Under existing law, the Public Utilities Commission has regulatory authority over public utilities, including telephone corporations. Existing law establishes the California High-Cost Fund-A Administrative Committee Fund, the California High-Cost Fund-B Administrative Committee Fund, the Universal Lifeline Telephone Service Trust Administrative Committee Fund, the Deaf and Disabled Telecommunications Program Administrative Committee Fund, the Payphone Service Providers Committee Fund, the California Teleconnect Fund Administrative Committee Fund, and the California Advanced Services Fund (CASF) in the State Treasury and provides that moneys in the funds are held in trust and may be expended only to accomplish specified telecommunications universal service programs, upon appropriation in the annual Budget Act or upon supplemental appropriation. This bill would prohibit the commission from collecting, for deposit into any universal service fund, any revenues derived from charges upon the provision of a communications service that the Federal Communications Commission has determined is an information service, as specified. Existing law establishes the Public Utilities Commission Utilities Reimbursement Account and authorizes the commission to annually determine a utility reimbursement fee to be paid by every public utility providing service directly to customers or subscribers and subject to the jurisdiction of the commission, except for a railroad corporation. The commission 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 commission budget for the same year, and an appropriate reserve to regulate public utilities, less specified sources of funding. This bill would prohibit the commission from imposing a utility reimbursement fee that is applicable to the provision of a communications service that the Federal Communications Commission has determined is an information service, as specified.
Sponsored bills
This measure would name the public street, circle, and plaza at 914 and 915 Capitol Mall in the City of Sacramento as the Willie L. Brown, Jr. Circle and Plaza. The measure would request the Department of General Services to determine the cost of erecting the appropriate signage commemorating this special designation and, upon receiving donations from nonstate sources, to cover that cost to erect that signage.
This measure would designate the month of September 2020 as Opioid Awareness Month in California.
Existing law, until January 1, 2026, authorizes a development proponent to submit an application for a multifamily housing development, which satisfies specified objective planning standards, that is subject to a streamlined, ministerial approval process, as provided, and not subject to a conditional use permit. Existing law requires a local government to notify the development proponent in writing if the local government determines that the development conflicts with any of those objective standards by a specified time; otherwise, the development is deemed to comply with those standards. Existing law provides that if a local government approves a project pursuant to that process, that approval will not expire until a specified period of time depending on the nature of the development. This bill would, notwithstanding those provisions, authorize a development proponent to submit an application for a development to be subject to a streamlined, ministerial approval process provided that development meet specified objective planning standards, including that the development provide housing for persons and families of low or moderate income. The bill would require a local government to notify the development proponent in writing if the local government determines that the development conflicts with any of those objective standards within 30 days of the application being submitted; otherwise, the development would be deemed to comply with those standards. This bill would provide that the local government's approval of a project pursuant to this process would not expire for 5 years. The bill would include findings that 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 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. By providing for the ministerial approval of certain housing projects, this bill would expand the exemption for the ministerial approval of projects under CEQA. By imposing new duties upon local agencies with respect to the streamlined approval process described above, the 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 creates the Department of Insurance, headed by the Insurance Commissioner, and prescribes the department's powers and duties. Existing law requires the department to establish the California Home Insurance Finder and, on or before July 1, 2020, and at least annually thereafter, to update the finder with the names, addresses, phone numbers, and internet website links of licensed insurance agents and brokers. Existing law requires the department to provide on a consumer-oriented internet website a list of certified agents or brokers who may be contacted to purchase a low-cost automobile insurance policy. Existing regulations require the department to maintain a list of licensees that may be transmitted electronically or by regular mail upon request. This bill would prohibit the department from including a licensee's contact information on the California Home Insurance Finder, the low-cost automobile insurance list, the department's internet website, or any other publicly available list if the licensee provides proof to the department that the licensee has been granted a protective or restraining order issued by a civil or criminal court. The bill would also require the department to delete a licensee's contact information from those resources upon receiving proof that the licensee has been granted a protective or restraining order issued by a civil or criminal court. Existing constitutional provisions require that a statute that limits the right of access to the meetings of public bodies or the writings of public officials and agencies be adopted with findings demonstrating the interest protected by the limitation and the need for protecting that interest. This bill would make legislative findings to that effect.
