BILL ANALYSIS 1
1
SENATE ENERGY, UTILITIES AND COMMUNICATIONS COMMITTEE
DEBRA BOWEN, CHAIRWOMAN
AB 669 - Hertzberg Hearing Date:
June 25, 2002 A
As Amended: March 11, 2002 FISCAL
B
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DESCRIPTION
Current law provides for a "911" Emergency Telephone
Service system, which is financed by a surcharge on all
residential and business telephone bills, and caps that
surcharge at 0.75% of a customer's telephone bill.
Current law provides for a pilot program to test a "311"
non-emergency telephone system.
This bill authorizes cities or joint powers authorities to
establish a "311" non-emergency telephone system within
their jurisdictions. If these agencies don't notify the
affected county and the Department of General Services
(DGS) by January 1, 2006 of their intent to establish a
"311" system, the county may establish such a system.
Wireless carriers are exempt from the provisions of this
bill until January 1, 2007.
This bill allows cities, counties, or joint powers
authorities to pay for such a system by imposing a
surcharge on intrastate telephone bills for customers
within that organization's jurisdiction of up to 0.25% of a
customer's phone bill, which would be administered through
the State Board of Equalization.
This bill requires the Telecommunications Division within
DGS to develop technical and operational standards for the
"311" system by January 1, 2003. DGS shall review local
public agency plans for their "311" system to ensure they
comply with the DGS standards and shall monitor the "311"
systems to ensure they remain in compliance.
BACKGROUND
"911" is the number for emergency telephone service. This
service was created in 1976 and paid for by a statewide
surcharge (statutorily capped at 0.75%) on each telephone
bill.
The number of calls to "911" has grown faster that the
number of operators needed to answer those calls. In Los
Angeles, it's been reported that 5% of all "911" calls went
unanswered and 27% of the calls took ten or more seconds to
answer. In the San Francisco Bay Area, 23% of "911" calls
made by cellular telephones went unanswered.
A significant number of "911" calls are for non-emergency
purposes - estimates on just how many calls are of a
non-emergency variety range from as low as 20% to as high
as 95%. In Sacramento, officials estimate between 50% and
80% of "911" calls aren't true emergencies. Current law
makes it a misdemeanor to use the "911" system for anything
other than reporting emergencies, though this has obviously
not been a successful deterrent.
One idea for relieving the pressure on the "911" system is
to provide an alternate means of contacting public safety
agencies for non-emergency purposes. In 1996, President
Clinton called for the creation of a nationwide
non-emergency telephone service similar to "911." In 1997,
the Federal Communications Commission ordered that "311"
service be made available for that purpose and in that same
year, the Legislature passed AB 1198 (Hertzberg), Chapter
887, Statutes of 1997, which created a "311" pilot program
in San Jose. Under the pilot, a "311" number was tested
against an attempt to educate the public about an existing
7-digit non-emergency public assistance number.
In 1999, a final draft report on the results of the pilot
program found that both approaches improved "911" response
and that the "311" program was the more effective of the
two approaches. Under the "311" program, the average "911"
answer time decreased by 26%, and the number of
non-emergency calls to "911" decreased by 63%. The City of
San Jose was one of the pilot project cities. It found the
"311" system relieved pressure on the "911" system and has
elected to continue the operation of the "311" system past
the end of the pilot project.
COMMENTS
1)The Third Time Is The Charm? Except for the wireless
carrier exemption, this bill is virtually identical to AB
1477 (Hertzberg), which this committee passed 8-0 in
2001, and AB 2837 (Hertzberg), which this committee
passed 8-0 in 2000. Both bills were vetoed by Governor
Davis, who wrote with respect to AB 1477:
While I agree with the author that the 911 emergency
system is overburdened in some jurisdictions, I
believe that the solution provided by AB 1477 is
unnecessary at this time. First, DGS has conducted
research on the implementation of non-emergency pilot
projects and has recommended that the State not invest
in a 311 system without conclusive information
regarding the relative benefits of such a program.
Because this bill would authorize an additional
surcharge on telephone users to support this program,
there should be ample justification to support the
proposed level of the increase. However, none of the
pilot studies authorized by previous legislation have
been able to provide this justification. In addition,
local governments are already authorized to impose
telephone surcharges on users within their
jurisdictions, and may use those revenues to establish
non-emergency telephone systems. To the extent that
individual communities determine a 311 program to be
beneficial, local jurisdictions may implement such
programs under existing law and I would encourage such
a local initiative.
2)Mandatory Statewide Application vs. Voluntary Local
Application . Conceptually, this bill replicates the
statewide "911" program on a voluntary basis for "311"
non-emergency services with the hope, based on the pilot
projects, that the response time for true emergency "911"
calls will decrease by diverting non-emergency calls to
"311."
One of the benefits of the "911" system is that it's
universal - no matter where you go in California, the
service exists. Allowing local jurisdictions to
establish a "311" non-emergency system will have the
benefit - as the San Jose pilot program demonstrated - of
diverting non-emergency phone calls away from the "911"
system. However, if the system is adopted in
checkerboard fashion by local agencies, it could be
argued that the benefit won't be as great to the system
(or the people who truly need emergency help) as it would
if it were a universal system similar to the "911"
system.
3)Narrowing The Universe To Cities Or Counties . As noted
above, the bill allows cities, joint powers agencies, or
counties to create their own "311" non-emergency system.
This raises several logistical questions.
The first is the issue of telephone billing complexity,
because each telephone customer would need to be matched
to the relevant organization for the purpose of assessing
the surcharge.
The second is the issue of "economies of scale." If
three neighboring cities set up three different "311"
non-emergency systems, that wouldn't be as cost effective
as if they were to band together and create one system
that all of them could share. While the bill puts the
DGS Division of Telecommunications in charge of setting
standards and arbitrating disputes, allowing each
individual organization the ability to set up its own
system will undoubtedly lead to conflicts and
diseconomies, though each system will be better tailored
to the need of the local community.
The author and committee may wish to consider limiting
the creation of a "311" non-emergency system to a
citywide basis (which would limit the potential number of
systems to 450+) and/or a countywide basis (which would
limit the potential number of systems to 58) to narrow
the potential for conflict.
PRIOR VOTES
Senate Public Safety Committee (5-0)*
Assembly Floor (77-0)*
Assembly Public Safety (7-0)*
*Votes reflect a previous, unrelated version of the bill.
POSITIONS
Sponsor:
Author
Support:
City of Los Angeles
City of Moreno Valley
City of Oakland
Los Angeles Fire Department
Los Angeles Police Department
Oppose:
California Public Utilities Commission (unless amended)
Randy Chinn
AB 669 Analysis
Hearing Date: June 25, 2002