Existing law provides for the licensure and regulation of health facilities, including among others, skilled nursing facilities and intermediate care facilities, by the State Department of Public Health. Existing law makes it a misdemeanor for any person to willfully or repeatedly violate the provisions governing the licensure and regulation of health facilities. This bill would authorize a skilled nursing facility or intermediate care facility to adopt a feeding assistant training program and would require the department to approve a feeding assistant training program for facilities to adopt that meets specified requirements. The bill would require skilled nursing facilities and intermediate care facilities that utilize feeding assistants to comply with certain requirements, including that a feeding assistant only provide dining assistance for residents who have no complicated feeding problems. The bill would also specify that hours of care provided by a feeding assistant may be used in determining whether a facility satisfies direct care service hour, or nursing hour, per patient day requirements. By expanding the scope of a crime, this bill would impose a state-mandated local program. 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.
Existing law establishes a system of public elementary and secondary schools in this state, and authorizes local educational agencies throughout the state to operate schools and provide instruction to pupils in kindergarten and grades 1 to 12, inclusive. This bill would appropriate, for the 2021–22 fiscal year, $1,000,000 from the General Fund to the State Department of Education for the Superintendent of Public Instruction to allocate, through a competitive selection process, to a school district for the purpose of implementing a Career Preparedness Systems Framework pilot program that could be used by local educational agencies as a diagnostic template that examines school systems that intentionally build and cultivate soft skills, hard skills, and pupil purpose and authentic voice. The bill would require the selected school district, on or before January 1, 2023, to submit a report to the department and the Legislature on the development of the Career Preparedness Systems Framework pilot program that includes recommendations on how to incorporate the framework into a local educational agency's local control and accountability plan. Funds appropriated by this bill would be applied toward the minimum funding requirements for school districts and community college districts imposed by Section 8 of Article XVI of the California Constitution.
Under existing law, the Public Utilities Commission (PUC) has regulatory authority over public utilities, including electrical corporations. Existing law requires the PUC, in consultation with the Independent System Operator (ISO) , to establish resource adequacy requirements for all load-serving entities, defined to include electrical corporations, community choice aggregators, and electric service providers. Existing law requires that the resource adequacy program achieve specified objectives, including to establish new or maintain existing demand response products and tariffs that facilitate the economic dispatch and use of demand response that can either meet or reduce an electrical corporation's resource adequacy requirements, as determined by the PUC. This bill would require the PUC, by July 1, 2022, to establish a capacity valuation methodology for customer-sited energy storage resources and customer-sited hybrid resources, as defined, in consultation with the ISO and the State Energy Resources Conservation and Development Commission, for the 2023 resource adequacy year.
Under existing law, when a vacancy occurs in the office of Representative in Congress, or in either house of the Legislature, the Governor is required, within 14 calendar days after the occurrence of the vacancy, to call an election to fill the vacancy, as specified. With regard to a vacancy in the office of United States Senator, however, existing law authorizes the Governor to appoint a person to fill the vacancy, as specified. This bill would instead require that a vacancy in the office of United States Senator be filled in the same manner as a vacancy in a congressional representative or state legislative office. The bill would make conforming and technical changes.
Existing law requires a general acute care hospital to take a variety of actions relating to the provision of language assistance services to patients with language or communication barriers, including, among others, preparing and maintaining a list of interpreters who have been identified as proficient in sign language who have the ability to translate the names of body parts, injuries, and symptoms. This bill would prohibit a general acute care hospital from including a sign language interpreter or cued language transliterator on that list unless the interpreter or transliterator meets certain certification or testing requirements. This bill would require the Department of Public Health, on or before January 1, 2024, to conduct a study to establish the guidelines for selecting testing organizations, agencies, or educational institutions to administer tests for certification of interpreters, including, but not limited to, American Sign Language interpreters, in medical settings for individuals who are deaf or hard of hearing. The bill would require the department, on or before January 1, 2025, to approve one or more entities to administer testing for American Sign Language interpreters for individuals who are deaf or hard of hearing pursuant to guidelines established by the department.
