Senate Resolution 82 declares February 2026 as Children's Dental Health Month in California to raise awareness about the importance of oral health. The resolution highlights that tooth decay is a major public health issue affecting many children, particularly those from disadvantaged backgrounds, and notes that untreated dental problems can lead to missed school days and learning difficulties. While acknowledging recent improvements in access to Medi-Cal dental services, the bill emphasizes the need for continued efforts to prevent cavities through education and preventive care. This measure serves as a symbolic recognition rather than establishing new laws or funding, aiming to encourage policymakers and the public to focus on childhood oral health.
The Personal Income Tax Law allows various credits against the tax imposed by that law. This bill, for taxable years beginning on or after January 1, 2026, and before January 1, 2031, would allow a credit against those taxes in an amount equal to 50% of unreimbursed costs paid or incurred by a taxpayer for the purchase of durable medical equipment, as defined, for use by a qualifying dependent, as defined, during the taxable year. The bill would limit the credit to $5,000 per taxable year for each qualifying dependent. Existing law requires any bill authorizing a new tax expenditure to contain, among other things, specific goals that the tax expenditure will achieve, detailed performance indicators, and data collection requirements. This bill also would include additional information required for any bill authorizing a new tax expenditure. This bill would take effect immediately as a tax levy.
Existing law, the Knox-Keene Health Care Service Plan Act of 1975, provides for the licensure and regulation of health care service plans by the Department of Managed Health Care and makes a willful violation of the act a crime. Existing law provides for the regulation of disability insurers by the Department of Insurance. Existing law requires a health care service plan or disability insurer to allow an individual to enroll in or change their health benefit plan as a result of a specified triggering event. This bill, the PARENT Act, would make pregnancy a triggering event for purposes of enrollment or changing a health benefit plan. Because a willful violation of this provision by a health care service plan would be a 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 establishes the State Department of Public Health to implement various programs throughout the state relating to public health. The department administers the California Wastewater Surveillance Dashboard that provides an overview of data from testing wastewater for SARS-CoV-2 virus in California. The data in the dashboard is generated by those participating in the department's California Surveillance of Wastewaters (Cal-SuWers) network, including the Cal-SuWers program, WastewaterSCAN, the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention National Wastewater Surveillance System, wastewater utilities, and academic, laboratory, and other state and federal partners. This bill would require the department, in consultation with participating wastewater treatment facilities, local health departments, and other subject matter experts, to maintain the Cal-SuWers network to test, as appropriate for public health use, for pathogens, toxins, or other public health indicators in wastewater. The bill would require participation in the Cal-SuWers network from local health departments and wastewater treatment facilities to be voluntary. The bill would authorize the department to coordinate with health care providers, local health departments, and emergency response agencies to ensure wastewater surveillance data is used for early intervention, outbreak response, epidemiological investigations, and public health planning. The bill would authorize the department to communicate to the general public, through a publicly accessible internet website, as specified, to provide transparency and public awareness of wastewater-based disease monitoring. The bill would authorize the department to utilize external funding sources, in addition to the department's existing, noncontinuously appropriated funding sources, to implement these provisions. The bill would make related findings and declarations.
Existing law, the Knox-Keene Health Care Service Plan Act of 1975, provides for the licensure and regulation of health care service plans by the Department of Managed Health Care and makes a willful violation of the act's requirements a crime. Existing law provides for the regulation of health insurers by the Department of Insurance. Existing law also 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 pursuant to a schedule of benefits. Existing law sets forth specified coverage requirements for health care service plan contracts and health insurance policies. Existing law generally authorizes a health care service plan or health insurer to use utilization controls to approve, modify, delay, or deny requests for health care services based on medical necessity. Existing law requires health care service plans and health insurers, as specified, within 6 months after the relevant department issues specified guidance, or no later than March 1, 2025, to require all of their staff who are in direct contact with enrollees or insureds in the delivery of care or enrollee or insured services to complete evidence-based cultural competency training for the purpose of providing trans-inclusive health care for individuals who identify as transgender, gender diverse, or intersex. This bill would require a health care service plan contract or health insurance policy issued, amended, renewed, or delivered on or after the bill's operative date that provides outpatient prescription drug benefits to cover up to a 12-month supply of a United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA) -approved prescription hormone therapy, and the necessary supplies for self-administration, that is prescribed by a network provider within their scope of practice and dispensed at one time, as specified. The bill would make the same prescription hormone therapy a covered benefit under the Medi-Cal program, as specified. The bill would prohibit a plan or an insurer from imposing utilization controls or other forms of medical management limiting the supply of this hormone therapy