Asm. Joaquin Arambula

Existing law authorizes the State Department of Public Health to authorize certain entities to apply to the department to provide hypodermic needle and syringe exchange services in any location where the department determines that the conditions exist for the rapid spread of human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) , viral hepatitis, or any other potentially deadly or disabling infections that are spread through the sharing of used hypodermic needles and syringes, and requires the department to provide for a period of public comment during that application process, as specified. Existing law prescribes the standards that apply to an entity that has been authorized to provide these services. Existing law, the California Environmental Quality Act, requires a lead agency, as defined, to prepare, or cause to be prepared, and certify the completion of, an environmental impact report on a project that it proposes to carry out or approve that may have a significant effect on the environment, or to adopt a negative declaration if it finds that the project will not have that effect. This bill would expressly exempt the above-described needle and syringe exchange services application submissions, authorizations, and operations from review under the California Environmental Quality Act. The bill would declare that this provision is intended to be declaratory of existing law. The bill would state that the provisions relating to needle exchange programs are severable.

Existing law provides for the licensure and regulation of general acute care hospitals and acute psychiatric hospitals by the State Department of Public Health. Existing law requires emergency services and care to be provided, as specified, at a licensed health facility that maintains and operates an emergency department to provide emergency services to the public when the health facility has appropriate facilities and qualified personnel available to provide the services or care. Existing law requires emergency services and care, including screening, examination, and evaluation to determine if a psychiatric emergency medical condition exists and the care and treatment necessary to relieve or eliminate the psychiatric emergency medical condition, to be provided to any person requesting the services or care. A knowing and intentional violation of these provisions is a crime. This bill would require a psychiatric unit within a general acute care hospital, a psychiatric health facility, or an acute psychiatric hospital to accept the transfer of a person with a psychiatric emergency medical condition from a health facility that operates an emergency department and to provide emergency services and care to treat that person, regardless of whether the facility operates an emergency department, if specified criteria are met. The bill would also require a facility accepting a transfer of a person pursuant to those provisions to comply with specified requirements. The bill would exclude state psychiatric hospitals and specified psychiatric health facilities from its provisions. By creating a new 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 provides for various memorials and monuments on the grounds of the State Capitol. Existing law requires the Department of Finance, subject to the approval of the Capitol Building and Planning Commission, to acquire and do all acts necessary to erect and maintain a monument to Father Junípero Serra on the grounds of the State Capitol. Existing law requires the Department of General Services to maintain state buildings and grounds. This bill would delete the requirement relating to the monument to Father Junípero Serra. The bill would authorize tribal nations in the Sacramento, California, region, in consultation with the Department of General Services, to plan, construct, and maintain a monument to the California Native people of the Sacramento, California, region on the grounds of the State Capitol. The bill would require the tribal nations to submit the plan for the monument to the Joint Rules Committee for its review and approval. The bill would prohibit the tribal nations from beginning construction of the monument until the Joint Rules Committee approves and adopts the plan and the Joint Rules Committee and the Department of Finance determine that sufficient private funding is available to construct and maintain the monument. The bill would require the planning, construction, and maintenance of the monument to be funded exclusively through private funding from the tribal nations in the Sacramento, California, region.

Existing law requires the operator of a private detention facility, as defined, to comply with, and adhere to, the detention standards of care and confinement agreed upon in the facility's contract for operations, as specified. This bill would require a private detention facility operator to comply with, and adhere to, all local and state public health orders and occupational safety and health regulations. The bill would state that its provisions are declaratory of existing law. This bill would declare that it is to take effect immediately as an urgency statute.

