Senate Budget and Fiscal Review Subcommittee No. 2 on Resources, Environmental Protection and Energy
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Speaker 3
I appreciate that. So I will be speaking from a handout, which you should all have, and which also is posted on our lao.ca.gov website. And it draws from two recent reports that we put out on the Natural Resources Environmental Protection budget and on Proposition four, which should also be passed out to you on the dais. So my comments will are really intended to kind of provide some context and overarching perspective from our office on all of the issues that you will dive into later today as well as in the coming weeks here in the subcommittee. So turning to page one of the handout, just the I think the under blanket of everything we need to talk about is the state's budget condition at this point.
The good news is that the stock market is booming and continues to boom. In fact, our office put out an upgraded revenue forecast late last week, reflecting continued robust stock market. The question is, how long will that last? And we see several signs in the market that historically have been signs of an overheated market. And so at some point, it is likely that there will be a downturn.
We don't know when, and we don't know to what degree, but that is pretty risky. And so that is some of the caution that we provide to you, that even though the state is benefiting from this strong, robust revenues right now, we don't know how long that will last, and so being prepared for that. Despite this very strong revenues we're having, the stock market is up 50% now from a year ago. The budget proposal before you from the governor is still relying on borrowing as well as using reserves. Usually, when a market is booming, that's a time when you're putting money into your reserves, not taking money out of it.
So the overall structure of the budget raises concerns for us, as well as looking ahead at the out year, even though the governor's budget proposal is balanced for the 'twenty six-'twenty seven budget year, based on the borrowing. And reserves, when we look out, both the administration and our office see very significant deficits, dollars 20,000,000,000 to $30,000,000,000 a year in the out years after 'twenty six-'twenty seven, reflecting a real structural budget problem. The Governor's budget proposal does not address this out year. There is indication from the administration that they will bring some proposals before you in May to start dealing with that out year. We think that's kind of late for you to have to make some very serious decisions and difficult decisions.
And addressing these structural deficits will be challenging. A lot of the low hanging fruit, if you will, the easier actions, things like pulling back onetime spending, which is also not easy but easier than cutting into ongoing spending, has already been done. So looking at raising revenues or making reductions to ongoing spending are some of the choices before you. So that is the context against which my subsequent comments on the exact proposals and environmental budget before you take place. So turning to page two.
While we have these concerns about the overall budget structure, when we look specifically I'll use environment budget as a shorthand, but we're talking about the proposals related to the Natural Resources Agency and Environmental Protection Agency we think the administration really did take a pretty bare bones approach. There aren't too many proposals, and most of them are focused on pretty pressing issues in our view. So we think the administration deserves credit for that constraint in putting together the budget, given the limited budget condition. But even proposals that are strongly justified do come with tradeoffs. In the context of a budget deficit, every bit of new spending necessarily comes at the expense of something else, of something existing.
And so that's the context with which you are having to consider these proposals. If you want to spend more on something, even if it seems justified, what are you going to cut, essentially, to make room or raise revenues to make room for? It may be tempting and have some justification to think about proposals funded with special funds differently from proposals funded with the general fund. We have a lot of special fund resources in across these budgets, there are a lot of reasons to think differently about those. But we would just caution you that even proposals that are funded with special funds, we think, should have a pretty high bar for approval, because special funds can be a tool you can use across your whole budget to focus on your highest priorities, absorbing activities that maybe historically were funded by the general fund, loaning to the general fund.
So, as you're looking across your whole budget, thinking about the general fund and special funds as tools to focus on your highest priorities, we think, makes sense. And then finally, we would recommend that even with the stock market still booming, now is the time to start thinking about addressing these out year budget problems as well as developing plans for if revenues do turn downwards, how will you address that. Some of the solutions you might want to employ will take time. For example, if you wanted to raise fees, that can take time to think about how to structure them, weigh the trade offs and potential implications of those. Starting to begin that hard work now.
So turning to page three of the handout. We took a little different approach this year in our office. Usually, we look at each individual proposal and weigh its merits, and we did do that. However, as I noted, when we looked across almost all of the proposals, we found some justification for them. In a robust budget year, we would probably say, Yeah, move forward.
These make sense. Given the budget context, however, we tried to find some tools and options for you to think about and instead kind of approach this as a framework. And we think you can use this framework either these criteria that we came up with or some of your own that will be a helpful tool for you as you're weighing the individual proposals. So the first piece of this framework is, as I noted, having a very high bar when thinking about new proposals because, in the context of a budget deficit, all of your new spending necessarily comes at the expense of something else you have. So the guidance we would suggest is thinking about proposals that meet critical health and safety concerns that really must be done this year, or there will be irreversible implications.
Those are the types of things you might want to move forward with, even with your budget constraints. Proposals that don't meet that high bar, even if they have really kind of strong policy merits, you may not have room for those in this year. And again, if you want to make room for them, what are you not going to do instead? For each of these criteria, we have examples in our report and in your hearings coming up today and in the coming weeks, we can give you specific examples of proposals we think meet these type of different criteria. We think you could consider modifying proposals that are before you, if you think that they make sense, but you given your general fund condition, you could look at special funds, for example, to sub out some of the general fund proposals.
You could look at raising fees. Some of the proposals before you are activities that could be supported by fees, so you could look at raising fees, not without trade offs, obviously, for the fee payers, but another tool for you. You could also think about funding some of these proposals at a lower level. Also comes with trade offs, but in some cases, doing some of the activity may be better than doing none of the activity. So maybe you are funding fewer Conservation Corps members, for example.
Maybe you're doing a lower level of cleanup, but you're still able to do something, if that is a priority for you. Another one of the criteria that we offer is taking steps to address the budget condition. So, about whether some of recently proposed and approved activities continue to be your highest priority. In some cases, it's easier to stop doing something that's just getting started rather than going back and looking at a longstanding program and cutting that. If it's still being phased in, that could be a time to scale it back.
Thinking about additional budget solutions like fees, for example, taking a look and and doing robust oversight over existing activities to see if they still represent your highest solutions, and then being really cautious about expanding, either through policy bills or collective bargaining, expanding ongoing expenses and increasing the problem which we are going to have to face. And then, finally here, remain ensuring remaining expenditures focus on the most important activities. As you figure out how much you can spend, thinking about how should those dollars be targeted most effectively. Just because you don't have new money to expand programs doesn't mean you can't focus on your priorities. It means you may have to shuffle things somewhat.
But, for example, if you look at zero emission vehicle budget, there are existing programs, there are existing funding. What's the mix you want? You want more money for heavy duty and medium duty vehicle activities? Well, maybe you have to do less of light duty within that mix. It doesn't mean you need new money to do new things.
Similarly, within your wildfire budget, thinking about forest health, home hardening, home inspections, thinking about what your highest priorities are with the funding you have. It doesn't mean just because what you've been doing is what you need to continue to do if you need to focus on your highest priorities. And then on the final page of the handout here, with regard to Proposition four, which I know is a cross cutting issue you'll be talking about both today as well as in the coming weeks, you can see in the figure here the Governor's proposal includes $2,100,000,000 from Proposition four in the proposed budget year. Combined with the funding the legislature has already appropriated, that would be just over half, about 55%, 56% of the total $10,000,000,000 that the voters have approved. As we looked across the proposals, they seemed very reasonable to us, consistent with the bond requirements.
We didn't see anything that jumped out as highly problematic. Generally, the administration provided a sound rationale for the timing of the funding across. You can see across the different chapters, it does differ how much is proposed, and that generally had to do with capacity of departments and other existing funds. You know, we heard a pretty strong rationale for the timing. Doesn't mean you can't change it, as the legislative body, but this seems like a pretty good starting place to us.
Also, you may recall that last year, the administration proposed a multi year spending plan and kind of to put things on autopilot. This deviates from that in response to legislative feedback that the legislature wanted to consider proposals and receive budget change proposals each year to check-in rather than putting it on autopilot. So this is responsive to that. As we looked at the existing funding that has already been provided, we found that it, at this point, is taking a while to get out the door. It's been pretty slow, in part because of the requirements that agencies and departments have had to have for developing guidelines and going through the emergency regulations process.
Now, you all just didn't pass AB 107, which will help address that issue in the current year, but it remains an issue for out years. There is a policy bill that's moving through the process that might alleviate some of those delays. One thing we want to highlight for you is that there are some examples, and we have them in our report, of new programs. Many of the bond programs are continuing that were funded with previous bonds or general fund, and it's just kind of continuing the same efforts. But there are some examples where it's new, and so this is a natural opportunity for the legislature to express its priorities for those funds or defer to the administration.
So, I'll give you a couple examples. There's a category in the bond that's called Reduce Climate Impacts on Disadvantaged Communities and Expand Outdoor Recreation. That's a pretty high level description. You could do a lot of different things under that category and still be consistent with what the bond language said. So do you want to express what you want those funds to go to?
Did the legislature have things in mind when it put the bond together? Or are you comfortable with the administration deciding across those kinds of categories? Nature, climate education, and research facilities grants another example of a very broad category. Even in a category like home hardening, where it's a little bit more specific, there are a lot of decisions about how should those funds be used, wide or how deep do you want those funds to go. So those are examples of areas where you could defer to the administration if you're comfortable.
There are a lot of experts in the administration to make those decisions, or if you had something in mind, we would suggest that adopting statutory guidance would be appropriate. There is I think you will probably have this on a future agenda. There is some budget control section language the administration has proposed regarding Proposition four that would allow some flexibility to move funds across departments to get rid of some administrative burdens and particularly to facilitate larger landscape level projects. As we looked at that, it seemed reasonable to us. We think you may want to add some reporting language so you can keep track of how that's used, but that seemed reasonable.
And then, finally, there are some Proposition four proposals that interact with other proposals in the budget that are funded by general fund or other sources. So we would suggest, as you consider those, home hardening as an example, where Cal Fire is proposing general fund for some inspection inspectors of I'm sorry, not home hardening, defensible space inspectors for defensible space as well as funding for Proposition four. So that's an example where we would suggest you might want to think about those two fund sources and proposals together and make sure your decisions are in alignment. And with that, Madam Chair, happy to answer questions after the Secretary speaks.
Speaker 1
Thank you, Ms. Ehlers. Thank you so much. The the report that you provided was it was very detailed in your reports, I I appreciate that you provided those to us. Now we'd like to hear from secretary Wade Crowfoot.
Welcome secretary Crowfoot.
Speaker 4
Thank you so much, madam chair and members of the committee. We appreciate the opportunity to begin this discussion on this coming year's budget and the opportunity to share an overview and answer your questions about our proposal. Frankly, it helps the budget be better, when it's finally passed. So really appreciate that and professionalism with with with which we interact. This is our eighth and final opportunity to present a proposed budget on behalf of the Newsom administration.
So I wanted to take a moment to reflect on the challenges we face together as as well as our progress. It's been a remarkable near decade in California. Governor Newsom took office in the wake of the Camp Fire, which claimed 85 lives and largely destroyed Paradise. A year later, our state underwent what we call a fire siege, where over 4,000,000 acres of California burned through catastrophic wildfire. All told, in the last decade, almost 9,000,000 acres have burned in California, much of it in a dangerous, catastrophic way.
That's almost 10% of our land mass. We collectively navigated through the driest three years in California's history, where 5,000,000 Californians were underwater rationing, and we were struggling to prevent the extinction of certain salmon species. That historic drought was broken by the wettest, what probably is the wettest three weeks in California's history, which created catastrophic and deadly flooding across the state. We have experienced the longest hottest heat wave in the history of the American West in 2022 that very nearly disrupted our grid and the ability to provide electricity to Californians. And sea level rise, which sometimes gets dismissed as a future planning exercise, has had real impacts, whether it's to coastal communities impacted by storm surges intensified by climate change, or whether it's erosion in Southern California worsened by climate change, including erosion that has disrupted passenger rail service between Los Angeles and San Diego.
So we know in California as a Mediterranean climate, climate change is a clear and present danger. We've navigated a changing, a dynamic relationship with the federal administration. Certainly in President Trump's first term, we navigated what was a real lack of alignment, I'll say, in our values and our goals to protect the environment and our natural resources. We experienced four years of remarkable alignment and historic federal investments, and now we are in a situation where, quite frankly, we are defending our state, from my perspective, against attacks to our public lands and our standards that protect air and water and coast. Together, we've navigated very tight budget situations, including this year, and we have worked to invest historic surpluses that have allowed us to make generational improvements on all of our shared priorities.
And amidst this, we all navigated a global pandemic. And I'm so proud of the 26,000 women and men across our agency that kept moving on all of these challenges, and all of our priorities in that time. So let's talk about progress. Your leadership, the governor's leadership, has invested nearly $40,000,000,000 in our fight against climate change, whether that's in the areas of water, energy, lands, transportation, and so much more, and it's delivering real results. We're decarbonizing our energy grid faster than expected.
Two thirds of energy in California last year was clean energy. 90% of days last year, at at some point during that day, a 100% of the energy that powers the fourth largest economy in the world is clean energy. And we know that over time, this is going to be the abundant, accessible, affordable energy that we need to power our economic future. We're shifting to better, less polluting technologies faster than expected. I worked for governor Brown, and we set a goal of 1,500,000 electric vehicles by 2025 and got laughed at.
And guess what? Thanks to Californians, we met that goal three years early. Thanks to your investments, we've made huge prog progress building our resilience to these climate extremes. Resilience meaning our ability to adapt, to weather, and ultimately to thrive through these threats. Billions of dollars of investment in wildfire protection.
Yes, improving the remarkable response capacity of our heroes at CAL FIRE, but also investing in over 2,500 projects, in and around our communities to protect communities from wildfire before it ever comes. On the water topic, we collectively have built local water resilience, whether it's effective implementation of the Sustainable Groundwater Management Act, or improving the way that we can recharge groundwater basins during floods, while we've made progress rehabilitating modernizing the backbone infrastructure of our water systems. It's been so critical. And on the coastal front, thanks to your investments, coastal communities have resources to plan and adapt to these changes that we know are already coming. The legislature and governor have established protecting 30% of our lands and coastal waters, 30 by 30, as a law.
A world leading goal to help nature and people thrive together. Thanks to your investments in the past few years alone, we've added 2,500,000 acres to conserved lands in California for the benefit of not only the the fish and wildlife that depend on those lands, but for people that can get out into those lands. This has included restoring or reintroducing keystone species across landscapes in California, called keystone species because they're critical to shaping the whole ecosystem on which life thrives. California condor are back. Beavers have been reintroduced.
Salmon are swimming over 400 miles of habitat in the Klamath River, the largest restoration river restoration project in American history. Your investments, our investments, have returned over 100,000 acres of land to Native American tribes in California, many of which that had been dispossessed of their land for well over a century. I'm proud to say that 57% plus of our state parks are under co management or tribal access, expanded tribal access agreements with California Native American tribes. Together, we've uplifted this priority of helping all Californians get outdoors, and recognizing not all communities, not all Californians have safe places to get outside and recreate. And we put over a billion dollars together into getting parks and open space into park poor communities, and found really interesting, innovative ways to help people get into our parks, including enabling state park passes to be checked out of our local libraries, which parenthetically, I've learned is the most popular checkout at most local libraries in California, is that parks pass, and actually bringing a lot of people into their local libraries for the first time in years.
And we're innovating, always innovating. Thanks to you, thanks to our governor, we've got groundbreaking methane and wildfire satellite projects. We created an online database, interactive database, to help local communities identify where 30 by 30 opportunities exist in their backyard. We've moved fishing and hunting permits online so that somebody can carry their license on their phone, which is not only simpler, but ultimately more of an affordable way to do this. And so none of this would happen without the investment and the partnership.
Now, from my view, there's still a lot more to do. As Governor Newsom says publicly, but I can tell you he says privately a lot, is we are running through the tape. So I wanted to share with you our key priorities over the next year within the agency. One is just advancing and completing key projects. The world's largest wildlife crossing in Greater Los Angeles, which we need to break which we need to cut the ribbon on by the end of the year, God willing.