to an amount that is less than a 12-month supply, but would not prohibit a contract, a policy, or the Medi-Cal program from limiting refills that may be obtained in the last quarter of the plan, policy, or coverage year if a 12-month supply of the prescription hormone therapy has already been dispensed during that year. The bill would exclude a Medi-Cal managed care plan contracting with the State Department of Health Care Services from these requirements. The bill would repeal these provisions on January 1, 2035. This bill would prohibit a subscriber, enrollee, policyholder, or insured from being excluded from enrollment or participation in, being denied the benefits of, or being subjected to discrimination by, any health care service plan or health insurer licensed in this state, on the basis of race, color, national origin, age, disability, or sex. The bill would define discrimination on the basis of sex for those purposes to include, among other things, sex characteristics, including intersex traits, pregnancy, and gender identity. The bill would prohibit a health care service plan or health insurer from taking specified actions relating to providing access to health programs and activities, including, but not limited to, denying or limiting health care services to an individual based upon the individual's sex assigned at birth, gender identity, or gender otherwise recorded. The bill would prohibit a health care service plan or health insurer, in specified circumstances, from taking various actions, including, but not limited to, denying, canceling, limiting, or refusing to issue or renew health care service plan enrollment, health insurance coverage, or other health-related coverage, or denying or limiting coverage of a claim, or imposing additional cost sharing or other limitations or restrictions on coverage, on the basis of race, color, national origin, sex, age, or disability, as specified. Because a violation of the bill's requirements by a health care service plan would be a crime, the bill would impose a state-mandated local program. Existing law requires a pharmacist to dispense, at a patient's request, up to a 12-month supply of an FDA-approved, self-administered hormonal contraceptive pursuant to a valid prescription that specifies an initial quantity followed by periodic refills. This bill would additionally require a pharmacist to dispense, at a patient's request, up to a 12-month supply of an FDA-approved, prescription hormone therapy pursuant to a valid prescription that specifies an initial quantity followed by periodic refills, unless an exception is met. 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 declare that it is to take effect immediately as an urgency statute.
Existing law establishes the Second Chance Program to support mental health treatment, substance use treatment, and diversion programs for persons in the criminal justice system with an emphasis on programs that reduce recidivism of persons convicted of less serious crimes and persons who have substance use and mental health problems. Existing law requires the Board of State and Community Corrections to administer a grant program to carry out the purposes of the Second Chance Program. Existing law requires the grant program to, among other things, restrict eligibility to proposals that offer mental health services, substance use disorder treatment services, misdemeanor diversion programs, or a combination thereof. Existing law also establishes the Second Chance Fund, a continuously appropriated fund, which is administered by the board. Existing law, the Treatment-Mandated Felony Act, makes it a crime for a person, who has 2 or more prior convictions for a felony or misdemeanor violation of specified controlled substances crimes, to possess a hard drug, as defined, unless it has been prescribed by a doctor, among others. Under existing law, a defendant who has been charged with this crime can elect treatment, in lieu of a jail or prison sentence or probation, by pleading guilty or no contest and admitting the alleged prior convictions, waiving time for sentencing and the pronouncement of judgment, and agreeing to participate in, and complete, a detailed treatment program developed by a drug addiction expert and approved by the court. This bill would require the Second Chance grant program to authorize eligibility for proposals that offer mental health or behavioral health services and drug court or collaborative court programs, including the treatment program under the Treatment-Mandated Felony Act. By expanding the purpose of a continuously appropriated fund, this bill would make an appropriation.
The Confidentiality of Medical Information Act governs the disclosure of medical information by an employer, a provider of health care, a health care service plan, or a contractor, as those terms are defined. The California Consumer Privacy Act of 2018 (CCPA) authorizes a consumer to direct a business, as defined, that collects sensitive personal information about the consumer to limit its use of the consumer's sensitive personal information, as specified, and defines "sensitive personal information" to include personal information that reveals a consumer's neural data. The CCPA also authorizes a consumer to request that a business delete any personal information about the consumer which the business has collected from the consumer, as prescribed. The California Privacy Rights Act of 2020, approved by the voters as Proposition 24 at the November 3, 2020, statewide general election, amended, added to, and reenacted the CCPA and establishes the California Privacy Protection Agency and vests the agency with full administrative power, authority, and jurisdiction to enforce the CCPA. This bill would require, under the CCPA, a covered business to use neural data only for the purpose for which the neural data was collected and would require a covered business to delete neural data when the purpose for which the neural data was collected is accomplished. The bill would define "covered business" to mean a person who makes available a brain-computer interface to a person in this state and would define "brain-computer interface" to mean a system that allows direct communication and control between a person's brain and an external device. This bill would declare that its provisions further the purposes and intent of the California Privacy Rights Act of 2020.