Existing law makes an act punishable as a hate crime if it is a criminal act committed, in whole or in part, because of an actual or perceived characteristic of the victim relating to the victim's disability, gender, nationality, race or ethnicity, religion, sexual orientation, or association with a person or group with one or more of these actual or perceived characteristics. Existing law defines "nationality" for this purpose to include citizenship, country of origin, and national origin. Under existing law, a person who commits a crime that is a hate crime is required to receive an enhanced sentence. This bill would expand the definition of nationality to include immigration status, thereby making it a hate crime to commit a criminal act, in whole or in part, because of the victim's actual or perceived immigration status. By expanding the scope of an enhancement, this bill would impose a state-mandated local program. This bill would also make technical, conforming changes. 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, the California Safe Drinking Water Act, provides for the operation of public water systems and imposes on the State Water Resources Control Board various responsibilities and duties. The act authorizes the state board to order consolidation with a receiving water system where a public water system or a state small water system, serving a disadvantaged community, consistently fails to provide an adequate supply of safe drinking water or where a disadvantaged community is substantially reliant on domestic wells that consistently fail to provide an adequate supply of safe drinking water. This bill would revise those consolidation provisions, including, among other revisions, authorizing the state board to also order consolidation where a water system serving a disadvantaged community is an at-risk water system, as defined, or where a disadvantaged community is substantially reliant on at-risk domestic wells, as defined. This bill would require the state board, before ordering consolidation or extension of service, to consult with any groundwater sustainability agency, as defined, that provides groundwater supply to the affected area. The bill would require the state board to conduct outreach to ratepayers and residents served by an at-risk water system, consider any specified petitions submitted by members of a disadvantaged community served by the at-risk water system, and consider any information provided by the potentially subsumed water system in support of its contention that it is not an at-risk water system before ordering the consolidation of the at-risk water system, as prescribed. The bill would authorize the state board to prioritize consolidation of an at-risk water system that has historically been overburdened by pollution and industrial development or faced other environmental justice hurdles. The bill would require a finding that a disadvantaged community, in whole or in part, is substantially reliant on at-risk domestic wells to be based on specified aquifer maps and inspection or testing of the domestic wells, as provided.

Existing law allows a person who was arrested or convicted of a nonviolent offense while they were a victim of human trafficking to petition the court for vacatur relief. Existing law requires the petitioner to establish by clear and convincing evidence that the arrest and conviction were the direct result of being a victim of human trafficking. Existing law requires that a petition be made and heard within a reasonable time after the person has ceased to be a victim of human trafficking, or within a reasonable time after the petitioner has sought services, whichever is later. Existing law allows a petitioner, or the petitioner's attorney, to be excused from appearing in person at a hearing on the petition only if the court finds a compelling reason why the petitioner cannot attend, in which case existing law allows the petitioner to appear by electronic means. This bill would prohibit a court from refusing to hear the petition on the basis of the petitioner's outstanding fines and fees or the petitioner's failure to meet the conditions of probation. With the exception of restitution, the bill would require that the collection of fines imposed as a result of a nonviolent offense that is the subject of the petition be stayed while the petition is pending. This bill would also allow the petitioner to appear at all hearings on the petition by counsel if the petition is unopposed. The bill would allow a petition to be made and heard at any time after the person has ceased to be a victim of human trafficking, or at any time after the petitioner has sought services for being a victim of human trafficking. The bill would specify that the right to petition for relief pursuant to these provisions does not expire with the passage of time. Existing law requires the court, for petitioners who qualify for vacatur relief, to order designated law enforcement agencies to seal their records of the petitioner's arrest and the court order to seal and destroy the records within 3 years from the date of arrest, or within one year after the court order for vacatur relief is granted, whichever is later, and thereafter destroy those records. Existing law requires the court to provide the petitioner with a copy of any court order concerning the destruction of the arrest records. This bill would designate additional agencies required to seal and destroy arrest records and require all designated agencies to seal and destroy the arrest records within one year of the date of arrest, or 90 days from the date the court order for vacatur relief is granted, whichever is later. The bill would also require the court to provide the petitioner and their counsel with a copy of any form the court submits to any agency related to the sealing and destruction of arrest records. The bill would require the department to notify the petitioner and their counsel that the department has complied with the order to seal the arrest records.

This measure would designate a specified portion of State Highway Route 41 in the County of Fresno as the Tom Seaver Memorial Highway. The measure would request that the Department of Transportation determine the cost of appropriate signs showing this special designation and, upon receiving donations from nonstate sources covering that cost, erect those signs.

This measure would proclaim November 3, 2021, as One Health Day, to celebrate and bring attention to the need for a One Health approach to address shared health threats at the human-animal-environmental interface.

This measure would designate the month of September 2021 as Leukemia, Lymphoma, and Myeloma Awareness Month and Blood Cancer Awareness Month and the first week of September 2021 as Blood Donation Week.