(1) Existing law establishes various public agency retirement systems, including the Public Employees' Retirement System (PERS) , the State Teachers' Retirement System (STRS) , the Judges' Retirement System II, and various county retirement systems pursuant to the County Employees Retirement Law of 1937, among others, and these systems provide defined pension benefits to public employees based on age, service credit, and amount of final compensation. The California Constitution permits a city or county to adopt a charter for purposes of its governance that supersedes general laws of the state in regard to specified subjects, including compensation of city or county employees. The California Constitution also establishes the University of California as a public trust with full powers of organization and government, subject only to specified limitations. Charter cities and the University of California may establish pension plans under their respective independent constitutional authority. These pension systems are funded by employee and employer contributions and investment returns. Existing law provides that public employee pension benefits are a form of deferred compensation, the right to which vests in the employee on contractual principles and is protected from impairment by the California Constitution and the United States Constitution. This measure would require each public retirement system, as defined in statute, to provide one or more hybrid pension plans meeting the requirements of this measure to each public employer that provides its employees a defined benefit pension plan administered by the public retirement system. The measure would require that a hybrid pension plan consist of a defined benefit component and a defined contribution or alternative plan design component, as specified. The measure would require, among other things, that a hybrid pension plan be designed with a goal of providing annually during retirement, based on a full career in public service, as defined, replacement income of 75% of a public employee's final compensation. The measure would require the Director of Finance, on or before January 1, 2013, to establish initial criteria and requirements for one or more hybrid pension plans, as specified. The measure would require, on and after July 1, 2013, each public retirement system to administer, and make available to each public employer that provides a defined benefit pension plan, one or more hybrid pension plans, except as specified, for public employees hired in each member classification in the public retirement system. The measure would require, for public employees hired on and after January 1, 2013, that retirement benefits be limited as provided, with regard to a defined benefit that is calculated with reference to final compensation, as specified, that final compensation be calculated using at least a consecutive 36-month period of service. The measure would establish various other limitations on the retirement benefits offered by public employers to public employees, regardless of the date the employees are hired, to the fullest extent permissible under the United States Constitution. In this regard, the measure would require that any change to a formula or benefit resulting in an increase in a member's pension benefits shall apply only to service performed on and after the operative date of the change and would require that employers and employees make required payments to fund the normal cost of benefits, as specified. The measure would require public employees to contribute at least 12 of the normal costs of any defined benefit plan and would prohibit an employer from paying an employee's required contributions, except as specified. The measure would also prohibit retirement systems from granting any nonqualified service credit, as specified. The measure additionally would require that a public employee, who is convicted of any felony arising from his or her official duties, forfeit retirement benefits based on certain statutes. The measure would limit the amount of service that a retired public employee may perform for public employers. The measure would provide that neither its provisions nor any related statutory provisions apply to, or otherwise restrict, death, survivor, and disability benefits, except as specified. The measure would provide that labor contracts that are in effect on November 7, 2012, and that are in conflict with the measure's provisions remain in effect until the expiration of the contract, at which time the requirements of the measure would apply. The measure would specify that terms used in those provisions are to be defined in a specified statute and would permit the Legislature to amend specified statutes referenced in the measure's provisions by a 23 vote of the membership of each house by a statute that is consistent with and furthers its purposes. The measure would provide that the activities, programs, and levels of service associated with its provisions are not state-mandated local programs requiring a subvention of funds. (2) The California Constitution prohibits the Legislature from changing the composition of the retirement board of a public pension or retirement system that included elected employee members as of a specified date, including the number, terms, and method of selection and removal of members, unless the change is ratified by a majority vote of the electors of the jurisdiction in which the participants of the system are, or were, prior to retirement, employed. This measure would require the composition of the retirement board of a public pension or retirement system to be modified, in the manner provided for in a specified statute, and would exempt that modification from ratification by the electors. (3) The measure would require the state to defend the constitutionality of its provisions.
Sponsored bills
Existing law provides for the organization and regulation of credit unions by the Department of Financial Institutions. Existing law entitles those provisions the California Credit Union Law. This bill would make technical, nonsubstantive changes to that title.
This measure would designate February 27, 2012, as California Day of Remembrance for the Massacres of Armenians in Sumgait, Kirovabad, and Baku, and would call upon the people of California to use vigilance to promote greater tolerance in Azerbaijan and ensure the peaceful settlement of the Nagorno Karabakh conflict while protecting the security of the Armenians in the Nagorno Karabakh Republic.
This resolution would recognize the month of January 2012, and each following January, as National Slavery and Human Trafficking Prevention Month, and it would recognize February 1, 2012, and each following February 1, as California's Free From Slavery Day.
The Vehicle License Fee Law, in lieu of any ad valorem property tax upon vehicles, imposes an annual license fee for any vehicle subject to registration in this state in the amount of 1% of the market value of that vehicle, as provided, for a specified amount of time. Existing law also, until July 1, 2011, imposes an additional tax equal to 0.15% of the market value of specified vehicles, as determined by the Department of Motor Vehicles, to the vehicle license fee, to be deposited in the General Fund and transferred to the Local Safety and Protection Account, a continuously appropriated fund. Existing law provides that money in the account shall be allocated for various public safety programs, as provided. This bill would, beginning July 1, 2011, and each July 1 thereafter for a transfer $500,000,000 from the General Fund to the account total of 5 years, as provided. By transferring funds to a continuously appropriated fund, this bill would make an appropriation. This bill would declare that it is to take effect immediately as an urgency statute.
