Existing law prohibits a state agency from sending any outgoing United States mail to an individual that contains personal information about that individual, including, but not limited to, the individual's social security number, telephone number, driver's license number, or credit card account number, unless that personal information is contained within sealed correspondence and cannot be viewed from the outside of that sealed correspondence. Existing law, commencing on or before January 1, 2023, prohibits a state agency from sending any outgoing United States mail that contains an individual's social security number unless the number is truncated to its last 4 digits or in specified circumstances. This bill would instead require, as soon as feasible, but not later than January 1, 2023, a state agency to stop sending any outgoing United States mail that contains an individual's social security number unless the number is truncated to its last 4 digits or in specified circumstances. The bill, commencing on or before October 1, 2021, would prohibit, with exceptions, the Employment Development Department from sending any outgoing United States mail to an individual containing the individual's social security number, unless that social security number is replaced with a modified unique identifier or the number is truncated to its last 4 digits. Existing law creates, in the Labor and Workforce Development Agency, the Employment Development Department, which is vested with the duties, purposes, responsibilities, and jurisdiction with respect to job creation activities. Existing law requires the Director of Employment Development to periodically review policies and practices used to determine eligibility for and the amount of benefits in the unemployment insurance program to identify those policies and practices doing certain things, including, but not limited to, providing little or no value in identifying or preventing fraud or abuse in the unemployment insurance program. This bill would require the department, on or before January 1, 2022, to identify the fraud prevention efforts it can adjust to improve effectiveness during periods of high demand for benefits. The bill would also require the department, on or before January 1, 2022, using existing resources, to designate a single unit responsible for coordinating fraud prevention and align the unit's duties with best practices for detecting and preventing fraud. This bill would declare that it is to take effect immediately as an urgency statute.
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Existing law requires the State Department of Education to incorporate age-appropriate materials relating to, among other things, genocide and the Holocaust into publications that provide examples of curriculum resources for teacher use, consistent with the subject frameworks on history and social science. Under existing law, the Legislature encourages the incorporation of survivor, rescuer, liberator, and witness oral testimony into the teaching of genocide and the Holocaust. This bill would establish a 15-member Governor's Council on Genocide and Holocaust Education to, among other things, establish best practices for, and promote implementation of, education on genocide, including the Holocaust, and submit an annual report to the Legislature, as specified. The bill would provide that the Governor, the Speaker of the Assembly, and the Senate Committee on Rules would each appoint 5 members of the council, who would be required to be individuals with particular interest in, or expertise on, genocide, including the Holocaust. The bill would make an appropriation by authorizing the department to use funds donated by private individuals or entities for the purpose of reimbursing members of the council for their actual and necessary expenses incurred in the performance of their official duties as members of the council. The bill would strongly encourage local educational agencies, as defined to include school districts, county offices of education, and charter schools, with pupils in grades 4 to 12, inclusive, to integrate the best practices into instruction on genocide, including the Holocaust, that meets existing academic content standards and the history-social science curriculum framework for these pupils. The bill would authorize the department to issue grants to local educational agencies for professional development, and would specify that the grant funds would either be appropriated through the annual Budget Act or another statute, or provided through donations to the department from private individuals or entities. To the extent that the bill would authorize the department to make grants with these donated funds, it would make an appropriation. The bill would require the department to conduct a study on the manner in which the instruction is offered to assess the impact of the instruction.
Existing law requires the State Department of Social Services, after setting aside state administrative funds, to allocate federal funds for refugee social services programs to eligible counties and, in certain circumstances, to nonprofit organizations. Existing law requires a county administering refugee social services to designate an agency that is responsible for developing and implementing a plan for the refugee social services. Existing law requires the plan to provide services to refugees that lead to their successful self-sufficiency and social integration. This bill would establish the Enhanced Services Program for Asylees to provide resettlement services for persons granted political asylum to live in the state by the United States Attorney General. The bill would authorize an agency that has been designated by a county to implement social services for refugees, as described above, to provide social services for persons granted asylum. The bill would require the program to provide culturally specific and responsive case management services, as specified, for persons newly granted asylum for up to 90 days. The bill would require the program to aim to have similar reintegration success rates for persons granted asylum as for refugees receiving social services. The bill would require an agency providing services under the program to notify the department each time a person applies for services and would require the department to provide funding to the agency for services for that person at the time the person is admitted to the program. Under the bill, the program would be implemented only to the extent that funds are appropriated for the program in the Budget Act of 2021.
This measure would recognize June 21, 2021, as the 2021 International Day of Yoga in California.
This measure would designate July 29, 2021, as Sugihara Visas Day to memorialize the great achievements of Sugihara Chiune in saving thousands of Jewish lives during World War II.
