Asm. Tom Torlakson

Existing law requires that, for the 2011–12 fiscal year and every fiscal year thereafter, a regional occupational center or program may claim no more than 10% of the state-funded average daily attendance for which the center or program is eligible, for services provided to students who are not enrolled in grades 9 to 12, inclusive, and up to an additional 5% for CalWORKs, Temporary Assistance Program, or Job Corps participants and participants under the federal Workforce Investment Act of 1998. This bill would exempt services provided by a regional occupational center or program to former dependents or wards of the juvenile court who reached the age of majority while in foster care from the cap imposed by this provision.

Existing law establishes the professional development block grant to apportion funds to school districts for the purpose of funding specified staff development, credentialed teacher retention in high-priority schools, as defined, and intersegmental programs, as specified. This bill would authorize an institution of higher education, a nonprofit organization specializing in English learner research or professional development, or a county office of education with demonstrated success in establishing and implementing English learner professional development programs to offer a Leadership for English Learner Success Program for school administrators or counselors, or both, under contract or other cooperative arrangement with a school district. The program would be required to include specified components. Necessary facilities and equipment would be provided by the school district and the necessary instructional materials would be provided by the contractor. The program would be implemented with funds from the school improvement grants component of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. The bill would require the State Department of Education to submit to the Legislature, by November 1, 2013, a report that evaluates the program and would require school districts that offer the program to provide the department with the information necessary to complete that report. This bill would make these provisions inoperative on July 1, 2015, and would repeal them as of January 1, 2016.

Existing law requires the Emergency Medical Services Authority to establish minimum standards for the operation of poison control centers, as defined, and to establish geographical service areas and criteria for designation of regional poison control centers. This bill would appropriate $3,000,000 from the General Fund to the authority for the support of poison control centers.

The Donahoe Higher Education Act sets forth, among other things, the missions and functions of California's public and independent segments of higher education, and their respective institutions of higher education. The act applies to the University of California only to the extent that the Regents of the University of California, by appropriate resolution, act to make the act applicable. Existing law requires that a person, other than a nonimmigrant alien, as defined, who has attended high school in California for 3 or more years, who has graduated from a California high school or attained the equivalent thereof, who has registered at or attends an accredited institution of higher education in California not earlier than the fall semester or quarter of the 2001–02 academic year, and who, if he or she is a person without lawful immigration status, has filed a prescribed affidavit relating to obtaining lawful immigration status, is exempt from paying nonresident tuition at the California Community Colleges and the California State University. Existing law also requires the waiver of student fees charged by community college districts for students who demonstrate financial need or are otherwise eligible for the waiver. Existing law requires the Board of Governors of the California Community Colleges to allocate, to community college districts for determining financial need and delivering student financial aid services, an amount based on the amount of fees waived. This bill would amend the Donahoe Higher Education Act to require the Trustees of the California State University and the Board of Governors of the California Community Colleges, and to request the Regents of the University of California, to establish procedures and forms that enable persons who are exempt from paying nonresident tuition under that provision, or who meet equivalent requirements adopted by the regents, to be eligible to receive institutional financial aid awards. The bill would define institutional financial aid as financial assistance offered by a campus of the California Community Colleges, California State University, or University of California, including grant, scholarship, workstudy, and loan programs. The bill would specify that institutional financial aid does not include a specified board of governors fee waiver. The bill would declare that it is a state law within the meaning of a federal statute that permits a state to provide an alien who is not lawfully present in the United States with eligibility for a state or local public benefit only through the enactment of a state law affirmatively providing for that eligibility. The bill would apply to the University of California only if the regents, by appropriate resolution, act to make it applicable.

(1) Existing law establishes the public school system in this state and, among other things, provides for the establishment of school districts throughout the state and for their provision of instruction at the public elementary and secondary schools they operate and maintain. Existing law authorizes school districts to establish and maintain a paper recycling program in all classrooms, administrative offices, and other areas owned or leased by the school district where a significant quality of wastepaper is generated or may be collected. Existing law requires the California Integrated Waste Management Board to develop and implement a source reduction and recycling program for schools in which schools are encouraged, but not required, to participate. This bill would express findings and declarations of the Legislature with respect to the potential benefits of school recycling programs. The bill would, until January 1, 2012, require each school district to establish a beverage container recycling program at each school campus and public office of that school district, but only to the extent that the district does not incur costs. Under the bill, a school district would be authorized to choose whether to operate its own beverage container recycling program, to contact its local Community Conservation Corps or another recycler to collect the beverage containers, to provide a beverage container collection program as a fundraising activity for the school district, or to continue a recycling program in existence on January 1, 2010. Because the bill would impose new duties on school districts, it would constitute a state-mandated local program. The bill would require the California Integrated Waste Management Board and the Department of Conservation to provide specified recycling supplies and materials to a school district to which the bill is applicable upon request of that district. The bill would authorize school districts to enter into an agreement or partnership with a public agency or private sector or nonprofit entity to obtain all or part of the supplies and information necessary for participation in the beverage container recycling program and to use the proceeds from the program for specified purposes. (2) 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 these statutory provisions.

Under existing law, prosecution for specified felony sex offenses, including rape, sodomy, lewd or lascivious acts, oral copulation, continuous sexual abuse of a child, and acts of sexual penetration that are alleged to have been committed when the victim was under the age of 18 years, may be commenced at any time prior to the victim's 28th birthday. Existing law also allows a complaint alleging one or more of these offenses to be filed beyond this time limitation in certain specified instances if the crimes involve substantial sexual conduct and there is independent corroborating evidence of the allegations. This bill would allow the prosecution of the felony sex offenses specified above to be commenced at any time if the crime is alleged to have been committed when the victim was under the age of 14.