Sites Reservoir Project, which would be the first large reservoir project in a generation. Open space projects that are critically important to communities, like the River West Project in Fresno, that's 500 acres along the San Joaquin River in Fresno's backyard. And also breaking ground on projects that, frankly, the next administration will cut the ribbon on, including breaking ground on important projects to the Salton Sea that meet our responsibility to protect against harmful dust there, and important infrastructure investments into Exposition Park in Los Angeles that will welcome the Olympics in in two short years. We're doing all this trying to streamline project delivery, taking direction from the legislature and the governor that we can do things faster and better, whether it's building housing or clean energy or restoring the environment. We've got exciting work underway to expedite wildfire safety projects, to do what we call cutting the green tape, delivering restoration projects more quickly and effectively, and even expanding our state park system, thanks to legislation that you all passed last year, by bringing in no cost acquisitions to enlarge our parks by streamlining the process to acquire those lands.
We're issuing an updated action plan for wildfire resilience, launching, as the governor noted, a new water plan for California, thanks to legislation that passed last year, establishing the next installment of our strategic plan to protect the ocean and coast, trying to create continuity for our progress while enabling the next administration to put their mark on these priorities. I am personally investing time in nature based solutions, which is all of the ways in elevating and building a building our movement to to improve the way that we we manage land, not only to capture and store carbon and buffer our communities from climate impacts, but for all sorts of benefits, including water retention and protecting our world renowned biodiversity. At the same time, know that to meet our carbon neutrality target, it's going to take restoring nature and also engineered carbon sequestration, which is a responsibility that lives in our agency, so we're working on advancing that this year. You'll hear more today about managing human wildlife conflict. Wolves, bears, mountain lions, these are really important species for our ecosystems and the health of our landscapes.
There are proven strategies to manage these animals living next to around our communities, and you'll hear a case made for resources to build our capacity to manage human wildlife conflict. In some ways, it's remarkable that we have a state that enables this coexistence, but it needs to be invested in. You'll hear more about that. And then lastly, just continuing to improve how we do our work. We're weeks away from issuing our first tribal stewardship policy, which really institutionalizes a lot of the work that we're quite proud of, to make it a standard practice moving forward.
We're doubling down on scientific partnerships, like one with NASA Ames, to take what is the statewide LiDAR data, this remote imaging data, and make it accessible to community based organizations doing wildfire safety work, so that they can actually utilize it. And then, lastly, I'll just say, as we move into the budget presentation, Proposition four is an absolute game changer for the continuity of this work. And I want to thank the legislature's vision for putting it on the ballot, and thank Californians. $10,000,000,000 of investment to ensure that we continue to protect our communities from this clear and present danger. We improve the way that we do business to improve our affordability and future economic prosperity.
So I won't belabor this because you'll hear more about this later, but there's critical investments that we're proposing in forests and wildfire, water, coastal resilience, extreme heat, outdoor access, and of course, protecting our biodiversity in these nature based solutions. So I'll just end because this is my last presentation in a budget by thanking you. It is a remarkable place to do this work and to live, and I couldn't be prouder of the partnership between the legislature and the governor. I also want to take the opportunity to thank partners that are not part of government that are delivering these solutions, whether they're conservation organizations or tribal governments, local governments. All this work that we're able to claim as progress happens because thousands of leaders and groups are doing this work.
And then final, final is just to thank our budget team. Brian Cash and Amanda Martin are the best in the business. They help me sound smart, or try to sound smart every year when I come before you. And ultimately, the department directors and the people that you hear from after me that comprise these 26 different departments are the folks doing the work. It's not a better and more important time to be a public servant, and it's been an honor to lead this agency.
So thank you for the ability to mark some of our progress, and I look forward to any questions you may have.
Speaker 1
Thank you, Secretary Crowfoot. I want to thank you. I think that the work that you have done as secretary of this particular agency has been phenomenal. You've taken us through so many just as you've mentioned at the very beginning, and I appreciate your leadership.
Speaker 1
And I appreciate what you presented. I think that the balance we have here, I think, is extraordinary. Department of Finance?
Speaker 6
Courtney Maskill, Department of Finance. I have nothing to add, but I'm available for questions.
Speaker 1
Thank you. And before we begin with questions, I'd like to establish quorum. Madam Consultant? Senators Reyes. Aye.
Alright. Present. Blake Spear. Choi.
Speaker 1
McNerney. Here. McNerney here. Thank you. And I also want to thank our consultants, Joanne Roy and Eunice Rowe, who are phenomenal.
I I as as the new chair of this particular sub, it's it's great to be with consultants that know the business and carry the message and then help us share the the right message. So I want to thank you for your leadership in this. So with that, I'd like to open it up to questions, comments from the members.
Speaker 2
Thank you, Chair. Secretary, I would like to say that you sounded very smart. And among all the important aspects that you have described, I didn't hear anything about the update. I'm from Southern California, 37th District in Orange County. It has been a long time concern to me that when the tunnel for the water conveyance from Northern California to Southern California will make progress, but no report has been made.
And as far as I'm concerned, that's a very important human element that environmentally, we need to supply necessary water to Southern California and also Central California for agricultural activities. I've heard that many farmland had to just quit their farming because of lack of necessary water. Can you update me what the progress has been made and what your plan is to my understanding, is that the cost was not going to be from our state general fund. That was going to be borne by water districts who will be benefiting from the water supply.
Speaker 4
Yeah, thank you very much. So, I'm glad to address this. I think most broadly, we have a challenge moving forward about how we adapt our infrastructure, which was really built seventy plus years ago, to the changing hydrology that we now know we face. So longer dry periods and getting most of our precipitation in the winter increasingly through these big winter storms. So we think it involves a lot of solutions, some that are localized.
For example, I said, I explained trying to get more of these flood flows percolating into our aquifers for local supply. But from the perspective of the Newsom administration, we think it's absolutely necessary to modernize what we call the backbone infrastructure of the state's water supply system. So the State Water Project provides water to three out of every four Californians, and we have real challenges. The way we describe this is earthquake risk within the Delta that could knock out our levees and disrupt that freshwater supply, as well as the longer term risk of saltwater intrusion into the delta. So we have, for a very long time, been very clear and transparent about just how important we think that conveyance project is through the delta.
We're recognizing that there are strong differences, even within the legislature, on this proposal. But we are continuing to move it forward because we see it as critical, and we don't think that we can defer this project if we really want to assure the water reliability for California moving forward. The point you make is a good one, which is we I don't talk about this in the state's budget context, because we're not suggesting that this be a taxpayer funded project. It's what's called a beneficiary pays project. So the water agencies that benefit, that get water from the state water project, are those that are investing.
But Governor Newsom is very clear on this infrastructure, other water infrastructure, we need a system that allows for these proposals to move through the process, and then be approved or disapproved. And part of our challenge to date on a lot of these infrastructure projects is our process is, frankly, too complex and takes too long. So oftentimes, the question doesn't get called, that projects ultimately die through delay. So we've been really focused on moving infrastructure, including Delta conveyance, through the process as quickly as possible. Where that project sits right now is at the State Water Resources Control Board.
They that entity within our sister agency, Cal EPA, has responsibility to issue a water right for this project, which is a big, complicated, sort of quasi adjudicatory process. And so, it's moving through that process as expeditiously as I think it can. We don't have weekly, or we don't have really any contact with them on this project, because they essentially sit in that quasi adjudicatory capacity. So, our focus from our agency is getting everything in place, and then doing whatever we can to help the regulatory process, the permitting process, the assessment process happen as quickly as it can. I will mention one other thing.
This budget does include funding for regional conveyance, which is not the Delta Conveyance, but its other important aqueducts in the state. Our state water project, South Of The Delta, needs help. It has been impacted by decades of subsidence. California, the last state in the American West to manage groundwater, until Sigma was passed in 2014. That has had real impact on the aqueduct that moves water to Southern California and throughout the Central Valley.
So there is funding through the climate bond for regional conveyance upgrades, could include the state water project, as well as more localized conveyance off those more backbone systems.
Speaker 2
It's just a follow-up. It's good news included in there, but focusing upon the Delta Conveyance System, specifically through the tunnel. The State Motor Control Board, are they making progress, positive progress, or are they stalling it? And also, what's the Governor Newsom's position to help it to go through or just sitting idle doing nothing?
Speaker 4
Yeah. So I work closely with our leadership at the state water board on a number of other issues, and I have full confidence that they are moving as quickly as they can on this, what they call a proceeding on this, as well as a process to consider a water rights permit for Seitz Reservoir, which I referenced, which is also a major goal or sort of commitment of the governors, as well as other items. It's a terribly complicated process that includes our water rights system and a lot of, you know, decades of sort of state regulations and process. We know that projects as large as this one are often litigated, so it's important that the Water Board move through its process in a thorough way, so that whatever it decides ultimately is durable to a legal challenge. So, I can tell you from where I sit, which is somebody who wants to get these projects done, you know, I can be constructively frustrated with the time it's taken, but I do have full confidence that the water board is discharging its its responsibility effectively.
Speaker 4
I would say, I can tell you this, the, you know, the governor's going to remain focused on these infrastructure projects until the very last day in office, and we're doing everything possible, respecting sort of the legal constraints and the process to get these projects in place.
Speaker 2
Yeah. It'll be his legacy if he makes sure that before he leaves, that will go through. Thank you.
Speaker 1
I think one of the best things, senator, is that they have you as an advocate. And so the subject comes up and then you get to have an answer from the secretary of the agency. Thank you. Senator McNerney.
Speaker 7
Well, I I thank the chair. Miss Sellers, thank you for your presentation. It seemed like a lot of that was pretty common sense. I mean, if you have a bad budget year, you have to look at how to to to save on the margins. I didn't see anything I didn't hear anything I was a little late, which I apologize for.
I didn't see or hear anything that really stuck out as this is gonna be an important way to save that we wouldn't thought of through common sense. Do you have anything that you could brag about that would be helpful?
Speaker 3
I wish that there were easier answers than reduce your spending or raise revenues. I wish there were. You know, some of the other creative tools, like borrow or, you know, pull back other spending. Those are tools, but they have been exercised quite a bit already. And so, I think that is part of our message.
It may seem like common sense, but it is hard. It will be hard. And I think particularly coming off of many years of surplus, it makes it even harder because, frankly, I think all of us this is my twenty second budget with the LAO all of us are out of practice a little bit of thinking about a very constrained budget environment coming off of a surplus because thinking about how to expand and spend new money on so many needs, so many needs across these budgets and across the whole budget, is a different mindset than thinking about pulling back, constraining, and what is actually truly essential government service versus what is more aspirational government service perhaps in more constrained environment. So no, I wish that I had something easier or creative to offer you rather than the risks seem pretty significant to us, and we are concerned that the budget situation will get worse before it gets better at this point.
Speaker 7
Thank you. Secretary Crook Foote, you know, I just you have so much enthusiasm, and you've got a great list of accomplishments. It's really great to hear all that. You can't be excited about the proposed cuts to positions in the agency, and at least I don't think you could be. The single biggest holdup with construction projects I mean, we've talked about permitting and all, but that's the single biggest holdup is the CDFW permitting.
So that's something that we need to think about. How can we streamline those permit requirements and regulations? Do you have comments on that?
Speaker 4
Well, first of all, I agree. We need to do more to simplify and streamline our permitting process in California to get things done. This does not mean sacrificing environmental review or environmental protection. But I can tell you, eight years into this job, if there's one thing I wish I would have focused on earlier, it's really breaking down this complexity and driving forward by reforming our permitting process. Clearly, the legislature, the governor are really focused on that.
There are important steps that we're taking, and I could go into those. Capacity is a real constraint. So, for example, there are hundreds of clean energy projects that have to be approved through multiple state agencies. One of them is the Department of Fish and Wildlife. State law requires that they discharge their authority or responsibility through issuing all of these permits.
And in order to do so, you need people. We can improve the processes, we can streamline the processes, but people are really important. I'll leave it to the governor and the legislature about positions, but I just say capacity does matter. I'll tell you we're being we're trying to be creative about bringing more resources in from those entities that, are are seeking permits. There's a fee for service where, you know, sectors that are driving, a lot of permits through will sometimes fund positions.
There's absolutely no quid pro quo. There's a total, separation between funding that goes into positions and permits. But it's a way, for example, our high speed rail authority has funded certain permitting agencies to provide capacity simply to to consider those permits. So we're trying to figure out, you know, if we can do that in the wildfire space and the energy space, but it's no substitute for this question of resources and state funding.
Speaker 7
Well, that's right. Eliminating positions is not going to speed up permitting, and so that's something that I'm very concerned about. Also, when you look at the delta, we have these invasive species like the the mussels, the golden mussels and the algae blooms and the water hyacinth. Again, if there's positions cut, then those are gonna be much harder. I mean, I've lived through the water hyacinth problem.
We had a lot of progress in terms of being able to contain that. Golden mussel seems like another very big challenge, so we need those positions to be able to deal with these big, big invasive species problems.
Speaker 4
Yeah. And I'll just share, the invasive species problems are getting more challenging, and sometimes it feels a little bit one may ask, well, how does that impact my life? Well, golden mussels are hugely invasive in our water infrastructure. And if they take over, they get to be very costly to maintain and remove, and that impacts water rates, for example. The water hyacinth impacts all sorts of things, including commerce and recreation that occur in the Delta.
So couldn't agree more that investment in invasive species control and removal is critical and capacity matters.
Speaker 7
So we agree on some things. There's issues we may not be in totally agreement on. The conveyance. The state water project, you know, you mentioned subsidence in the in the South Of The Delta, and that's a critical problem. If if that continues, it threatens the water supply for, what, 27,000,000 Californians.
We also have the levees in the Delta are old. Some of them haven't been managed since the eighteen hundreds. So I guess there's seepage under some of the the ones near Victoria Island. These are these are big problems that we're gonna have to deal with. I've got a piece of legislation out there, s b eight seventy two, which will provide funding for both of those issues for twenty years, and I think that's what's gonna take to do that.
And if that happens, if we get that through our right now we're asking for GGF GGRF money, but we're open to other forms of money, other sources of income that we can use to do those two things. And we need a we haven't had, in California, a real discussion about the future of water in California. We haven't had that in my opinion. It's been, well, let's put in the tunnel and that'll solve everything. And, no, I don't think that's the case.
I I for example, if you just put in the tunnel and you forget about subsidence, you've solved nothing. If you let the levees fail, we'll be facing just a massive amount of damage, people's lives at risk, and so on. So there's there's I think if we look at how we can do this in a practical way, strengthening the levees, dealing with the subsidence, we can provide a reliable water supply for California for the next generation. And I think that's that's kinda where I'm I'm at in this position and this issue. And we have interestingly enough, we have the water contractors and the environmentalists on the Delta agreeing with this idea.
And that's something you don't always see.
Speaker 7
Yeah. Yeah. So we're really proud we're really proud of that. And we're gonna, you know, not knowing that, but we've we've worked with other entities that that and stakeholders that that are interested in this. A lot of for example, the the Delta Counties Coalition is strongly behind it.
I think we're in a good position to move forward on that and get this discussion started and take first steps. There's other things we should be doing that I'd like to throw in as a Christmas ornament. More groundwater storage, more recycling, more conservation, more efficiency, maybe a little bit of ESOL. Those are all things that are going to help reduce dependence on the delta. But right now, I think I'm focusing on subsidence and the levy strengthening.
So I think that puts us in a strong position for future water supply for California.
Speaker 4
Thanks. I'll just reinforce two points you made. One is there's no silver bullet for water reliability and water resilience, you know, water security for California communities and a healthy environment. There's no silver bullet. We contend that the backbone of our distribution system, our infrastructure, including the Delta conveyance, is really important, but that is no replacement for the breadth of investments that we have to make, including levy strengthening in the Delta.
You know, the Delta Delta Health is important, you know, whether or not this project happens, to cities like Stockton and local communities, but also to the state, because so much is moves to the Delta in terms of water. I think that so I would agree with you there, and from my perspective, it's an and, not an or. I think, you know, from our perspective, we have to have this tough conversation about how to modernize conveyance, and we have to shore up the existing infrastructure.
Speaker 1
Thank you, Senator McNerney. Some of the comments that were made earlier and I appreciated that in the comments from the LAO that the administration deserves credit for the budget they've proposed for this particular agency. And then to remind us that even with that, we have to look at the big picture. We do have a structural problem with our budget. Even if we're able to balance it this year because of the stock market being so strong, and we may even have a surplus that we get to applaud, we still have that structural deficit.