Existing law establishes various employment protections to promote parent-infant bonds and infant health. The Moore-Brown-Roberti Family Rights Act, or California Family Rights Act, makes it an unlawful employment practice for an employer, as defined, to refuse to grant a request by an eligible employee to take up to 12 workweeks of unpaid protected leave during any 12-month period to care for a child born to, adopted by, or placed for foster care with, the employee. The New Parent Leave Act prohibits an employer, as defined, from refusing to allow eligible employees to take up to 12 weeks of parental leave to bond with a new child within one year of the child's birth, adoption, or foster care placement. Other existing law requires both public and private employers to provide a reasonable amount of break time, and make reasonable efforts to provide a private location, for expressing breast milk, as prescribed. This bill, from January 1, 2020, until January, 1, 2022, would establish the Infant at Work Pilot Program. The bill would authorize a state agency, as defined, to participate in the pilot program to allow an employee of the agency who is a new parent or caregiver to an infant to bring the infant to the workplace. The bill would establish certain required elements for the pilot program. The bill would authorize a state agency to adopt regulations that it determines necessary to participate in the pilot program. The bill would prohibit a state agency from participating in the pilot program in circumstances that are inappropriate based on safety, health, or other concerns for the infant or adult, as specified.
Existing law, the Ortiz-Pacheco-Poochigian-Vasconcellos Cal Grant Program, establishes the Cal Grant A and B Entitlement Awards, the California Community College Transfer Entitlement Awards, the Competitive Cal Grant A and B Awards, the Cal Grant C Awards, and the Cal Grant T Awards under the administration of the Student Aid Commission, and establishes eligibility requirements for awards under these programs for participating students attending qualifying institutions. Existing law specifies the amounts of the maximum Cal Grant A and B awards for students attending private nonprofit postsecondary institutions of higher education and private for-profit postsecondary educational institutions that are regionally accredited, as specified. Beginning with the 2020–21 award year, the maximum tuition award is either $9,084 or $8,056, depending upon whether the number of new unduplicated transfer students accepted by private nonprofit postsecondary educational institutions who have been given associate degree for transfer commitments, as defined, in the prior award year meet and exceed specified targets. This bill would change, in accordance with a prescribed formula, the maximum Cal Grant award for tuition for a new recipient attending an independent institution of higher education, commencing with the 2020–21 award year. This bill would provide that the award amount for a student attending an independent institution of higher education may be determined in the annual Budget Act if the independent institutions of higher education, as a group, do not accept the specified number of transfer students who have been given associate degree for transfer commitments.
Existing law provides for the implementation, by counties and foster family agencies, of the resource family approval process, which is a unified, family-friendly, and child-centered approval process that replaces the multiple processes for licensing foster family homes, approving relatives and nonrelative extended family members as foster care providers, and approving adoptive families. This bill would require the State Department of Social Services to establish and facilitate a pilot program in up to 5 counties that voluntarily apply and are selected by the department, to increase placement stability for foster youth and facilitate greater resource family retention through the provision of strengths-based, skills-based, trauma-informed coaching. The bill would specify that the pilot program is not intended to supplant any existing obligation on counties to provide core services, or to duplicate services already available to foster children in the community. The bill would set forth the pilot program responsibilities of the department and the participating counties, and would require the department, by June 30, 2020, to consult with relevant stakeholders and to consider the stakeholders' recommendations to the department regarding certain parameters of the pilot program, as specified. The bill would require a county that elects to participate in the pilot program to conduct at least one evaluation of the program's impact and effectiveness on increasing placement stability for foster youth and retaining resource families in accordance with, and upon issuance of guidance from, the department, and to submit the evaluation to the department no later than December 31, 2022. The bill would require the department to report the information provided by the counties to the Legislature, as prescribed. The bill would require the pilot program to be implemented only if the Legislature appropriates sufficient funding. The provisions of the bill would be repealed on January 1, 2023.
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.