Existing law, the Labor Code Private Attorneys General Act of 2004, permits an aggrieved employee, on behalf of themselves and other current or former employees, to bring a civil action pursuant to specified procedures for a violation of a provision of the Labor Code that provides for a civil penalty to be assessed and collected by the Labor and Workforce Development Agency. This bill would prohibit an aggrieved employee from maintaining an action on behalf of themselves or any other aggrieved employee under the act if certain conditions apply, including if the aggrieved employee has brought an action under the act in conjunction with, or in addition to, claims for monetary damages or penalties for violations of the Labor Code arising out of the same period of employment that occurred between March 4, 2020, and the state of emergency termination date, as defined.
Existing law, the California Suicide Prevention Act of 2000, allows the State Department of Health Care Services, contingent upon appropriation, to establish and implement a suicide prevention, education, and gatekeeper training program to reduce the severity, duration, and incidence of suicidal behaviors. Existing law authorizes the State Department of Public Health to establish the Office of Suicide Prevention to, among other things, convene experts and stakeholders, including, but not limited to, stakeholders representing populations with high rates of suicide, to encourage collaboration and coordination of resources for suicide prevention. This bill would require the department to establish an Ending Military Suicide Task Force to systematically reduce military suicides and to develop a plan to eliminate all military suicides in the state, as specified. Commencing June 1, 2023, the bill would require the task force to submit a specified report to the Governor and the Legislature on the state of veteran suicide prevention, as specified, including, among other things, an analysis of the plans, activities, strategies, and programs undertaken pursuant to the task force's recommendations and their effects on reducing military suicides in the state.
Existing law establishes the Department of Housing and Community Development (department) and sets forth its powers and duties including functioning as the principal state department responsible for coordinating federal-state relationships in housing and community development, except for housing finance. Those duties include, among other things, administration of the Emergency Housing and Assistance Program. Existing law, the Bergeson-Peace Infrastructure and Economic Development Bank Act, establishes the California Infrastructure and Economic Development Bank (bank) and sets forth the powers and duties of the bank including authority to make loans, issue bonds, and provide financial assistance relating to economic development or public development facilities. This bill would require the department and the bank to develop a proposed program, as specified, to invest in the building of offsite industrialized housing to support the policy goal of increasing the state's capacity to quickly respond to additional housing needs precipitated by homelessness, wildfires, COVID-19, or other emergency situations. The bill would require the department and the bank to report its recommendations to the Legislature by January 1, 2023, including whether and how industrialized housing would alleviate the state's housing, homelessness, and disaster response needs. The bill would preclude implementation of the recommended programs unless approved by a subsequent act of the Legislature.
Existing law provides for the Medi-Cal program, which is administered by the State Department of Health Care Services, under which qualified low-income individuals receive health care services, including enteral nutrition products, pursuant to a schedule of benefits, and subject to utilization controls, such as prior authorization. The Medi-Cal program is, in part, governed and funded by federal Medicaid program provisions. Existing law requires the department to establish a Medically Tailored Meals Pilot Program to operate for a period of 4 years from the date the program is established, or until funding is no longer available, whichever date is earlier, in specified counties, including the Counties of Alameda and Sonoma, to provide medically tailored meal intervention services to Medi-Cal participants with specified health conditions, such as diabetes and renal disease. This bill would require the department to establish, no earlier than January 1, 2022, a pilot program for a 2-year period in the Counties of Alameda, Fresno, and San Bernardino to provide food prescriptions to eligible Medi-Cal beneficiaries, including individuals who have a specified chronic health condition, such as Type 2 diabetes and hypertension, when utilizing evidence-based practices that demonstrate the prevention, treatment, or reversal of those specified diseases. The bill would authorize the department, in consultation with stakeholders, to establish utilization controls, including the limitation on food prescriptions, and to enter into contracts for purposes of implementing the pilot program. The bill would require a Medi-Cal managed care plan or their contractor that participates in the pilot program to establish procedures for referring and enrolling eligible Medi-Cal beneficiaries in the pilot program. The bill would require the department to evaluate the pilot program upon its conclusion, to report to the Legislature on those findings, and to implement these provisions by various means, including provider bulletins, without taking regulatory action. The bill would repeal these provisions on January 1, 2027. This bill would make legislative findings and declarations as to the necessity of a special statute for the Counties of Alameda, Fresno, and San Bernardino.