And if we don't take care of how we spend now, we're going to have a problem next year and the next year, and it has to be dealt with. I appreciated the comments about, you know, what needs what needs to be cut, and there are trade offs. If we approve something here, there's going to be a trade off. Otherwise, we do have problems. There there are other subcommittees that are dealing with very serious issues like health and food and housing.
The issues we deal with here are also very important because it has to do with the future of California, And we need to be sure that we protect the investments we've made and also make the investments that are necessary so we are protecting the future of California. And for all Californians, and having that access to open space and making sure it's available to everybody. And these are all very important. I appreciated lens of serious health and safety concerns, making sure that if we're going to have to make cuts, let's not make cuts to those items that we can classify as being serious health and safety concerns. The robust oversight, I appreciate that very much.
And I think that rather than saying, Okay, we agree, administration. We agree with what you're proposing, saying we agree, but let's rein it in. Let's make sure that we have some oversight so that we know that what we had intended to spend this money on is how it's being spent, without saying, Okay, we're allowing you to make all of the decisions. What the agency has been through, and I appreciate that you've thanked all the men and women who have seen us through so much and helped us to stay afloat and to to to to do well, quite frankly. I think that the wildfires wildfires, the drought, the wettest three weeks, as as you talked talked about, sea level rising, the erosion, all of these things are we have to deal with them.
We have to deal with the delta, make sure that we have the water for Californians. These are all things that that are extremely important, reminding us that not all Californians get out into the open space, and it's so important. It has to do with equity. It has to make making sure that that all of our communities have the parks that they need so that the kids can get out and be kids. Sometimes we forget that because the poorest communities oftentimes are overlooked, and I know that the next the next presentation will be on our parks.
We'll have a little bit more to say there. I do want to ask some questions, especially now with the administrations, our current administration, and the changes that we have had to deal with in California, very specifically your agency. What federal actions has your agency or its boards or departments or offices had to respond or make up for? And is the agency or or your your boards and offices anticipating any federal action that we're hearing about that your agency is now having to prepare for?
Speaker 4
Well, it's been a chaotic last year plus, certainly. A lot of these key federal management agencies have been gutted. Upwards of 30% of their personnel have been dismissed in a really chaotic way, and that has created real challenges. I'll give you one really good example, what I think is a good example, which is the river forecasting center, which is critical to emergency flood operations. Joint center between the federal government and the state government.
So critical to have staffing at both. And when we see a big atmospheric river come in, it's the river forecasting center that provides that real time information to first responders on the ground that actually impact where you put equipment and personnel to protect life and safety. Well, almost overnight, you know, the River Forecasting Center lost most of its federal staff. And so the administration had to come in with essentially an emergency appropriation or not an appropriation, but essentially emergency funding through the existing administrative funding to supplant the federal staff, because we couldn't let the river forecast system fall down this winter. That's one really good example.
There's others where the fast elimination of programs has reduced data coming in, including data on offshore storm swells that impact coastal communities in California. Large cuts to the Forest Service and National Park Service also impact land management, slowing down the ability to do wildfire safety on federal lands, the National Park Service reducing access to our parks. You know, half of California's landmass is owned and managed by the federal government. And when you talk about a reduction in one year of a third plus of the capacity, real impacts. So, we've got, you know, CAL FIRE stepped in and tried to supplant where it's seeing gaps in the Forest Service, state parks where it's seeing gaps in the National Park Service.
Our Parks Director, who you'll hear from, actually was able to raise funds so that we could open our parks on Martin Luther King Day when, President Trump actually removed free entry on that day and and changed free entry to his birthday, believe it or not. So we're finding creative ways to to supplant that absence of federal leadership. But we want to make the case that, you know, we do not want this to be business as usual. The federal government has responsibility to manage half the lands, and we don't want to all of a sudden shift the burden on the state taxpayers or state agencies. So we'll do what we need to do to protect life and safety and protect landscapes and the environment with the expectation that this pendulum will swing and the federal investment needs to come back.
Speaker 1
And we hope that that will be soon. Senator Blakespeare, do you have any questions you'd like to ask?
Speaker 1
Thank you. All right. Well, I'd like to thank you all for your presentations, and we will move now to our next panel. Thank you. All right.
Our next item is issue number 18, an overview of the Department of Parks and Recreation. Director Quintero, welcome.
Speaker 9
Okay. Sorry, kept turning it off. I'll start over. Good morning, Madam Chair and members. My name is Armando Quintero, and I'm the Director of the California Department of Parks and Recreation.
Thank you for this opportunity to provide you a brief overview of the department. The department is responsible for protecting and preserving the state's most valued natural, cultural, and recreational resources across two eighty state park units, spanning roughly 1,600,000 acres. California operates the largest and one of the most diverse state park systems in the nation, serving over 80,000,000 visitors annually. I want to mention here that we also manage funds to invest in communities across the state, and since 1968, over 800, almost 900 communities in California have benefited from investments from bonds and projects. And and I looked at the, we looked at the investments in your districts, and the number or the amount of investments that have been made in local parks ranges in this group from $60,000,000 in the last, since 2011, to about $30,000,000 And we can give you a list of those investments in your community.
One of the things we're doing is trying to brand that so people go want to ahead.
Speaker 1
Just pause here for a moment and say, yes, we would like to receive that. It's always good to be able to to tell our communities and to brag about the investments that have been made in our respective
Speaker 9
We actually have the information here that we can provide you today. And when I first came into this position, we were talking about this, and we've as we've met with legislators, we provided each of them with this information. And I can honestly say, in my first two years, only two of the legislators that I met with were aware that the very funds that you were approving were benefiting their own districts to that degree. So it's really exciting and and something that we all need to brag about. I mean, it's your it's your decisions and investments that have made that possible.
Sorry. I'd I yeah, sure. I mentioned that there's two eighty state park units. This is the largest and most diverse state park system in the nation. We serve over 80,000,000 visitors annually.
This includes the department's Division of Boating and Waterways, which funds, plans, and develops boating facilities, water recreation opportunities, and actually treats the invasive species in the Delta, which the senator was asking about. And we do this across the state. We also operate the division of off highway motor vehicle recreation, which provides high quality off road recreational vehicles at nine state off highway vehicle parks, and we also oversee the state office of historic preservation, which is responsible for administering federally and state mandated historic preservation programs. Since 2019, the department has made significant investments to expand access to the outdoors and address the impacts of climate change. The department's commitment to advancing California's Outdoor for All initiative has resulted in programs that enable safe, equitable, and enjoyable access to parks, open spaces, and recreational opportunities.
These programs remove historical, financial, and logistical barriers that prevent children and families from accessing accessing, excuse me, state parks and amplifying the admissions promise of a California for all. Some of the highlights include the outdoor access program, which we began in 'twenty 01/2002, has significantly reduced cost barriers and expanded equitable park access across the state, including the California State Library Park Pass, which offers free vehicle day use entry to state parks through partnerships with the public and tribal libraries statewide. Every year, we've been able to provide 33,000 of these passes to libraries, and we've also developed the adventure pass, which offers a full year of free day use entry to 50 state parks, where we have developed curriculum based activities for fourth grade public school students and their families. Today, we've issued 95,000, fourth grade adventure pass passes. And the Golden Bear Pass, which provides year round free access at over 200 state parks for families who receive CalWORKS, individuals who receive supplemental security income, income eligible Californians over the age of 62, and participants of California's tribal temporary assistance for needy families program.
Through this innovative partnership with the Department of Social Services, Golden Bear pass applications have increased by over 4000% since 2021. At present, there were 100,000 of those passes in the hands of families in need. We also opened Dos Rios State Park in 2023, and that is the first California State Park to be opened in ten years, and this reflected the restoration of the 2,500 acre agricultural site at the confluence of two big rivers in California, the Tuolumne River and the San Joaquin River, and this provides floodplain habitat, climate resilience, new public recreation, groundwater recharge, and our opportunity to provide educational opportunities to people from the Central Valley. This fulfills a long standing goal outlined in the department's 2009 Central Valley Vision Implementation Plan. With the recent passage of SB six thirty, by Senator Allen and AB six seventy nine by Palaron, The department is actively engaging with our land trust, conservancy, and nonprofit partners on no and low cost language land acquisitions, which will expand the existing state park system, while creating operational efficiencies, and protecting and preserving sensitive ecosystems and critical wildlife habitat corridors.
As the Secretary mentioned, we are actually on track to add quite a significant amount of acreage to state parks in the next few years of properties that are going to be no cost, and are either adjacent to, or inside state parks that are privately owned. Tribal acknowledgments and tribal memorandums of understanding. The department has partnered with California native tribes to create land acknowledgment content for 191 state parks, and these MOUs allow that we add new signage, create public events, and on park's public websites and educational materials, we talk about these tribal partnerships. The department has also focused efforts on MOU agreements with California native tribes. The MOUs establish mutually beneficial activities between the department and the tribes, and the beneficial activities include easy tribal access to parks, gathering of plants and materials and minerals for cultural practices, the application of traditional ecological knowledge for the management of important resources, data sharing between parties and communities, collaboration on interpretation and cultural and natural resources programs and protection.
With these added agreements, as the Secretary mentioned, the Department's tribal MOU program now encompasses 57% of all State Park lands, and we have additional agreements in negotiation. The department is also keenly focused on the implementation of the climate bond. Highlights of these efforts include our statewide park program, and the statewide park development and community revitalization program creates new parks and recreation opportunities in underserved communities across California. Those are the investments that I mentioned earlier, about the investments that are made in all of your districts, and all of the legislators' districts. The 'twenty five-'twenty six expenditure plan included $190,000,000 for this program, with 1,900,000 proposed for this next year's budget for program administration.
Since 2008, roughly $1,200,000,000 in grants have been awarded to three thirteen projects, resulting in new and improved parks that provide walkable, safe recreation opportunities to thousands of California's in previously park poor communities. Forest health and watershed improvements for the stewardship of state owned lands. State parks has significantly increased the pace and the scale of its wildfire and forest resilient work in recent years, treating over 32,000 acres across more than 100 parks over the last five years, including over 10,000 acres of prescribed fire. The treatments have protected irreplaceable natural places like the South Grove Of Giant Sequoias and Calaveras Big Tree State Park, protected public and visitor safety in places like Castle Crags State Park, and have restored beneficial fire to parks like Mount Diablo, Mount Tamal Pias, providing benefits to communities in the wild land urban interface. The $33,000,000 proposed $33,000,000 proposed in the current budget will be spent on prescribed fire and fuel reduction project implementation, and program support at state parks, as well as other state land management agencies, which are consistent with the wildfire and forest resilience action plan.
I might mention that most of these projects involved interagency cooperation with Calaveras Big Trees. We worked with Cal Fire, local fire departments, and tribal fire departments to apply fire and learn how to work better together in these landscapes. Efforts also prioritize wildfire management planning and align with the facility's ignition reduction program and emergency preparedness work. All work perform aims to transform Parkland and other state loan ANS into models of proactive stewardship. And I can say that when we implemented fire at Mount Diablo, Mount Tamalpais it had been many, many years since that had been done, and it was done with 100% public support.
And so, that is clearly welcomed by communities, and we're looking to better adapt to this, and this is all about better adapting to the changing climate, benefiting biodiversity, and supporting resilient communities. I'm almost there. Deferred maintenance is the last time I'll address. To address a statewide backlog exceeding $1,200,000,000 the climate bond provides $84,400,000 in 'twenty five-'twenty six, and additional funding through 2030. Health and safety are a key factor in the prioritization of deferred maintenance project funding.
For example, the Malibu Pier at Malibu Lagoon State Beach will provide critical safety upgrades while increasing recreational access. The budget proposal before you today requests $400,000 for program delivery, and program delivery costs represent the expenses associated with administering, implementing, and sustaining the program's ongoing operations, and this includes personnel costs, operating expenses, and equipment. These strategic priorities reflect the department's evolving role, not only as a steward of the state's most iconic natural and cultural landscapes, but also as a critical partner in advancing equity, climate resilience, community well-being, and belonging across California. Thank you so much for your time, and we appreciate your ongoing support. I'm happy to take questions now, or can move to the next item.
Okay. I'm going to oh, I see. I'm sorry. I didn't see the numbers in front of the items. I have 19.
Speaker 9
Am looking at it. I apologize. We request the ongoing transfer of 6,750,000.00 from the general fund to the State Parks and Recreation Fund to transition the library parks program from prior one time funding to an ongoing program. The program was launched under the California Outdoors for All initiative as a three year pilot in 'twenty one and 'twenty two, and it provides 33,000 state library park passes to more than a thousand or 1,100 library branch locations statewide, including library tribal libraries. 60% we have a QR code on the passes so that people can self report what they're experiencing or what they're what they would like to share with us.
60% of pass users report annual household incomes below $60,000 a year, demonstrating the program's role in expanding access. While the department does offer other free and low cost pass programs, such as the adventure pass and the golden bear pass for income eligible Californians, the distinguished veterans pass, and disabled discount pass, these are all tailored to specific groups. The library pass is the only free pass available to anyone with a library card. And I will mention, if you ever bump into a librarian, guaranteed if you ask them about the State Park Library pass, they often get emotional. It's the most checked out item in libraries, and they're thrilled about families coming in and actually wanting to know more.
Time spent outdoors and in nature is crucial for both mental and physical health and well-being. Certainly, we saw that during COVID. Parks were packed and really demonstrated the public's demand for our mental health in times of stress. Scientific studies estimate that every dollar spent on creating and maintaining trails can save almost $3 in healthcare costs. Additional studies show that access to parks and open space can reduce stress in children, improve academic performance, increase physical activity, and improve sleep.
The proposal represents what we believe is a modest investment with proven exponential outcomes. I appreciate your support here, and happy to take questions.
Speaker 10
Daniel Ross Jones, Department of Finance. Nothing to add, but available for questions.
Speaker 10
Brian Metzger, LEO. We recommend the legislature reject this proposal. Consistent with the framework we presented at the beginning of the hearing, we suggest the legislature apply a high bar to its review of new spending proposals. While this proposal has merit, certainly, as a way of increasing access to state parks, it does not meet this high bar. It does not address near term and significant health and safety risks or other time sensitive objectives.
The proposal also would commit the state to ongoing general fund spending at a time when significant deficits are projected. And parks also offers other discounted and free pass programs, such as those that were previously mentioned. And happy to take questions.
Speaker 8
Okay. Okay. I have a couple of questions on a couple of topics. So thank you very much for the presentation. I very much apologize for being late, and I am excited to have been able to catch the all of this part.
So our state parks are critical to the state of California, I mean, the reasons that the director described at the beginning. And I just wanna say that I strongly support the library pass program, and I just want to share the small anecdote that I was at the library with my son, and we were in line, and the person next to me was an older woman who was attempting to check out a pass. And she was told by the librarian that they were all full. They were all there was a long waiting list. But but he said, if you wanna check out the backpack, the backpack comes with poles for walking and also includes the pass.
And I started chatting with her about why she wanted the pass, where she was going with the pass. And what was clear is that the the parking fees associated with the state parks are were a barrier to entry for her and her husband. And so she they they really enjoy the state parks, but they're just not able to absorb that in their budget. And so being able to have a pass allows them to be outside and to go to the places that they love in the state of California. And so and she couldn't speak more highly of being able to pick get this pass at the library.
So to me, this is really, it's an example of something that is has such clear benefit directly, and we have a lot of, state funding for a lot of different things, and we, of course, have a lot of needs. But to me, this this is a very high value add for people, that that we should fund. And so to me, it seems like something that should be a priority, and I, was grateful that she was able to check out the backpack with the polls even if she didn't quite need the polls because then she was able to do these things with her husband. So, anyway, I appreciate this coming up. I understand the LAO's perspective and also kind of rigidity around if we're gonna be serious about the budget, we have to look in these categories only.
But I think there are things that are so public facing that have such direct benefit that we should prioritize those. So I just wanted to put that out there as important. The other thing I'd like to circle back to is the system for reservation at our state parks. So I don't know if you're going to be touching on that in a different, like in issue number 20 or in the future, but I'm very concerned about making sure that we do not have our reservations being sitting open. And when we had this hearing last year, we talked about this extensively, and I wanted to have an update on what's happening there.
