The Budget Act of 2021 and Budget Act of 2022 made appropriations for the support of state government for the 2021–22 and 2022–23 fiscal years. This bill would amend the Budget Act of 2021 and Budget Act of 2022 by amending and adding items of appropriation and making other changes. The bill would declare that it is to take effect immediately as a Budget Bill.
The California Health Facilities Financing Authority Act authorizes the California Health Facilities Financing Authority to, among other things, make loans from the continuously appropriated California Health Facilities Financing Authority Fund to participating health institutions, as defined, for financing or refinancing the acquisition, construction, or remodeling of health facilities. This bill would create the Distressed Hospital Loan Program, until January 1, 2032, for the purpose of providing loans to not-for-profit hospitals and public hospitals, as defined, in significant financial distress or to governmental entities representing a closed hospital to prevent the closure or facilitate the reopening of a closed hospital. The bill would require the Department of Health Care Access and Information to administer the program and would require the department to enter into an interagency agreement with the authority to implement the program. The bill would require the department, in collaboration with the State Department of Health Care Services, the Department of Managed Health Care, and the State Department of Public Health, to develop a methodology to evaluate an at-risk hospital's potential eligibility for state assistance from the program, as specified. The bill would require a hospital or a closed hospital to provide the authority and the department with financial information demonstrating the hospital's need for assistance due to financial hardship. The bill would additionally require that the department, in consultation with the authority, develop an application and approval process for loan forgiveness or modification of loan terms, as specified. This bill would create the Distressed Hospital Loan Program Fund, a continuously appropriated fund, for use by the department and the authority to administer the loan program, as specified. The bill would authorize both the authority and the department to recover administrative costs from the fund. The bill would authorize the Department of Finance to transfer funds from the General Fund to the Distressed Hospital Loan Program Fund between state fiscal years 2022–23 and 2023–24 to implement the bill, as specified. The bill would authorize the department and the authority to require any hospital receiving a loan under the program to provide the department and the authority with an independent financial audit of the hospital's operations for any fiscal year in which a loan is outstanding. The bill would abolish the fund on December 31, 2031, and would require any remaining balance, assets, liabilities, and encumbrances of the fund to revert to the General Fund. By creating a continuously appropriated fund, the bill would make an appropriation. The bill would specify that the authority and the department may implement these provisions by information notices or other similar instructions, without taking any further regulatory action. Existing law generally requires a health care facility to report specified data to the department, including total inpatient and outpatient revenues by payer, including Medicare and Medi-Cal. Existing law requires the department to adopt regulations regarding the identification and reporting of charity care services, and specifies various obligations to provide hard copies of hospital data reports submitted pursuant to these provisions. This bill would additionally require data for total inpatient and outpatient revenues by payer to include commercial coverage payers. The bill would require a hospital subject to these data reporting requirements to submit a balance sheet detailing the assets, liabilities, and net worth at the end of the quarter as specified by the department. The bill would also remove the provisions regarding regulations related to charity care services and obligations to provide hard copies of hospital data reports. This bill would declare that it is to take effect immediately as a bill providing for appropriations related to the Budget Bill.
Read. Adopted. (Ayes 36. Noes 0. Page 1024.)
Existing law, the Early Education Act, among other things, requires the Superintendent of Public Instruction to administer all California state preschool programs, including, but not limited to, part-day and full-day age and developmentally appropriate programs for 3- and 4-year-old children. Existing law requires the State Department of Education, in collaboration with the State Department of Social Services, to implement a reimbursement system plan that establishes reasonable standards and assigned reimbursement rates for purposes of the act, and specifies the reimbursement rate for contractors. Existing law requires $184,794,000 in one-time funding to be made available to address inequities between the standard reimbursement rate and the regional market rate ceiling for center-based childcare providers in the California state preschool program, among other programs, by providing reimbursement rate supplements. This bill would, commencing July 1, 2022, and subject to available funding, authorize the department to issue temporary rate increases to contractors that exceed the existing specified rates and the previously described reimbursement rate supplements. Existing