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All Eyes Today Should Be on California Water Hearings
By Frank D. Russo
The California Special Session on Water will see its first State Senate hearing today at 1:30 p.m. on a day that many Californians and most state workers have a holiday. Columbus Day is celebrated today in California, and for many it is a three day weekend. It could be the beginning of three days of action for the Senate.
The Senate Daily File for the Second Extraordinary Session gives a few clues. It shows that the Natural Resources and Water Committee will hear 5 bills that have been introduced with a pesky little asterisk stating "pending receipt." It also shows that a hearing is calendared for tomorrow of the Senate Appropriations Committee on the same bills with that asterisk. A Senate Floor Session is listed for both Tuesday and Wednesday "upon call of the President pro Tem."
This means that if a deal is struck in the Senate between Democrats and Republicans on bonds to be placed on the February ballot, the way is paved for passage in the next three days. Remember that it takes a two-thirds vote of both the California Senate and Assembly to place a bond before the voters.
Latest reports identify October 16 as the latest day for passage and signature by the Governor of any ballot measures--and for all of the preliminaries needed to print ballot pamphlets with arguments and analyses and the ballots themselves. It's unclear how hard and fast that deadline is if there is a supplemental ballot pamphlet--something that has been used in the past.
There's been a good deal of discussion, primarily in the Assembly, about whether the process should be rushed in some eyes and whether it wouldn't be best to see any measures placed on the June or November ballots. The sentiment of Assembly Democrats in particular seem to favor this go slow approach, although it was stated at last week's Assembly Water Committee hearing that a hearing was anticipated to be held this week in time for deadlines for the February ballot.
Los Angeles Times columnist George Skelton has an interesting article today, "California's fragile water system is too important to risk on slapdash fixes."
The bills that may be considered today are:
SBX2 1 (Perata) Appropriates $611 million from bonds already passed by the voters in Propositions 1E and 84 on last November's ballot for water quality, flood control, water storage, and wildlife preservation. in bond funds already approved by the voters It is identical to SB 1002 (Perata) that passed during the regular session and is on the Governor's desk.
SBX2 2 (Perata), "The Water Supply Reliability Bond Act of 2008," previously reported as a $5.4 billion bond to be placed before the voters which, according to Skelton has been amended and now totals $6.8 billion. The amended bill is not yet in print and publicly available. In its initial form, it appropriated $2 billion of this bond for "water supply reliability projects." Another $1.4 billion would go to Delta restoration and operation. A final $1 billion would go to regional projects to resolve conflicts with water supply and water quality. For more on the details of this bill, see our optimistic article that we might already have a water deal by now that we published before the Governor and Republican plan was announced.
SBX2 3 (Cogdill) is a competing bond measure for the ballot, also denominated in the bill as "The Water Supply Reliability Bond Act of 2008." It is a $9 billion bond with $5.6 billion in above and below ground water storage ($5.1 billion in surface storage and $500 million in groundwater storage) and specifically identifies three locations for surface storage (Sites, Temperance Flat Reservoir and Los Vaqueros Expansion Project.). It contains $1.9 billion for "Delta restoration and water supply reliability, and $500 million in grants for specified watersheds throughout the state.
SBX2 4 (Cogdill) Appropriates $552 million from on bonds already passed by the voters for water resources. This is a competing measure to SBX2 1 by Perata.
SBX2 5 (Wiggins) Appropriates $5.3 million from Prop 1E passed last November for salmon and steelhead protection and fishery restoration.
Today's hearings should be broadcast on the California Channel, also available on the net.
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