By Kaci Poor
The Eureka Times Standard
HUMBOLT COUNTY, Calif. — A California state senator has been cleared to begin collecting signatures as part of a referendum petition to reverse a bill requiring rural California homeowners to pay a state fire prevention fee.
Humboldt County fire and government officials came out in opposition to the fee when it was signed by Gov. Jerry Brown in early July, and now local fire officials are voicing their support for the petition created by Sen. Ted Gaines against the fee. Like Gaines, Humboldt officials believe the fee will devastate already struggling fire agencies that operate in tandem with CalFire.
Secretary of State Debra Bowen announced Monday that Gaines, who represents the 1st Senate District, including Modoc and Mono counties, may begin collecting the signatures required from California voters to qualify the petition for the statewide ballot.
ABX1 29, the bill the petition opposes, established an annual fee capped at $150 to be paid by residents living in state responsibility areas. The bill has raised concern among many fire and government officials, including those in Humboldt County. The state Board of Forestry and Fire Protection is discussing the bill on Aug. 9.
According to CalFire and census data, the owners of as many as 800,000 properties could be subject to the fee. In Humboldt County, the fee is likely to affect all residents living outside of incorporated cities.
According to the language of the bill, revenue generated from the fee will be allocated to CalFire, resulting in "$200 million in ongoing General Fund savings,” Gov. Jerry Brown wrote in a letter to the California State Assembly after signing the bill in early July.
In signing the bill, Brown stated that lawmakers need to clean up the law before its implementation in September. Brown directed the state’s Department of Finance and CalFire to work with the Legislature to clean up the bill’s language.
But promises of changes to the bill haven’t soothed the concerns of many California officials, including Gaines.
“People are hurting in this economy — a couple million residents in the state of California could be directly impacted by this bill,” Gaines said. “We are hoping that the threat of a referendum could change policy.”
The Roseville senator has called the fee “double-taxation,” stating that it is “illegal and unfair — plain and simple.” According to Gaines, in the upcoming weeks, those who are in support of the referendum will be able to sign the petition through a link on his website, www.tedgaines. com.
Gaines has 90 days from the date Assembly Bill X1 29 was chaptered to collect the 504,760 required signatures — the number equal to 5 percent of the total votes cast in the 2010 gubernatorial election. The signatures need to be collected and turned into county election officials by Oct. 6. If Gaines is successful, the petition will be placed on the ballot for approval by voters in the next statewide election.
Fire officials in Humboldt County have said they support Gaines’ efforts — and will continue to do so until they are provided with a guarantee that the specific changes they want will be included in the bill’s new language.
Proponents of the bill have claimed that the cleaned up language will direct a substantial amount of the collected fee not just to CalFire, but also to local fire jurisdictions. Fortuna Fire District Chief and Humboldt County Fire Chief’s Association President Lon Winburn said he isn’t optimistic that those funds will materialize.
“Maybe they are thinking that those dollars will make up for the funds that the fire districts will lose, but there is no real guarantee that those funds will be there,” Winburn said.
Humboldt No. 1 Fire Protection District Chief and fire chief’s association Vice President Ken Woods agrees.
He said that new language must be introduced to the bill exempting individuals who live in state responsibility areas from paying the fee if they already pay a tax to their local fire protection district.
“Two-thirds of our district is in an area classified as an SRA, but we are the ones that respond 24/7, 365 days a year,” Woods said, adding that CalFire is only fully staffed in Humboldt County for six months out of the year. “Our constituents are already paying for quality fire service without the fee.”
Humboldt County officials are also concerned that the current language of the bill will harm local Southern Humboldt fire agencies which are trying to form into fire protection districts. In order to become a district — which would guarantee a source of funding for the small agencies — the voters living in the proposed district would have to approve a tax.
“Because of this fee, they probably won’t want to do it,” Woods said. “People who are paying $150 to the state won’t want to pay more.”
The fee makes sense in Southern California, Wood said, because some of those counties are exclusively tied to CalFire for fire protection services. But in Northern California counties, like Humboldt — where many residents rely on local fire protection districts instead of CalFire — the fee isn’t a good fit, he said.
“I think there will be a lot of support for the referendum petition, particularly in the northern part of the state,” he said. “CalFire provides a good service, but in our end of the state it is the locals that provide the first emergency response on 90 percent of the calls, not CalFire.”
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