The Trial Court Employment Protection and Governance Act establishes a trial court employee personnel system that provides authority to hire trial court personnel, regulates the classification and compensation of trial court employees, labor relations, and personnel files, and requires each trial court to establish a system of employment selection and advancement and an employment protection system. Existing law authorizes state agencies to use personal services contracts to achieve cost savings if specified standards are satisfied, including, among other things, the contract does not cause the displacement of civil service employees and the contract is awarded through a publicized, competitive bidding process. The State Personnel Board is required to review a proposed contract upon the request of an employee organization for compliance with those standards. This bill would establish specified standards if a trial court intends to enter into a contract for any services that are currently or customarily performed by that trial court's employees. Among other things, the bill would require the trial court to clearly demonstrate that the contract will result in actual overall cost savings to the trial court for the duration of the entire contract as compared with the trial court's actual costs of providing the same services. This bill would provide that these standards apply to any contract entered into on or after January 1, 2015. The bill would provide that its provisions do not apply to a contract under specified circumstances, including when services are incidental to a contract for the purchase or lease of real or personal property. This bill would require each trial court to provide a report by February 1, 2015, to the Chairperson of the Joint Legislative Budget Committee and the chairpersons of the Senate Judiciary Committee and the Assembly Judiciary Committee if the trial court entered into a contract between July 1, 2014, and December 31, 2014, inclusive, for services that were provided or are customarily provided by its trial court employees if the contract has a term extending beyond March 31, 2015. This report would be required to include specified information relating to these contracts, including an analysis of whether the contract resulted in the displacement of trial court employees. The bill would provide that its provisions are severable.
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This measure would call upon all Californians to observe César Chávez's birthday, March 31, as a day of public service, to recognize the hard work and self-sacrifice that farmworkers go through to feed all the families in our state, and to learn from César Chávez's life and his mission of nonviolence, social justice, and selfless service to others.
Under the Sales and Use Tax Law, if a purchaser who gives a resale certificate or purchases property for the purpose of reselling it makes any storage or use of the property other than retention, demonstration, or display while holding it for sale in the regular course of business, the storage or use is taxable as of the time the property is first so stored or used. This bill would make technical, nonsubstantive changes to that provision.
Existing law requires the Department of General Services and Department of Transportation to develop and implement advanced technology vehicle parking incentive programs in specified parking facilities to provide incentives for the purchase and use of alternatively fueled vehicles in the state and lists exemplars of those incentives. This bill would expressly list parking spaces with charging stations for plug-in hybrid and electric vehicles as an exemplar of the incentives.
Existing law requires the Instructional Quality Commission to recommend, and the State Board of Education to adopt, curriculum frameworks, as provided. Existing law defines "curriculum framework" as an outline of the components of a given course of study designed to provide state direction to school districts in the provision of instructional programs. Existing law prohibits the state board from adopting instructional materials until the 2015–16 school year, except as provided. This bill would require the commission to consider incorporating computer science curriculum content into the mathematics, science, history-social science, and English language arts/English language development curriculum frameworks, as it deems appropriate, when those frameworks are next revised. The bill would require computer science curriculum to focus on foundational concepts in computer science by integrating basic skills in technology with simple ideas about computational thinking, communication, and collaboration, and being responsible citizens in a changing digital world, as specified. The bill would require the commission to consult with classroom teachers and school administrators to ensure the age-appropriateness of the computer science curriculum. If computer science curriculum content is incorporated into the curriculum frameworks at their next revision, the bill would require the Superintendent of Public Instruction to identify and post on the State Department of Education's Internet Web site professional development resources for teaching computer science curriculum content. The bill would require its provisions to be implemented in a manner that does not result in new duties or programs being imposed on local educational agencies, as specified.
Existing law vests the Public Utilities Commission with regulatory authority over public utilities, including electrical corporations. Pursuant to its existing authority, the commission issued Electrical Rule 21 establishing operational and metering requirements for a generation facility to be connected to an electrical corporation's distribution system. Existing law relative to private energy producers requires every electric utility, as defined, to develop a standard contract or tariff providing for net energy metering, as defined, and to make this contract or tariff available to eligible customer-generators, as defined, upon request for generation by a renewable electrical generation facility, as defined. The existing definition of an eligible customer-generator requires that the generating facility use a renewable source of energy, as specified, and have a generating capacity of not more than one megawatt. Existing law requires that every electric utility ensure that requests for an interconnection agreement from an eligible customer-generator are processed in a time period not to exceed 30 working days from the date it receives a completed application form from the eligible customer-generator for an interconnection agreement. This bill would require the commission to determine criteria that would allow an independent generation facility, as defined, to apply for interconnection to the utility electric distribution grid under the fast track review process, as defined under Rule 21. Under existing law, a violation of an order, rule, direction, demand, or requirement of the commission is a crime. Because a failure of an electric utility to process an interconnection request from an independent generation facility pursuant to Rule 21 would be a 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.
