Days before the Legislature wrapped up for the year, lawmakers expedited a measure to set new building restrictions on warehouses. The aim was to protect homes, schools, hospitals and other sensitive areas from diesel truck pollution resulting from the Inland Empire’s warehouse boom.
Yet a large coalition of businesses and local governments fiercely opposed the legislation—both in its initial failed attempt last year and then the new bill last week.
As a coauthor on Assembly Bill 98, Assemblymember Eloise Gómez Reyes, D-Colton, described a pressing land use issue before lawmakers, as California and the world economy increasingly rely on the movement, storage and delivery of goods. She noted that the Inland Empire, a metropolitan region sprawling out from Riverside and San Bernardino, contains about 4,000 warehouses that encompass more than a billion square feet of space and account for 600,000 truck trips per day.
“This has resulted in a public health crisis in my community, where, among other things, we have the worst ozone pollution in the country,” said Reyes, during committee debate last week on AB 98.
Reyes has attempted to tackle the problem since she took office in 2016, authoring many of the 15 bills relating to heavy-duty vehicles near warehouses — just one has passed. Last year she proposed a thousand-foot buffer for new warehouses near homes. Facing heavy industry backlash, the bill failed to pass out of committee. When it was up for reconsideration in January, Assembly Speaker Robert Rivas directed Reyes to pull it ahead of the hearing and establish a stakeholder working group to develop more of a consensus on protecting vulnerable communities while maintaining support for economic development.
After months of reworking her proposal, Reyes partnered with Asm. Juan Carrillo, D-Palmdale, to gut language from an existing bill last week and fill it with a new proposal under AB 98. The lawmakers are now seeking to enact mandatory setbacks of 300 to 500 feet for new or expanding warehouses and 100-foot buffers prohibiting heavy truck traffic along neighboring property lines. AB 98 would require developers to build two new homes for every one destroyed during construction and to cover rent for a year for any displaced tenants. Distribution centers would also have to reroute truck traffic to avoid residential streets.
“This is a very delicate compromise that has disappointed parties on both sides,” said Carrillo. “While that was not my hope when we started this process, I would argue that it's a sign we did a pretty good job of finding a fair compromise.”
Environmental justice groups have blasted AB 98 as not going far enough to protect communities and asserted they were not involved in the backroom negotiations. Andrea Vidaurre, a policy advocate at the People's Collective for Environmental Justice, claimed research from the California Air Resources Board found setbacks would have to be about a thousand feet to be able to mitigate the cumulative health impacts.
Asm. Eloise Gómez Reyes, D-Colton“We believe that ushering in a bill at the 11th hour, with no opportunity for community input, is the wrong and unjust way of addressing this issue,” said Vidaurre.
Many cities and counties also felt excluded from the negotiations. Trade associations for those interests described the mandates in AB 98 as overly restrictive and costly. Mark Neuburger, a legislative advocate at the California State Association of Counties, said the bill would disrupt local control in adapting development to the realities presented by the authors and to the limitations on such solutions.
“This is especially true in rural settings, where agricultural logistics centers and warehouses will be impacted by this bill and have a different set of concerns that local governments address,” said Neuburger. “This bill may either conflict or create new requirements for these projects that don't make any sense in rural settings.”
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Melissa Sparks-Kranz, a legislative affairs lobbyist at the League of California Cities, worried it would saddle California’s 483 cities and 58 counties with immense costs and penalties. Local governments would face $50,000 fines every six months if they fail to enforce the provisions. She estimated it would collectively cost counties up to $29 million to comply and as much as $720 million for all the cities.
“We could have addressed these concerns and ways to reduce these costs on local governments had we had a seat at the table,” said Sparks-Kranz.
The Milk Producers Council, Community Alliance with Family Farmers and California Grocers Association also registered their opposition to the bill.
Republicans scrambled to fend off the bill as the Legislature raced toward a midnight deadline on Saturday night to vote on measures. Senator Brian Dahle, R-Bieber, labeled AB 98 a deal cooked up in smoke-filled backrooms of the Assembly and warned it would extend well beyond the Inland Empire.
“This is a statewide bill and it's going to impact a rice farmer in Yuba who is going to expand 10,000 feet and he has a school next to it,” said Dahle, during floor debate on AB 98.
Sen. Shannon Grove, R-Bakersfield, argued the proposal would be extremely harmful to jobs, farming and redevelopment efforts in her district.
“The bill was intended to address warehouses in urban areas. However, as drafted, the bill applies to agriculture and processing facilities,” said Grove, who reasoned it could hurt a farmer seeking to expand a warehouse for an almond harvester. “It just doesn't fare well to the agricultural communities.”
Several progressive Democrats also voted against the measure. Sen. Susan Eggman, D-Stockton, who is terming out of office this year, argued a rushed bill at the end of session is “not the way to go about good legislation.” She worried about inadequately addressing the impacts to communities and of superseding local ordinances on the issue.
“If my environmentals and my local community are against this, then I think something's wrong with looking at a one-size-fits-all,” said Eggman. “I'm not saying these warehouses should be the end-all-be-all for people, but it is a part of our society and our goods movement.”
She reminded her colleagues the Port of Stockton is the third largest inland port in the Western Hemisphere, sending the state’s agricultural goods by rail and truck to the nation and the world.
Sympathizing with the environmental backlash, Sen. Caroline Menjivar, D-San Fernando Valley, also voted against the bill and pushed for 1,000-foot setbacks. Siding with local governments, Sen. Angelique Ashby, D-Sacramento, explained that the healthcare industry has intentionally developed warehouses close to homes in her district to more quickly deliver medical products to patients. She was skeptical the broad opposition to the measure was the sign of a balanced negotiation.
“When nobody is happy, it means we need to keep working on it,” said Ashby.
On the Assembly side, contention over the bill added more fuel to Republican outrage over a perceived lack of transparency by Democratic leadership.
Like his colleagues in the Senate, Asm. Tom Lackey, R-Palmdale, said AB 98 would heavily impact farmers and drive up food prices. He also worried about creating more shipping delays for exports and eroding the competitiveness of California businesses.
“Any disruption in the warehouse capacity near these ports will directly impact the speed and efficiency with which goods are processed, stored and transported, leading to more backlogs and delays throughout the supply chain,” said Lackey. “Even more frightening, the disruption of warehouse operations could create national security risks and weaken our position in the global trade.”
With an hour until the deadline and dozens of bills still up for votes, Assembly Majority Leader Cecilia Aguiar-Curry, D-Winters, then stepped in with a legislative procedure to end the discussion and shift to the next bill. Soon afterward the Assembly leaders limited debate to just 30 seconds for each member.
“To shut down debate on a bill that is this dramatic, I do not believe is in order,” responded Asm. Heath Flora, R-Ripon. “This body is where we have these discussions.”
Gov. Gavin Newsom has until the end of the month to decide on the measure.
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