(1) Existing law, the Lanterman-Petris-Short (LPS) Act, authorizes the involuntary commitment and treatment of persons with specified mental disorders. Under the act, when a person, as a result of a mental health disorder, is a danger to themselves or others, or is gravely disabled, the person may, upon probable cause, be taken into custody by specified individuals, including, among others, a peace officer and a designated member of a mobile crisis team, and placed in a facility designated by the county and approved by the State Department of Health Care Services for up to 72 hours for evaluation and treatment. Existing law defines "assessment" for those purposes to mean the determination of whether a person shall be evaluated and treated. This bill would require an assessment to consider reasonably available, relevant information as specified. The bill would also authorize an assessment to be used to assist specified individuals in developing an aftercare plan for an individual, if that individual has agreed to an aftercare plan and can be properly served without being detained. (2) Existing law provides a procedure for the appointment of a conservator for a person who is determined to be gravely disabled as a result of a mental disorder or an impairment by chronic alcoholism (hereafter LPS conservatorship) . Under existing law, a professional person in charge of an agency providing comprehensive evaluation or a facility providing intensive treatment may recommend a LPS conservatorship for a gravely disabled person in their care if the professional person determines that the person is unwilling to accept, or is incapable of accepting, treatment voluntarily. Under existing law, a professional person in charge of an agency providing comprehensive evaluation or a facility providing intensive treatment or a professional person in charge of providing mental health treatment at a county jail, or their designee, may recommend a conservatorship for a gravely disabled person without that person being an inpatient in a facility providing comprehensive evaluation or intensive treatment if specified conditions are met. This bill would additionally authorize recommendations for an LPS conservatorship if a determination is made that the gravely disabled person has demonstrated an inability to accept voluntary treatment due to apparent incapacity. The bill would expand the list of individuals or entities that may recommend a conservatorship for a gravely disabled person without that person being an inpatient in a facility providing comprehensive evaluation or intensive treatment to include, among others, the county agency providing investigations for conservatorships of the person. (3) Existing law separately provides for the establishment of a conservatorship for a person who is unable to properly provide for their personal needs or is substantially unable to manage their finances (hereafter probate conservatorship) . Existing law requires the officer providing conservatorship investigation, if they concur with the recommendation of the professional person or facility, to petition the superior court in the patient's county of residence to establish a conservatorship. Existing law requires the officer providing conservator investigation to investigate all available alternatives to conservatorship, including, among other things, assisted outpatient treatment, as specified, and the Community Assistance, Recovery, and Empowerment Act program. Existing law requires the officer to recommended conservatorship to the court only if no suitable alternatives are available. Existing law requires the officer to render to the court a comprehensive written report of investigation prior to the hearing and to set forth all alternatives available if the officer recommends either for or against conservatorship. This bill would specify probate conservatorships with or without major neurocognitive disorder powers in the list of available alternatives that the officer providing conservatorship investigation is required to investigate. In a county where probate conservatorship and LPS conservatorship duties are split between separate agencies, the bill would require LPS conservatorship referrals that include the presence of a major neurocognitive disorder to be reviewed by both agencies to ensure the continuity of evaluations. The bill would additionally require an officer providing conservatorship investigation to include a recommended individualized plan for treatment and care drawn from the documented list of less-restrictive alternatives in the written report described above if the officer recommends against an LPS conservatorship. The bill would also make various clarifying changes. By expanding the duties of county agencies that provide services related to probate conservatorships and LPS conservatorships, and by expanding the duties of the county officer providing conservatorship investigation, this bill would impose a state-mandated local program. (4) Existing law authorizes a conservator of the person, the estate, or the person and the estate to be appointed for a person who is gravely disabled as a result of a mental health disorder or impairment by chronic alcoholism for the purpose of providing individualized treatment, supervision, and placement. Existing law requires the creation of an individualized treatment plan within 10 days of the establishment of a conservatorship, as specified. Existing law requires the treatment plan to specify goals for the conservatee's treatment, the criteria by which the accomplishment of those goals can be adjudged, and a plan for reviewing the progress of the treatment. If a treatment plan is not developed or if the conservator fails to report to the court that the conservatee is no longer gravely disabled, existing law requires specified individuals, including a person designated by the county, to refer the matter to the court. Existing law requires the court, upon report by a person designated by the county that the goals have been reached and the person is no longer gravely disabled, to terminate the conservatorship. This bill would require an individualized