Fellow Democrats are questioning California Gov. Gavin Newsom’s budget proposal to spend $1.5 billion to accelerate the adoption of zero-emissions vehicles (ZEVs) by building charging infrastructure and providing incentives to low-income households and buyers of heavy-duty vehicles.

Newsom’s proposal does not renew funding for the state’s Clean Vehicle Rebate Program (CVRP), a mainstay of the state’s transportation electrification efforts for the last decade. CVRP gives a $2,000 rebate to mid-income residents who buy an EV.

During a State Assembly budget subcommittee hearing on Wednesday, the omission proved controversial — as did what lawmakers called a troubling lack of specificity in the governor’s proposal.

Assemblymember Phil Ting (D), chair of the full Budget Committee, said during Wednesday’s hearing that the governor’s plan to spend such a vast sum remains too vague for him to support.

“You’re coming forward to this committee for over $1 billion of appropriation, and I’m hearing a lot of very lofty goals but no detailed information,” Ting told representatives of the California Energy Commission (CEC) and the California Air Resources Board (CARB), the agencies that would administer programs funded by Newsom’s plan. “What are we getting for $1.5 billion?”

Hannon Rasool, deputy director of the CEC’s Fuels and Transportation Division, said $300 million would go toward installing 62,000 EV chargers and building 21 hydrogen refueling stations.

But details about how the CEC and CARB intend to spend the other $1.2 billion were less concrete. Sydney Vergis, a CARB division chief, told the subcommittee that funds would be put toward “buckets” of various programs and that, later, a public process would help determine how to spend the money specifically.

Several Democratic members of the subcommittee — Budget Subcommittee 3: Climate Crisis, Resources, Energy and Transportation — said the sketchy outlines from the agencies and governor’s office would not justify such large appropriations.

CEC Commissioner Patty Monahan told the subcommittee that the proposed allocations were a statement of the state’s larger goals and would put commercial interests at ease about investing in ZEVs.

“This big investment now shows the world that we’re committed,” Monahan said. She agreed with Ting, however, that a “cash-on-the-hood” rebate program was the best way of getting residents to buy electric vehicles.

Ting questioned eliminating the CVRP incentives. He said it did not make sense to build so much infrastructure without enough EVs to use it. The state is far behind its target, ordered by former Gov. Jerry Brown in 2018, of putting 5 million ZEVs on the road by 2030, he noted.

Democrats Among Critics

Building on Brown’s order, Newsom in September ordered that all new passenger vehicles sold in California must be ZEVs by 2035. (See Can California Meet Its EV Mandates?)

Newsom’s budget proposal is meant to bolster that effort. His proposed budget for fiscal year 2022, released in January, would allocate $1 billion to ZEV infrastructure, including charging and fueling stations for battery-powered EVs and hydrogen fuel cell electric vehicles (FCEVs). (See Calif. Governor Proposes $1.5 Billion for ZEVs.)

The spending plan calls for securitizing revenues from vehicle registration fees to support the expansion of the CEC’s Clean Transportation Program. A portion of the proceeds would fund loans “to leverage additional private sector capital to build the necessary infrastructure,” the governor’s office said in its summary of the plan.

Another provision would allocate $465 million in one-time cap-and-trade funds for incentives, rebates and financial assistance “to improve access to new and used zero-emission vehicles,” including $315 million for heavy-duty vehicle adopters and $150 million for low-income programs, it said.

The plan would put $50 million toward the installation of ZEV charging stations at state-owned facilities.

Those now questioning the proposal include Democrats representing liberal, affluent districts where EV adoption is widespread.

Subcommittee Chair Richard Bloom, whose district includes Malibu and Beverly Hills, and Assemblymember Laura Friedman, who represents Glendale and Burbank, said they too wanted to see more specifics from Newsom, the CEC and CARB.

“One of the things that we’re suffering from here today, if it hasn’t been evident, is a lack of analysis showing that the proposals that are being made support the goals that we all share,” Bloom said. “More information demonstrating that would be very, very welcome as we continue to analyze the budget proposals that are made by your agencies.”

Friedman said the low-income components needed more work.

“I think this program has to have extremely strong oversight and metrics and guardrails, because it’s a lot of money that will be put up,” Friedman said. “Great intentions, but it would be awful to see later that the money was spent and it’s not helping the communities that it’s intended to help.”

Ting authored a 2018 measure, Assembly Bill 2127, that requires the CEC to assess the EV charging infrastructure needed to reach the state’s ZEV goal and reduce greenhouse gas emissions to 40% below 1990 levels by 2030.

“I am a big fan of the idea that we need to do upfront investments,” Ting said. “The time is definitely now to be investing in this infrastructure. However, I’m not clear what we’re investing in, and it’s not clear what we are spending this money on, so if we don’t know what we’re getting for a billion dollars … I don’t know we could approve that.”

In a Jan. 11 hearing of the full Budget Committee, Assemblymember Jim Wood (D) asked whether it was appropriate for the governor to propose spending $1.5 billion on ZEVs but far less on helping small businesses recover from the economic damage of the pandemic.

Priorities need to be targeted, and addressing the pandemic is paramount, Wood said. That includes reopening schools and businesses and putting people back to work.

“I think my environmental record is pretty strong in this building,” he said. “I own an electric car. I love my electric car. [But] we have $1.5 billion in the budget for electric car infrastructure and incentives. We have $575 million going to small businesses. I wonder, is that the right number?”

The state’s 4 million small businesses are an economic driver for the state, and the workers they employ will be among the residents purchasing ZEVs, Wood said.

“Those are the people,” he said, “that are going to buy the electric cars, that are going to use that [charging] infrastructure.”