Existing law makes freely available to all inhabitants of the State of California all state publications by distribution to libraries throughout the state, with the assumption that those libraries will keep the documents readily accessible to patrons without charge. Existing law additionally requires that the State Printer print sufficient copies of each state publication, the amount of which is determined by the State Librarian, to be distributed to libraries. This bill would authorize a member of the public to copy, share, distribute, or republish a state publication authored by the state.
Existing law provides for the licensure and regulation of various healing arts licensees by various boards within the Department of Consumer Affairs, including the Board of Psychology. Under existing law, until January 1, 2017, the board is vested with the power to enforce the Psychology Licensing Law, and the board consists of 9 members, 4 of whom are public members and 5 of whom are licensed psychologists. Existing law specifies that a quorum of the board requires 5 members. Existing law requires the board to post information on its licensees, including the license status and address of record for a licensee, as specified. This bill would enact the Behavior Analyst Act and would, until January 1, 2022, vest the board with the power to enforce the act. This bill would, on and after July 1, 2018, increase the number of members that constitute a quorum of the board to 6 members, and would require the Governor to appoint 2 additional members to the board that meet certain requirements, including, but not limited to, that one member is licensed as a psychologist and is qualified to practice behavior analysis, as defined. The bill would also additionally require the board to post license information regarding behavior analysts, assistant behavior analysts, behavior analysis technicians, and behavior analyst interns. This bill would require a person to apply for and obtain a license from the board prior to engaging in the practice of behavior analysis, as defined, either as a behavior analyst or an assistant behavior analyst. The bill would require these applicants to, among other things, meet certain educational and training requirements, and pass a specified state and federal criminal background check. The bill would require an assistant behavior analyst applicant to provide proof to the board of ongoing supervision by a licensed behavior analyst or a licensed psychologist who is qualified to practice behavior analysis, as specified. The bill would provide that those licenses expire 2 years after the date of issuance and would authorize the renewal of unexpired licenses if certain requirements are met, including the completion of specified continuing education. The bill would also require an applicant for relicensure or reinstatement to certify, under penalty of perjury, that he or she is in compliance with that continuing education requirement. By expanding the crime of perjury, the bill would impose a state-mandated local program. This bill would require the registration of a behavior analyst intern by the board and would require the intern to be supervised by a licensed behavior analyst or a licensed psychologist who is qualified to practice behavior analysis. In order to be registered, the bill would require an intern applicant to meet certain educational requirements, pass a specified state and federal criminal background check, and pay an application fee, as provided. The bill would make these intern registrations subject to renewal every 2 years and would require the payment of a renewal fee. This bill would also require the registration of a behavior analysis technician, as defined, who practices under the direction and supervision of a registered behavioral analyst intern, a licensed behavior analyst, a licensed assistant behavior analyst, or a licensed psychologist who is qualified to practice behavior analysis. The bill, among other things, would require that technician to submit an application, pass a specified state and federal criminal background check, and pay an application fee. The bill would make these registrations subject to renewal every 2 years and would require the payment of a renewal fee. This bill would, until January 1, 2022, create the Behavior Analyst Committee within the jurisdiction of the board, and would require the committee to be composed of 5 members who shall be appointed as specified. The bill would authorize the committee to make recommendations to the board regarding the regulation of the practice of behavior analysis, as provided. This bill would require the board to conduct disciplinary hearings, as specified. The bill, on and after July 1, 2019, would make it unlawful to, among other things, practice behavior analysis without being licensed by the board, except as specified. This bill would make a licensee or health care facility, as defined, that fails or refuses to comply with an authorized client request or court order for the medical records of a client subject to a specified civil penalty, except as specified. The bill would also make a licensee or health care facility with multiple violations of those court orders subject to a crime. By creating a new crime, the bill would impose a state-mandated local program. This bill would make a violation of the act a misdemeanor punishable by 6 months in the county jail or a fine not to exceed $2,000, or by both imprisonment and a fine. By creating a new crime, the 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 requires each county to provide cash assistance and other social services to needy families through the California Work Opportunity and Responsibility to Kids (CalWORKs) program using federal Temporary Assistance to Needy Families (TANF) block grant program, state, and county funds. Existing law specifies the amounts of cash aid to be paid each month to CalWORKs recipients. Existing law establishes the Aid to Families with Dependent Children-Foster Care (AFDC-FC) program, under which counties provide payments to foster care providers on behalf of qualified children in foster care. Under existing law, a child who is placed in the approved home of a relative is eligible for AFDC-FC if he or she is eligible for federal financial participation in the AFDC-FC payment, as specified. Existing law provides for benefits for a child who is placed in the approved home of a relative and who is ineligible for AFDC-FC pursuant to the CalWORKs program. Existing law establishes the Approved Relative Caregiver Funding Option Program in counties choosing to participate, for the purpose of making the amount paid to relative caregivers for the in-home care of children placed with them who are ineligible for AFDC-FC payments equal to the amount paid on behalf of children who are eligible for AFDC-FC payments. This bill would require, until January 1, 2020, and subject to the availability of funds, counties participating in the Approved Relative Caregiver Funding Option Program to pay to an approved relative caregiver, for each child eligible for benefits pursuant to the program, an annual clothing allowance of $240 for a cumulative total of three years. Existing law continuously appropriates moneys from the General Fund to defray a portion of county costs under the CalWORKs program. This bill would instead provide that the continuous appropriation would not be made for purposes of implementing the bill.
