16 of 18 Hill Bills Signed by Governor
SACRAMENTO – Today marked the end of the bill signing period for the 2014 Legislative Session with the Governor taking action on hundreds of bills prior to his midnight deadline. Senator Jerry Hill, D-San Mateo/Santa Clara counties, had 16 of his 18 bills signed by the Governor including:
SB 434 – CPUC Commissioner Board Conflicts – Prohibits current and future members of the CPUC from sitting on governing boards of entities they create as commissioners. Also tightens a conflict-of-interest provision to rein in CPUC president Michael Peevey. Since he was appointed in 2002, Peevey has been involved in the creation of seven foundations and for-profit ventures funded with $160 million of ratepayer money, and he serves on the boards of some of those entities. These foundations are not subject to the close scrutiny that legislative committees give third-party entities that receive taxpayer money, nor do they undergo merit reviews to ensure ratepayers money is well spent.
SB 445 – Underground Storage Tank Cleanup – Protects soil and groundwater from petroleum contamination by making several reforms to the state’s underground storage tank cleanup fund such as requiring single-wall gas station tanks to be replaced within 10 years. Also allows money from the fund to be used for surface and groundwater contamination cleanup and provide the State Water Board with more authority to crack down on fraud from claimants and consultants.
SB 611 – Limousine Safety Inspections – Spurred by a tragic limousine fire that killed five women last year on the San Mateo-Hayward Bridge, this bill expands safety protections to limousines that seat 10 or fewer people. Specifically, the bill requires that modified limousines with a seating capacity of fewer than 10 passengers be equipped with two readily accessible and fully charged fire extinguishers and be inspected by the California Highway Patrol every 13 months.
SB 636 – Due Process in CPUC Penalty Proceedings – Preserves due process in CPUC penalty proceedings by allowing commission staff to serve in an advocacy role or in an advisory role, but not both concurrently. Last year, the commission’s general counsel dismissed all the attorneys prosecuting PG&E. The attorneys felt it illegal and unethical to advocate that PG&E should not be penalized. Since the general counsel advises the commissioners, it would be unethical for the general counsel to also direct the prosecution. While an ethical separation of roles is already the general practice at the CPUC, agency guidelines allow this practice to be waived whenever convenient.
SB 699 – Electric Grid Security – Requires the CPUC to adopt rules compelling utilities to protect the state’s electric power grid from vandalism and attack. The legislation was unanimously approved by the Senate just two days after the second of two serious security breaches in as many years at Pacific Gas & Electric Co.’s Metcalf power substation near San Jose. The security breach occurred despite PG&E’s security improvements to the substation as a part of its three-year, $100 million program to increase security system wide. The improvements were prompted by an attack on April 16, 2013, in which snipers knocked out 17 giant transformers at the Metcalf facility and slipped into an underground vault to cut telephone cables. The former chairman of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission has called the attack “the most significant incident of domestic terrorism involving the grid that has ever occurred” in the United States.
SB 900 – CPUC Safety in Ratemaking – Requires the CPUC to consider the safety performance of natural gas and electricity companies when setting customer rates and developing regulations. For at least three years, the PUC has recognized the need to scope safety into its proceedings, but the development of effective procedures for doing so has been slow. Because the commission has only recently begun to incorporate risk management tools in its policymaking, it has yet to embed safety considerations in the process. SB 900 would ensure such efforts continue and are completed.
SB 915 – Mills High School Advanced Placement Testing – Clarifies rules for conducting advanced placement tests for college admission and placement and ensures that investigations and retesting occur in a timely fashion if exams are called into question. It was sponsored by parents and students from Mills High School who submitted the bill idea in the Senator’s annual “Oughta Be a Law …” contest after the test scores of 286 Mills students on 641 advanced placement exams were invalidated in July 2013. The testing process had been challenged and the agency overseeing the exams deemed that “testing irregularities” occurred, even though an investigation turned up no evidence of cheating or other impropriety.
SB 968 – Martins Beach Access – Requires the State Lands Commission to enter into negotiations with Silicon Valley billionaire and Martins Beach property owner Vinod Khosla for one year, to acquire a right-of-way or easement for the creation of a public access route to and along the shoreline, including the sandy beach, at Martins Beach. If the commission is unable to reach an agreement to acquire a right-of-way or easement or Khosla does not voluntarily provide public access by January 1, 2016, the commission may acquire a right-of-way or easement, pursuant to Public Resources Code Section 6210.9 (eminent domain), for the creation of a public access route to and along the shoreline.
SB 1027 – Bars Web Mug Shot ‘Extortion’ – Bars websites from posting arrest mug shots and then charging hundreds, and if not thousands, of dollars to take the photos down. Sites that post mug shots and charge fees to remove them have flourished by making the photos widely available via the Web. This bill stops these shakedowns. A mug shot is included in an arrest record for identification purposes but it is not intended to imply guilt. In more than half of the cases in California, an arrest does not lead to a charge or conviction.