Existing law requires the governing board of a school district to employ persons for positions not requiring certification qualifications. Existing law requires the governing board of a school district to classify those employees and positions and requires that they be known as the classified service. Existing law requires, if specially funded positions are restricted to employment of persons in low-income groups, from designated impoverished areas, or other criteria which restricts the privilege of all citizens to compete for employment in the positions, these positions to be classified as "restricted." Existing law requires persons employed in restricted provisions to be classified employees for all purposes, except as provided. This bill would make nonsubstantive changes to those provisions relating to restricted positions.
Existing law, the Medicinal and Adult-Use Cannabis Regulation and Safety Act (MAUCRSA) , provides for the licensure and regulation of commercial cannabis activity. MAUCRSA prohibits the manufacture, sale, delivery, holding, or offering for sale of a cannabis product that is adulterated and defines "adulteration" for this purpose. This bill would impose testing and labeling requirements on products that are, or contain, one or more psychoactive or nonpsychoactive cannabinoids that are derived from a plant that is not cannabis, referred to as noncannabis cannabinoids or NCCs. The bill would require the State Department of Public Health to review each noncannabis cannabinoid in use in products for sale in the state to determine whether the NCC is psychoactive and to determine the safety and efficacy of the substance. The bill would require the department to publish a list that categorizes NCCs as approved psychoactive, approved, nonpsychoactive, or not approved, as specified. Existing law imposes an excise tax upon purchasers of cannabis or cannabis products sold in this state at the rate of 15% of the average market price of any retail sale by a cannabis retailer, and a separate cultivation tax on harvested cannabis that enters the commercial market, as specified. Under existing law, those taxes are administered by the California Department of Tax and Fee Administration and are deposited into the California Cannabis Tax Fund, which is continuously appropriated for specified purposes, including youth, education, prevention, and early intervention and treatment services, environmental restoration and protection, and law enforcement, pursuant to a specified schedule. This bill would impose an excise tax upon purchasers of noncannabis cannabinoids sold in this state at the rate of $0.01 per milligram of NCC and would prohibit noncannabis cannabinoids from being sold to a purchaser unless the excise tax is paid by the purchaser at the time of sale. The bill would require a manufacturer to report and remit the excise tax to the department, as provided, and to collect the tax from the retailer. The bill would establish the Noncannabis Cannabinoid Tax Fund and would require revenues from the excise tax on NCCs to be deposited into that fund. The bill would continuously appropriate the moneys in the fund for specified purposes, including youth, education, prevention, and early intervention and treatment services, environmental restoration and protection, and social justice and equity programs, pursuant to a specified schedule. By creating a continuously appropriated fund, the bill would make an appropriation. This bill would include a change in state statute that would result in a taxpayer paying a higher tax within the meaning of Section 3 of Article XIII A of the California Constitution, and thus would require for passage the approval of 23 of the membership of each house of the Legislature. This bill would take effect immediately as a tax levy, but its operative date would depend on its effective date.
Existing law requires the Director of Forestry and Fire Protection to identify areas in the state as very high fire hazard severity zones based on consistent statewide criteria and based on the severity of fire hazard that is expected to prevail in those areas. This bill would require the Department of Forestry and Fire Protection, in consultation with the California Fire Science Consortium and the Department of Insurance to develop a fire risk assessment map for the state that quantifies the risks of wildfire for a parcel of land for a time span of 50 years. The bill would require the department to annually update the wildfire risk assessment map. The bill would require the department to make the wildfire risk assessment map available to the public.
