SB 483

Bill Subjects

Abstract

(1) Existing law requires the Secretary for Environmental Protection to adopt regulations and implement a unified hazardous waste and hazardous materials management regulatory program. Existing law establishes the respective responsibilities of unified program agencies, designated to implement that unified program locally and requires the secretary to establish a statewide information management system for purposes of receiving data collected by unified program agencies. Existing law establishes the responsibility of a local administering agency authorized to implement and enforce provisions that require (a) the administering agency to establish area plans for emergency response to a release or threatened release of a hazardous material and (b) a business that handles a hazardous material to establish and implement a business plan for such a response. Existing law authorizes a unified program agency to implement and enforce these provisions as an administering agency, as specified. Existing law specifies the contents of the business plan required of the hazardous materials handler and requires the plan to be submitted to the administering agency. Existing law requires the administering agency to submit to the Office of Emergency Services, the area plan, a plan to conduct onsite inspection, and a plan to institute a data management system. A violation of the business plan requirements is a misdemeanor. This bill would revise and recast the area and business plan requirements and, among other things, would require instead that a unified program agency enforce these requirements. The bill would instead require the inspection program that is part of the unified program to include the onsite inspections of businesses and would delete the requirement to institute a data management system. The bill would require the unified program agency to provide to agencies that have certain shared responsibilities access to information collected in the statewide information management system and would require handlers to submit certain information to that system, as specified. The bill would require a business owner, operator, or officially designated representative to annually review and certify that the information in the statewide information database has been verified and is complete, accurate, and up to date. This bill would also delete obsolete provisions and make general conforming changes. This bill would impose a state-mandated local program by creating new crimes with regard to the submission of business plans and by imposing new duties upon local agencies with regard to implementing those requirements. (2) Existing law imposes certain requirements on stationary sources handling regulated substances, as defined, including, among other things, the preparation and implementation of a risk management plan. A violation of these requirements is a misdemeanor. Existing law requires the administering agency, upon a determination that a risk management plan is complete, to publish in a daily local newspaper a notice of availability of the risk management plan for public review. This bill would extend the requirements to prepare and implement a risk management plan imposed on those stationary sources to apply to a person, as defined. Because this bill would expand the scope of a crime to include a person, this bill would impose a state-mandated local program. The bill would authorize the administering agency to place the notice on the administering agency's Internet Web site in lieu of publication in a daily local newspaper. (3) The bill would make legislative findings and declarations that the business and area plan provisions specified above conform to the changes in the law made by the Governor's Reorganization Plan No. 2, effective July 1, 2013, as proposed by AB 1317. (4) This bill would incorporate amendments to Section 13143.9 of the Health and Safety Code proposed by AB 1317, to be operative only if AB 1317 and this bill are both chaptered and become effective on or before January 1, 2014, and this bill is chaptered last. (5) 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 specified reasons.