39711.
(a) (1) The California Environmental Protection Agency shall identify disadvantaged communities for investment opportunities related to this chapter. These communities shall be identified based on geographic, socioeconomic, public health, and environmental hazard criteria, and may include, but are not limited to, either of the following:(A) Areas disproportionately affected by environmental pollution and other hazards that can lead to negative public health effects, exposure, or environmental degradation.
(B) Areas with concentrations of people that are of low income, high unemployment, low levels of
homeownership, high rent burden, sensitive populations, or low levels of educational attainment.
(2) The California Environmental Protection Agency shall hold at least one public workshop prior to the identification of disadvantaged communities pursuant to this section.
(3) The Administrative Procedure Act (Chapter 3.5 (commencing with Section 11340) of the Part 1 of Division 3 of Title 2 of the Government Code) does not apply to the identification of disadvantaged communities pursuant to this section.
(b) No later than July 1, 2017, the California Environmental Protection Agency shall update the identification of disadvantaged communities for investment opportunities related to this chapter, as
established pursuant to subdivision (a), to include factors factors, using the best-available data, that include, but need not be limited to, areas of the state that are disproportionately impacted by any of the following:
(1) High poverty rates.
(2) High rent burden and severe rent burden where households pay more than 50 percent of their household income in gross rent.
(3) High cost of living.