The California Legislature introduced an extraordinary bill on October 26, 2009.  It is SB 1 (6th Extraordinary Session), introduced by Senators Correa, Ashburn, Denham, Huff, and Walters but principal co-authors include Assembly Members Blakeslee and Soloria and co-authors include Assembly Members Conway, Fletcher, Garrick, Gilmore, Hagman, Hall, Nava, Portantino, Tran and Villines.   The equivalent Assembly bill is AB 2.

This bill, among other things, would allow the California Housing and Community Development (HCD) Department to designate eleven (11) additional Enterprise Zones in 2009.  These eleven additional Enterprise Zones would include:  Anaheim, El Monte, Escondido, Fremont, Gardena, Los Angeles County, Madera County, Monrovia, Needles, Oxnard, and Wasco.  Fremont is included to aid that city in keeping the NUMMI auto manufacturing plant open, but the other ten cities and counties had applied for conditional designation with HCD in March 2009 and qualified for designation but were not named August 19, 2009 when the results were announce because of the cap on the total number of zones allowed in California, i.e., currently set at 42. 

Proponents claim that adding these new EZs will generate over 100,000 jobs during the 15-year designation period that will run from 2010 to 2025.

Popularity: 5% [?]