Chapter 2. The Clean Air And Transportation Improvement Fund of California Public Utilities Code >> Division 10. >> Part 11.5. >> Chapter 2.

The Clean Air and Transportation Improvement Fund is hereby created.

It is the intent of the people of California, in enacting this part, that bond funds shall not be used to displace existing sources of funds for rail and other forms of public transportation, including, but not limited to, funds that have been provided pursuant to Article XIX of the California Constitution, the Transportation Planning and Development Account in the State Transportation Fund, the Mills-Alquist-Deddeh Act (Chapter 4 (commencing with Section 99200) of Part 11), and local transportation sales taxes; that any future comprehensive transportation funding legislation shall not offset or reduce the amounts otherwise made available for transit purposes by this act; and that funding for public transit should be increased from existing sources including fuel taxes and sales tax on fuels.

Notwithstanding Section 13340 of the Government Code, all money deposited in the fund is hereby continuously appropriated to the commission, without regard to fiscal years, for allocation for grants to itself, the department, the Department of Parks and Recreation, and to local agencies pursuant to Chapter 3 (commencing with Section 99620).

(a) The commission shall allocate money from the fund in accordance with the allocations specified in Chapter 3 (commencing with Section 99620) to the department, to the Department of Parks and Recreation, and to local agencies as grants for expenditure for the preservation, acquisition, construction, or improvement of any of the following:
  (1) Rights-of-way for rail purposes.
  (2) Rail terminals and stations.
  (3) Rolling stock, including locomotives, passenger cars, and related rail equipment and facilities.
  (4) Grade separations and other improvements along rail rights-of-way for rail purposes.
  (5) Rail maintenance facilities.
  (6) Other capital facilities deemed necessary for a specified rail service, including soundwalls.
  (7) Capital expenditures for the purposes specified in subdivision (b) of Section 1 of Article XIX of the California Constitution.
  (8) Paratransit vehicles, bicycle facilities, and water-borne ferry vessels and facilities.
  (9) The project described in Section 99648.
  (b) The commission shall require each applicant for a grant pursuant to Chapter 3 (commencing with Section 99620), including the department, to demonstrate in its application that if the grant funds being applied for are awarded, no other funds which were previously planned, programmed, or approved for rail purposes will be used for other than rail purposes.
  (c) Consistent with Section 99665, money from the fund may be used to satisfy any federal, state or local matching fund requirement for the project to be funded. Money from the fund may be used to provide local matching funds for grade separations pursuant to subdivision (c) of Section 1202 or Section 1202.5.
  (d) Authorized expenditures listed in paragraphs (1) to (7), inclusive, of subdivision (a) are "rail projects" as defined in subdivision (j) of Section 99602.
  (e) Grant funds shall be expended only for capital expenditures.
  (f) Projects to be funded shall include, to the greatest extent possible, projects which integrate and facilitate transfers between rail lines, including all rail lines for which funding is provided by this part.

(a) Notwithstanding Section 16312 of the Government Code and Section 99694.5 of this part, the interest on any loans made from the Pooled Money Investment Account to the fund for the purposes of carrying out the purposes of this part shall be paid from the General Fund.
  (b) Notwithstanding Section 13440 of the Government Code, the amounts required to be paid pursuant to subdivision (a) are hereby continuously appropriated from the General Fund.
  (c) The appropriations for interest payments pursuant to subdivision (b) are appropriations for debt service, as defined in Section 8 of Article XIII B of the California Constitution, and are therefore exempt from the appropriations limit set by that article.