Speaker 9
Give me just a second. Well, I can just say that we, too, recognize that our reservation system is a reflection of what state parks is doing for the public. And our teams work on a daily basis with this new reservation system provider, and we often get Liz and I are often provided with the communications from the reservation system operator, Tyler, and we see the problems, and we also see the resolution pretty quickly. And we recently got a couple of letters which were resolved almost immediately, and absolutely understood the concerns of the users of those, of that reservation system and the problems they ran into. In some cases, well, we found several things.
The information on our website and on Tyler's website now provides more clarity that, for example, when you go to make a reservation, you need to log in before you start searching for a reservation. Because what happened is people were searching for reservations, and then they were getting kicked out and didn't realize that they had to log in. So we're correcting those kinds of problems, and I like to think that we are putting a lot of attention to this, to fix this in real time, and we're communicating directly to the members of the public that are encountering, these problems. But there's also, creating better understanding of the legislation, which was passed, which really said, Here's what you need to be doing with the reservation system. We have implemented everything that's in that legislation, and we this is a very high priority for us, and it's a daily part of our conversations.
And I will also I need to really give credit to our IT department at State Parks. They are the director of IT is involved in these conversations, and really, he does jump they jump on this right away, and we do reach out to the public. They have only been they've been running this reservation system since August '4, and we're still we're working with them as we find new challenges. So, for example, one of the most recent things that we started doing was creating a new lottery system for high there's four high demand parks, and it's really tough to create just that competition. So we're experimenting with a lottery system for those sorts of areas.
I don't know Liz, do you want to add anything else to that?
Speaker 11
Liz Mugirk, Chief Deputy Director at State Parks. I would just add that the implementation of the legislation that was recently passed around the no shows, people who modify their reservations, we have informed the public that we're beginning to implement those new processes and rules, they should take effect July 1. So we wanted to give the public ample time to understand the changes, and they will go into effect July 1. So we think we will see more compliance and less of the open spaces that you've experienced and talked to us about.
Speaker 8
Okay. So last year when we had this hearing, there was the explanation was we have a new Internet system, and we don't have the data yet that shows whether it's working or not. So now it's been, you know, almost a year. So do we not have any actual data about whether we have a higher rate of basically a lower rate of no shows and a higher rate of spots being filled? Do we not have any data that shows where we are on that?
Because I'm I'm I appreciate the you know, there's a complaint about needing to log in. I mean, those things, like, clearly need to be dealt with, but I'm really interested in, like, at a systems level, that our park system is providing the opportunity for people to stay overnight when they want to. And I think, you know, as I expressed, which I'll express again, people are able to game the system because they wanna stay on a Saturday, and they start booking on a Thursday, and they don't come on Thursday or Friday, and they might not show on Saturday because it doesn't cost very much anyway. So it's like when you walk around even these really high demand campgrounds in the morning and you see vacancy, vacancy, vacancy, and they all have signs that say, Reserved, reserved, reserved. And you're thinking, What are we doing as a state?
And so, to me, that should be like a really top priority, and I guess what I'm hearing you say is that you haven't really started any change to this until July, but there should be some data that shows, like, where are we right now? So if you could just address that more directly. Sure.
Speaker 9
We are explaining on the website, for example, that when somebody makes a reservation, that reservation is held until twelve p. M. Of the morning they were the day after they were supposed to be there. So, that can explain some of those vacancies, but it's also very clear as to how many days a reservation includes, to reduce that gaming system and picking five days to get one or two nights, and that's in our website, and it's also on Tyler's website, and I don't have the answer for the data right now, but I do know that the daily discussions do involve that, but I didn't bring that.
Speaker 8
So what you're saying is if somebody books for a Thursday, a Thursday, Friday, Saturday night, and they don't show by noon on a Friday, then they lose their whole reservation. Okay. And then what do you do with that vacancy?
Speaker 9
Both. Okay. And the way that it works is if you go to a this is one of the changes that we made that's different from last year. If you go online to a state park and you pick the name of a campground, immediately you get all of the campsites listed, and if they're available, they're green. If they're not available, they're red.
And the system is set up so right there, you can just click on the green, and it puts you into the reservation system. You log in, and you can get it right then. The system before was much more archaic than that. So we're making improvements, but honestly, what I'm seeing is, as we make improvements, it's like, Oh, we didn't expect that. But we really are I really want to say the teams are really jumping on this, and we take every complaint very seriously.
Speaker 8
Okay. Yeah, I'm thrilled to hear that. So what is it that you think will be happening or should be improving in July?
Speaker 11
Right. So the actual, you know, rules and policy will take effect July 1. So that includes that if you no show, I think it's two or three times in a year, you cannot book a campsite for a year. That you if you no show, you automatically lose your reservation. Those all take and will be implemented as of July 1.
We're doing education for the public now so that they know that this will happen because losing your ability to book a campsite for a year is a strong penalty. We wanna make sure people understand that while going into it. So the the the changes will be implemented as of July 1. I will say prior to that, though, so for example, in a campground, if it's Thursday and the person has not shown up, the the park staff will call and say, you coming? You know?
And if they say they're not coming, we will open it up immediately for reservations. So we're not waiting for that to happen July 1. We're doing things now. It's just the strict rules will be implemented on July 1.
Speaker 8
Okay. I'm very happy to hear that because last year, it seemed like the answer was, well, our new system is to send reminders. And to me, that was, like, actually not getting at the problem at all, but it was what was the approach was, well, we wanna remind people. But the reality is is that this is a high demand activity, and we had an enormous number of vacancies. And I don't even think we were actually quantifying what they were, but it was it was constituent complaints and personal experience was like, we are not doing a good job here.
So we really needed to get on top of that. So I'm happy to hear that you have, without legislation, implemented, you know, what you see because you're the closest to the problem. You're you have you have, obviously, staff who are working on-site who are walking around every morning and seeing these vacancies. And so saying, you know, we really wanna get to as close to a 100% occupancy, especially during summer in the times when so many people there's a big waiting list and people wanna be outside, that we make that happen, and it's a high priority. So I I'm I'm happy to hear what you're sharing.
I would like to see some data on vacancies If you're able to provide that and to my office, that would be great. And thank you for talking about this internally and continuing to make this a high priority because this is the one one of the most public facing things that the state park does. And when you compare it to private campgrounds and federal campgrounds, you know, you don't want us we want to represent the state well, right? And we have beautiful places, and we want the public to be able to be there.
Speaker 9
I will mention that we are working with other park partners like Hip Camp and other groups that assist with those reservations, so it's just not one avenue or two avenues of either walking in or talking to Tyler. You can actually go to partners and also be able to secure campsites with their assistance.
Speaker 1
I think making sure that we have the data then. I think as Senator Blake's request, I think that's a fair request to to get an idea that we really are getting a handle on this. I did want to go back to the Del Rio State Park. When that opened, I I was chair of the select committee on state parks at the time, and we we we had the presentation on the new state park, and it was a big thing to celebrate after having had no state parks open for so many years, for a decade, I think you said. So that was, congratulations on that.
I think the state of California is much better because of that. On the Park Pass program, I agree with Senator Blake Spear. I appreciate the comments from the LAO. And we do have a big we talked about this big structural problem that we have to deal with, but some of these nuggets that are so good to the very Californians that we represent is extremely important. And the success of that program, again, during the Select Committee on State Parks, that information was provided and it's clear that the community is aware of it and it's clear that they're using it.
So, thank you for that presentation. All right, then let's move to issue item number 20, low cost accommodations PCPs.
Speaker 9
Brian Dewey, is joining us, and he works with our acquisitions and development. So anyway, you want to go ahead and give the report?
Speaker 12
Sure. Thank you. Good morning. Brian Dewey, Assistant Deputy Director, State Parks. Issued 20, introduced here with the low cost accommodations.
The governor's budget requests $3,800,000 for five new and continuing low cost accommodation projects, including $2,000,000 from Prop 68 for two low cost accommodation projects at five for Big Sur State Park for the construction phase and Fort Ardunes State Park construction phase $1,800,000 in reimbursements and donations for low cost accommodation projects at Silver Strand State Beach for the working drawings phase, Angel Island State Park, preliminary plans, and Emma Wood State Beach, also for preliminary plans. Funding for these continuing projects will support the department's goal to continue to provide high quality, low cost coastal accommodations throughout the state. And with that, I'll be happy to take any questions you may have.
Speaker 13
David Jensen with the Department of Finance. No questions, but happy to field any questions that you may have as they come.
Speaker 10
Brian Metzger, Elio. We reviewed these proposals and had no concerns. They primarily use bond funding and reimbursement authority to advance the planning and construction of these projects, and once completed, would improve access to state parks and therefore have merit.
Speaker 8
just I'm looking through the agenda of the issues and just want it seems like the director might be leaving after this, or are you continuing to because I wanted to bring up the issue of the wildlife coexistence program, but I'm not sure exactly where that would fit with the issues.
Speaker 9
That's Fish and Wildlife. Oh, okay. The new director is That's the new okay.
Speaker 9
it. So I just know that I was leaving. Okay, got it. You. You know, can I just mention something about lower cost accommodations?
It's important, and we do have a lot of lower cost accommodations along the coast, in particular.
Speaker 9
about it. Well, we have campgrounds, cabins, cottages, and RV sites. I'll give Oceano Dunes as one example. To camp on the beach overnight at Oceano Dunes is $10 And the fees for these already are lower cost. And when we talk about lower accommodations, which Brian described, these are simple cabins that families or individuals could rent for somewhere in the neighborhood of like $100 $100 is what we consider lower cost accommodations when there's a structure involved.
But definitely, all of the campgrounds and and I would say that state parks' overnight facilities inherently are low cost. But with the demand that we have and the opportunity to really you know, I really do think of the visitorship of parks as being an opportunity to really continue to develop a constituency amongst the public about the public lands. And not only that, you mentioned Dos Rios. Dos Rios is actually an opportunity to really talk about water in California. And along with the questions, about water, I do think that, it's the most critical issue that is least understood in the public.
I served on the California Water Commission for six years or five years. It was six. And I also served on a local water board in Marin where I live, and I was astonished at the I mean, there are 10 basic questions that nobody can answer, and you could certainly answer those questions when it comes to your car and gasoline, but you can't answer those questions. So, I think a critical part of understanding the public's understanding of water in California it's actually pretty simple. In a way, it can be very clear.
And I do think that parks are a perfect platform for providing that information in place that people can take home.
Speaker 1
Very good. Thank you so much. Any other questions? Very good. Then let's move to item number item number 21.
Department overview for the California Department of Fish and Wildlife.
Speaker 14
Good morning, madam chair and senator Blake Spear. I am incredibly thrilled to be here. My name is Megan Hertel. I'm the new director of California Department of Fish and Wildlife. I am on day nine, which is why they've sent law enforcement up here with me, to make sure that I stay on my Ps and Qs.
But I will say I do have, some team members here that are going to help answer your detailed questions, just given my newness in this role. And I also wanted to let you know that I'm really looking forward to having a robust working relationship with all of you after we go through the Senate confirmation hearing. So looking forward to that conversation there. So, today, I'm going to talk a little bit about myself, just because we haven't met before. I'll give an overview of the department, talk about Proposition four proposals, and service based budgeting, which I know we've all talked about before.
So quickly about me. I'm coming from California Natural Resources Agency, where I had the privilege of working with Secretary Crowfoot, who you heard from earlier today. My previous role was Deputy Secretary for Biodiversity and Habitat, which means I led the state's 30 by 30 effort, as well as worked on cutting the green tape, which is one of the prime initiatives that the department has. It's looking at permit streamlining to improve the pace and scale of environmental restoration. The third part of my portfolio there was all things biodiversity.
So some days, that was wolves. Some days, it was giant pandas and zoos. You never knew what it was going to be. But all of those things, plus twenty plus years in California conservation, has really prepared me for this role. But more than all of that, I'm the person that grew up building pretend forts in the vacant lot behind my mom's apartment in North Carolina, or when I lived in Florida, waiting anxiously every year for sea turtle season so I could watch the little turtles go to the ocean.
And I'm still the most happy when I'm outside. And that is why it is such a privilege to be part of this department. I strongly believe that we have to protect our natural resources in California and that we have to do it in a way that also creates livable, resilient communities that increases opportunities for people to get outside. That's why I do this job. That's probably why you all have a passion for this.
We need to create that for more Californians. So, to put the department's mission very simply, we care for California's nature, and we do that for the benefit of Californians and the people that visit here, and we do it for the benefit of the plants, animals, and wildlife that make up California and make it unique. And it is not an easy task, as you helped set up in the hearing today. We are one of the globe's biodiversity hotspots. There's only 36 of them.
What that means is we have more plants and animals here in California than most other places in the world, and that's because of this incredible Mediterranean climate. A little early for allergy season right now, but otherwise incredibly beautiful. We also have amazing geography, some of the highest places and lowest places in The United States. And of course, part of this is also our long commitment to protecting the plants and animal species that make up the foundation of California. So our staff at California Department of Fish and Wildlife are on the front line every day as your trustees and the people of California's trustees for fish and wildlife.
We have the legal jurisdiction to manage, protect, and care for these plants, animals, and wildlife for the benefit of Californians and for the benefit of future generations. So, a couple facts about the department. The proposal is an 800,000,000 budget that is made up of state, federal, and bond funds. It comes from, in descending order, special funds of around $379,000,000, general fund of $181,000,000 and then further descending order federal funds, reimbursements, and bond funds. We have roughly 3,300 incredible people that work for the department.
I will admit, I have not met them all in my first nine days, but I have met a fair number of them, and I just wanted to let you know that routinely, every one of them starts with how passionate they are about the mission of the department, and I've also been impressed at how many are long serving. And what that tells me is we've got a workforce that is committed, that is passionate, and has deep expertise to do the work that we're asking them to do day in and day out. Of the roughly 3,300 people, the vast majority of them are permanent positions, so about 2,900. The rest are temporary. And what a lot of people don't know is we actually have 500 folks, like Chief Arnold here, who are part of our law enforcement division that are out there protecting wildlife, but also protecting people.
And Senator, we'll get to your questions on coexistence and human wildlife conflict. So this year, through the BCPs, we're requesting 68.5 additional permanent positions, and my colleagues who are in the audience who will come up and join for some of the more detailed BCP conversations can provide details on that. So, that's a lot of numbers, but just to make that real about what happens in the ground. We organize ourselves into six outward facing programs or work areas: biodiversity conservation land management hunting, fishing, and public access law enforcement communications, education, and outreach and oil spill prevention and recovery, or OSSPR, as most people would refer to it. Some examples of this work.
We just heard from director of state parks about the incredible public access that they provide. The department also manages 1,100,000 acres of land in California. So, it's a little bit less than state parks, but much of that land does provide public access. Other parts of it are closed for sensitive species or restoration, and we also manage hatcheries, helping recover fisheries. Our law enforcement side, which Chief Arnold will talk more about, is not only busting illegal cannabis grows, but is also stopping illegal international wildlife trade.
So they're protecting species here and also internationally. Just last month, they did an incredible effort in Fresno where they stopped an illegal shipment from Thailand that included ivory, elephant, walrus, and sadly other species as well. They've been providing protection to the people of California and our species for more than one hundred and twenty years. It's an incredible act of service. Our biodiversity conservation Senator, this will get to some of your question on permitting.
Actually, one of the things we do under that is cutting the green tape, which Secretary Crowfoot talked about, and that's an effort to increase the pace and scale of environmental restoration. One example of that in this last year, there was a project called Wildwood Canyon Wildfire Resilience Project. It's in San Bernardino, and this is in a landscape that looked much like the L. A. Landscape did before the fires.
So, a really invasive species, high fire risk. We put that through a statutory exemption for restoration projects, or SERP, which a lot of people call it, to speed that project forward, reduce costs for it. It's going to remove non natives, put in fire resilient native plants that reduce fire risk, and help recover species like crotches bumblebee, burrowing owl, and western spate bud. And the final one I wanted to highlight, actually, Senator, comes to the question you've got. So, I wanted to talk a little bit about communication, education, and outreach.
So, this is one of the areas that we think a lot about when we think about human wildlife conflict. It's only one of the prongs or one of the ways we need to address it, but studies have shown that outreach and education is an incredibly effective way to prevent conflict from happening. I saw this incredible presentation actually from a state parks individual who said, you know, if you're in downtown city, you wouldn't leave your laptop on the side of your car when you leave it parked. So, in Tahoe, don't leave a granola bar. And I thought, like, that kind of simple outreach and education means the world, right?
