(1) The existing Emergency Telephone Users Surcharge Act generally imposes a surcharge on amounts paid by every person in the state for intrastate telephone service to provide revenues sufficient to fund "911" emergency telephone system costs. Before July 1, 2013, amounts are determined annually by the California Technology Agency, and on and after that date, by the Department of Technology, and upon collection are paid to the State Board of Equalization on a monthly basis by the telephone service supplier and are deposited into the State Treasury to the credit of the State Emergency Telephone Number Account in the General Fund, to be expended for limited purposes, including to pay the Department of General Services for its costs in administration of the "911" emergency telephone number system. Under existing law, the Public Utilities Commission (PUC) has regulatory authority over public utilities, including telephone corporations, and is authorized to fix just and reasonable rates and charges for services provided by those public utilities. Existing law establishes the Public Utilities Commission Utilities Reimbursement Account and authorizes the PUC to annually determine a fee to be paid by every public utility providing service directly to customers or subscribers and subject to the jurisdiction of the PUC, except for a railroad corporation. The PUC is required to establish the fee, with the approval of the Department of Finance, to produce a total amount equal to that amount established in the authorized PUC budget for the same year, and an appropriate reserve to regulate public utilities, less specified sources of funding. Existing law establishes the state's telecommunications universal service programs and authorizes the PUC to impose charges for the purpose of funding those programs. Pursuant to this authority, the PUC has established 6 end-user surcharges to fund 6 universal service programs. This bill would enact the Prepaid Mobile Telephony Services Surcharge and Collection Act. The bill would establish a prepaid MTS surcharge, as defined, based upon a percentage of the sales price of each retail transaction that occurs in this state for prepaid mobile telephony services, as defined. The prepaid MTS surcharge would include the emergency telephone users surcharge, as defined, and PUC surcharges, as defined. The bill would require a seller, as defined, to collect the prepaid MTS surcharge, as provided, from a prepaid consumer, as defined, and remit the amounts collected to the State Board of Equalization pursuant to the Fee Collection Procedures Law. The bill would require the board, after deducting its administrative expenses, to deposit the amounts collected in the Prepaid Mobile Telephony Services Surcharge Fund, which the bill would establish in the State Treasury, as provided. The bill would require the PUC to annually compute the PUC's reimbursement fee and 6 universal service program fees, to post notice of those fees on its Internet Web site, and to notify the State Board of Equalization of the amounts, which would be adjusted, as specified, and which together would be the PUC surcharges. The bill would require the California Technology Agency to annually compute, as specified, the intrastate portion of the 911 surcharge to be collected on prepaid mobile telephony services to post notice of those charges and to notify the State Board of Equalization of the amount, which would be the emergency telephone users surcharge. Existing law defines mobile telephony services for purposes of the Public Utilities Code. This bill would revise that definition and incorporate that definition for purposes of the Prepaid Mobile Telephony Services Surcharge and Collection Act. (2) Existing law establishes requirements for consumer disclosure and service that are applicable to the advertising and sale of prepaid calling cards, as defined, and prepaid calling services, as defined, including the disclosure of ancillary services, as defined. This bill would except the prepaid MTS surcharge from the definition of ancillary services if the surcharge is disclosed, collected, and remitted pursuant to the Prepaid Mobile Telephony Services Surcharge and Collection Act. (3) The Fee Collection Procedures Law makes a violation of any provision of the law, or of certain requirements imposed by the board pursuant to the law, a crime. By expanding the application of the Fee Collection Procedures Law, the violation of which is 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. (4) This bill would state that changes made by this bill to amend and add specified code sections are not intended to supersede changes made by Section 310 of the Governor's Reorganization Plan No. 2 of 2012, which took effect on July 3, 2012, and will become fully operative on July 1, 2013. (5) Provisions of this bill would become inoperative on January 1, 2017, and the Prepaid Mobile Telephony Services and Collection Act would be repealed on that date. The bill would further state the intent of the Legislature to develop and implement means to collect local utility user taxes and local communications related-charges on the purchase of prepaid mobile telephony services with the intent that the state MTS surcharge and those local charges would be in a uniform manner consistent with this bill collection procedures by that date. (6) This bill would declare that it is to take effect immediately as an urgency statute.