law, the Child Care and Development Services Act, administered by the State Department of Social Services, establishes a system of child care and development services for children up to 13 years of age. Existing law requires the department, in collaboration with the State Department of Education, to implement a reimbursement system plan that establishes reasonable standards and assigned reimbursement rates, and specifies the reimbursement rate for contractors. Existing law also specifies the reimbursement rates for childcare services provided to CalWORKs recipients. This bill would, commencing July 1, 2022, and subject to available funding, authorize the department to issue temporary rate increases to contractors and childcare providers that exceed those existing specified rates. Existing law requires the State Department of Social Services, in consultation with the State Department of Education, to establish a fee schedule for families using preschool and child care and development services and requires families who utilize those services to be assessed a family fee that is based on income, certified family need for full-time or part-time care services, and enrollment. Existing law prohibits those family fees from being collected for the 2022–23 fiscal year. Existing law allocates $519,000,000 in previously appropriated federal funds, and appropriates $60,000,000 in federal funds, to the State Department of Education, and requires the State Department of Education to transfer most of those funds to State Department of Social Services to provide subsidized childcare and preschool providers with COVID-19 pandemic-related assistance, including, among other things, reimbursement for childcare and preschool contractors for family fees that are waived, as specified. Existing law also appropriates $739,025,000 in federal funds to the State Department of Education to, upon order of the Department of Finance, be transferred to the State Department of Social Services for the purpose of expanding childcare access by funding additional slots under the alternative payment program and the general childcare and development program. This bill would extend the prohibition on the collection of those family fees through September 30, 2023, and would require contractors to reimburse subsidized childcare providers for the full amount of the certificate or voucher without deducting family fees during this extended period. The bill would also make the above-described previously appropriated federal funds to expand childcare access slots and provide for family fee waivers and the reimbursement for waived family fees available in the 2023–24 fiscal year in an amount that is equal to the cost to extend family fee waivers from July 1, 2023, to September 30, 2023, inclusive, for all families receiving subsidized childcare services from childcare providers through specified programs administered by the State Department of Social Services. By extending the period of time in which previously appropriated funds are available for encumbrance and by expanding the purposes for which an existing appropriation may be expended, the bill would make an appropriation. This bill would declare that it is to take effect immediately as a bill providing for appropriations related to the Budget Bill.
(1) The Personal Income Tax Law, in modified conformity with federal income tax law, generally defines "gross income" as income from whatever source derived, except as specifically excluded, and provides various exclusions from gross income. Existing law authorizes the Chancellor of the California Community Colleges to discharge unpaid fees due or owed by a student to a community college district. This bill would exclude from an individual's gross income, for taxable years beginning on or after January 1, 2022, and before January 1, 2027, any amount relating to the discharge of unpaid fees due or owed by a student pursuant to that law. (2) Existing federal law authorizes various specified higher education emergency grants to support students and higher education institutions with expenses and financial needs related to the COVID-19 pandemic. This bill would, for taxable years beginning on or after January 1, 2020, and before January 1, 2028, exclude from an individual's gross income specified higher education emergency grants received by a student in postsecondary education, as specified. (3) Existing federal law excludes from gross income the amount of certain student loans discharged, in whole or in part, after December 31, 2020, and before January 1, 2026. This bill would, for taxable years beginning on or after January 1, 2021, and before January 1, 2026, exclude from an individual's gross income the amount of certain student loans discharged, in whole or in part, after December 31, 2020, and before January 1, 2026, in conformity with that federal law. (4) This bill would appropriate $20,000 from the General Fund to the Franchise Tax Board for the purpose of administering the provisions of this bill. (5) Existing law requires any bill authorizing a new tax expenditure to contain, among other things, specific goals, purposes, and objectives that the tax expenditure will achieve, detailed performance indicators, and data collection requirements. The bill would also include additional information required for any bill authorizing a new tax expenditure. This bill would make findings and declarations related to a gift of public funds. This bill would declare that it is to take effect immediately as a bill providing for appropriations related to the Budget Bill.