Under the existing Barry Keene Underground Storage Tank Cleanup Trust Fund Act of 1989, every owner of an underground storage tank is required to pay a storage fee for each gallon of petroleum placed in the tank. The fees are required to be deposited in the Underground Storage Tank Cleanup Fund and the State Water Resources Control Board is authorized to expend the moneys in the fund, upon appropriation by the Legislature, for various purposes, including the payment of claims to aid owners and operators of petroleum underground storage tanks who take corrective action to clean up unauthorized releases from those tanks, corrective actions undertaken by the board, a California regional water quality board, or a local agency, the cleanup and oversight of unauthorized releases at abandoned tank sites, and grants to small businesses to retrofit certain hazardous substance underground storage tanks. Existing law repeals the act on January 1, 2016, but specifies that certain associated rights, obligations, and authorities that apply prior to the repeal date do not terminate until the moneys in the fund are exhausted. Existing law, until January 1, 2014, provides for an increase in the fee for storage in an underground tank of $0.006 per gallon of petroleum. This bill would require payment of the additional $0.006 per gallon until January 1, 2016. The bill would extend the repeal date of the fund until January 1, 2018, and make conforming changes. The bill would require the board, no later than January 1, 2015, to make specified information relating to the payment of claims available on its Internet Web site. This bill would constitute a change in state statute that would result in a taxpayer paying a higher tax within the meaning of Section 3 of Article XIIIA of the California Constitution, and thus would require for passage the approval of 23 of the membership of each house of the Legislature.
Under existing law, the State Department of Social Services regulates the licensure and operation of community care facilities, residential care facilities for the elderly, child day care centers, and family day care homes. Existing law requires that these facilities be subject to unannounced visits by the department that occur at least once every 5 years. Existing law requires the department to conduct an annual unannounced visit under specified circumstances, including when a license is on probation, and to conduct annual unannounced visits to no less than 20% of the facilities not subject to an evaluation under those specified circumstances. This bill would instead make every facility of the types described above subject to an annual unannounced visit by the department on and after July 1, 2017. The bill would revise the provisions requiring the department to conduct annual unannounced visits to no less than 20% of the facilities by instead requiring the department to conduct annual unannounced visits to no less than 30% of facilities on or before July 1, 2015, and no less than 20% of those facilities on or before July 1, 2016. The bill would also delete the provisions requiring an unannounced visit at least once every 5 years. Existing law requires the department to immediately request a fire clearance and notify an applicant to arrange a time for the department to conduct a prelicensure survey if an application for initial licensure is complete. This bill would provide that the prelicensure survey is optional at the discretion of the department if the department determines that an application is for licensure of a currently licensed facility for which there will be no material change to the management or operations of the facility.
The Personal Income Tax Law and the Corporation Tax Law allow various deductions in computing the income that is subject to the taxes imposed by those laws. Both laws allow a deduction for ordinary and necessary business expenses, including a deduction for amounts paid or incurred for specified types of punitive damages. This bill, for taxable years beginning on or after January 1, 2014, would disallow, under both laws, a deduction for amounts paid or incurred for punitive damages, as provided. This bill would include a change in state statute that would result in a taxpayer paying a higher tax within the meaning of Section 3 of Article XIIIA of the California Constitution, and thus would require for passage the approval of 23 of the membership of each house of the Legislature. This bill would take effect immediately as a tax levy.
The California Constitution conditions the imposition of a special tax by a city, county, or special district upon the approval of 23 of the voters of the city, county, or special district voting on that tax, except that certain school entities may levy an ad valorem property tax for specified purposes with the approval of 55% of the voters within the jurisdiction of these entities. This measure would provide that the imposition, extension, or increase of a special tax by a local government for the purpose of providing funding for transportation projects requires the approval of 55% of its voters voting on the proposition, if the proposition proposing the tax includes certain requirements. The measure would also make conforming and technical, nonsubstantive changes.