BILL NUMBER: SCR 115INTRODUCED BILL TEXT INTRODUCED BY Senator Lara (Coauthors: Senators Block, Corbett, Correa, De Len, Hancock, Hernandez, Hueso, Liu, Mitchell, Padilla, Pavley, Steinberg, and Torres) (Coauthors: Assembly Members Ian Calderon, Campos, Garcia, Gonzalez, Medina, V. Manuel Prez, Rendon, and Rodriguez) APRIL 21, 2014 Relative to the Senator Jenny Oropeza Memorial Freeway. LEGISLATIVE COUNSEL'S DIGEST SCR 115, as introduced, Lara. Senator Jenny Oropeza Memorial Freeway. This measure would designate the portion of State Highway Route 710 that runs between Pico Avenue and West Wardlow Road in the City of Long Beach as the Senator Jenny Oropeza Memorial Freeway. The measure would also request the Department of Transportation to determine the cost of appropriate signs showing this special designation and, upon receiving donations from nonstate sources covering that cost, to erect those signs. Fiscal committee: yes. WHEREAS, Jenny Oropeza, who passed away on October 20, 2010, was a lifelong public servant who was active in her community and was first elected to the Long Beach Unified School District Board of Education, then the Long Beach City Council, the Assembly of the State of California, and finally to the Senate of the State of California; and WHEREAS, During her time as a Member of the Legislature, Jenny Oropeza was a champion for public transportation, health care, education, clean air, equality, and the prevention of cancer; and WHEREAS, Senator Oropeza was so admired by her constituents and community that she was posthumously awarded the Political Leadership Award in 2011 by the Democratic Women's Study Club in Long Beach, which has renamed that award the Jenny Oropeza Political Leadership Award; and WHEREAS, The Long Beach Community Hispanic Association (Centro CHA) posthumously awarded Senator Oropeza the Create Change Community Service Excellence Award in 2011, which will in future years be called the Create Change: Jenny Oropeza Community Service Excellence Award; and WHEREAS, In recognition of Senator Oropeza, the Long Beach Lambda Democratic Club created the Jenny Oropeza Ally of the Year Award, which was first awarded in 2011; and WHEREAS, As a tribute to Senator Oropeza's dedication to fostering protections for key state public health programs, the Los Angeles County Affiliate of Susan G. Komen for the Cure, in joint collaboration with the six other California-based Komen affiliates, known as "the California Collaborative," established the Senator Jenny Oropeza Public Policy Internship position; and WHEREAS, The City of Long Beach named the community center in Cesar E. Chavez Park the Jenny Oropeza Community Center and the Los Angeles Unified School District dedicated the Jenny Oropeza Global Studies Academy at the Rancho Dominguez Preparatory School; and WHEREAS, Shortly after taking office in 2000, then Assembly Member Oropeza became aware that the Alameda Corridor would open in 2002 and that all the planned bridges, designed to prevent cars from having to wait for trains to pass at street level, would be completed, except for the bridge on State Highway Route 1 (Pacific Coast Highway) in the community of Wilmington, which was the busiest route along the Alameda Corridor; and WHEREAS, The bridge to be built at that location would bisect the Equilon Refinery and was therefore the most complicated and expensive bridge to build, and there was not enough funding to complete the on State Highway Route 1 bridge; and WHEREAS, Senator Oropeza brought together the interested parties, including the Department of Transportation, the Alameda Corridor Transportation Authority, the Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority (LACMTA), the Equilon Refinery, the Union Pacific Railroad, and the City of Los Angeles to solve this problem of completing the bridge and was able to help facilitate $107 million in funding from a combination of sources that included state transportation funds, state Proposition 116 bond funds, federal demonstration funds, LACMTA funds, and railroad funds; now, therefore, be it Resolved by the Senate of the State of California, the Assembly thereof concurring, That the Legislature hereby designates the portion of State Highway Route 710 that runs between Pico Avenue and West Wardlow Road in the City of Long Beach as the Senator Jenny Oropeza Memorial Freeway; and be it further Resolved, That the Department of Transportation is requested to determine the cost of appropriate signs consistent with the signing requirements for the state highway system showing this special designation and, upon receiving donations from nonstate sources sufficient to cover that cost, to erect those signs; and be it further Resolved, That the Secretary of the Senate transmit copies of this resolution to the Director of Transportation and to the author for appropriate distribution.