This measure would designate the month of September 2022 as Opioid, Heroin, Fentanyl, and Prescription Drug Abuse Awareness Month, as specified.
This measure would designate the portion of U.S. Route 101 in the County of San Luis Obispo, from postmile 19.812 to postmile 15.579, as the Katcho Achadjian Memorial Highway. The measure would request the Department of Transportation to determine the cost of appropriate signs showing this special designation and, upon receiving donations from nonstate sources covering that cost, to erect those signs.
This measure would proclaim the month of October 2022 as Domestic Violence Awareness Month.
Existing law provides for various memorials and monuments on the grounds of the State Capitol. Existing law requires the Department of General Services to maintain state buildings and grounds. This bill would authorize a nonprofit organization representing Gold Star Families, in consultation with the Department of General Services, to plan, construct, and maintain a monument to the Gold Star Families of California on the grounds of the State Capitol. The bill would require the nonprofit organization to submit a plan for the monument to the Joint Rules Committee for its review and approval. The bill would require the monument to be funded exclusively from private sources.
The California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) 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. CEQA also requires a lead agency to prepare a mitigated negative declaration for a project that may have a significant effect on the environment if revisions in the project would avoid or mitigate that effect and there is no substantial evidence that the project, as revised, would have a significant effect on the environment. Existing law, until January 1, 2023, exempts from the requirements of CEQA prescribed fire, thinning, or fuel reduction projects undertaken on federal lands to reduce the risk of high-severity wildfire that have been reviewed under the federal National Environmental Policy Act of 1969, as provided. Existing law requires the Department of Forestry and Fire Protection, beginning December 31, 2019, and annually thereafter until January 1, 2023, to report to the relevant policy committees of the Legislature the number of times the exemption was used. This bill would extend the exemption from CEQA to January 1, 2026. The bill would additionally require that a project's significant impacts identified in an environmental impact statement prepared pursuant to the federal National Environmental Policy Act of 1969 are avoided or mitigated in order for the exemption to apply. The bill would require the lead agency, if it determines that the exemption applies and determines to approve or carry the project, to file a notice of exemption with the Office of Planning and Research and the county clerk of the county in which the project is located. If the lead agency is not the department, the bill would require the lead agency to file a notice with the department containing specified information about the project. If the lead agency is the department, the bill would require the department to maintain records containing that specified information. The bill would delete the requirement for the annual report and would instead require the department, on or before January 1, 2025, to submit a report to the Legislature containing information received or maintained by the department about the exempt projects. By extending the obligation of a lead agency to determine the applicability of the exemption and imposing additional duties on a lead agency, 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 establishes veterans homes in the State of California, under the jurisdiction of the Department of Veterans Affairs. Existing law requires the department to review the use of each home no later than 5 years before the expiration of the use restriction imposed on the home by federal law to determine the best continued use of the home. In making that determination, existing law requires the department to review, among other things, the current needs of the regional veteran population. When the department reviews the use of each home, this bill would require the department to assess, among other things, the potential for the Veterans Health Administration to place satellite medical clinics on state veteran home campuses and within a 30-minute drive of a state veteran home campus, to serve both residents of the veteran homes and nonresident veterans in the communities where state veteran homes are located. The bill would require the department to meet and confer with officials of the United States Department of Veterans Affairs on the possibility of locating satellite clinics on state veteran home campuses and within a 30-minute drive of a state veteran home campus.
Under existing law, the Department of Veterans Affairs within state government has specified powers and duties relating to veterans, including those relating to education benefits. Existing law provides federal educational benefit awards for certain members and veterans of the Armed Forces of the United States. Existing law authorizes the California State University, and encourages the University of California, to report to the Department of Veterans Affairs, on an annual basis, specified information, including the total education benefits obtained by all qualified students assisted by a specified office. This bill would require the California State University, and request the University of California, to electronically transmit specified personal information regarding students whose tuition or fees, or both, are paid, or intended to be paid, using GI Bill educational benefits, as defined, to the Department of Veterans Affairs for each academic year, starting with the 2023–24 academic year, as provided. The bill would, on or before June 1, 2023, require the office of the Chancellor of the California State University, and request the office of the President of the University of California, to develop a template for informed, written consent to be used by campus financial aid offices that permits a student to opt in to having the student's personal information shared with the Department of Veterans Affairs, as provided.
