This measure would recognize September 2020 as Sickle Cell Disease Awareness Month and encourage the Legislature to appropriate funds for research, treatment, and monitoring of sickle cell disease, and for related education and outreach.
Existing law establishes the Department of Housing and Community Development in the Business, Consumer Services, and Housing Agency. The department is administered by the Director of Housing and Community Development. The department is responsible for administering various housing and home loan programs throughout the state. Existing law requires the department, on or before December 31 of each year, to submit an annual report containing specified information to the Governor and both houses of the Legislature on the operations and accomplishments during the previous fiscal year of the housing programs administered by the department. This bill would establish the Master Plan for Aging Housing Task Force, chaired by the director or their designee, and composed of specified stakeholders and representatives of government agencies to, among other things, identify policy strategies that will help increase the supply of affordable housing for older adults and reduce barriers to providing health care and social services to older adults in affordable housing, and make recommendations to the Legislature. This bill would require the task force to meet at least 6 times in the 2020 calendar year, and would require the task force to submit a report to the Legislature by April 30, 2021, that provides specified information and policy recommendations related to the supply of affordable housing for older adults. The bill would make various related legislative findings.
Existing law generally requires the licensure and regulation of various health care facilities, including, among others, a hospice facility. The Compassionate Use Act of 1996, an initiative measure enacted by the approval of Proposition 215 at the November 5, 1996, statewide general election, prohibits specified criminal penalties from being imposed on a patient or a patient's primary caregiver who possesses or cultivates cannabis for the personal medical purposes of the patient upon the written or oral recommendation or approval of a physician. Existing law, known as the Medical Marijuana Program, requires counties to administer an identification card program for qualified patients and provides immunity from arrest to qualified patients with a valid identification card or designated primary caregivers, within prescribed limits. This bill, the Compassionate Access to Medical Cannabis Act or Ryan's Law, would prohibit specified types of health care facilities from prohibiting or interfering with a terminally ill patient's use of medical cannabis within the health care facility, subject to certain restrictions. The bill would require a patient to provide the health care facility with a copy of their medical marijuana card or written documentation that the use of medical cannabis is recommended by a physician. The bill would authorize a health care facility to reasonably restrict the manner in which a patient stores and uses medical cannabis to ensure the safety of other patients, guests, and employees of the health care facility, compliance with other state laws, and the safe operations of the health care facility. The bill would prohibit the department that licenses the health care facility from enforcing these provisions, and compliance with the bill would not be a condition for obtaining, retaining, or renewing a license as a health care facility. The bill would authorize a health care facility to suspend compliance with these provisions if a regulatory agency, the United States Department of Justice, or the federal Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services takes specified actions, including initiating an enforcement action against a health care facility related to the facility's compliance with a state-regulated medical marijuana program.
Existing property tax law requires the county auditor, in each fiscal year, to allocate property tax revenue to local jurisdictions in accordance with specified formulas and procedures, subject to certain modifications. Existing law requires an annual reallocation of property tax revenue from local agencies in each county to the Educational Revenue Augmentation Fund (ERAF) in that county for allocation to specified educational entities. Existing law authorizes certain local agencies to form an enhanced infrastructure financing district, affordable housing authority, transit village development district, or community revitalization and investment authority for purposes of, among other things, infrastructure, affordable housing, and economic revitalization. This bill would establish in state government the Affordable Housing and Community Development Investment Program, which would be administered by the Affordable Housing and Community Development Investment Committee. The bill would authorize a city, county, city and county, joint powers agency, enhanced infrastructure financing district, affordable housing authority, community revitalization and investment authority, transit village development district, or a combination of those entities, to apply to the Affordable Housing and Community Development Investment Committee to participate in the program and would authorize the committee to approve or deny plans for projects meeting specific criteria. The bill would also authorize certain local agencies to establish an affordable housing and community development investment agency and authorize an agency to apply for funding under the program and issue bonds, as provided, to carry out a project under the program. The bill would require the Affordable Housing and Community Development Investment Committee to adopt guidelines for plans. Subject to