure would recognize October 2011 as Domestic Violence Awareness Month and urge all Californians to take a stand against domestic violence.
This measure would urge the United States government to consider the California jobs and economic stimulus provided by the California floriculture industry when advancing free trade agreements, specifically with Colombia.
This measure would proclaim February 28, 2011, as Rare Disease Day.