Existing law, the Dymally-Alatorre Bilingual Services Act, requires every state agency directly involved in the furnishing of information or the rendering of services to the public where contact is made with a substantial number of non-English-speaking people to employ a sufficient number of qualified bilingual persons in public contact positions to ensure provision of information and services to the public in the language of the non-English-speaking person, except as specified. This bill would establish the Office of Language Access, within the California Health and Human Services Agency, to ensure individuals with limited English proficiency have meaningful access to government programs and services. This bill would require the Office of Language Access to, among other things, lead the development, monitoring, and periodic updating of every Language Access Plan within the agency and coordinate with language access coordinators throughout the agency to implement each Language Access Plan. The bill would require the Office of Language Access to maintain an internet website containing specified information, including every current Language Action Plan and all corrective action plans. The bill would require the Office of Language Access, commencing November 1, 2026, and every other year thereafter, to submit a report to the Legislature and the relevant policy committees that contains specific information, including challenges encountered while implementing Language Access Plans, lessons learned, best practices, and metrics regarding individuals with limited English proficiency who use agency services. This bill would require the California Health and Human Services Agency to develop a Language Access Plan Guidance Document to support its various departments and offices in the development of their Language Access Plans. The bill would require each department and office within the agency to develop a Language Access Plan, as specified. The bill would require the agency to develop a correction for a department or office that fails to implement and achieve the goals set forth in its Language Access Plan. This bill would also require the agency to submit annual compliance reports to the Office of Language Access regarding the progress made with Language Access Plans and corrective action plans. The bill would require, commencing January 1, 2025, the agency to commence the Language Access Advisory Workgroup, to meet on a prescribed schedule, with specified membership. This bill would require the workgroup to share the progress of the various Language Access Plans, address relevant issues, and obtain community input.
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 requires a health care service plan and a health insurer that contracts with providers for alternative rates of payment to publish and maintain a provider directory or directories with information on contracting providers that deliver health care services enrollees or insureds, and requires a health care service plan and health insurer to regularly update its printed and online provider directory or directories, as specified. Existing law authorizes the departments to require a plan or insurer to provide coverage for all covered health care services provided to an enrollee or insured who reasonably relied on materially inaccurate, incomplete, or misleading information contained in a health plan's provider directory or directories. This bill would require a plan or insurer to annually verify and delete inaccurate listings from its provider directories, and would require a provider directory to be 60% accurate on July 1, 2025, with increasing required percentage accuracy benchmarks to be met each year until the directories are 95% accurate on or before July 1, 2028. The bill would subject a plan or insurer to administrative penalties for failure to meet the prescribed benchmarks. The bill would require a plan or insurer to arrange care and provide coverage for all covered health care services provided to an enrollee or insured who reasonably relied on inaccurate, incomplete, or misleading information contained in a health plan or policy's provider directory or directories and to reimburse the provider the contracted amount for those services. The bill would prohibit a provider from collecting an additional amount from an enrollee or insured other than the applicable in-network cost sharing. The bill would require a plan or insurer to provide information about in-network providers to enrollees and insureds upon request, and would limit the cost-sharing amounts an enrollee or insured is required to pay for services from those providers under specified circumstances. On or before January 1, 2025, this bill would authorize the Department of Managed Health Care and the Department of Insurance to develop uniform formats for plans and insurers to use to request directory information from providers and to establish a methodology and processes to ensure accuracy of provider directories and consistency with other laws, regulations, or standards. The bill would require the health plan or the insurer, as applicable, to ensure the accuracy of a request to add back a provider who was previously removed from a directory and approve the request within 10 business days of receipt, if accurate. Because a violation of the bill's requirements by a health care service plan would be a crime, 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.