the Legislature enacting a budget bill for the applicable fiscal year that specifies the amount for the committee to allocate pursuant to the program, the bill would require the committee to approve no more than $200,000,000 per year from July 1, 2021, to June 30, 2026, and $250,000,000 per year from July 1, 2026, to June 30, 2030, in transfers from a county's ERAF for applicants for plans approved pursuant to this program. This bill would provide that eligible projects include, among other things, the predevelopment, development, acquisition, rehabilitation, and preservation of workforce and affordable housing, certain transit-oriented development, and projects promoting strong neighborhoods. The bill would require the Affordable Housing and Community Development Investment Committee, upon approval of a plan and subject to specified conditions, to issue an order directing the county auditor to transfer an amount of ad valorem property tax revenue that is equal to the affordable housing and community development investment amount approved by the committee, except as provided, from the county's ERAF. The bill would require the county auditor to either deposit that amount into the Affordable Housing and Community Development Investment Fund, which this bill would create in the treasury of each county, or, if the applicant is a specified type of authority or special district to transfer to the city or county that created the authority or district an amount of property tax revenue equal to the amount approved by the Affordable Housing and Community Development Investment Committee for that authority or district. The bill would require the city or county that created the district to, upon receipt, transfer those funds to the authority or district in an amount equal to the affordable housing and community development investment amount for that authority or district. By imposing additional duties on local officials, the bill would impose a state-mandated local program. The bill would authorize applicants to use approved amounts to incur debt or issue bonds or other financing to support an approved project. The bill also would require each applicant that has received funding to submit annual reports, as specified, and would require the Affordable Housing and Community Development Investment Committee to provide a report to the Joint Legislative Budget Committee, if it approves funding under the program, that includes certain project information. Section 8 of Article XVI of the California Constitution sets forth a formula for computing the minimum amount of revenues that the state is required to appropriate for the support of school districts and community college districts for each fiscal year. This bill would require the Director of Finance to adjust the percentage of General Fund revenues appropriated for school districts and community college districts for these purposes in a manner that ensures that the transfers from a county's ERAF pursuant to the Affordable Housing and Community Development Investment Program have no net fiscal impact upon the total amount of the General Fund revenue and local property tax revenue allocated to school districts and community college districts pursuant to Section 8 of Article XVI of the California Constitution, as specified. 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 the statutory provisions noted above.
This measure would urge specified state departments and the Attorney General to use their authority to ensure that health care service plans and health insurers subject to their authority comply with the federal Paul Wellstone and Pete Domenici Mental Health Parity and Addiction Equity Act of 2008.
(1) Existing federal law governing immigration authorizes the importation of an alien as a nonimmigrant agricultural worker, known as an H-2A worker, if specified requirements are met, including that the employer furnish housing, as provided. Existing state law establishes various housing programs administered by the Department of Housing and Community Development, including the Joe Serna, Jr. Farmworker Housing Grant Program, pursuant to which the department provides, subject to availability of funds, grants and loans to specified entities for the construction or rehabilitation of housing for agricultural employees and their families or for the acquisition of manufactured housing, as provided. Existing state law, the California Community Services Block Grant Program, requires the Department of Community Services and Development to administer the federal Community Services Block Grant funds to provide financial assistance for activities designed to have a measurable and potentially major impact on causes of poverty in a community or areas of a community where poverty is a particularly acute problem. Existing law authorizes this funding to assist programs that, among other things, meet the needs of migrant and seasonal farmworkers and their families, such as improved housing and sanitation, including the provision and maintenance of emergency and temporary housing and sanitation facilities. This bill would prohibit the provision of state funding, as defined, for the purposes of funding predevelopment of, developing, or operating any housing used to comply with the federal law requirement to furnish housing to H-2A workers and would require an employer, as defined, or other recipient of state funding who utilizes state funding for these purposes to reimburse the state or state agency that provided the funding in an amount equal to the amount of that state funding expended for those purposes. The bill would exempt from these provisions any contract or other enforceable agreement pursuant to which the state or a state agency provides funding that was entered into prior to January 1, 2020. The bill would also make various conforming changes to