Sponsored bills
(1) Existing law authorizes the tax collector to apply any refund due a taxpayer, or a taxpayer's agent, to specified delinquent taxes, except when a refund is due to a taxpayer because the taxpayer or the agent for the taxpayer submitted a replicated tax payment, as defined. This bill would eliminate the exception described above. (2) Existing law, in the case in which a taxpayer has failed to pay taxes on an assessment that is the subject of a pending assessment appeal, limits, as provided, the amount of penalty relief to the difference between the final determination of value by the county board, as defined, and the value on the assessment roll for the fiscal year covered by the application. This bill would similarly limit penalty relief in the case in which a taxpayer has failed to pay taxes on an assessment that is the subject of a pending informal review due to a decline in value as a result of damage, destruction, depreciation, obsolescence, removal of property, or other factors causing a decline in value. This bill would require the tax collector to accept a payment in the amount of 80% of the amount of tax finally determined due if that payment was made within 30 days of the taxpayer filing an application for reassessment. This bill would require the county tax collector to provide notice to taxpayers of these penalty provisions. This bill would also provide that these provisions shall apply in a county only if the county board of supervisors, with the approval of the county's tax collector and the county's auditor, adopts a resolution or ordinance approving the penalty relief, as provided. (3) Existing law requires the payment of interest on property tax refunds at the greater of 3% per annum or the county pool apportioned rate. Existing law requires, for each fiscal year, the county treasurer to advise the Controller of the county pool apportioned rate, and of computations made in deriving that rate, no later than 60 days after the end of that fiscal year. This bill would extend the time period the county treasurer has to advise the Controller of the county pool apportioned rate from 60 to 90 days.
The Teachers' Retirement Law limits the amount of postretirement compensation that may be earned in specified types of employment by a retired member of the Defined Benefit Program without a reduction in the retirement benefits of the member. That law provides exemptions from this limit and until June 30, 2012, specifies that the limitation provisions do not apply to compensation earned by a member retired for service who has returned to work after retirement and, for at least 12 consecutive months, has not performed specified activities. This bill would extend the operation of that exemption until June 30, 2013. The bill also would exempt from the earnings limitation, until June 30, 2013, compensation paid to a retired member who has returned to work after the date of retirement as a trustee, administrator, or fiscal adviser approved pursuant to specified provisions by the Superintendent of Public Instruction, the Board of Governors of the California Community Colleges, or a county superintendent of schools to address academic or financial weaknesses in a school district. The bill would specify the documentation required for any of those persons exercising that compensation exemption. The bill would additionally exempt from the earnings limitation an employee of a 3rd party which does not participate in a California public pension system if the activities performed by the person are not normally performed by employees of a public employer and it is for a limited-term assignment. The Teachers' Retirement Law limits the amount of compensation for certain creditable service activities by a retired member in one school year to be $22,000 adjusted by the percentage change in the average compensation earnable by active members of the Defined Benefit Program, from the 1998–99 fiscal year to the fiscal year ending in the previous calendar year.The bill would change that limit to be 12 of the median final compensation of all members who retired for service during the fiscal year ending in the previous calendar year. Existing law authorizes a retired member of the State Teachers' Retirement System (STRS) to terminate his or her retirement allowance, reinstate as an active member, and later cancel the termination upon subsequently retiring, as specified. Existing law prescribes the conditions under which a STRS service retirement allowance becomes effective and requires, in this regard, that the effective date be at least one year following the date on which it is terminated pursuant to the above-described provision. This bill would eliminate the one-year waiting period after the termination. The bill would also prohibit a member who terminates his or her retirement allowance pursuant to that provision and retires within one year of reinstatement from electing a different option or different set of beneficiaries than were in effect at the time of the termination. This bill would declare that it is to take effect immediately as an urgency statute.