treatment plan to specify goals for stabilization, the individual's evidenced-based treatment, and movement to a less-restrictive setting. The bill would require those goals to include the criteria by which accomplishment can be judged. The bill would require the treatment plan to be filed with the court, as specified, after it is developed. The bill would require the court to order the treating agency to remedy any perceived defects in a treatment plan if the plan does not meet the specified goals and criteria and would create procedures for remedying those defects and terminating the conservatorship. The bill would authorize the court, upon termination of the conservatorship, to refer the individual to assisted outpatient treatment or CARE court, as specified. This bill would prohibit the court from terminating the conservatorship prior to the end of the conservator's one-year mark if the conservatee cannot be located at any point during that one-year period, except as specified. The bill would require, when a county is filing a petition and the county is aware that the subject of the petition was, within the prior 6 months, a conservatee whose conservatorship was terminated before the one-year termination date, to include in its petition the circumstances that gave rise to the termination. Because this bill would increase the duties on county personnel, this bill would impose a state-mandated local program. (5) Existing law, the Community Assistance, Recovery, and Empowerment (CARE) Act, authorizes specified people to petition a civil court to create a CARE plan to provide an individualized, appropriate range of community-based services and supports to an eligible individual. Under the CARE Act, all reports, evaluations, diagnoses, and other information filed with the court that are related to the respondent are confidential, except as specified. This bill would authorize that information to be shared only by a court order or as approved by the respondent. If the information is used outside of the above-described proceedings, the bill requires a court order for that information to be shared. This bill would authorize a court, at any point after entry of a CARE agreement or adoption of a CARE plan, to order the respondent to an evaluation under the LPS without a petition from the county if the court believes the respondent has become gravely disabled. The bill would establish the procedures required before a court could issue an order pursuant to these provisions. (6) 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, if the Commission on State Mandates determines that the bill contains costs mandated by the state, reimbursement for those costs shall be made pursuant to the statutory provisions noted above.
Existing law authorizes a county to establish a homeless adult and family multidisciplinary personnel team, as defined, with the goal of facilitating the expedited identification, assessment, and linkage of homeless individuals to housing and supportive services within that county and to allow provider agencies to share confidential information for the purpose of coordinating housing and supportive services to ensure continuity of care. This bill would authorize a county to also establish a behavioral health multidisciplinary personnel team, as defined, with the goal of facilitating the expedited identification, assessment, and linkage of a justice-involved person, as defined, diagnosed with a mental illness to supportive services within that county while incarcerated and upon release from county jail and to allow provider agencies and members of the personnel team to share confidential information, as specified, for the purpose of coordinating supportive services to ensure continuity of care. The bill would require the sharing of information permitted under these provisions to be governed by protocols developed in each county, as specified. This bill would authorize a behavioral health multidisciplinary personnel team to designate a qualified person to be a member of the team for a particular case and would require a member who receives information or records regarding a justice-involved person in their capacity as a member of the team to be under the same privacy and confidentiality obligations and subject to the same confidentiality penalties as the person disclosing or providing the information or records. The bill would also require the information or records to be maintained in a manner that ensures the maximum protection of privacy and confidentiality rights.
Existing law, the Knox-Keene Health Care Service Plan Act of 1975, provides for the licensure and regulation of health care service plans by the Department of Managed Health Care, and makes a willful violation of the act a crime. Existing law provides for the regulation of health insurers by the Department of Insurance. Existing law sets forth specified prior authorization limitations for health care service plans and health insurers. This bill would prohibit a health care service plan contract or health insurance policy issued, amended, or renewed on or after January 1, 2027, that provides coverage for physical therapy from imposing prior authorization for the initial 12 physical therapy treatment visits for a new condition. The bill would authorize prior authorization for physical therapy for a recurring condition, as specified. The bill would require a physical therapy provider to verify an enrollee's or an insured's coverage and disclose their share of the cost of care, as specified. The bill would require a physical therapy provider to obtain separate written consent for costs that may not be covered by the enrollee's or insured's plan contract or policy, that includes a written estimate of the cost of care for which the enrollee or insured is responsible if coverage is denied or otherwise not applicable. With respect to health care service plans, the bill would specify that its provisions do not apply to Medi-Cal managed care plan contracts. Because a willful violation of this provision by a health care service plan would be a 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.