It can help people really understand how to avoid the conflict in the first place. And so, that's the type of work our outreach education and communication team does. So, in Prop four, the department is requesting 10,200,000.0 for a salmon parental based tagging program. That's a very long way to say taking genetic samples from small baby fish before we release them, so that when they return, we know where they came from. This is an efficiency improvement because it helps us understand what's working and what's not working as we work to help recover salmon and native fish populations.
We're also requesting roughly $20,000,000 for Central Valley hatcheries. This is going to help us with capital improvements, facility repairs, so those can operate successfully, and $20,000,000 to complete projects on some of those public access lands that I talked about earlier, so making sure that when people go out there, it's safe, they have a place to park, potentially can use a bathroom, and that those facilities and trails are adapted to extreme weather and climate events that we are already seeing on our properties. So, we have a handout. It is also available online. I'm not going to walk through each of these, but this does detail some of the service based budgeting.
The public can also see it on your website. I think all of you are relatively familiar with this process, but if not, just quick cliff notes on it. In 2018, the legislature directed us to go through a service based budgeting process. This basically means we looked at our mission and our mandate, and then we looked at how many dollars does it take to do it, right down to how much does it take Chief Arnold to operate his, how much does it take to run a hatchery. When
Speaker 14
was completed with a consultant, Deloitte, who is a world expert in doing this, we found that the department was operating at a three x deficit. So, basically, we were doing trying to do $3 of work when we had $1 The great thing from this is we now have data and tools that allow us to do this year in and year out, right? So, we can track change on it. As of FY24, 'twenty five, we were at 2.64x was where we were at. So, that was our service based budgeting numbers.
We are in the process right now of going through the 'twenty five, 'twenty six update on that, and that will let us know both where we have gaps but also help us prioritize the spending and look for where we need to put it. So, I will just close out by saying there are a lot of people that think that you cannot reach climate targets, address natural resource issues, have a strong economy, be affordable place to live, and I would argue that California, with your leadership and the Newsom administration's leadership and the work of departments like CDFW, is proving them wrong. And it is not easy, and it is especially hard in tough budget times when we have to make choices, but it's also the right conversation to be having because it's these natural resources that support our clean air, our clean water. They provide mental health, public health. They're the foundation of our economy.
This department is one of the oldest organizations in state government. We will show up and continue to do the work. We are committed to doing the work as best as we can to steward these resources now and for future generations. So, thank you so much for your time, and looking forward to the conversation.
Speaker 14
Can we squeeze them up here? So, coming up to join us are Deputy Director Dan Reagan, who is in charge of our fiscal department and you should ask the extra hard questions to him because he's an incredible expert And Deputy Director Chad Dibble, who is in charge of our Fisheries and Wildlife Division.
Speaker 1
Thank you. You may begin when you're ready. Or are you here just to answer questions?
Speaker 5
Madam Chair, members, Dan Reagan, Deputy Director of Fiscal Service Division, here to go through the presentation along with my colleague, Deputy Director Dibble, on the additional items or answer any current questions you may have.
Speaker 15
I think we're starting with Nutria. Okay. So in front of you is a proposal from the department to request one permanent position and funding for existing staff and temporary help to support our and expand our nutrient eradication program efforts. It's seeking 8,200,000.0, for fiscal year twenty six twenty seven and 8,000,000 ongoing. We anticipate the funding would allow the department to hire about five additional temporary staff to help us with our efforts, along with some vehicles.
With those staff and those vehicles, we think that it will give us the capability to expand our coverage to seven days a week, a little bit more than what we're doing now, and increase our ability to survey the lands at about 10% from what we're doing today. Nutri, as you know, their colonies create extensive burrows, they increase soil erosion, reduce bank stability, and cause lots of issues and concerns for our infrastructure, including levee failure. It's a pretty big issue here, as you know. The persistence of invasive nutrient in California will result in increasing prevalent impacts to multiple sectors, including wildlife and habitat conservation, agriculture, water supplies and conveyance, flood protection, greenhouse gas reduction. Not to mention all the agencies that are responsible for all of those things have to also deal with them.
It's a pretty big problem for us. We're really concerned about it. And I don't want to give you a whole bunch of things, I'm going give you some metrics and numbers. We like numbers. We are scientists.
So just to give you a little bit of background of what we're doing. At our current capacity, we're able to survey about a third of what we think is existing nutrient habitat across the landscape. That's about 170,000 acres a year of the 500,000 that we think is where nutrient are at. To date, we've deployed about 14,500 cameras. We have about a thousand of them that are currently active that we monitor.
We've detected over 1,500 sites across 11 counties where Nutria are. We've deployed over 20,000 trap sets. And as of today, we've now taken a total of 7,605 nutria, and we've removed 9,669 fetal nutria from the population so pregnant females. We continue to see that about fifty two percent of all females at the average of six months old are pregnant. And as a reminder of how invasive these species are, pregnant nutria can create an exploding population.
They breed year round. They can have three litters in thirteen months, with a litter size as large as 14. And those offspring can become reproductively mature at six months, as I mentioned. So basically, if you were to take one female that disperses and gets out pregnant female in just over a year, that single female can become 200 animals. So we're constantly on the lookout for these species.
We're constantly working with our staff, with the land managers that we work with, gaining access to these properties, and trapping for these animals to remove them as extensively as we can. And I think I'll leave it there.
Speaker 16
Sonia Sonia Sonia Pettig with the Legislative Analyst Office. Within the context of our overall framework report, this was one of the proposals that we highlighted as meeting the high bar for legislative consideration for approval. And that is because this proposal addresses important health and safety issues. As already pointed out, these animals can be very destructive to vital flood management and water supply infrastructure. In addition, we would point out that spending money now can help save money later.
Given how quickly these animals can reproduce and spread, doing nothing now could result in much higher costs down the road.
Speaker 17
Lanisha Capassewala, Department of Finance. I have nothing to add, and I'm happy to take any questions.
Speaker 15
Again, that's me. Thank you. I maybe I should have formally introduced myself. It got said a couple times, but I'm Chad Dibble. I'm the Deputy Director for the Wildlife and Fisheries Division at the Department of Fish and Wildlife.
So thank you again for having us, Madam Chair and members. This proposal for Golden Muscle is requesting eight permanent positions to increase our capacity to prevent the spread of Golden Muscle from infested waters to uninfested waters. These positions will be funded for the next three years from the funds that were approved this year under Prop one Prop four, excuse me. I think it was mentioned earlier, gold muscle is an issue we should be paying attention to, and the department is very much paying attention to. As was stated, you know, the first detection in The United States was at the Port Of Stockton in October 2024.
Golden mussels attach to surfaces, although they can attach and reattach. And their larvae suspend in water carried with flow. And they they can also get entrapped in conveyance facilities and live there for a while before they decide to attach the surfaces. They are present throughout the Delta, and we should assume that they are on every in every facility and every conveyance structure that the Delta supplies. And they will be detected at some point in the future.
We continue to work through with those agencies and with our partners to detect to look for detections across the landscape, But right now, we have not detected any golden mussels outside of the Delta and its conveyance system. They are a great threat to our state's water supply. They're a threat to our beneficial uses, including agriculture, recreation, and the environment. And they're more likely to spread overland than, what we've seen with quagga in the past. Following detection back in 2024, the department took immediate action and formed a task force, as you may know, led up of state and federal and local agencies to start working through, some solutions.
We put out what we called the golden muscle muscle task force response framework, which was intended to inform all of you, policymakers, legislative folks, to give them some ideas about what we can do as a state to try and manage this and address this issue. So we've continued to work with those partners over the last couple of years to provide outreach, work with the communities, most importantly, and kind of in our jurisdiction, is to working with parties to address how they might manage water infrastructure, what types of plans those folks need to have, how they can work through alternatives and ways to deal with it. And then also on our side, for our large constituent base, is making sure that, you know, we're working with the water operators and the reservoir operators to ensure that we still have access the water bodies across the state for our boating constituents that would like to continue access, then we can do so in a safe manner. So this proposal is just requesting the eight positions that would be supported through the funds we have to help us maintain the efforts we're doing now and help work with the communities to address Golden Mussels.
Ms. Hallou? Ms. Ms.
Speaker 16
Thank you, Madam Chair. We've reviewed this proposal and think it seems like a reasonable request for positions. The department needs people to do the necessary work. And we'd also point out that the department's had to redirect staff from other important jobs and responsibilities in order to respond immediately to this golden muscle infestation, so this would help alleviate some of that pressure. Thank you.
Speaker 1
Thank you. The final is Issue 24, protecting California's federally listed species.
Speaker 15
Again, this proposal is requesting five permanent positions to implement requirements imposed by Assembly Bill thirteen nineteen. These five staff would focus on the initial steps in AB 13, which are the monitoring aspects of what was created in that bill, which includes monitoring regulatory, legislative, judicial, and administrative actions, as well as proposed state legislation and regulatory changes, monitoring particularly those that relate to the species in California, analyzing and tracking legislation and regulations and development recommendations, preparing scientific and supporting documentation, such as those required for provisional listings, and publishing written findings in the California regulatory notice register, if needed, based on what's happening on the federal landscape.
Speaker 16
Thank you. Elio? Thank you. We also found this proposal to be reasonable. It's a modest request for physicians to implement the monitoring requirements of AB thirteen nineteen.
And in light of the budget situation, as well as uncertainty about the extent to which the federal government will weaken protections of California species, this seems like an appropriate approach. We would note that to the extent that the federal government does weaken those protections, we could potentially expect to see request in the future for additional staff and resources to actually implement protections at the state level for those species.
Speaker 18
Andrew Hall, Department of Finance. Nothing to add, but happy to answer any questions.
Speaker 1
Thank you. All right. Let's bring it back to the members. Questions? Senator Blexpierre.
Speaker 8
Okay. Thank you. Well, welcome, new director. So thrilled to have you. I'm we're looking forward to your tenure, so thank you for your work in advance.
I wanted to ask about three species, wolves, grizzlies, and beaver. So can you describe any thoughts on reintroducing grizzly bears and also ongoing work with our recovery of wolves and the wildlife human coexistence, and then also status on beavers?
Speaker 14
Great. I'll make some just overarching, and then I'm actually going to turn it over to Chad, who's been living this day in and day out for quite a long time. So, with respect to wolves, you know, the recovery and reintroduction well, the return, not reintroduction, of wolves to California is incredible from an ecological standpoint, and it is not easy on rural communities. And that is the place that we're at right now, is trying to figure out how respond to protecting this amazing species that has made its way back into California and doing it in a way that still allows people in rural communities to have livelihoods and to be able to go about business, right? And so, last year, the department did a tremendous effort to have an emergency response to some pretty extreme conditions and also made some really difficult decisions.
And so, I want to turn it over to Chad to give a little bit of overview of what we did then, because I think that gives you a sense of the scope of the challenge that we're facing in a relatively challenging budget year when hard choices have to be made.
Speaker 1
Chad? You want to cover Bay Of Sales specifically? No, just would wolves, generally.
Speaker 15
In general? So, we have a lot of outreach going on right now with wolves. We recognize both the return of wolves is super important to the state and many of our constituents, and we also recognize the impact it's having in the agricultural ranching communities. We continue to work with those folks day in and day out. We are a small but mighty team of three people that we've figured out how to reprioritize and shift funds around to provide the support.
Those staff work incredibly hard to respond to incidents of depredation, work with the ranchers to talk about preventative measures and solutions that they can apply on their landscapes to help prevent depredation events. They're the same staff that have to do the monitoring and research that we're trying to do to answer all of the questions that everybody has about how wolves are doing, where are they, the collaring efforts to try and collar animals so that we can track them and better understand them. So, we're constantly working with our folks and with those communities. We have ongoing relationships with every county, frankly, that has wolves in it. We've set up sort of a structure that we are working with our regional managers who are more out on the landscape.
They're meeting with these counties regularly. We're meeting with these counties regularly. We held a meeting in January or excuse me, in December, where we invited all of the Board of Supervisors from these counties, their Agricultural Commissioner, and their Sheriffs, along with several NGOs, and other folks that are just involved in wolf conversations. We're continuing those conversations now. Just Monday, we kicked off a workshop to start an evaluation of the existing wolf livestock compensation program, which, by the thank you for your support, over the last couple of years to put funding into that program so that we can help ranchers who are experiencing loss from wolf and cattle conflict, as well as putting real techniques onto the ground and helping support them with their techniques to reduce conflict.
So, we're working through all sorts of angles to try and work through that. We're increasing our communications. As you know, last year, we put up a website that sort of helps the landowners and the public see where wolves are for the collared wolves we have. We recognize that that's not every wolf in California has a collar on it, and so we still have some ground to gain there with how we can communicate better and work with those folks. But we are trying on all fronts to really work with the community to solve some of these issues bring that into tolerable levels and figure out how we can have some coexistence.
Speaker 14
The only thing I would add to that is thanks. The only thing I would add to that is that we recognize in a budget limited area that we're not going to be able to do everything. So, we've been working hard to work with partners like U. S. Fish and Wildlife Service, UC Cooperative Extension, cattlemen's, defenders of wildlife, California biological diversity.
So, you know, we are trying to bring everyone together to find a path forward here, but resources are short to be able to reply to this challenge. And as we think about the return of any top apex predators, there will be similar challenges. So, that would be my statement on grizzlies, because we have not, as an administration, taken a position on any proposals there yet.
Speaker 14
Beavers. I'm a beaver believer. I should say that. That will probably make some people in the audience really happy. But also, you know, there are, again, challenges with how beavers interact and landscape.
And so, the department has been doing reintroductions and trying to work with landowners to get around that. There is a beaver Hotline for those who are experiencing challenges. Chad, you may have more to add on here.
Speaker 15
Yeah. Another great program. We've been working really hard. Again, thank you for some budget support a couple years ago that created this program within the department to be able to make this happen. We've had several reintroductions that we're working through, and we have several sites located for this year to continue that.
It is a seasonality thing, so you have to sort of look at where you're trying to put these animals, what time of the year would be best to move them, what's the source locations we're looking for. We've had some success. We've learned some things along the way as well, and we're seeing some great signs of what's happening. The biggest issue is trying to find the right locations to reintroduce them to. There is a lot of work that needs to happen to ensure that that habitat is ready to receive beavers again, and that they will be able to thrive as we bring them to those locations, and then they enhance those ecosystem benefits that we're hoping to get out of moving them there.
So, lots of work happening there, lots of things coming in the near future. Great team of inside the department, super dedicated, working with the tribes, with the local, you know, land districts, with the forest service and other folks and partners that are really interested in this and trying to figure out how we can continue to move beavers. Also, paying attention to the human wildlife conflict side of things, making sure that we're finding the right locations where we think the beavers will have the best benefit and where they'll be able to survive.
Speaker 8
And what's an example of where they're being introduced that's on more successful side?
Speaker 15
The Tasman And Coyum, where we just did our first location, was a great place. They had spent years investing in habitat restoration in that area so that you have willows. There's a creek side. There's places where these beavers can go in immediately and start building lodges and dams and have the protection they need to survive just from the general predators and other animals that are in the environment. So, we're really working with them.
The Tule River Tribe was another place where we're continuing to look for projects down in that area. We had some mixed success in the beginning because we're learning as to which is the right type of habitats. And, you know, no meadow is created the same, no river is created the same. So we're really working through those as we go. We're developing tools to try and help us assess in the state where we think those locations would be, and if they're not ready yet, how we can invest other dollars to create habitats to prepare them for future reintroductions.
Speaker 15
No, we're trying to expand. Actually, we have some sites that we're looking down south. I don't have that number or those places exactly yet, but we are trying to expand and find those locations. A logistical thing we have is that you have to have a source population, and then there's also time. We have a quarantine period where we bring those animals into captivity so that we can ensure that they're healthy enough, they're safe enough to move.
So we have to have those facilities. Then you have transport time. So if you're traveling these animals really, really far from where we might have quarantined them and where we've held them for a while, there's logistics and all of that. So right now, that's a little bit of a limitation to find those locations. We only really have two places where we can house these animals after we've captured them and then we transport them out.
Speaker 8
Okay. Thank you. So the Human Wildlife Conflict Program was a specific program that was funded, and then it basically was allowed to lapse, but a lot of the work is still being done, it sounds like. And I'm a big supporter of us and introducing a bill on us funding it and basically restarting it. But I'm curious about the decision making around letting it lapse.