other laws. (2) The Planning and Zoning Law requires that the housing element of a city's or county's general plan include, among other things, that the housing element of a city's or county's general plan include, among other things, an analysis of any special housing needs, including the needs of, among others, farmworkers. Existing law exempts certain housing developments from conditional use permits and requires those developments to be subject to certain streamlined approval processes, as specified. Existing law, the Employee Housing Act, requires a person operating employee housing, as defined, to obtain a permit to operate that housing from the agency that enforces the act, which may either be the Department of Housing and Community Development or a city, county, or city and county that assumes responsibility for enforcing the act. The act generally reserves local use zone requirements to local governments except as provided, including requiring a specified streamlined approval process for certain improvements related to employee housing for agricultural employees. A violation of the act is a misdemeanor. This bill would provide that a tenant residing in agricultural employee housing, as defined, has all rights applicable to a person residing in employee housing under existing provisions, including the California Fair Employment and Housing Act and specified provisions relating to tenant rights. The bill would require the department to establish and administer, as specified, an application and review process for certifying that a person is an affordable housing organization qualified to operate specified agricultural employee housing. The bill also would require the department to establish and maintain a roster of all certified affordable housing organizations. The bill would, as an exception to the provision reserving local use zone requirements to local governments, authorize a development proponent to submit an application for an agricultural employee housing development that is subject to a streamlined, ministerial approval process, as specified, and that is not subject to a conditional use permit if certain requirements are met, including that the agricultural employee housing will be maintained and operated by a qualified affordable housing organization that has been certified by the department, as specified. The bill would require a local government to notify the development proponent in writing if the local government determines that the development does not meet those requirements by a specified time; otherwise, the development would be deemed to comply with the requirement that the development not be located on certain types of hazardous or conservation sites, as specified. The bill would authorize a specified local government entity to conduct a development review or public oversight of the development, as provided. The bill would provide that agricultural employee housing approved pursuant to the provision providing for a streamlined, ministerial approval process is not subject to the density limitations otherwise required to be considered an agricultural land use and exempt from local approval, taxes, and fees, as described above. The bill would also require, as a condition of that approval process, the qualified affordable housing organization and the landowner to obligate themselves and any successors in interest to maintain the affordability of the proposed agricultural employee housing, as specified, for not less than 35 years. If that organization does not continue to operate and maintain the housing for the time period agreed to satisfy that condition, the bill would require the landowner who obtained approval of the housing to select an alternative certified person within 90 days, and would subject the landowner to an unspecified administrative penalty if the landowner fails to do so. By increasing the duties of local officials with respect to the Employee Housing Act, and by expanding the scope of an existing crime with respect to violations of the Employee Housing Act, this bill would impose a state-mandated local program. The bill would make related findings and declarations, and would include findings that the changes proposed by this bill address a matter of statewide concern rather than a municipal affair and, therefore, apply to all cities, including charter cities. The bill would make various conforming changes. The Employee Housing Act deems employee housing consisting of no more than 36 beds in a group quarters or 12 units or spaces designed for use by a single family or household to be an agricultural land use for purposes of specified provisions of the act. The act provides that, for the purpose of all local ordinances, employee housing is prohibited from being deemed a use that implies that the employee housing is an activity that differs in any other way from an agricultural use. The act prohibits a local government from requiring a conditional use permit, zoning variance, or other zoning clearance for the employee housing, or from subjecting the employee housing to certain taxes or fees that are not required for other agricultural activities in that zone. The act, for the purposes of any contract, deed, or covenant for the transfer of real property, requires employee housing consisting of no more than 36 beds in a group quarters or 12 units or spaces designed for use by a single family or household to be considered an agricultural use of property. This bill, for purposes of the above-described provisions of the act, would deem employee housing that is approved pursuant to the above-described provisions of the bill providing for a streamlined, ministerial approval process, an agricultural land use. The bill would modify the prohibition on a local government requiring a zoning clearance for the employee housing to, instead, prohibit a local