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Legislative Updates 2007

Sierra Club 2007 Legislative Update #5

February 2, 2007

Hello Conservation Friends!  Please come to Progressive Lobby Day on the House lawn on February 6, 2007 from 10:00am to 1:30 p.m.  Call Megan at (602) 650-0900 to r.s.v.p.  Stop by and see the forest health posters in the Ice Cream Parlor of the old Capitol as well.  This week, the agendas are packed ­ some of it is good, some of it is bad, and a lot of it is just plain unnecessary. 

Please call members of the Senate Natural Resources and Rural Affairs Committee and ask them to support cleaner air and to support SB1552 air quality program (Allen, Huppenthal).  This bill implements several measures to reduce emissions relative to both ozone and particulate emissions.  It expands area A (Phoenix-area nonattainment area); requires cities in the ozone and particulate nonattainment areas to adjust work hours for employees; prohibits the use of leaf blowers on high pollution advisory days, except while in vacuum mode,; and prohibits the blowing of landscape debris into public roadways at any time by city or town employees or contractors. It includes a no burn restriction for any high pollution advisory day.  It allows the director as part of an air quality permit to require that applicants include consideration of the cumulative impact on the airshed of the source by considering emissions from sources in proximity to the applicant's source.  It prohibits agricultural tilling in Area A on high pollution advisory days. 

 Senators: Amanda Aguirre, Marsha Arzberger, Robert Blendu, Jake Flake (Chairman) , Chuck Gray, Karen Johnson, and Leah Landrum Taylor.

Also please call members of the Senate Judiciary Committee and ask them to oppose SCR1015 referenda and initiatives; legislative restrictions (C. Gray, Allen, Bee, et al.).  It undercuts the voter protection act and authorizes the Legislature to repeal, amend or supersede an initiative or referendum five years after voter approval of the initiative or referendum.

The committee includes Senators: Ken Cheuvront, Ron Gould, Chuck Gray, Albert Hale, Karen Johnson, Richard Miranda, and Jim Waring,

You can find their contact information at http://azleg.gov/MemberRoster.asp   You can also reach them by calling (602) 926-3559  and asking them to connect you with their office.  For those outside the Phoenix area, just call 1-800-352-8404 and ask for the Senator. 

HB2228 vehicle license tax; hybrid vehicles (McClure, Bee: Nelson) which allows a reduction in the cost of the vehicle license tax was held in the transportation committee this week. 

Here is the schedule for this week: 

Monday, February 5

Subcommittees on Education and Natural Resources at 9:00 a.m. in Senate Hearing Room 109

Budget presentations on State Mine Inspector, Department of Environmental Quality, Department of Water Resources

House Ways and Means Committee at 1:30 p.m. in House Hearing Room 4

HB2491 solar energy tax credit; application (Mason, Boone: Anderson, et al.) is merely a technical correction bill to clarify the commercial solar energy tax credit program established last year and make it clear that the credit can be claimed by a third party.  SUPPORT.

Senate Judiciary Committee at 1:30 p.m. in Senate Hearing Room 1

SB1188 clean elections; publicly funded elections (Burns, Aguirre, Allen et al.) renames the Clean Elections Act the Publicly Funded Elections Act.  Is this a first step toward repeal?  WATCH.

SB1432 initiative measures; three judge panel (Johnson, C. Gray) requires a panel of three superior court judges to hear any action challenging a substantive provision of, or the constitutionality of an initiative that becomes law.  Why have a different process than for determining the constitutionality of laws passed by the legislature?  WATCH.

SCR1004 justices and judges; senate confirmation (Harper) eliminates the commissions on appellate and trial court appointments and replaces the current system for filling appellate and superior court vacancies with a Senate confirmation process. OPPOSE.

SCR1015 referenda and initiatives; legislative restrictions (C. Gray, Allen, Bee, et al.) See above.

Senate Government Committee at 1:30 p.m. in Senate Hearing Room 3

SB1022 qualified immunity; public entities’ employees (Harper: Groe) has a strike everything amendment on state trust lands.  It is not net posted, but I would be very surprised if it is anything good. WATCH.

SB1544 municipal planning; fee disclosure (Verschoor) requires a planning department to disclose all planning fees collected by the department within ten days. WATCH.

Tuesday, February 6

House Higher Education Committee at 1:30 p.m. in House Hearing Room 3

HB2497 public buildings; energy savings goals (Mason, Aboud, O’Halleran, et al.) expands the existing goals for state facilities to increase energy efficiency and to reduce the costs associated with their energy consumption.  Currently, the law sets the goals at 10% reduction in energy use per square foot by 2008 and 15% by 2011.  HB2497 adds a new goal of increasing the energy savings to 20% by 2015.  It also includes community colleges in the state facilities with these energy efficiency and cost-saving goals.  SUPPORT.