I mean, as a priority that you hear about, you know, was that not something that you were able to make work in the budget?
Speaker 15
So the conflict program has really started in, like, 2014 with some we started noticing some of that. We had some very short one time dollars early on through the drought cycles of 1516 in that space. That was again came back up in 2021 through some biodiversity enhancement one time funding, as well as continued with drought into 2022. Those funds expired in 'twenty four, which is what you're talking about. All of those were one time dollars for us to stand up program and work through it.
What you're seeing now is the ability to use those dollars and create some programs and some efficiencies where the department can stay engaged at that level, But a bulk of that program itself is literally just the staffing and the resources to be able to respond to those conflicts in a timely manner. We've tightened our belt. We've figured out how we can, to the best of our ability, pull staff here, redirect prioritize here, and do these things, which is what the public is still continuing to see. But it is not meeting the demands, as you have seen and heard, from what the public expects, and I think what we could do to do things better, as the director mentioned, with outreach, with just working with the public to generally understand how we can avoid this from the first place so we don't end up with the phone calls that we get. So there's lots of things happening, and we do try our best every day to try and be as responsive as we can to the public.
Speaker 8
Yeah. And hopefully, were here earlier when there was a really great analogy between in a coffee shop, you wouldn't leave your computer sitting out, and Lake Tahoe, you shouldn't leave a granola bar sitting out. You know, I think that that kind of education and communication is really important with the public and also with those who live with apex predators.
Speaker 15
Yeah. The The benefits we had from those one time dollars and what you see today is what we call our wildlife incident reporting system or WIR system. That is an online tool where the public can immediately go in and report a sighting. Whether it's just I saw one, I need help, they can work through that to actually get a depredation permit should they need it. There's all sorts of things there.
That was a tool that came out of that one time funding that is still existing today, which helps us organize internally as well. It receives about 6,000 incidents reported to it a year. However, we receive about 30 to 50,000 calls a year. So it's helpful, and it's out there, the public uses it, and we appreciate it. We still have more on that side.
The other thing that the one time funding created for us was to develop the toolkit we have online, Where right now, you your first stop should hopefully go to the website and not call us, because there's a myriad from bats to beavers to bears to mountain lions of information and sources of materials and tools and things that can help constituents. It can help local communities. It can help folks that want to work with their homeowners association to get the word out. There's all kinds of brochures and pamphlets they can download and things that you can use that hopefully eliminate the cost for us to come out and respond, and we can help as a community try and have a more coexisting lifestyle in some of these places where they continually have conflict.
Speaker 8
Right. Yeah, I mean, the depredation permit shouldn't be where we're trying to route people to. It should be that we don't need to have the desire for so many depredation permits. And then, I guess, just as a final comment, Chair, thanks for the indulgence with so many questions. It does concern me that the Department over many years has been trying to do with the money for one job, three jobs.
So, you know, the many different things that protecting endangered species, restoring these really important species, and supporting the communication with the public and how to live together, enforcing wildlife laws, responding to oil spills, you know, preventing them. The there's there's so much really critical work and also, you know, protection of habitat generally, removal of invasives. And I'll say I'm a recent a convert to goats. I think goats are an incredible way to manage fire hazard. I hope that you're seriously looking at those.
Is there any involvement with
Speaker 15
A 100%. Some of the numbers that the Secretary routed off earlier with wildfire resistance and the projects we've been able to implement through some of the funds that we've received are directly aimed at that. We have a very extensive program that is looking at vegetation management on our properties. So state properties is what we do, and goats are a large part of management and how we control vegetation across our properties.
Speaker 8
Yeah. I mean, the reality that every other way that you might clear brush, you have to do something with that brush. You either have to landfill it, burn it, compost it. But the goats just eat it and then poop out these little time capsules of nutrition. And then it just goes back into the land, you know, but you don't have this overgrowth of all the material.
It's just it really is an amazing, and also herd animals, if you think about the idea that our land used to have both either fire or herd animals. When you eliminate, you know, both of them, it's like we're gonna have a problem. And so reintroducing herd animals to places that haven't had any brush clearing in a century, you know, is just such a great solution. So I'm glad that you're looking at it as a department. But so, basically, I just wanna also just put in the the concern about being able to do the core work that needs to be done and making sure that I I in this budget year, it's not practical that we're gonna go from staffing at one to times three.
So I recognize that, but really just trying to support you and you identifying what your priorities are so that we can do that is really important to me. Thank you. Thank you, Chairman.
Speaker 1
It is of great concern that you are doing the work with one with just one third of the personnel that you need. And I think, as my colleague has said, trying to find those balances when we talk about health and safety as a priority from the LAO's office. Looking at that looking at our budget through that lens is extremely important because we won't be able to fund everything that we want to fund and we won't be able to start new programs and even implement some of the legislation that our colleagues had signed by the governor just last year, implementing some of those that are extremely important but having to make the tough decisions in our committee. Senator McNerney, did you have some questions or comments?
Speaker 7
I believe I do. Very good. Thank you. Director, thank you for coming in front of us in just eight days. That's pretty brave, in my opinion.
Where did you come from before? What was your prior situation?
Speaker 14
I was at California Natural Resources Agency, where I was Deputy Secretary for Biodiversity and Habitat. So I worked for Secretary Croufon.
Speaker 7
Okay, so you came with some knowledge of the problems and challenges. Thank you. Well, I've got three things to talk about. First of all, fairly straightforward. I'm encouraged that the CDFW is working with the Winteman Wintu tribe on the salmon restoration on the McLeod River.
I think that's worthwhile, and, they they're doing good work. What I'd like is to ask next time, that, your department comes in front of us, you have a report about, what how the work is going and, how the money is is flowing. Is that gonna be a continuous So I think that's important to me and my district and the state, really. The second is the nutria. I've never seen one of these things live, but I guess they're big rodents.
Rodents, little rodents are already pretty scary. Big ones gotta be worse. So, you know, hearing that these guys are multiplying at the rate that's being described is is very, very concerning. There's a thousand miles of levee levees in the Delta, and so preventing that species from causing damage to levees is very concerning. It's a very big problem, and I I wanna make sure that we have we have a good start on this.
I guess the $8,200,000 is a good start, and I I just wanna know if that's gonna be anywhere near enough to do what needs to be done to get these rodents under control.
Speaker 15
Like I said, right now, this proposal is essentially seeking to maintain where we are given the fiscal, you know, conditions we're in in the state. The department, since 2018 when these new trees were first detected, has really tried to build a portfolio. We've had a multitude of of avenues to fund this over time. You all have provided some funds. We've worked with others for grant funds.
We've worked with other entities to create this portfolio. Those funds have depleted as many funds across the state have depleted. And so, this proposal here is to maintain where we're at. And as I mentioned, we're not able to survey everywhere. There is a nutria, or we believe there is.
But we've we're tackling about a third of what we think is existing habitat as it relates to nutria on the ground right now. We have taken more animals in the last three years than we've done ever. Last year was the highest we've ever taken. And that's really just a little bit of us being able to concentrate on an area. It's kind of this give and take.
If you take all of your resources and concentrate on an area where you have known detections and try to really wipe that out or take that number down, it limits your ability to look at where dispersing nutrient are moving and what are their habitats so you can get in front of where they're starting to expand. So we're trying our best to manage that in amongst a very vast waterway, as you mentioned. I mean, our whole Central Valley is is waterways, which is how these animals move. They can disperse up to 50 miles. They eat, you know, 25% of their body weight in in a day, And they're very reproductive, or very fertile.
So, we work through all of that, and it's our our best guess right now is to continue where we're at. And that's what we're trying to do is just, at least, this will help us maintain where we are today with what's happening on the landscape.
Speaker 15
Vegetation. They'll wipe out a a wetland habitat, which is part of our risk here is that we're investing, you know, millions of dollars into our landscapes and trying 30 by 30 and our different wetland landscapes, and we're putting a lot of effort into that. So, this is really also a protection of the resources and the money we've spent into those programs for carbon sequestration. It's a protection in our levy systems for health and safety, water delivery, all of the above.
Speaker 7
And in prior years, how has the funding been spent? Spent? Yeah. How has the prior money been used?
Speaker 5
It's the task force and staff. Program. Yeah. So, yeah, Dan Reagan again, Deputy Director of Fiscal Service Division. The funding that we've received over the years, whether it be the one time grants from states, some federal funds or general fund, is supporting the mutual eradication program within the department.
Currently, it's roughly 19 permanent staff with over 50 temp help staff that go out and do the trapping, do the detections, as well as using detection dogs as well, and a variety of different ways to go out and really try to eradicate the new tria by cell, as well as continuing to be on top of new detections as we find them.
Speaker 15
Yeah, thank you, Dan. I was not understanding that. Yes, about 50 staff limited term, as Dan mentioned, with some permanent staff. We have tried some novel ideas, learning from others, and as Dan mentioned, with the detection dogs to come out and help us seek areas where maybe these animals have dispersed, look at new areas where we haven't been able to get to in a more efficient manner than, you know, putting out cameras and just waiting. We've also tried some what we call Judas Nutria, which is sterile nutria.
We've worked a couple of times to where we'll bring those into our animals in. We'll sterilize them, and then we will release them with tags or collars or not collars, but radio tags on them, so that we can track where they might go, see if they're meeting up with other nutria, and to help. We've had mixed success in that space. It's a little bit, you know, science research y kind of stuff that we're still working through. But our best effort is on the ground, camera traps and just traps in general, and deploying staff out to remove the animals.
Speaker 7
Well, I'm worried about the cuts to the the department and the positions that might be lost. So that's something that we need to make sure we can get you guys the staff you need to do that. The other question is the other comments of Goblin Muscle. These invasive species invasions seem to be getting worse. A few years ago, as I mentioned earlier in this hearing, the Waters Hyethis were pretty pretty much of a threat.
They choked off a lot of the waterways. There was couldn't boat down certain, know, canals and so on. I think that's kind of controlled now, I'm not entirely sure about that. The NutriEat Hyacinth?
Speaker 15
No. Division of Boating Waterways runs that program with the Hyacinth control program. We work with them, obviously, but that is the the agencies that's responsible for that. I will agree. We've had years of boom and bust.
I think they're doing their best to get out there and try and to address hyacinth controls. We actually recently, a year or so ago, had some additional funding and worked with them to deploy hyacinth control, which actually was to our benefit so that we could access areas where nutria were. Because we too were having restrictions in in our ability to get to some of those locations. So we were working hand in hand with them to allow us to help get access to where some of these colonies were.
Speaker 7
Can you detect nutrient with infrared light like humans or other mammals?
Speaker 15
Infrared? I mean, yeah. We don't we don't you'd like night vision stuff. Yeah. We don't we don't currently do that now as part of our deployment, but I would imagine, yes.
Speaker 5
Yeah. No. I mean, as part of you can. As part of the trapping efforts and detection efforts, you know, we trap day and night, that's part of what this proposal does. The second part there, the challenges, though, within Nutria and then their habitat also exists beaver and muskrat, and they all look very similar.
And so, you know, the detection particularly at night, need to make sure you have a positive detection of the right species before we go attempt to trap or eradicate.
Speaker 7
Well, is the CDFW providing guidance to help water agencies that convey water to operate reservoirs to develop plans for the mussels?
Speaker 15
We are working through. We, we're fortunate enough, again, thank you, to receive some funds just like this this current year. We're working through, as Minnie mentioned earlier, about Prop four funds, trying to get those on the ground. We've actually made some great strides to try and, work through the responsibilities there, which are working with water agencies to update their management plans and their response plans to, ensure that golden muscle protections are part of it. We are continuing to work with stakeholders, to, understand how they can be preventative in their water bodies to allow boating access and continue in that efforts.
What we hear mostly is is they're in the same boat as us. It's very hard to do this work. It requires new staff, new new resources to be able to maintain these, new activities. And and I do think that you're gonna see the hardest hit communities, which we're already starting to see in the Delta proper now. You're starting to see the agricultural impacts that are coming, the drinking water supply impacts that are coming.
You're starting to see, waterways or conveyance facilities, whether they're screens or pumps, pipes that are starting to be infected, by a golden muscle and they're having to deal with that, across the landscape. That is not something the department is funded or or or worked to do. That is that is falling on these local communities and these other water districts, and I think it's something that, you all are hearing about, we're hearing about, and needs more conversation around how do they get some support in this space as well.
Speaker 7
So, they don't use more water, but they obstruct water. They obstruct water, correct. And so tunnels or aqueducts or any kind of movement of water is liable to be infected and obstructed by these things.
Speaker 15
Correct. And and our biggest thing is overlay concern mostly is not only just delivery systems because that's the easiest vector to get through, but you have overlaying concerns. Things that sit in the in the delta or in infected water for any limited or any amount of time, they become infected. So as those things, whether it's a boat, whether it's monitoring equipment, whether it's construction activity that goes from one, you know, place to another, those things now need to be decontaminated. They need to be, evaluated to ensure that not maybe not decontaminated, but they need to be inspected to ensure that they're carrying villagers or they're not having issues with gold muscle before they're deployed or put into another water body.
And that's part of this preventative measures we're taking. Those are the conversations we're having. Those are steps we're taking to help folks understand that risk, and understand what protocols they can do to help prevent that risk.
Speaker 15
They have a high tolerance, and that's why they're successfully in the Delta now, which is the difference between quagga and zebra where we're seeing these the tolerance level of of gold mussel is much higher, And therefore, we have a lot of more susceptible water bodies in the state than we did with quagga and zebra. So you kind of had a little bit of a benefit for water bodies that had alkalinity levels that didn't line up with where those species could survive. Golden mussel have a much higher tolerance, and we're so the concern risk is really real.
Speaker 7
So is there a concern that they'll travel up the Sacramento River or the McCullumie River or San Joaquin River?
Speaker 15
Yes. Those are all connected to the delta. Very much concerned that they will make their way through those systems, and it there right now is no way for us to prevent that. The concern we have is when you get outside of the delta system or the conveyance system where water coming from the delta is going and trying to, you know, get above dams and above reservoirs or things that are off stream from what the delta and conveyance is. And that's where we're trying to make sure that we don't get that infrastructure going across there or get those gold mussels going across that infrastructure.
Speaker 7
Yeah. Well, this is God's work Yeah. Or something. Thank you. I'll yield back.
Speaker 1
Thank you, senator. I have just a few questions, and I'll start with the golden muscle. It you're it's a request for eight permanent positions, $28,000,000 from the from prop four. How many years is is that going to fund?
Speaker 1
I I don't remember what it what it was that I read, where it where it came from. But is this something that you're expecting within the three years then to have a plan that's going to eradicate this?
Speaker 15
Right now, we're not aware of any eradication methods that will successfully remove them from the environment. What we know is that we're working with our scientists and with researchers to figure out ways to mitigate and offset the impacts of golden muscle as they affect and disrupt delivery of water primarily and clog infrastructure. But right now, there is no eradication method or process that we're aware of. It's it's part of the concern that everyone has.
Speaker 1
Oftentimes, when we hear that something just came into our system, it's to find where it came from and what they did to to manage it or to eradicate it. But are you're saying the scientists are and everyone involved as of yet doesn't have a real plan to get rid of it, to eradicate it then.
Speaker 15
Correct. There's been no way to eradicate it that we're aware of. It's a it comes from, I think, Southeast Asia, and it was believed to have come from ballast water system and and gotten into the delta.
Speaker 1
Thank you. On the Nutria, I think the first time I was involved with one of the budget subs in the assembly in 2017 or 2018, We heard about this. We saw the photos. It was hard to believe. You should have brought a photo for senator McNerney.
It's it's hard and in color. It's hard to believe that these rodents are so big. From 2017 to now, what is the annual amount that has been budgeted specifically for Nutria?
Speaker 5
I'll take that one. That's varied from year to year. So from 2017, actually didn't have 'eighteen, 'nineteen was our first year of funding that we received, and we received a grant from WCB, from Wildlife Conservation Board, U. S. Fish and Wildlife Service.
And that's the budget that you're referring to for the $1,200,000 that we received from general fund as well. So we had about $1,600,000 in 'eighteen-'nineteen. Since then, we've received an ongoing general fund appropriation that started in 'nineteen-'twenty. That was the continuation of that 'eighteen-'nineteen funding. That is currently approximately 1,400,000.0.