government from requiring a zoning clearance that is discretionary for the employee housing. The bill, as an exception to the requirement that employee housing be deemed an agricultural use for purposes of all local ordinances, would authorize a local government to subject an agricultural employee housing development, approved pursuant to the above-described provisions of the bill providing for a streamlined, ministerial approval process, to specified written objective development standards. The bill, as an exemption to the prohibition on a local government subjecting employee housing to certain taxes or fees that are not required for other agricultural activity in that zone, would authorize a local government to impose fees and other exactions otherwise authorized by law that are essential to provide necessary public services and facilities to an agricultural employee housing development. The bill, for the purposes of any contract, deed, or covenant for the transfer of real property, would require employee housing, approved pursuant to the provisions of the bill providing for a streamlined, ministerial approval process, to be considered an agricultural use of property. The bill would provide that if any owner, who invokes the above-described provisions or the provisions of the bill providing for a streamlined, ministerial approval process, fails to maintain a permit to operate throughout the first 10 consecutive years following the issuance of the original certificate of occupancy, the public agency that has waived any taxes, fees, assessments, or charges, as specified, is authorized to recover certain amounts of those taxes, fees, assessments, or charges. 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. CEQA does not apply to the approval of ministerial projects. Because the approval process established by the bill is streamlined and ministerial in nature, the approval of projects subject to this process are exempt from CEQA. The bill, additionally, would prohibit the approval of a development and the application of development standards pursuant to specified provisions of the bill from being deemed a discretionary act within the meaning of CEQA. 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 specified reasons.
Existing law provides for the Medi-Cal program, which is administered by the State Department of Health Care Services, under which qualified low-income individuals receive health care services. The Medi-Cal program is, in part, governed and funded by federal Medicaid program provisions. Under existing law, face-to-face contact between a health care provider and a patient is not required under the Medi-Cal program for teleophthalmology, teledermatology, and teledentistry by store and forward. Existing law requires a Medi-Cal patient receiving teleophthalmology, teledermatology, or teledentistry by store and forward to be notified of the right to receive interactive communication with a distant specialist physician, optometrist, or dentist, and authorizes a patient to request that interactive communication. This bill would delete those interactive communication provisions, and would instead specify that face-to-face contact between a health care provider and a patient is not required under the Medi-Cal program for any health care services provided by store and forward. Existing law, the Knox-Keene Health Care Service Plan Act of 1975, provides for the licensure and regulation of health care service plans by the Department of Managed Health Care, and makes a willful violation of the act a crime. Existing law provides for the regulation of health insurers by the Department of Insurance. Existing law prohibits a health care service plan or health insurer from requiring that in-person contact occur between a health care provider and a patient, and from limiting the type of setting where services are provided, before payment is made for covered services provided appropriately through telehealth services. This bill would require a contract issued, amended, or renewed on or after January 1, 2021, between a health care service plan and a health care provider for the provision of health care services to an enrollee or subscriber, or a contract issued, amended, or renewed on or after January 1, 2021, between a health insurer and a health care provider for an alternative rate of payment to specify that the health care service plan or health insurer reimburse a health care provider for the diagnosis, consultation, or treatment of an enrollee, subscriber, insured, or policyholder appropriately delivered through telehealth services on the same basis and to the same extent that the health care service plan or health insurer is responsible for reimbursement for the same service through in-person diagnosis, consultation, or treatment. The bill would authorize a health care service plan or health insurer to offer a contract or policy containing a copayment or coinsurance requirement for a health care service delivered through telehealth services, subject to specified limitations. The bill would require telehealth services covered under a health care service plan contract or policy or health insurance issued, amended, or renewed on or after January 1, 2021, to be subject to the same deductible and annual or lifetime dollar maximum as for equivalent services that are not provided through telehealth. Because a willful violation of the bill's requirements relative to health care service plans would be a crime, the bill would impose a state-mandated local program. This bill would incorporate additional changes to Section 2290.5 of the Business and Professions Code proposed by AB 1519 to be operative only if this bill and AB 1519 are enacted and this bill is enacted last. 