Existing law establishes the Department of Resources Recycling and Recovery to administer the California Integrated Waste Management Act of 1989, and authorizes the department to hold hearings and conduct investigations in any part of the state necessary to carry out its powers and duties. This bill would require the department, in the next regularly scheduled waste characterization study conducted by the department, to include specified information relating to food service packaging waste management.
Existing law makes it a crime, punishable by a fine, by imprisonment, or by both a fine and imprisonment, for a person to willfully inflict corporal injury, including, but not limited to, by strangulation or suffocation, resulting in a traumatic condition upon a person with whom the defendant has been in a specified domestic relationship. This bill would make it a crime, punishable by a fine, by imprisonment, or by both a fine and imprisonment, for a person to willfully inflict corporal injury resulting in a traumatic condition by strangulation or suffocation upon a person with whom the defendant has been in a specified domestic relationship. By increasing the duties of local prosecutors, the 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 the Seed Advisory Board to advise the Secretary of Food and Agriculture and make recommendations on matters pertaining to the California Seed Law, and requires the board to be advisory on the scope of the program funded by industry and recommend the dollar volume assessments that, when combined with registration fees, provide adequate funds to support the program. This bill would authorize the board to advise the secretary and make recommendations to assess alfalfa seed sold in the state to fund research to benefit the alfalfa forage industry. The bill would authorize the board to recommend that the secretary impose an assessment of up to $0.10 per pound of alfalfa seed sold and, if the board recommends an assessment, would require the secretary to appoint an alfalfa seed subcommittee comprised of 9 members, as specified, to advise the secretary on funding alfalfa research benefitting the alfalfa forage industry with the proceeds of the assessments collected.
The Firefighters Procedural Bill of Rights Act and the Public Safety Officers Procedural Bill of Rights Act grant certain rights to firefighters and public safety officers, as defined. The acts require that, when a firefighter or public safety officer is under investigation and is interrogated by his or her commanding officer, or another member of the employing agency, on matters than that could lead to punitive action, the interrogation be conducted under certain conditions. Upon the filing of a formal written statement of charges or when an interrogation focuses on matters that, in the case of a firefighter, may result in punitive action or, in the case of a public safety officer, are likely to result in punitive action, the acts grant the firefighter or public safety officer a right to be represented by a person of his or her choice, except as specified, who may be present at all times during the interrogation. The acts prohibit requiring the representative to make certain disclosures or subjecting the representative to punitive action for refusing to make those disclosures. This bill, in an investigation that focuses on matters that may result in punitive action against a firefighter or public safety officer who is not formally under investigation but is interviewed as a witness in an investigation of another firefighter or public safety officer, would grant the firefighter or public safety officer who is a witness the right to have representation in the interview at the time that he or she has reasonable cause to believe that the interrogation may result in punitive action against him or her. If the firefighter or public safety officer requests representation and the request is denied, the bill would prohibit statements taken after the request is made from being used against the firefighter or public safety officer in a disciplinary proceeding or in determining or imposing a punitive action.
The California Finance Lenders Law generally provides for the licensure and regulation of finance lenders and brokers by the Commissioner of Business Oversight, and makes a willful violation of its provisions a crime. The law authorizes a licensee to offer credit disability insurance under specified conditions and requires premiums to be made available on a monthly or annual premium basis. This bill would instead authorize credit disability insurance to be offered on a monthly, annual, or single premium basis. The bill would require, when a monthly premium is offered, the premium rate charged per month to not exceed a pro rata relationship to the annual or single premium.