That's the only ongoing funding that CDFW has. Everything else has been supplemented with grants or other one time general fund. And so we've varied between we've gone between, you know, 1,400,000.0 to as high as about 5,000,000 a year through various one time funding opportunities, whether it's reimbursements from Delta Conservancy, which was funded by a Prop one grant from them, or other federal funding opportunities. And we continuously look for additional opportunities that are out there, whether it be from federal or state opportunities, to supplement the program where we can.
Speaker 1
The request now is for $8,200,000 this year and then $8,000,000 ongoing. How many positions does this account for?
Speaker 5
So this continues our 19 permanent positions with an additional of one additional permanent position. So roughly funds 19 existing staff and one additional new staff. And then it funds approximately between 35 to 50 temp help staff that we put the boots on the ground, typically sci aids, scientific aids for boots on the ground work. So you're looking at a total team of roughly 60 to sixty sixty to 70 folks at any point in time. And it as Chad said, it kind of while we trap year round, it depends on seasonality, depends on weather of how many folks we have on the ground at any point in
Speaker 1
And we heard that last year was the year you were able to trap more than any other year.
Speaker 15
Focused effort. I think us really concentrating on some areas that, we hadn't been looking at. We're able to get into some of those areas, and the numbers were just really high. And so, like I said, it was a trade off of, are you trying to put your resources everywhere and spread it out really thin, which gives you numbers and you're keeping sort of maintaining? Or do you go in and try to fully eradicate some of these areas in a cell area if you can?
These animals move. They're constant. And so it's a difficult task for us. But if you can look at it, can we eradicate from this small area where they're at, knowing that some might disperse, but really get to a point where you're really trying to clean that area up, recognizing that you might have some growth in other areas, and then we can move resources over to those areas. But that's really what's, I think, part of that ability for us was this last year was concentrating in some areas and really finding out that there's a lot there.
Speaker 15
Yes. Oh, it's all everything is intentional with this group. We work with several partners to implement this program. This isn't just solely the department as far as decisions and how things happen with land access and working with landowners and duck clubs and hunting clubs and wetland areas and refuges and things like that. It's a very coordinated effort with many folks.
But at the end of the day, most of this is the department. The U. S. Fish and Wildlife Service, I should say, does do stuff on their refuges, so they have had some federal funding that's assisted them in their work, so we cooperate with them in those spaces. But the rest of it has been the department primarily driving most of these activities.
Speaker 1
And the last question in this regard is, have you been able to receive any financial help from or work in coordination with other entities like DWR, local flood control, water districts, or agricultural interests?
Speaker 5
No, none of those entities. We have received federal funding from U. S. Fish and Wildlife Service. We've also received a federal grant from the National Wildlife Refuge System, as well as Delta Conservancy, which was ultimately a Prop one grant.
Speaker 1
Okay. Do you see any opportunities with any of these agencies for the future?
Speaker 5
We're constantly looking for opportunities of any types, shape, or form.
Speaker 1
Very good. And law enforcement, I did want to ask. Welcome back. I had the privilege of meeting with some of the representatives of law enforcement and with the representatives specifically from Fish and Wildlife, how many wildlife game wardens do you currently have?
Speaker 1
And what is your general estimates to the number of wardens that you need to adequately fulfill the law enforcement responsibilities?
Speaker 20
It's kind of a multifaceted approach when you look at it. As we know, with the SBB data, we're working with a third of our mission level. But there's other things out there that the law enforcement division is doing that helps. Advancements in technologies, advancements in particular pieces of equipment like the procurement of a new airplane and a patrol vessel, which are things that we're able to get through BCP, thankfully, from all of you in order to do that. That helps us tremendously because when we're able to when a patrol vessel goes down for three or four months, that obviously limits our capabilities quite a bit.
So it's kind of a holistic approach, but there's a lot of different mechanisms in order to fulfill that mission that we need to within the law enforcement division.
Speaker 1
So what would be just your estimate, the number of wardens you would need to to do the work and to fulfill the obligations and responsibilities. Just try to get an estimate. Clearly, you all all work more than you should, and you're taking care of more duties because in the end you've been able to fulfill, at least generally speaking, your obligations. But to fulfill all of the obligations adequately, just in your opinion or in anyone's opinion? Even our new chair or new secretary who's been there for nine days, eight days.
Speaker 5
Yeah. Mean, I would say there's as Chief Arnold said, I mean, there's a lot of things that go into it. We are operating and our SPB data does show, overall, the departments at a 2.64 x gap for the positions and hours, staff hours and positions the departments needs. That is similar to law enforcement. Law enforcement's operating at currently 33% of their need if it was a one for one.
Speaker 1
Okay. Comes out So as we talk about additional people to add on to permanent positions to add on, we're talking about people who are taking on some of those responsibilities?
Speaker 5
Yeah. Other people could be taking on the responsibilities. I mean, for the wardens, not so much. There's a lot of other things that they're using, whether it's technology to close the gaps to help be more efficient or overtime as well, or it's just prioritizing where we put boots on the ground and what those wardens are doing and focusing on at any given time?
Speaker 1
Prioritizing, that's the word we're going be hearing a whole lot about during these budget hearings. Department of Finance?
Speaker 18
Yeah, Andrew Hole with the Department of Finance. I was just going to say that, you know, the SPB does represent a gap, but there's multiple ways of trying to close that gap, and staffing is not the only way to do that, as they've alluded to.
Speaker 1
Thank you. My last question has to do with prop four. The governor's budget includes $10,000,000 in this 2627 budget for reducing climate impacts on disadvantaged communities and expanding outdoor recreation. Would you please tell us how the department plans to use the $10,000,000 of prop four funding proposed to reduce climate impacts on disadvantaged communities and expanding outdoor recreation?
Speaker 5
want to clarify, it's actually $20,000,000 in 'twenty six-'twenty seven. We received $10,000,000 in 'twenty five-'twenty six.
Speaker 5
And I'll start with examples from what we used the $10,000,000 for because that's pretty much just an expansion of the 'twenty six, 'twenty seven funding. So in 'twenty five, 'twenty six, the department received $10,000,000 as you stated, for projects. We've identified eight projects that will build on projects and investments and improvements that completed the access to underserved community funding that we received in 'twenty one-'twenty two from both General Fund and Prop 68. It's across eight different properties in the state currently, and then the 'twenty six-'twenty seven funding expands to an additional 21 properties for the $20,000,000 But a lot of that funding goes to things like lands management plans, which is new and updated land management plans, which will provide clear vision for the public, access opportunities on CDFW lands and key focal sites. In addition, we're looking at new interpretive panels and kiosks.
As our director stated to you before, ADA panels, kiosks or ADA bathrooms, ADA trails, trail hardening, covered picnic tables, benches, viewing platforms, parking lot and access road improvements, and mobility impaired hunting blinds for opportunities for the public. The land management plans, as I said, will guide a phased expansion on public access infrastructure so that the increased pressure on the resources caused by more visitors will not result in negative impacts on sensitive resources on the property. We're also looking at investing a small amount of this funding to ensure key metrics so that we can come back and prove that the investment was successful by looking at things and ways to be engaged with with the public and find out how they're how they're accessing the property, whether it's successful, what features they're using at the property, things like metered entry gates, traffic counters for vehicles, and other ways to baseline public usage and change over time to follow the installation of access improvements. So things like QR codes on our interactive panels so that folks can not only go to and find what species may be there, including things of we're looking at opportunities for folks to use a QR code and hear what species may be out at the wildlife areas or what birds or what animals may be out there.
And that kind of goes to the statewide education interpretation for as those well as looking at increased tribal participation and development for the interpretive materials to provide that education and opportunity for folks to learn about the lands and about the connection to the lands of what's out there. So that's the projects we've identified for the $10,000,000 Just a quick oversight. We're happy to provide more information and provide you some photos and samples of what the projects look like. And then for the $20,000,000 we're expanding on the existing eight properties and have identified 21 additional properties throughout the state for those same types of projects.
Speaker 1
And I think for Prop four, it's very specific, about 40% having to be used for disadvantaged low income communities. So what is the specific outreach that you're using and how are you targeting the disadvantaged communities to make sure that they are the ones that are using that have access to the benefit of the $20,000,000 Sure.
Speaker 5
I'll start it off, and then I'll turn it over to my colleague, Chad. So part of it is the engagement of looking at where these properties are and the radius to which they are within a disadvantaged community to making sure that those folks we're putting it in somewhere where it's not even accessible by disadvantaged communities, whether by walking or bicycling or community transportation. So that's kind of the first step to ensure that it's benefiting disadvantaged communities, the proximity to which those properties are and ensuring that they have the opportunity and then that the access improvements are actually improvements that they'll be able to utilize. So does the property even have, which a lot of our properties don't, have a restroom or have an ADA accessible restroom? And so that's the first step as far as identifying what project to ensure that it was even being utilized by a disadvantaged community.
And then for the outreach, I'll let the turnover to you.
Speaker 15
Well, thank you, Dan. I'd just clarify that while it calls for 40%, we're targeting 100 The properties we have identified do meet that criteria for STEC or disadvantaged communities. So we're working through our properties that are within those radiuses, as Dan mentioned, so that it does provide those opportunities. Secondarily, we have a great interpretive system. We have, as the director mentioned, with our education outreach folks, we work really hard with local communities, with our school districts, with our, you know, promotional activities, things that we do to help encourage folks to come to these properties.
And as Dan mentioned, making these improvements, we plan to celebrate those to let people know that they're there, to remind folks that they're out there. There is somebody other than just state parks, out there with with opportunity for the public to get out onto state owned land. So we're working through some of those things now and strategies on how to do that better, how to continue to do that where we have been successful. And then we're also going to work with the interpretive folks to really try to push this through a new narrative. And like I said, I guess I just said the same thing.
But it's basically that we're just we're trying to expand on where we've Sounds different. Yeah. We're trying to expand on where we've been before. It's this is a great opportunity. When we got the funds several years ago, it was amazing to see, even within our own department, when our staff came and presented what we were able to do, and to see the faces light up of like, wow, like how what a difference it is to actually have a parking lot for our folks to come out and just start to walk on a trail.
Or I couldn't believe how expensive it was to build a shade structure. That was pretty amazing. And so we get these dollars and then you start to apply them on the landscape and you realize, you know, sometimes the dollar doesn't go very far, but the improvement in the end is huge. And to have to know that you can now go out to these properties and actually have a vaulted toilet or a bathroom for somebody to actually go is a pretty big deal. So we're really excited to continue these funds and we're appreciative of the money we've had and we hope to bring you some great projects that are just completed and show you the success we've had when we get it done.
Speaker 1
I am very interested in seeing where they are located throughout the state of California. Sure. Oftentimes, Northern California, I mean, they have lots of open space, and so lots of attention is given to them. But there are areas, like, further south, the Inland Empire. There are areas that, in my humble opinion, require more attention.
And I so I would like to see where where the emphasis is throughout the state of California to make sure that all communities are included, especially if we're talking about disadvantaged, then we look to those measures that help us find where the disadvantaged communities are to make sure that we really are reaching them and that they are getting access to this great California that we have and the open space that we have and what's available to them, and to make sure that they also know that the investment of this prop 40 that they voted on is helping them also, is bringing access to them.
Speaker 15
I appreciate that, and I can give you a short list just so you can know geographically. We're looking at the eight projects we mentioned, Mount Shasta Hatchery, Gray Lodge, Northern, North Table Mountain, we have Grizzly Island, Elkhorn Slough, Syenega Springs, Hot Creek Hatchery, and Imperial Wildlife Area. So we very much are on the same page as you in trying to make sure that we're spreading these resources around and looking for opportunities across the state to provide this access for folks that already have it to some extent, but creating more ability for folks to get out there and then again trying to remind them that this resource is actually out there for them and we'd like them to come visit us.
Speaker 1
Imperial, I think, was the closest. I didn't hear San Diego, but we've got 20 more projects coming. And I think I would like to see where those 20 projects are. Personally, I would like to see that.
Speaker 5
Yes. We're happy. We'll get you a map with them dotted out on you so can see exactly Thank where they're
Speaker 1
you. Any further questions? Very good. I do want to thank oh, now we have public comment. Alright.
Can't forget our public comment. Thank you all.
Speaker 21
We made it to the afternoon. Good afternoon, madam chair. Thank you so much for your leadership, this year in this subcommittee. My name is Jennifer Fearing. On behalf of Surfrider, I just wanted to express support for funding the Coastal Commission to implement Senator Laird's SB four eighty four, that was issue 16.
And on behalf of National Wildlife Federation and San Diego Humane Society regarding issue 21, The severe, long standing, and chronic underfunding of the Department of Fish and Wildlife must be addressed, and there are two ways we urge you to do that in fiscal year twenty six-twenty seven. First, by reinvesting in wildlife coexistence and wolf recovery support to keep communities, people, and animals safe and to avoid a preventable conflict. Thank you, senator Blake Spear, for your leadership on that. And secondly, maintaining all of the 164 positions and the funding proposed to be swept from this department by the administration. As senator McNerney said, eliminating positions is not gonna speed up permitting, and it's not also not going to protect endangered species, restore beavers, enforce wild life laws, or respond to oil spills, among other priorities that are included in positions that would be lost there.
There really are no unnecessary positions at a department that's only got a third of its personnel. And lastly, the California Wildlife Officers Foundation, also regarding issue 21, we too support the coexistence investments so that wildlife officers can focus on fighting crimes against wildlife rather than responding to conflicts. And we strongly urge retaining the 47 wildlife law enforcement positions that were only vacant to allow them to onboard an academy of newly trained officers. These are critical positions that cannot be considered remotely unnecessary when only a third of needed law enforcement personnel, are there as you as you pointed out. So thank you, and we look forward to continuing to work throughout this budget year on these issues.
Speaker 22
Thank you. Good afternoon. Kim Delfino, representing Defenders of Wildlife, California Native Plant Society, Sonoma Land Trust, Mojave Desert Land Trust, Cal Trout, Trout Unlimited. Want to echo the comments already made by Jennifer Fearing with respect to the need to invest in coexistence, and also to retain those 164 positions at the Department of Fish and Wildlife. It is a department that has already seen, as you've seen with the grid on service based budgeting, they've dropped down 5% in permitting and law enforcement.
And so this is a serious need. As for Issue 21, the Golden State Salmon Association strongly supports the administration's Prop four funding for hatcheries and parental based tagging. On Issue 24, Defenders of Wildlife and the long list of clients that I already mentioned also support the department's budget change proposal to implement AB thirteen nineteen. We know that the Trump administration will be rolling back protections for endangered species. These five positions will be critical to start doing those protections.
And finally, actually, two more. Issue 17, the California Association of Zoos and Aquariums really strongly support the $10,000,000 in Prop four funding for the Nature Climate Education Research and Facility grants. And finally, the California Coastal Protection Network supports the BCP for the education person at Coastal Commission, but also would request that there be additional funding appropriated out of Prop four for the Whale Tail Grant Program, which is, by the way, California's oldest outdoor education and outdoor access program. Thank you.
Speaker 23
Good afternoon, Madam Chair, members of the committee. Paul Mason with Pacific Forest Trust. The nice thing about not going first is I can refer to what was already said, and I really will echo what Ms. Delfino and Ms. Fearing said about the human wildlife conflict conversation.
I think that's a really important place to continue in making more investments because it is such a public facing part of what the department does, and it really helps people understand that Department of Fish and Wildlife really plays an important role. With regards to the bond appropriations, talked about in item 17, we're very supportive of the administration's proposal, urged the APA exemption to be carried over into that budget appropriation as well. I will flag that the wildfire investments, when you look at the combined bond and GGRF, this year would actually represent a decline of funding compared to the last five years. And that's because, of course, we've moved the GGRF into the lowest priority allocation, the wildfire GGRF. That's going to be a problem going forward, so I'll just flag that right now.
And also just to express support for Issue 24, the funding for the AB thirteen nineteen implementation. Thank you.