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 federal law, the Agricultural Act of 2014, authorizes an institution of higher education, as defined, or a state department of agriculture, as defined, to grow or cultivate industrial hemp under an agricultural pilot program, as defined, under certain conditions. Existing federal law, the Agricultural Marketing Act of 1946, as amended by the Agriculture Improvement Act of 2018, requires a state desiring to have primary regulatory authority over the production of industrial hemp in the state to submit to the United States Secretary of Agriculture, through the state department of agriculture, a plan, with specified contents, under which the state monitors and regulates hemp production. Existing state law regulates the cultivation and testing of industrial hemp, as defined, and regulates the activities of seed breeders to develop seed cultivars through seed development plans, as defined. Existing law creates the Industrial Hemp Advisory Board. Existing state law requires an entity that is either a grower of industrial hemp for commercial purposes or a seed breeder that develops varieties of industrial hemp for sale or research to register with the county agricultural commissioner of the county in which it intends to cultivate industrial hemp and to annually renew its registration. Existing state law exempts an established agricultural research institution, as defined, from these registration requirements. Existing state law requires the Department of Food and Agriculture to establish a registration fee and appropriate renewal fee to be paid by registrants. Under existing state law, these fees are deposited in the Department of Food and Agriculture Fund and continuously appropriated to the department for the administration and enforcement of this registration program and other provisions regulating the cultivation of industrial hemp. Existing state law requires a county agricultural commissioner to transmit information collected pursuant to these provisions to the department. Under existing state law, a violation of these provisions is a misdemeanor. Under existing state law, these provisions are operative only to the extent authorized by federal law, as set forth in an opinion of the Attorney General. Before enactment of the federal Agriculture Improvement Act of 2018, an opinion of the Attorney General issued pursuant to existing state law concluded that industrial hemp may only be grown pursuant to these provisions to the extent authorized by the federal Agricultural Act of 2014. Existing law, the Control, Regulate and Tax Adult Use of Marijuana Act (AUMA) , added by Proposition 64 at the November 8, 2016, statewide general election, revised some provisions of state law regarding industrial hemp. This bill would revise the provisions regulating the cultivation and testing of industrial hemp to conform with the requirements for a state plan under the federal Agricultural Marketing Act of 1946, as amended by the federal Agriculture Improvement Act of 2018, by, among other things, revising the definition of "industrial hemp," and replacing the terms "seed breeder," "seed cultivar," and "seed development plan" with the defined terms "hemp breeder," "cultivar," and "variety development plan," respectively. The bill would expand and change the membership of the Industrial Hemp Advisory Board, as specified. The bill would apply the registration requirements to growers of industrial hemp for noncommercial as well as commercial purposes. Upon approval of a state plan, as specified, the bill would apply certain registration and regulatory requirements to established agricultural research institutions, including submission of research plans, as defined, to county agricultural commissioners before cultivating hemp. The bill would impose new requirements on the department and county agricultural commissioners for the handling and transmittal of registration information, impose new testing requirements, provide new enforcement procedures to be operative as of the effective date of an approved state plan, as defined, and impose new conditions on eligibility to participate in the industrial hemp program, as defined. By expanding registration requirements, including payment of registration fees, to some growers of industrial hemp for agricultural or academic research purposes, the bill would establish a new source of revenue for a continuously appropriated fund, thus making an appropriation. This bill would require the Secretary of Food and Agriculture, in consultation with the Governor and the Attorney General, to develop and submit a state plan to the United States Secretary of Agriculture, as provided, on or before May 1, 2020. This bill would specify consequences for a violation of its provisions according to the frequency of prior violations and whether the violation was negligent, grossly negligent, reckless, or intentional. By imposing new registration requirements on some growers of industrial hemp for agricultural or academic research purposes, the violation of which would be a misdemeanor, this bill would impose a state-mandated local program. AUMA authorizes the Legislature to amend certain provisions of AUMA to further the purposes and intent of AUMA with a 2/3 vote of the membership of the Legislature. This bill would amend AUMA by modifying the definition of "established agricultural research institution" and imposing certain registration and other requirements on these institutions, as of the date on which a state plan for California is approved pursuant to the federal Agricultural Marketing Act of 1946, as amended by the federal Agricultural Improvement Act of 2018. This bill would declare that its provisions further the purposes and intent of AUMA. By increasing the duties of county agricultural commissioners who would enforce certain of these new provisions, 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 specified reasons.
