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 Bill Text - SB-954 California Environmental Quality Act: advanced manufacturing facilities: exemption.

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 |Add To My Favorites |Track Bill | Version: 05/14/26 - Amended Senate
 04/16/26 - Amended Senate
 03/25/26 - Amended Senate
 02/02/26 - Introduced

 SB-954 California Environmental Quality Act: advanced manufacturing facilities: exemption.(2025-2026)

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 Date Published: 05/15/2026 11:31 AM

SB954:v96#DOCUMENTBill Start

 Revised
 June 25, 2026

 Amended
 IN 
 Senate
 May 14, 2026

 Amended
 IN 
 Senate
 April 16, 2026

 Amended
 IN 
 Senate
 March 25, 2026

 CALIFORNIA LEGISLATURE—
 2025–2026 REGULAR SESSION

 Senate Bill

No. 954

Introduced by Senator Blakespear
(Principal coauthor: Assembly Member Connolly)
(Coauthors: Senators Allen, Arreguín, Cortese, Laird, McGuire, Pérez, and Reyes)
(Coauthors: Assembly Members Addis, Caloza, Lee, Pellerin, Schultz, and Ward, and Kalra)

February 02, 2026

An act to amend Sections 21067.5, 21080.085, and 21080.69 of, to add Section 21069.5 to, and to add Chapter 8 (commencing with Section 21189.100) to Division 13 of, the Public Resources Code, relating to environmental quality.

LEGISLATIVE COUNSEL'S DIGEST

SB 954, as amended, Blakespear.
 California Environmental Quality Act: advanced manufacturing facilities: exemption.

The California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) requires a lead agency, as defined, to prepare, or cause to be prepared, and certify the completion of, an environmental impact report on a project that it proposes to carry out or approve that may have a significant effect on the environment or to adopt a negative declaration if it finds that the project will not have that effect. CEQA also requires a lead agency to prepare a mitigated negative declaration for a project that may have a significant effect on the environment if revisions in the project would avoid or mitigate that effect and there is no substantial evidence that the project, as revised, would have a significant effect on the environment. 

CEQA defines various terms, including “natural and protected lands” for its purposes.

This bill would revise the definition of that term to include habitats for protected species identified as candidate, sensitive, or species of special status by state or federal agencies.

CEQA exempts from its requirement projects that consist exclusively of a day care center that is not located in a residential area and projects that consist exclusively of an advanced manufacturing facility located on a site zoned exclusively for industrial uses.

This bill would additionally exempt projects consisting exclusively of a family day care home, as defined. The bill would, for the exemption for the day care center and family day care home, instead, instead require the projects for those facilities not
 be located in an area zoned for industrial use or within 3,200 feet of a facility that actively extracts or refines oil or natural gas in order for the exemption to apply. The bill would revise the exemption for advanced manufacturing facility projects to require those projects to meet certain requirements be used exclusively for final tier manufacturing, as defined, and for the Governor to certify the project, as provided. The bill would require an applicant of an advanced manufacturing project that is exempted from CEQA under the bill’s requirement to enter into a bona fide community benefits agreement, as provided, and to comply with certain labor requirements, as provided. The bill would require to
 the lead agency, before determining that an advanced manufacturing project is exempt from CEQA, to hold at least one public hearing on the project and to ensure that the applicant complies with the requirement to enter into a bona fide community benefits agreement and the labor requirements.

CEQA also exempts from its requirements rezoning the generally does not apply to a rezoning that implements of the schedule of actions contained in an approved housing element. CEQA provides that this exemption does not apply to rezoning that
 element, unless the rezoning would allow for the construction of certain facilities, including oil and gas infrastructure.

This bill would provide that the above exemption also does not apply make CEQA applicable to a rezoning of this kind that authorizes a tourism facility use that was not permitted before the rezoning or authorizes an increase in the allowable floo