House Counties, Municipalities & Military Affairs Committee at 1:30 p.m. in HHR5

HB2486 county improvement districts; roads (Mason, Brown, O’Halleran, et al.) allows counties to form special districts for roads for road improvements to less than the county standard. WATCH.

Senate Transportation Committee at 1:30 p.m. in Senate Hearing Room 3

SB1585 HOV lane conversion; toll lane (Gould, Gorman: Harper) requires the Arizona Department of Transportation to issue a request for proposal to convert the high occupancy vehicle lanes to toll lanes.  OPPOSE.

House Government Committee at 1:30 p.m. in House Hearing Room 4

HB2217 clean elections; daily reporting (McClure, Bee: Alvarez et al.) requires daily reports for a Clean Elections participating candidate in the last two weeks before an election.  It requires a ć vote.

Wednesday, February 7

House Natural Resources and Public Safety Committee at 9:00 a.m. in House Hearing Room 1

HB2443 off-highway vehicles; user fee (JP Weiers) will have a strike everything amendment on it.  It is not posted.  The current bill establishes a user fee for off-road vehicles to go to various purposes.  We support increasing funding for law enforcement, clarifying that areas are closed unless signed open, and the safety provisions in the bill.  We do have some concerns about the legislation, however.  The main concern is that a large amount of the dollars will likely go to these grants which can be used for a number of things including to fund off-highway vehicle related law enforcement, information and environmental education programs, mitigation of environmental damage, facility development, land acquisition and construction of off-highway vehicle related facilities.  Because the committee that determines the direction of the dollars is stacked with off-road vehicle users, we are very concerned that these grant dollars will be used primarily to build trails and other facilities ­ a stated purpose of many of the proponents of the legislation ­ and will open up even more areas for off-road vehicle use, which will mean more loss of wildlife habitat and more destruction of vegetation, soil erosion, and negative impacts to water quality. NEUTRAL (for now). 

HB2626 aggregate mining operations recommendation committees (Burges, Boone, Harper, et al.) allows non property owners who live within three miles of these operations to serve on these committees.  That seems okay.  WATCH.

House Environment Committee at 1:30 p.m. in House Hearing Room 5

HB2334 air quality; vapor recovery; Tucson (Farley, Ch Campbell, Saradnik, et al.) requires vapor recovery for Area B ­ Tucson area.  This is a maintenance measure to limit deterioration of air quality in Tucson.  SUPPORT

HB2602 environmental quality; border inspectors (Barnes, Reagan: Ableser, et al) provides for at least three persons who are qualified to perform inspections for hazardous materials to be posted at this state's ports of entry. SUPPORT.

HB2603 air quality measures; inspection fees (Barnes: Crump) establishes the air quality control fund from portions of the emissions fees to fund programs to improve air quality.  SUPPORT.

Senate Natural Resources and Rural Affairs Committee at 1:30 p.m. in Senate Hearing Room 109

SB1198 county powers; open fires (O’Halleran, Brown, Mason, et al) allows a county board of supervisors to adopt ordinances prohibiting open fires and campfires on lands in the unincorporated areas of the county that are private property islands within the boundaries of the National Forests, Bureau of Land Management Lands or state lands, if these other entities have implemented a prohibition.  SUPPORT.

SB1311 channelization districts; Formation (Flake) removes the requirement that allows a county to form a channelization district that includes a city or town, if that city or town has also approved it.  These channelization districts are a subsidy for the sand and gravel operators.  This removes a requirement for cooperation between the political subdivisions ­ counties and cities.  This is a bad idea.  OPPOSE.

SB1312 water storage permits; notice requirements (Flake) requires 15-day notification of cities, towns, private water companies, etc. for any water storage. WATCH.

SB1313 state trust lands; planning (Flake) narrows the provisions the urban land planning oversight committee can consider regarding the final conceptual land use plans and the final five year state trust land disposition plans. WATCH.

SB1435 state trust lands; mineral leases (Flake) gives a preferred right of renewal to the lessee and requires the commissioner to renew a mineral lease unless within two years after the date of the renewal application the commissioner notifies the lessee that renewal is not in the best interest of the trust.  I think this still has constitutional problems.  What if the commissioner determines that it is not in the best interest of the trust six months before the lease expires?  OPPOSE.

SB1441 water quality assurance revolving fund (Flake, Barnes) assures 15 million per year for this program versus the current 18 million. WATCH.

