State: California

City: Oakland
Group: Oakland Indicators Project
AB1360
Brownsfield accountability and tracking of Volatile Organic Compounds (VOCs) on all sites.

Group: Asthma Action Plan
Implementation of recommendations of the Cal/EPA Advisory Committee on Environmental Justice.

In October of 2003, the California Environmental Protection Agency’s Advisory Committee on Environmental Justice approved a precedent-setting recommendations report identifying a comprehensive program for achieving environmental justice in California. These recommendations seek the most far-reaching set of environmental justice policies in the nation, and call for new policies and practices that could change permitting processes, regulations and all programs dealing with the. The recommendations cite the need to incorporate key elements of the Precautionary Principle into Cal/EPA decision-making processes and call for addressing and reducing the cumulative environmental impacts.  The report acknowledges the need to prevent harm and that race, class and other social economic factors impact community vulnerabilities to environmental exposure.

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City: Sacramento
Organization: Environmental Justice Coalition for Water
AB 2644
WATER VENDING MACHINE CONSUMER PROTECTIONS IN CALIFORNIA

Significant Action — in Senate Appropriations Committee

Do you know what is in the water you purchase from a vended water machine? Vended water consumers expect the water to be cleaner and safer than their tap water. In reality, many water vending machines fail to meet State health and consumer protection standards as a result of insufficient routine monitoring.

AB 2644 establishes a mechanism to provide needed accountability for an industry that currently operates with virtually no oversight. This bill uses existing tools within state government to ensure that public health and consumer rights are protected, rather than creating a costly new bureaucracy.

AB 2644 provides public health and consumer protection safeguards for consumers of Water Vending Machines (WVMs) operating in California. AB 2644:

• Uses an existing inspection program conducted by the County Departments of Weights and Measures to supplement DHS activities.
• Requires WVM operators to:
  • Maintain their machines on a regular schedule and to keep service records for state review.
  • Post last service date, as well as toll-free numbers for both the WVM operator and the DHS complaint line, on the machine.
  • Provide posted information in Spanish as well as English.
  • Conduct annual tests for those contaminants (trihalomethanes and lead) for which WVM drinking water standards exceed those of tap water.
• Targets WVM operators who violate the law, as most additional costs would come from fines charged to those operators found to be in violation.

City: Fort Ord
Organization: Fort Ord Environmental Justice Network, Inc
Helped to write policy to implement Environmental Justice and to implement it in the State of California. (Received Certificate of recognition from the Secretary of the State, Mr. Hickox.)