Existing law, the Labor Code Private Attorneys General Act of 2004, authorizes an aggrieved employee to bring a civil action to recover specified civil penalties that would otherwise be assessed and collected by the Labor and Workforce Development Agency on behalf of the employee and other current or former employees for the violation of certain provisions affecting employees. The act provides the employer with the right to cure certain violations before the employee may bring a civil action, as specified. For other violations, the act requires the employee to follow specified procedures before bringing an action. This bill would provide the employer with the right to cure any violation of the Labor Code covered by the act before the employee may bring a civil action. That right to cure would be provided before, and in addition to, any other specified procedures the employee is required to follow prior to bringing an action. Existing law establishes the Department of Industrial Relations within the agency and sets forth its powers and duties, including, but not limited to, fostering, promoting, and developing the welfare of wage earnings. This bill would appropriate $1,400,000 to the department for deposit into the Labor and Workforce Development Fund for the purpose of establishing 9 new positions to review and investigate private attorneys general cases under the act.
Existing sales and use tax laws impose a tax on retailers measured by the gross receipts from the sale of tangible personal property sold at retail in this state, or on the storage, use, or other consumption in this state of tangible personal property purchased from a retailer for storage, use, or other consumption in this state, and provides various exemptions from those taxes. The bill would exempt from those taxes, on and after January 1, 2017, and before January 1, 2030, the gross receipts from the sale of, and the storage, use, or other consumption of, qualified tangible personal property purchased by a qualified person, as defined, for use primarily in, at, or on a marine terminal or qualified tangible personal property used primarily to maintain, repair, or test the above-described equipment, as provided. The bill would require the purchaser to furnish the retailer with an exemption certificate, as specified. The Bradley-Burns Uniform Local Sales and Use Tax Law authorizes counties and cities to impose local sales and use taxes in conformity with the Sales and Use Tax Law, and existing law authorizes districts, as specified, to impose transactions and use taxes in conformity with the Transactions and Use Tax Law, which conforms to the Sales and Use Tax Law. Exemptions from state sales and use taxes are incorporated into these laws. This bill would specify that this exemption does not apply to local sales and use taxes, transactions and use taxes, and specified state taxes from which revenues are deposited into the Local Public Safety Fund, the Education Protection Account, the Local Revenue Fund, or the Local Revenue Fund 2011. This bill would take effect immediately as a tax levy.
Under existing law, the Public Utilities Commission has regulatory authority over public utilities, including telephone corporations. Existing law authorizes the commission to fix just and reasonable rates and charges for every public utility. Existing law, with certain exceptions, prohibits a public utility from changing any rate, except upon a showing before the commission and a finding by the commission that the new rate is justified. Existing law requires the commission to exercise its regulatory authority to maintain the California High-Cost Fund-A Program (CHCF-A program) to provide universal service rate support to small independent telephone corporations, as defined, in amounts sufficient to meet the revenue requirement, as defined, established by the commission through rate-of-return regulation in furtherance of the state's universal service commitment to the continued affordability and widespread availability of safe, reliable, high-quality communications services in rural areas of the state. This bill would revise the CHCF-A program requirements to provide that the revenue requirement of a small independent telephone corporation includes rate case expenses, as defined. This bill would require the commission to issue its final decision on a general rate case of a small independent telephone corporation no later than 390 days following the corporation's filing of its general rate case application or advice letter initiating the general rate case. If the commission fails to issue a final decision by the 390th day, the bill would authorize the small independent telephone corporation to file a tariff implementing interim rates. The interim rates would generally be effective on the first day of the first test year in the general rate case application, subject to refund and adjustment upward or downward back to the interim rate effective date, consistent with the final rates adopted by the commission. The bill would provide that these provisions may be waived at any time by mutual consent of the executive director of the commission and the small independent telephone corporation.
Existing law, the Medical Marijuana Regulation and Safety Act, establishes the licensure of persons engaged in specified activities relating to medical cannabis and other regulatory provisions. That act establishes within the Department of Consumer Affairs the Bureau of Medical Marijuana Regulation. That act also requires a licensing authority to deposit all licensing fees to be deposited into accounts established in the Medical Marijuana Regulation and Safety Act Fund, a fund established in the State Treasury. Existing law imposes certain fines and civil penalties for specified violations of the act and requires moneys collected as a result of these fines and civil penalties to be deposited into the Medical Marijuana Fines and Penalties Account, established within that fund. This bill would rename, on January 1, 2017, the act as the Medical Cannabis Regulation and Safety Act and the bureau as the Bureau of Medical Cannabis Regulation. This bill would rename, on January 1, 2017, the fund as the Medical Cannabis Regulation and Safety Act Fund and the account as the Medical Cannabis Fines and Penalties Account. The bill would make conforming changes to the act and would replace, where appropriate, the term "marijuana" with the term "cannabis." This bill would also make other conforming and similar changes to other related areas of law.