This measure would state the Legislature's support for the programs and initiatives administered by the University of California Division of Agriculture and Natural Resources and would request the United States Department of Agriculture, the Regents of the University of California, and the board of supervisors in each county in the state to continue their support and funding of the division.
Existing law provides that every dealer in or collector of junk, metals, or secondhand materials, or the agent, employee, or representative of that dealer or collector, who buys or receives any wire, cable, copper, lead, solder, mercury, iron, or brass which he or she knows or reasonably should know is ordinarily used by or ordinarily belongs to a railroad or other transportation, telephone, telegraph, gas, water, or electric light company or county, city, city and county, or other political subdivision of this state engaged in furnishing public utility service without using due diligence to ascertain that the person selling or delivering the same has a legal right to do so, is guilty of criminally receiving that property, and shall be punished by imprisonment as specified, by a fine of not more than $250, or by both that fine and imprisonment. This bill would increase that maximum fine to an amount not to exceed $1,000. Existing law provides that a person commits the crime of vandalism when he or she defaces, damages, or destroys property that is not his or her own. Existing law provides that vandalism is punishable by imprisonment in a county jail for not more than one year, by a fine, as specified, based on the amount of the defacement, damage, or destruction, or by both the fine and imprisonment. This bill would enact a clarifying statement relating to vandalism committed against public transit property and facilities, public parks property and facilities, and public utilities and water property and facilities, and would also express certain findings and declarations of the Legislature relating to the theft of nonferrous materials.
Existing law specifies the manner of disposition of cremated human remains, including allowing the remains to be taken by boat or by air, and scattered at sea, in accordance with specified procedures. Existing law requires cremated remains to be removed from their container before the remains are scattered at sea. This bill, notwithstanding the requirement that cremated remains be removed from their container before scattering, would authorize the remains to be transferred from a durable container into a scattering urn, as defined, no more than 7 days before scattering the cremated remains at sea from a boat.
Existing law requires a court to order a person, who is at least 18 years of age and who is convicted of a first violation of a driving-under-the-influence (DUI) offense, as specified, to attend a DUI program, including specified alcohol or drug education and counseling services, and provides for the licensing of those programs by the State Department of Alcohol and Drug Programs. This bill would prohibit any DUI program activities from (1) being conducted through a program that is not so licensed and (2) being completed through an online, distant learning, or remote learning method. The bill would further prohibit any credit from being given for any DUI program activities completed through an unlicensed program or through an online, distant learning, or remote learning method.
(1) Existing law authorizes a peace officer to impound for 30 days a vehicle driven by a person who had never been issued a driver's license. Existing law subjects to forfeiture, and requires the impoundment of, a vehicle driven by an unlicensed driver who is a registered owner of the vehicle and who has a previous misdemeanor conviction of operating a vehicle without a driver's license. This bill would prohibit a peace officer from towing and impounding, or causing the towing and impoundment of, a vehicle driven by a person who does not have a valid driver's license, as specified, if the vehicle is, or could be, legally parked at a location near the scene of the traffic stop or if control of the vehicle is, or could be, relinquished to a licensed driver. If a licensed driver is not present at the time of the traffic stop, the bill would require the peace officer to inform the driver that the vehicle will not be towed and impounded if a licensed driver can retrieve the vehicle within a reasonable amount of time of the traffic stop. The bill would require a peace officer to obtain the approval of a supervisory officer before the towing and impoundment of a vehicle subject to these provisions. By requiring a higher level of service by a local law enforcement agency, this bill would impose a state-mandated local program. The bill would require the release of the impounded vehicle upon the presentation of the registered owner's, or his or her agent's, currently valid driver's license and proof of current vehicle registration, or upon order of a court. This bill would also make conforming changes. (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.
This measure would urge the President and the Congress of the United States to immediately enact the Achieving a Better Life Experience Act of 2011.