Existing law requires various state agencies to administer programs relating to water supply, water quality, and flood management in the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta. The Johnston-Baker-Andal-Boatwright Delta Protection Act of 1992 (Delta Protection Act) creates the Delta Protection Commission and requires the commission to prepare and adopt a comprehensive long-term resource management plan for specified lands within the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta. Existing law requires the Secretary of the Resources Agency to convene a committee to develop and submit to the Governor and the Legislature, on or before December 31, 2008, recommendations for implementing a specified strategic plan relating to the sustainable management of the Delta. This bill would revise and recast the provisions of the Delta Protection Act to, among other things, reduce the number of commission members to 15 members, as specified. The bill would require the commission to appoint at least one advisory committee consisting of representatives from specified entities to provide input regarding the diverse interests within the Delta. The bill would require the commission to adopt, not later than July 1, 2011, an economic sustainability plan containing specified elements and would require the commission to review and, as determined to be necessary, amend the plan every 5 years. The bill would require the commission to prepare and submit to the Legislature, by July 1, 2010, recommendations on the potential expansion of or change to the primary zone or the Delta. The bill would establish the Delta Investment Fund in the State Treasury. Moneys in the fund, upon appropriation by the Legislature, would be required to be expended by the commission to implement the regional economic sustainability plan. The bill would establish in the Natural Resources Agency the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta Conservancy. The conservancy would be required to act as a primary state agency to implement ecosystem restoration in the Delta and to support efforts that advance environmental protection and the economic well-being of Delta residents. The bill would specify the composition of the conservancy and grant certain authority to the conservancy, including the authority to acquire real property interests from willing sellers or transferors. The conservancy would be required to use conservation easements to accomplish ecosystem restoration whenever feasible. The conservancy would be required to prepare and adopt a strategic plan to achieve the goals of the conservancy. The strategic plan would be required to be consistent with the Delta Plan and certain other plans. The bill would establish the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta Conservancy Fund in the State Treasury. Moneys in the fund would be available, upon appropriation, to finance projects, including ecosystem restoration and economic sustainability projects. These provisions would only become operative if AB 39, AB 49, SB 12, and SB 229 of the 2009–10 Regular Session of the Legislature, relating to water use and resource management, are each enacted and become effective on or before January 1, 2010.

Existing law appropriates the sum of $402,000,000 from the General Fund to the Superintendent of Public Instruction for the 2009–10 fiscal year to be allocated to schoolsites selected to participate in the Quality Education Investment Act program, as specified. Existing law requires the Superintendent, for each school district and chartering authority receiving an allocation pursuant to these provisions, to reduce its revenue limit or its general purpose entitlement, as specified, for the 2009–10 school year by the amount of the allocation received pursuant to these provisions. This bill would condition this reduction upon certification by the Superintendent that an equivalent amount of additional federal or state funds that may be used by a school district or chartering authority for revenue limit or general purpose uses have been made available to the school district or chartering authority. The bill would require the Superintendent of Public Instruction and the Director of Finance to report to the Legislature by March 1, 2010, the amount of the reductions specified in the bill that will not be eligible for restoration with available federal funding. The bill would require the Superintendent of Public Instruction to use $64,872,000 in federal funds, as specified, in combination with other available funds, for the purpose of awarding grants to local educational agencies that participate in the Quality Education Investment Act Program in the 2009–10 fiscal year, thereby making an appropriation.

Existing law authorizes the governing board of any school district to provide a comprehensive educational counseling program for all pupils enrolled in the district. Existing law requires that educational counseling include academic counseling, in which pupils receive counseling regarding establishment and implementation of educational plans, achievement of proficiency standards, completion of required curriculum, and access to, and success in, higher education, and career and vocational counseling, in which pupils are assisted in planning for the future, becoming aware of their career potential, developing realistic perceptions of work, and relating to the work world. This bill would state legislative intent relating to the role of school counselors and counseling programs. The bill would, to align academic counseling with the Middle and High School Supplemental Counseling Program, authorize the academic counseling component of educational counseling to also include an individualized review of pupil's academic and deportment records and of his or her career goals, and the opportunity for a counselor to meet with each pupil and his or her parents or legal guardian to explain the academic progress needed to complete middle or high school, pass the high school exit examination, and be eligible for admission to a 4-year institution of postsecondary education and the availability of career technical education, among other things. The bill would authorize the career and vocational counseling component of educational counseling to include identifying personal interests, skills, and abilities, career planning, course selection, and career transition, and assisting pupils to understand the changing work environment, the effect of work on lifestyle, the relationship between academic achievement and career success, the importance of maximizing career options, the value of participating in career technical education and work-based learning activities and programs, and the need to develop essential employable skills and work habits, among other things. The bill would require ongoing professional development related to career and vocational counseling to include strategies for pupils pursuing postsecondary education, career technical education, multiple pathways, college, and global career opportunities.

Existing law requires the Superintendent of Public Instruction to establish an advisory committee to advise on all appropriate matters relative to the creation of the Academic Performance Index and the implementation of the Immediate Intervention/Underperforming Schools Program and the High Achieving/Improving Schools Program. Existing law requires the committee to make recommendations to the Superintendent, by July 1, 2005, on the appropriateness and feasibility of a methodology for generating a measurement of academic performance by using unique pupil identifiers and annual academic achievement growth to provide a more accurate measure of a school's growth over time. This bill would require the advisory committee, by July 1, 2010, to make recommendations to the Superintendent regarding the inclusion of the results of the English language development test or series of tests developed or acquired pursuant to a specified provision and the feasibility of including English learner proficiency as part of the Academic Performance Index (API) . The bill would require the Superintendent, with the approval of the state board, to include the results of the English language development test or series of tests developed or acquired pursuant to a specified provision and English language proficiency levels and growth of those levels in the API.