SB 1064 – NTSB Rail Safety Recommendations – Requires the CPUC to respond to National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) recommendations for rail safety. The legislation mirrors Hill’s AB 578 of 2012, which requires the PUC to reply to NTSB recommendations for natural gas safety within 90 days and to vote on those recommendations and how they will be carried out. Last year, a rail car on the Angel’s Flight Railway in Los Angeles’ Bunker Hill derailed, leading to a dangerous rescue of four passengers. The firefighter who led the effort had no ropes, railing or walkway to prevent him or the passengers from falling onto concrete 25 feet below. After a fatal 2001 accident on the line, the NTSB had recommended that the commission prevent Angel’s Flight from reopening unless a walkway was constructed to provide a safe path of escape, but the CPUC chose not to do so – an action NTSB considered “unacceptable,” though there had been no mechanism to force the CPUC to comply.
SB 1249 – Auto & Appliance Shredder Waste Regulation – Requires the California Department of Toxic Substances Control (DTSC) to regulate shredded automobile and metal appliance waste. Roughly 700,000 tons of this waste – also called fluff – is disposed of in the state’s landfills each year. But state toxics regulators have failed to revoke an exemption granted decades ago to the metal shredding industry regarding this type of waste, despite warnings from top scientists that this waste could become hazardous during the shredding process. A 2001 legal opinion by DTSC attorneys called the exemption “outdated and legally incorrect.” Seven fires have broken out at metal recycling facilities in the Bay Area since 2007. After fires in November and December, Redwood City leaders called on regulators to do more to help protect residents from future incidents. This bill rescinds exemptions for facilities that deal with vehicle shredder waste and require DTSC to develop regulations to ensure that treatment, transport and disposal are conducted in a manner that protects public health and the environment. The legislation also provides for better DTSC oversight of the industry to prevent contamination, explosions and other risks to California communities.
SB 1311 – Establishing Hospital Protocols for Antibiotic Use in Patients – Requires general acute care hospitals in California to establish antimicrobial stewardship programs by July 1, 2015. Stewardship programs ensure that antibiotics are used only when necessary, that the right antibiotic is chosen, and that antibiotics are administered correctly.
SB 1409 – CPUC Safety Investigations – Requires the CPUC to list in a report the gas and electric accident investigations the commission finalized in the previous year, as well as those pending completion. The bill also requires the commission to summarize these investigations in its annual report. The CPUC has reported that 150 fatalities and 413 injuries have occurred involving PG&E’s, Southern California Edison’s, and San Diego Gas and Electric’s electrical facilities since 2003. An average of 13 such fatalities occur in California each year. Although the CPUC is required by law to investigate accidents involving electricity infrastructure that result in fatalities and serious injuries, the investigations typically take years to complete, and there is no accounting of completed investigations or those in progress, nor has the public been told of the nature of these accidents.
SB 1415 – Bay Area Quality Management District Advisory Council – Modernizes the Bay Area Air Quality Management District’s (BAAQMD) Advisory Council. Currently the BAAQMD is the only air management district in the state with prescriptive categories of people that must serve on their Advisory Council which was established in 1959. The bill reduces the cumbersome membership of 20 to a manageable seven, and it would also require the members of the Advisory Council to be skilled and experienced in the fields of air pollution, the health impacts of air pollution or climate change.
SB 1430 – San Francisco International Airport Unlicensed Commercial Transportation Operators – Closes a procedural loophole and enables the San Mateo County District Attorney to prosecute unlicensed commercial transportation operators that illegally transport passengers to San Francisco International Airport.
SB 1433 – Modern Infrastructure Contracting – Extends the sunset for the “design-build” contracting tool for transit operators for two years. “Design-build” is a contracting process that allows both the design of a project and its construction to be covered in a single contract—a tool well-suited to large, complicated infrastructure projects. This two-year extension better allows transit operators to deliver critical capital projects like the BART extension or the electrification of CalTrain.
Hill Bills Vetoed By Governor:
SB 831 – Political Spending Transparency and Prohibitions – Would have modernized California’s Political Reform Act by requiring elected officials to disclose the destination of travel in reporting to the Fair Political Practice Commission and require nonprofits that pay for legislators’ travel to disclose the source of travel funding. The bill also would have prohibited elected officials from contributing campaign funds to 501(c)(4) nonprofits owned or operated by their family members. In addition, it would have prohibited the expenditure of campaign funds for an elected official’s mortgage, rent, utility bills, clothing, club memberships, vacations, tuition, vehicles and gifts to family members.
SB 835 – Restricting Antibiotics in Farm Animals – The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reports that every year resistance to antibiotics kills at least 23,000 Americans. SB 835 would have allowed antibiotics to be sold for use in livestock only for medical reasons. California would have become the first state in the nation in which antibiotics could be administered to these animals only with a prescription and under veterinary oversight.
Senator Hill’s response to Governor’s veto of SB 835:
“I am disappointed in the Governor’s veto of SB 835, which would have given California the strongest law in the nation by making it illegal to give antibiotics to livestock for growth promotion and by requiring a veterinarian prescription for a livestock antibiotic.
SB 835 received near unanimous bipartisan support in the Legislature, receiving only one dissenting vote, and was endorsed by a broad coalition of organizations, including the California Veterinary Medical Association, the Infectious Disease Association of California, the Health Officers Association of California, and the Governor’s own Department of Food and Agriculture.
Although SB 835 would have put California at the forefront of the fight against antibiotic resistance, I am glad to see that the Governor recognizes the importance of addressing the issue. I look forward to working with the Governor’s office and his Department of Food and Agriculture in 2015 to enact reforms that will decrease needless antibiotic use in our farm animals.”