Speaker 4
Madam Chair, Senator Robert Gore from the Guelco Group. On behalf of a long list of, cities, districts, including more than 100 DACs, I'll get a list to your amazing consultant. Water, thanks to this legislature, is a statutory human right. Water that's delivered on demand, on time, insufficient quality and quantity by, unfortunately and largely, invisible infrastructure that includes forecast analyses, storage conveyance, and treatment facilities. We thank you for your continued support, and this fiscal year in particular, perhaps restoring the DAC drinking water funding at the Water Board.
Thank you.
Speaker 13
Good afternoon, Madam Chair. Carlos Gutierrez with KSC, here on behalf of the California Rice Commission. We respectfully request $5,000,000 in one time general fund to support and continue the California Winter Rice Habitat Incentive Program administered by the Department of Fish and Wildlife. With more than 95% of California's historic wetlands lost, rice fields in the Sacramento and San Joaquin Valleys provide essential surrogate habitat for millions of birds along the Pacific Highway. This investment will strengthen critical habitat protection while advancing the state's biodiversity, environmental, and agricultural goals.
Speaker 24
Good afternoon, Madam Chair and members. My name is Amaruq Weiss. I am a biologist and former attorney and the senior wolf advocate for the Center for Biological Diversity. Nearly a quarter million of the center's 1,800,000 members and supporters live here in California because we love it so much. As we heard earlier, CDFW's program to prevent and reduce conflicts between humans and wildlife tragically ended in 2024.
We need to fix that. Wildlife is California's heart and soul. Thank you, senator Blakespeare, for introducing senate bill eleven thirty five to establish a statewide wildlife coexistence program and to build on CDFW's wolf recovery efforts. The final budget for fiscal year twenty six twenty twenty seven should include $18,000,000 general fund and 15,000,000 in ongoing funding to support around 60 permanent positions and associated costs for CDFW in Dear Lord, so they do not have to slash any existing positions. We also strongly urge the inclusion, excuse me, of $30,000,000 in the final budget for CDFW's wolf program to adequately fund staffing and to invest in the much needed conflict deterrence efforts that we all want.
It's what Californians want. It's what our wildlife deserves. Thank you.
Speaker 25
Good afternoon, Chairing members. Jamie Finneus with the Community Alliance with Family Farmers, representing 8,000 small and underserved farmers across California. Here to comment on issue number 17, on the Governor's proposal, Prop four proposal specifically on two new programs. First, on the land access and tenure for socially disadvantaged farmers and ranchers. This would create the first ever land access program in the nation.
We agree with the LAO that the legislature should provide clear direction on how to implement this vital program. Additionally, we urge the legislature to increase the total appropriation from 5,000,000 to $15,000,000 this year, which is half the funding in Prop four. This would ensure meaningful distribution of funding in this initial phase of the program. Secondly, CAF is in strong support of the Governor's proposal to allocate $14,800,000 for the Equipment Sharing and Farmer Cooperative Program. Thank you.
Speaker 26
Good afternoon, chair and member. Karen Stout here on behalf of the Animal Legal Defense Fund. Really similar comments to a lot of the other speakers. Really appreciate the focus on both workforce and the coexistence efforts. As we've already talked about, recent human wildlife conflicts have generated a lot of press and concern.
And we're also similarly concerned about the human wildlife conflict program ending in 2024. We have the tools and the knowledge to promote coexistence, which will require that continued investment into the department. And we're particularly concerned about the lack of necessary funding and staff. We really appreciate both the department and the LAO's comments as well as those from committee members. We would urge that the final budget includes 18,000,000 general fund and $15,000,000 in ongoing funding to support those permanent positions and associated operating costs.
Appreciate your time.
Speaker 27
Good afternoon, Madam Chair and members. Brandon Knapp with Golden Bear Strategies on behalf of the Thermalito Water and Sewer District in Oroville. Although not on today's agenda, I want to briefly flag an urgent prioritization of an important rural drinking water request submitted by Senator Dolly and Assembly Member Gallagher to restore the Concow Reservoir, the district's primary drinking water source serving about 12,200 residents in a disadvantaged community still recovering from the Camp Fire. Wildfire sediment has reduced storage capacity by more than 2,000 acre feet, essentially an entire year of water supply. Restoring that capacity is a $54,000,000 multi year effort that a small rural district simply cannot absorb on its own.
We are actively pursuing opportunities under Proposition four, clean drinking water funding programs, and other potential federal and Cal OES resources. We look forward to working with this subcommittee as well as the full budget committee to help move this critical wildfire recovery project forward. Thank you so much.
Speaker 19
Hi. Good afternoon. Michael Chan on behalf of Audubon, California. We would like to urge future expenditures of Prop four funding to contain the APA exemption similar to what was passed in AB 107 earlier this session. We support the $18,000,000 and $15,000,000 ongoing for the wildlife conflict program at CDFW.
Also support the proposal to fund AB thirteen nineteen for these positions for endangered species at CDFW. Additionally, we would also ask for some of the Prop four grant funding to be directed to the Whale Tail Grant Program, as mentioned earlier. Lastly, we would also like to ask the legislature to reject and non concur the sweepings of the vacant positions at CDFW. Thank you so much.
Speaker 28
Good afternoon. My name is Jenny Berg, and I'm the California state director for Humane World for Animals. On behalf of our California members and supporters, we urge the state legislature to include critical funding for CDFW's statewide human wildlife conflict program. And I echo a lot
Speaker 28
previous statements by some of my colleagues. The need for effective coexistence strategies has never been greater. After the program ended, we've unfortunately seen human wildlife conflicts, particularly those with wild carnivores, draw increasing public attention. This program is necessary to keep communities safe and conserve our state's wildlife populations from unnecessary, cruel killings. And we also thank Senator Blake Spear for her leadership in introducing SB eleven thirty five.
Thank you so much. Thank you.
Speaker 29
Hi. My name is Jana Martin. I'm a fifth generation cattle rancher from Siskiyou County, and the whaleback pack alone has 117 known confirmed kills, more than the Sierra Valley Conflict. Despite diligently utilizing multiple deterrent efforts currently approved by CDFW, a great number of those whale backed kills have occurred on my baby calves and yearling heifers. Furthermore, we provide the open space and wildlife habitat so that the wolves can thrive.
You've seen the data and shocking studies proving that 92% of whale backpack diet is cattle, Not deer, not elk. Livestock almost exclusively feed the wolf pack. Top priority, continue to support Berkeley's research and wolf studies. Please realize spending more money on staff does not necessarily prevent the wildlife the whaleback pack from killing more cattle. It's the rancher that's coexisting with the wolf right now that does what CDFW wants to pay a staff person to do.
We're doing that deterrent effort right now, today, on the ground. Support ranchers implementing deterrent efforts on a daily basis at our own expense. Support the direct loss multiplier already used successfully in other Western states, include retroactive kills. Again, fund Berkeley, fund research, and I welcome fruitful dialogue with any of you in the future. Thank you.
Speaker 30
Hello. Griselda Chavez here with the California State Parks Foundation and the 34 organizations signed on to a letter that was submitted recently to this committee. We respectfully request that the legislature support the governor's proposed $6,750,000 continuous allocation to the California State Parks Foundation sorry, to California State Parks Library Pass program, which has become one of California's most effective and equitable tools for expanding access to nature. And on a separate note, on behalf of Mid Peninsula Regional Open Space District, we respectfully request that the legislature increase this year's prop four allocations to the state coastal conservancy's coastal program from the governor's proposed $33,000,000 to $60,000,000, and the San Francisco Bay Restoration Authority Act and San Francisco Bay Area Conservancy program from $1,000,000 to $15,000,000. With the passage of AB one zero seven, the state cons coastal conservancy will be able to quickly award last year's funds, and we must replenish these programs to continue work that is critical to address escalating threats posed by climate change and sea level rise.
Thank you.
Speaker 31
Hi, everyone. Thank you, chair and members of the subcommittee. My name is Matt Roberts, and I live here in Sacramento. I'm here on behalf of the many Californians who followed the multi year effort to list six mountain lion populations under the California Endangered Species Act. That listing was a promise, and today you have the opportunity to fund it.
Coexistence isn't just a policy choice, it's a biological necessity. When they are managed effectively, research shows they support healthier deer herds, stronger riparian corridors, and more resilient ecosystems. But coexistence fails without staff. The Department of Fish and Wildlife is operating far below its own assessed standard staffing needs in core mission areas like law enforcement, conservation, and human wildlife conflict response. In parts of SoCal, dedicated conflict response capacity has been dramatically reduced just as encounters are increasing.
The positions you are considering restoring include the scientists, wardens, and permit staff who allow California to move from a reactive model after conflicts escalate to a proactive model focused on prevention and public safety. By funding the wildlife coexistence program, consistent with SB eleven thirty five, you give Californians the tools for the tools to protect pets, livestock, and people while honoring the protections this legislator has already put in place for mountain lions. Please view these positions not as costs, but as investments in a safer, more resilient California where people and wildlife can share the landscape. Thank you for your leadership.
Speaker 32
Good afternoon, T. R. A. S. And senator Blake Spear.
Megan Cleveland with The Nature Conservancy. On issue 16, The Nature Conservancy strongly supports the California Natural Resources Agency's budget change proposal to implement AB 900, which is related to the increasing stewardship of our 30 by 30 conservation lands. Additionally, we appreciate the governor including $2,100,000,000 in prop four investments for nature based solutions and biodiversity protection in the January budget. We have, our parties lined out in a letter that we recently submitted to the legislature and look forward to discussing those with you further in future budget hearings. And then, finally, to echo some of the comments from prior speakers, we would like to voice our support for the recommendation of the Joint Legislative Budget Committee on the non concurrence in the elimination of the over 77 positions at CDFW and other environmental agencies.
We'd also like to urge the legislature to reject the 34 additional open positions, sweeping those at CDFW, half of which are related to permanent activities. Thank you so much.
Speaker 33
Hi, Senator. Mariella Racho with Leadership Council for Justice and Accountability. We support the release of Prop four funding for TCC and CRC programs as proposed under the January budget, under the extreme heat mitigation chapter for the bond. But we urge the legislature to find more consistent, sustainable funding for future years as these are high demand programs. We also share concerns with the LAO, for the ZEP funding, as it was touched on by Senator Crawford today, due to not having equity provisions, and we think it would be better utilized for ZEV medium and heavy duty trucks as you have experienced in your district.
We urge the legislators to fund programs that provide essential community benefits for residents who experience the worst air quality and climate impacts that by providing air quality improved air quality and clean energy, essential for extreme heat days. Thank you.
Speaker 34
Good afternoon. My name is Angeli Rona Divey. I'm the founder of Woman for Wolves. I live in rural El Dorado County, where I run a wolf dog sanctuary and rescue. I'd like to thank all of you for hearing our public comments today.
Thank you, Senator Blake Spear, for introducing SB eleven thirty five. I wanted to also thank Secretary Crowfoot on emphasizing the importance of human wildlife coexistence. It's very clear and apparent that Californians want coexistence. At the hearing we attended, the California State Assembly hearing about human wildlife conflict, all stakeholders from various different regions with various different views at least agreed on one aspect, and that's to refund the Human Wildlife Coexistence Program. To me, that's a testament to the true nature of California.
We're community centered, we're collaborative, and that is why it's so important to protect wildlife, because protecting wildlife protects us. I know that wolves and wildlife, they saved me. I wouldn't be standing here without them. And because of that, they inspired me to invest in Sacramento, to invest in California and our communities. And so I'm urging you to consider giving the Fish and Wildlife Department what they need for staffing for the Human Wildlife Coexistence Program, because protecting wildlife protects what it means to be a Californian.
Thank you.
Speaker 35
Good afternoon, everyone. Thank you for hearing our public comments. My name is Danielle Hanisch. I live in rural Placer County. I am on the board of Women for Wolves.
And I'm a former classroom educator who actually left teaching because I believed so much in creating a leadership program for youth across the country. It's called LEAP, Leaders for Ethics, Animals, and the Planet. And it teaches students, young people, hands on outdoor advocacy and learning about coexistence. California already has a really strong foundation, as we talked about many times over today, for a science based coexistence model, and I strongly encourage the funding of CDFW for staffing and non lethal predator management. It's not the fault of returning predators that a large portion of our lands over the last couple of hundred of years have been turned into animal agriculture operations, and wolves have as much right to be here as we do.
Funding this would not simply put a Band Aid on the problem, but with human wildlife conflict, it would be a long term investment in the preservation of keystone species, like we talked about today, in encouraging healthy ecosystems and in preserving climate resilience and fortifying it. It would also really help with biodiversity over the long term. Connecting students with nature has been shown to increase mental health and well-being and also to empower new innovative solutions, but we need funding to be able to do that. So I strongly encourage you to fully fund CDFW with their $18,000,000 for the coexistence program. Thank you so much for hearing our statements today.
Speaker 17
Good afternoon. My name is Tara Dahari, and I'm the director of technology at Women for Wolves. The decisions you make today will shape whether wildlife recovery in California succeeds or fails, and whether wildlife and communities can truly coexist. Through the research I've seen, proactive nonlethal conflict prevention reduces human wildlife conflict and supports long term coexistence. California's dedicated human wildlife conflict program ended in 2024.
And without renewed funding and staff, the tools that prevent conflict are disappearing. I urge you to refund and establish a statewide wildlife coexistence program under SB eleven thirty five and protect the CDFW positions that make this work possible. As humans, we need wildlife to stay grounded. California has a choice. Please choose coexistence, because once recovery is lost, we risk losing it for good.
Thank you.
Speaker 36
My name is Omar Khayyam, and I'm a field biologist and wildlife researcher.
Speaker 36
to speak today on behalf of wolf recovery and coexistence in California, and would also like to request that Senate Bill eleven thirty five be accepted and that $18,000,000 be put towards the twenty six-twenty seven budget for wildlife coexistence and human wildlife conflict. I urge the subcommittee to consider the comments made by the many constituents who have come to speak on behalf of wolves today and to focus on wolf longevity and coexistence by prioritizing nonlethal management tools and considering programs that benefit those ranchers living alongside wolves, and go beyond cases of direct compensation. Thank you.
Speaker 37
Hi. I'm Debbie Bachigalupi. I share a long fence line with Jana Martin. On December 28, my favorite heifer, Trixie, was killed by the whale backpack just over a hill from our house, its death by a thousand bites, and that image does not fade. Since 2016, we've been ranching with wolves, absorbing losses, adapting constantly, working around the clock in what's called coexistence.
While it feels like a twenty four seven battlefield, Siskiyou County ranchers continue to respond with willingness and integrity given devastating results on our cattle. We are truly the ones practicing coexistence, not from an office or a memo, but in the dark on our landscapes regardless of our own health and mother nature's weather. Here's my ask. The state and partners model that coexistence it demands. For example, CDFW predator conflict employees should no longer be spending their own money and personal resources simply to do their job.
As a rancher, I request timely, full cost reimbursement for livestock with immediate access to every available deterrent tool. No more waiting weeks or months for CDFW staff to come and put flagery on our ranches while wolf packs continue to grow. And I ask that CDFW, and perhaps you all, partner with NGOs that are actually right now making a positive difference, and those two are Working Circle and the California Wolf Foundation. We graciously welcome you to Siskiyou County. There are ranchers who would love to hear from you directly, and we would love to have you in our our county as welcome guests.
So thank you for what you do, and we look for a positive result. Thank you.
Speaker 6
Good afternoon. Thanks for waiting. I'm Meg Snyder with Acxiom Advisors, making comments today on behalf of Renew Home and Rewiring America in support of funding $75,000,000 for the CEC's demand side grid support program. It provides a lot of climate resiliency benefits as well as grid reliability, and hope to see future conversations for funding the program in the future year. Thank you.
Speaker 1
Thank you. Any other public comments? All right. I do want to thank all of you for being here. All of the items that we've discussed today will be on call and left open.
That's right. They will be left open, not on call because we haven't taken a vote. But I do want to thank all of you, especially those of you who provided public comment and public testimony today. If you were unable to be here today to provide your public comment, we do invite you to submit your comments and suggestions in writing to the Budget and Fiscal Review Committee or visit our website. Your comments and suggestions are important to us, and we want to include your testimony in the official hearing records.
Thank you and we appreciate your participation. And thank you to our presenters and members to our members for today's robust discussions on today's hearing issues and the department overviews as well. Thank you, everyone, for your patience and your cooperation. We've concluded the agenda for today's hearing. Senate Budget Subcommittee two is adjourned.
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