Existing law requires the State Department of Public Health to license and regulate various health facilities, including general acute care hospitals. Existing law requires the department to issue a special permit, in addition to a license, to a health facility to offer one or more special services, such as an emergency center, if specified requirements are met, including that the department finds that the standards of care and services are adequate and appropriate. Existing regulations generally require emergency medical services and care to be provided within a hospital. Existing law provides that a special permit issued under these provisions expires on the expiration date of the license, which occurs 12 months from the date of the issuance of the license. This bill would make legislative findings relating to the impact of the Camp Fire in 2018 on the County of Butte, including the destruction of Feather River Hospital in that county. Pursuant to those provisions, the bill would require the department to issue a special permit to allow a general acute care hospital to offer emergency stabilization services at a location that is neither inside nor contiguous to the hospital if the hospital provides satisfactory evidence to the department that, among other things, the hospital has a written transfer agreement with the hospital closest to the location where emergency stabilization services will be provided, and satisfactory evidence to the department that this location meets certain requirements, including that the location is in the town of Paradise within the County of Butte and serves the same area previously served by Feather River Hospital. The bill would require that the special permit application fee be $15,000. The bill would require this special permit to expire 2 years from the date of its issuance, and would authorize the special permit to be renewed every 2 years, for a combined period not to exceed 6 years from the initial date of issuance. The bill would impose certain requirements on the hospital to renew a special permit under these provisions. The bill would authorize the department to implement these provisions through an All Facilities Letter or similar instruction, without taking regulatory action. The bill would repeal its provisions on January 1, 2028. This bill would make legislative findings and declarations as to the necessity of a special statute for the County of Butte.
Existing law establishes the Medi-Cal program, which is administered by the State Department of Health Care Services and under which qualified low-income individuals receive health care services. The Medi-Cal program is, in part, governed and funded by federal Medicaid program provisions. Under existing law, in-person contact between a health care provider and a patient is not required under the Medi-Cal program for services appropriately provided through telehealth, as defined, subject to reimbursement policies adopted by the department to compensate a licensed health care provider who provides health care services through telehealth that are otherwise reimbursed pursuant to the Medi-Cal program. Existing law, for purposes of payment for covered treatment or services provided through telehealth, prohibits the department from limiting the type of setting where services are provided for the patient or by the health care provider. This bill would provide that neither face-to-face contact nor a patient's physical presence on the premises of an enrolled community clinic is required for services provided by the clinic to a Medi-Cal beneficiary during or immediately following a proclamation declaring a state of emergency. The bill would authorize the department to apply this provision to services provided by another enrolled fee-for-service Medi-Cal provider, clinic, or facility during or immediately following a state of emergency. The bill would require that telehealth services, telephonic services, and other specified services be reimbursable when provided by one of those entities during or immediately following a state of emergency. The bill would condition the implementation of these provisions to the extent that the department obtains federal approval and federal matching funds. The bill would require the department to issue, on or before July 1, 2020, guidance for those entities to facilitate reimbursement for the above-described services, including certain instructions on the submission of claims for telehealth or telephonic services. The bill would authorize the department to implement the provisions by various means, including provider bulletins, and would require the department to adopt regulations, for purposes of the guidance, by January 1, 2024.