Existing law, the Alatorre-Zenovich-Dunlap-Berman Agricultural Labor Relations Act of 1975, grants agricultural employees the right to form and join labor organizations and engage in collective bargaining with respect to wages, terms of employment, and other employment conditions, and authorizes employees to elect exclusive bargaining representatives for these purposes. Existing law creates the Agricultural Labor Relations Board and prescribes its composition, duties, and powers. Existing law authorizes the board to hold hearings and conduct investigations and requires that certain procedures be the exclusive method of redressing unfair labor practices. Existing law requires the board to certify the results of an election conducted by secret ballot of employees in a collective bargaining unit to designate a collective bargaining representative, unless the board determines there are sufficient grounds to refuse to do so. Under existing law, any person who willfully resists, prevents, or interferes with a member of the board or its agents or agencies in the performance of their duties is guilty of a misdemeanor. Existing law refers to the election by secret ballot process as a polling place election. Existing law establishes alternative procedures to the polling place election process to allow a labor organization to be certified as the exclusive bargaining representative of a bargaining unit of agricultural employees through either a labor peace election conducted by mail ballot, or a non-labor peace election, on petition and conducted as prescribed. Under existing law, the applicable procedure is dependent on whether an employer enrolls and agrees to a labor peace election for labor organization representation campaigns. Under existing law, a non-labor peace election requires a petition to be submitted to the board, as specified, including proof of majority support through authorization cards, petitions, or other appropriate proof of majority support of the currently employed employees and subject to investigation and certification by the board. Existing law requires, for both alternative procedures, that an employer respond to the board with regard to a petition, including providing a specified list of employees to the board, which the board is required to provide to the applicable labor organization. Existing law establishes a schedule for agricultural employers to indicate to the board whether they agree to a labor peace compact. Existing law prohibits a labor peace compact from prohibiting an employer from communicating truthful statements to employees regarding workplace policies or benefits, as specified. Existing law requires the board to develop an online web-based labor peace election process that will allow employers to indicate their labor peace choice online, and that will allow labor organizations to see whether a specific agricultural employer has agreed to a labor peace election campaign. Existing law repeals the above-described provisions on January 1, 2028. This bill would establish, until January 1, 2028, a single alternative process that is, in most respects, the same as the non-labor peace election process of existing law, but it would instead be referred to as a Majority Support Petition. The bill would limit the authorization to file a Majority Support Petition to labor organizations that have a specified bargaining agreement covering agricultural employees in place as of the effective date of its provisions. Under the bill, a certification through Majority Support Petition would be a valid election for purposes of limiting board authority to direct elections, as specified. The bill would cap at 75 the number of Majority Support Petitions that result in the certification of a labor organization that are authorized to be conducted under its provisions before January 1, 2028. The bill would require an employer to respond to the board with regard to a Majority Support Petition, including by providing a specified list of employees to the board. By expanding the definition of a crime, this bill would impose a state-mandated local program. The bill would require the board to provide this information immediately to the applicable labor organization. This bill, until January 1, 2028, would also make various conforming changes to account for the Majority Support Petition process, including authorizing the board to certify labor organizations in this connection, establishing that representatives designated by the submission of authorization cards are exclusive agricultural employee representatives, and prohibiting the board from conducting reviews of a majority support petition for a specified period. This bill would require the board, in specified situations, to order proceedings to determine the specific amount of a monetary remedy, and if the monetary remedy is continuing to accrue, the amount accrued as of the date of the board's order. The bill would specify when the board's order becomes final in these situations. The bill would make conforming amendments in this regard in connection with the processing of final board orders. This bill would require an employer who petitions for a writ of review of a final board order, as specified, or who otherwise appeals, petitions, or seeks to overturn or stay or modify any order of the board in which the board has ordered the payment of a monetary remedy to first post a bond with the board in the amount of the entire economic value of the order, as a condition of proceeding. The bill would prescribe the characteristics of the bond and a procedure in connection with its application. The bill would prescribe analogous bond requirements with respect to an employer who seeks review of a final order of the board pursuant to ordering into effect the terms of a mediator's report. The bill would require a mediator's report, in specified instances, to include a statement of the economic value of the collective bargaining agreement as determined by stipulation of the parties or by the mediator. This bill would state that its provisions are severable. The California Constitution requires the state to reimburse local agencies and school districts for certain costs mandated by the state. Statutory provisions establish procedures for making that reimbursement. This bill would provide that no reimbursement is required by this act for a specified reason. This bill would appropriate $10,000 for the 2022–23 fiscal year from the General Fund to the board to implement the provisions related to agricultural labor relations in the bill. This bill would declare that it is to take effect immediately as a bill providing for appropriations related to the Budget Bill.
Read. Adopted. (Page 1489.).
Read. Adopted. (Page 1480.).
Read. Adopted. (Ayes 75. Noes 0. Page 1465.).
Existing law authorizes the California Horse Racing Board to approve minisatellite wagering sites, as defined, under specified conditions. Existing law requires an organization formed by associations or fairs to operate the audiovisual signal system to execute a specified agreement with the association conducting a racing meeting and the minisatellite wagering facility that specifies, among other things, the components of its racing program, including live, out-of-zone, out-of-state, and out-of-country races, that an association or fair will make available to the site. This bill would explicitly require the agreement to specify which live in-state races would be provided by the association or fair to the site. The bill would also make nonsubstantive changes, including deleting obsolete language.
Read. Adopted. (Ayes 37. Noes 0. Page 960.)
This measure would recognize May 11, 2023, as California Attractions and Parks Day, and would declare that the Legislature intends to take actions to commemorate the 19th anniversary of the California Attractions and Parks Association and celebrate the organization's important role and many contributions to California's tourism industry through its promotion, support, and sponsorship of a wide variety of activities and programs at attractions and parks throughout the state.