Existing law establishes the Employment Development Department within the Labor and Workforce Development Agency and sets forth its powers and duties, including job creation activities, computation of benefits, and determination of contribution rates and collection of contributions for benefits. Existing law provides for the payment of unemployment compensation benefits to eligible persons who are unemployed through no fault of their own through a federal-state unemployment insurance program administered by the department. Unemployment compensation benefits are paid from the Unemployment Fund, and the expenses for administering these provisions are paid from the Unemployment Administration Fund, which is continuously appropriated for these purposes. Under existing law, workers are required to pay contributions to the Unemployment Compensation Disability Fund, and those funds are continuously appropriated for the purpose of providing disability benefits and making payment of administrative expenses. Existing law requires all standard information employee pamphlets provided by the department concerning unemployment and disability insurance programs to be printed in English and the 7 other most commonly used languages among participants in each program. Existing law also requires the department to make the pages on its internet website that provide information regarding applying for, and receiving, unemployment insurance benefits available in the 7 languages, other than English, most commonly used by unemployment insurance applicants and claimants. This bill would require all standard information employee pamphlets provided by the department concerning unemployment and disability insurance programs to be printed in English and any written language that is or becomes a Medi-Cal threshold language in any county, as provided. The bill would additionally require the department, commencing July 1, 2022, to provide translation by qualified human translators between English and the languages described above, in accordance with certain procedures, for all benefits programs administered by the department, vital documents and notices, and any other communications to a claimant. The bill would require the department, if the claimant's written language is not within these languages, to provide the claimant, upon request, with a translated document in their written language within 2 business days of the request and on an ad hoc basis, or to read the document aloud and orally explain the document to the claimant in their preferred language, as prescribed. This bill would require the department, by July 1, 2022, to undertake development of a community review process for translation of the department's online application interface, forms, and other documents and communications, to ensure, among other goals, plain language, readability, and cultural appropriateness. The bill would require the community review process to be fully implemented commencing July 1, 2024, and to include user testing and input from members of the public, local government, and community-based organizations. This bill would require the department to identify a claimant's language needs at the earliest point of contact and make efforts to, among other things, ensure that each written application for unemployment insurance, disability insurance, paid family leave, or other benefits contains a section asking claimants for their preferred written and spoken language. The bill would require written materials sent by the department to the claimant to be provided in the language indicated by the claimant. This bill, with respect to the online portals provided via the department's website, would require the department to develop a mechanism to allow for the selection of spoken language options to be expanded on the portal by a claimant, with the option to indicate a language not provided on the portal's list and would require materials sent to the claimant to be provided in the claimant's indicated language. This bill would require the department to make the pages on its internet website that provide information regarding applying for, and receiving, unemployment insurance benefits, available in all of specified languages. The bill would also require the department to annually publish the total number of applications and claimants for each of the benefit programs administered with specified information, including preferred language. The bill would define related terms, and would include related legislative findings. Because this bill would authorize the expenditure of funds from the Unemployment Administration Fund, and the Unemployment Compensation Disability Fund, for new purposes, the bill would make an appropriation.
This measure would proclaim April 8, 2021, as California Holocaust Memorial Day, and would urge all Californians to observe this day of remembrance for the victims of the Holocaust in an appropriate manner.
Existing law establishes the University of California, under the administration of the Regents of the University of California. Existing law requires the Office of Emergency Services, in coordination with all interested state agencies with designated response roles in the state emergency plan and interested local emergency management agencies, to jointly establish by regulation a standardized emergency management system for use by all emergency response agencies, and to include specified components. Existing law requires the office to approve, adopt, and incorporate the California Animal Response Emergency System (CARES) program developed under the oversight of the Department of Food and Agriculture into the standardized emergency management system. This bill would require the University of California, Davis, School of Veterinary Medicine to develop a program called the California Veterinary Emergency Team, and would require the program to assist in the support and training of a network of government agencies, nongovernmental organizations, and individuals to assist in the veterinary care of household and domestic animals and livestock in emergencies, including disaster preparedness, response, recovery, and mitigation. The bill would also require the program to conduct or support research on best practices for the evacuation and care of the animals in disasters. The bill would require the university, the Secretary of Food and Agriculture, and the Director of Emergency Services to develop a memorandum of understanding for the university to consult with the secretary and the director regarding the coordination of the program's activities with the state government's disaster response practices and the deployment of the program's participants during disasters. The bill would require these provisions to apply to the university only to the extent that the Regents of the University of California, by resolution, make any of these provisions applicable to the university. The bill would establish the California Veterinary Emergency Team Fund in the State Treasury to, upon appropriation, be used solely to support the program. The bill would specify that moneys in the fund are not to be considered offsets to any other state funds appropriated to the university.
Existing law requires elections officials to provide each polling place with specified materials, including not fewer than 6 nor more than 12 instruction cards to guide voters in obtaining and marking their ballots. This bill would eliminate the maximum limit of 12 instruction cards.
The Assisted Outpatient Treatment Demonstration Project Act of 2002, known as Laura's Law, commencing January 1, 2022, requires each county to offer specified mental health programs, unless a county or group of counties opts out by a resolution passed by the governing body stating the reasons for opting out and any facts or circumstances relied on in making that decision. Existing law authorizes participating counties to pay for the services provided from moneys distributed to the counties from various continuously appropriated funds, including the Mental Health Services Fund, when included in a county plan, as specified. Existing law authorizes a court to order a person who is the subject of a petition filed pursuant to those provisions to obtain assisted outpatient treatment if the court finds, by clear and convincing evidence, that the facts stated in the petition are true and establish that specified criteria are met, including that the person has a history of lack of compliance with treatment for their mental illness, and that there has been a clinical determination that the person is unlikely to survive safely in the community without supervision. Existing law authorizes the petition to be filed by the county behavioral health director, or the director's designee, in the superior court in the county in which the person who is the subject of the petition is present or reasonably believed to be present, in accordance with prescribed procedures. This bill would additionally authorize the filing of a petition to obtain assisted outpatient treatment under the existing petition procedures, for a conservatee or former conservatee, as specified, who would benefit from assisted outpatient treatment to reduce the risk of deteriorating mental health while living independently.