Existing law provides for state mental hospitals for the treatment of mentally disordered persons. These hospitals are under the jurisdiction of the State Department of Mental Health, which is authorized by existing law to make regulations regarding the conduct and management of these facilities. This bill would state the intent of the Legislature to enact legislation that would address the safety of staff and other individuals in state hospitals under the jurisdiction of the State Department of Mental Health.
Existing state law authorizes the Secretary of State to provide grants to local elections officials, nonprofit corporations, and unincorporated associations to conduct voter outreach and voter education programs, or to increase accessibility for eligible voters with disabilities, using funding provided by the Help America Vote Act of 2002. This bill would make nonsubstantive changes to these provisions.
Existing law requires the Commission on Health and Safety and Workers' Compensation in the Department of Industrial Relations to review and approve applications from employers and employee organizations, as well as applications submitted jointly by an employer organization and an employee organization, for grants to assist in establishing effective occupational injury and illness prevention programs, as specified. Existing law requires certain civil and administrative penalties relating to workers' compensation to be deposited in the Workers' Compensation Administration Revolving Fund. Existing law authorizes the department to expend these funds upon approval by the commission, and upon appropriation from the fund by the Legislature, to fund the above-described grants and other activities and expenses of the commission. Existing law requires any civil or administrative penalty assessed pursuant to the California Occupational Safety and Health Act of 1973 against a school district, county board of education, county superintendent of schools, charter school, community college district, California State University, University of California, or joint powers agency performing education functions to be deposited with the Workplace Health and Safety Revolving Fund. Existing law requires moneys in the fund that are not refunded, as specified, to be expended as provided for in the above-described grant provisions to assist schools in establishing effective occupational injury and illness prevention programs. This bill would, instead, require any civil or administrative penalty assessed pursuant to the California Occupational Safety and Health Act of 1973 against a county, city, special district, public authority, public agency, joint powers authority, school district, county board of education, county superintendent of schools, charter school, community college district, California State University, University of California, or joint powers agency performing education functions to be deposited with the Workers' Compensation Administration Revolving Fund. The bill would require moneys in the fund that are not refunded to be expended as provided for in the above-described grant provisions to assist the entities listed above, regardless of whether any penalty has been assessed against them, in establishing and maintaining effective occupational injury and illness prevention programs. This bill would add funding the above-described grants to the list of purposes for which moneys in the Workers' Compensation Administration Revolving Fund may be expended. This bill would make other nonsubstantive changes to these provisions. Existing law, the Labor Code Private Attorneys General Act of 2004, allows aggrieved employees to bring civil actions to recover penalties for violations of the Labor Code if the Labor and Workforce Development Agency or its departments, divisions, commissions, boards, agencies, or employees do not do so. The penalties collected in these actions are distributed 75% to the agency to be continuously appropriated for purposes of enforcement and education and 25% to the aggrieved employee, except as specified. This bill would provide that the above provisions pertaining to civil or administrative penalties assessed pursuant to the California Occupational Safety and Health Act of 1973 shall not apply to that portion of any civil or administrative penalty that is distributed directly to an aggrieved employee pursuant to the above-described provisions.
(1) Under existing law, the Department of Parks and Recreation administers the state park system. Existing law requires, following classification or reclassification of a unit by the State Park and Recreation Commission, and prior to the development of any new facilities in any previously classified unit, the department to prepare a general plan or revise any existing plan for the unit. This bill would revise the department's responsibilities regarding the preparation and revision of the general plan. (2) Existing law requires that the purpose of state parks be to preserve outstanding natural, scenic, and cultural values, indigenous aquatic and terrestrial fauna and flora, and the most significant examples of ecological regions of California. Each state park is required to be managed as a composite whole in order to restore, protect, and maintain its native environmental complexes to the extent compatible with the primary purpose for which the park was established. This bill would delete those requirements. (3) Existing law requires the general plan, for a unit of the state park system that is the subject of an operating agreement between the department and another public agency for the care, maintenance, administration, and control of lands under the jurisdiction of any party to the agreement for the purpose of the state park system, to specifically evaluate and define the manner in which the unit is proposed to be operated. The general plan is required to be reviewed by the commission for a determination that the unit will be operated in a manner that generally meets the standards followed by the department in its operation of similar units, that enhances the general public use and enjoyment of, and recreational and educational experiences at, the unit, and that provides for the satisfactory management of park resources. Revenues, received from lands subject to operating agreements entered into, renewed, or renegotiated on and after October 1, 1994, in excess of the cost, maintenance, operation, administration, improvement, or development of those lands, as determined by the department, are required to be available to the department, upon appropriation by the Legislature in the annual Budget Act, for expenditure for support of the department. This bill would delete those requirements.