SB1531 vehicle emissions inspection; sunset extension (Allen) continues the vehicle emissions inspection program in both Area A and Area B through January 1, 2019.  SUPPORT.

SB1552 air quality program (Allen, Huppenthal) See above.

SB1603 air quality measures; tax credit (Flake, Allen, Burns, et al.) provides a tax credit for monies paid to pave or otherwise place a permanent hard surface over exposed soil or gravel in a nonattainment area for particulate pollution.  It’s hard to feel good about subsidizing paving. WATCH.

Senate Finance Committee at 1:30 p.m. in Senate Hearing Room 1

SB1172 state highway fund bonds (Blendu) allows thirty year bonds for freeways. OPPOSE.

House Committee on Appropriations at 1:30 p.m. in House Hearing Room 1

HCR 2025 state appropriation limit; reduction (Pearce, Groe, Murphy, et al.) limits how much the legislature can appropriate each year.  OPPOSE. 

Thursday, February 8

House Water and Agriculture Committee at 9:00 a.m. in House Hearing Room 1

HB2484 well impacts; contamination (Mason: Adams, Bradley, et al.) will have a strike everything amendment. WATCH.

HB2494 energy; water; savings loan fund (Mason, Aboud, O’Halleran, et al.) develops a revolving loan fund of $25 million to assist existing state facilities and schools in implementing energy and water saving projects and in meeting the energy saving goals and standards contained in HB2497.  State facilities and schools would repay the loans using their energy and water cost savings, and the funding would then be made available for another project.  This will have a strike everything amendment.  SUPPORT. 

HB2496 schools; energy and water savings (Mason, J. Burns, Aboud, et al.) creates an energy and water savings accounting mechanism which allows schools to use the cost savings in Maintenance and Operations portion of their budgets to pay for capital investments in energy or water saving measures.  This provides an opportunity for schools to invest in cost-effective measures that save money, energy, and water over time. It also allows them to retain a portion of the cost savings as a further incentive for being more efficient.  This will have a strike everything amendment.  SUPPORT.

HB2664 water; interstate transportation (Groe, Verschoor: Biggs, et al) states that it is presumed that the transportation of water out of this state is detrimental to the public welfare of this state if the primary purpose of the transportation is to provide a water supply for residential, municipal, industrial or agricultural uses in another state.  I see nothing wrong with this. WATCH.

HB2692 water supply development revolving fund (Mason, Ableser, Saradnik, et al.) establishes a water development revolving fund for the purpose of providing financial assistance to water providers for water supply development.  It does not provide any protections for stream or river flows and therefore could be used by Prescott or Prescott Valley to pipe from the Big Chino and dry up the upper portion of the Verde River.  OPPOSE.

HB2693 water adequacy provisions (Mason, Ableser, Saradnik, et al.) generally allows counties to deny approval of subdivisions outside of active management areas if there is not adequate water, but provides substantial exemptions.  It provides no protections for flow in our streams and rivers however. WE WILL LIKELY OPPOSE THIS UNLESS IT IS AMENDED.

House Transportation Committee at 9:00 a.m. in House Hearing Room 3

HB2569 highway expansion fund; growth cities (Biggs) allocates $20 million dollars in the fund for street improvements in cities with a population growth of at least fifty per cent in the immediately preceding five years. More subsidies for growth. OPPOSE.

HB2570 railroad right-of-way acquisition (Biggs) directs the director of the department of transportation to deposit $650,000 in a special account to acquire a railroad right-of-way deemed by the director to accommodate future freight or passenger rail service.  SUPPORT.

HB2682 blue ribbon transportation committee (Biggs) establishes a committee made up entirely of legislators to make recommendations on transportation for the next legislative session.  This does not require a bill ­ the speaker could just appoint one ­ besides, it seems like they could use a little diversity in this process.  WHATEVER.

For more information on these bills go to http://arizona.sierraclub.org/political_action/tracker/.

Thank you for taking the time to learn more about the issues and to contact your legislators.  To email legislators go to http://www.azleg.state.az.us/MemberRoster.asp .  If you are not sure who your legislators are, please go to http://www.vote-smart.org  (You will need your 9-digit zipcode.) or call the House or Senate information desks.  If you're outside the Phoenix area, you can call your legislators’ offices toll free at 1-800-352-8404.  In the Phoenix area call (602) 926-3559 (Senate) or (602) 926-4221 (House).  Correspondence goes to 1700 W. Washington, Phoenix, AZ 85007-2890.  For more information on legislation go to http://www.azleg.state.az.us/.

All 2007 Legislative Updates

Sierra Club, Grand Canyon Chapter, 202 E. McDowell Rd, Suite 277, Phoenix, AZ 85004, (602) 253-8633