(1) The Plastic Pollution Prevention and Packaging Producer Responsibility Act covers certain single-use packaging and plastic single-use food service ware, as provided. As part of its comprehensive statutory scheme, the act requires producers of those covered materials to reduce and recycle the covered plastic material and to ensure that covered materials that are offered for sale, distributed, or imported in or into the state on or after January 1, 2032, are recyclable or compostable, as provided. The act authorizes the Department of Resources Recycling and Recovery to identify materials that are trending toward meeting specified requirements and criteria to be considered recyclable within the state, as provided, and requires those material types and forms to be considered and labeled as recyclable in the state as long as the material types and forms meet certain requirements. This bill would instead authorize a producer or group of producers of products using covered materials to, on or before January 1, 2026, petition the department to identify material types and forms that meet those specified requirements and criteria to be considered as recyclable in the state. The bill would require the department to review the petition and approve or deny it within 60 days of receipt, as provided. (2) Existing law provides that a product or packaging that displays a chasing arrows symbol, among other symbols, statements, or directions, is deemed to be a deceptive or misleading claim unless the product or packaging is considered recyclable pursuant to statewide recyclability criteria and is of a material type and form that routinely becomes feedstock used in the production of new products or packaging, except for products or packaging manufactured up to 18 months after the date the department publishes or updates a specified material characterization study, as provided. This bill would additionally exempt from the above-described provisions any product or packaging that has been manufactured up to 24 months after the date the department publishes its first update to a specified material characterization study and for which a producer or group of producers has submitted a specified petition to the department. (3) Existing law provides that a product or packaging is not considered recyclable in the state unless the product or packaging meets specified criteria, including that the product or packaging does not contain an intentionally added chemical identified pursuant to specified regulations. This bill would exclude chemicals that are disclosed only for purposes of compliance with a specified regulation governing the disclosure of chemicals on a list produced under the Safe Drinking Water and Toxic Enforcement Act of 1986 (Proposition 65) from the intentionally added chemicals that would affect whether a product or package is considered recyclable in this state.
Under existing law, the California Fair Employment and Housing Act (FEHA) , it is an unlawful employment practice for an employer, unless based upon a bona fide occupational qualification or applicable security regulations established by the United States or the State of California, to refuse to hire or employ a person or to refuse to select a person for a training program leading to employment, or to bar or discharge a person from employment or a training program leading to employment, or to discriminate against a person in compensation or in terms, conditions, or privileges of employment because of the race, religious creed, color, national origin, ancestry, physical disability, mental disability, medical condition, genetic information, marital status, sex, gender, gender identity, gender expression, age, sexual orientation, or military and veteran status of that person. FEHA provides that nothing in that act relating to discrimination on account of sex affects the right of an employer to use veteran status as a factor in employee selection or to give special consideration to Vietnam-era veterans. FEHA is enforced by the Civil Rights Department, which is in the Business, Consumer Services, and Housing Agency, and is under the direction of an executive officer known as the Director of Civil Rights. This bill would enact the Voluntary Veterans' Preference Employment Policy Act to authorize a private employer to establish and maintain a written veterans' preference employment policy, to be applied uniformly to hiring decisions, to give a voluntary preference for hiring a veteran over another qualified applicant. The bill would require a private employer with a veterans' preference employment policy to annually report to the Civil Rights Department the number of veterans hired under the preference policy and any demographic information about those veterans that the employer obtained in response to the department's reporting requirements. Under the bill, failure to submit that report would render any preference granted by the employer ineligible for the protections provided by this bill. The bill would require the department to report that information, in addition to the number of discrimination claims received based on an employer's veterans' preference employment policy, to specified legislative policy committees by July 1, 2026, and July 1, 2028. This bill would provide that the granting of a veterans' preference pursuant to the bill, in and of itself, shall be deemed not to violate any local or state equal employment opportunity law or regulation, including, but not limited to, the antidiscrimination provisions of FEHA. The bill would require the Department of Veterans Affairs to assist any private employer in determining if an applicant is a veteran, to the extent permitted by law. The bill would prohibit a veterans' preference employment policy from being established or applied for the purpose or with the effect of unlawfully discriminating against an employment applicant on the basis of a protected classification, as specified. The bill would repeal these provisions on January 1, 2029.
Existing law, as amended by the DNA Fingerprint, Unsolved Crime and Innocence Protection Act, Proposition 69, approved by the voters at the November 2, 2004, general election, requires a person who has been convicted of a felony offense to provide buccal swab samples, right thumbprints, and a full palm print impression of each hand, and any blood specimens or other biological samples required for law enforcement identification analysis. Existing law makes these provisions retroactive, regardless of when the crime charged or committed became a qualifying offense. The Legislature may amend Proposition 69 by a statute passed in each house by majority vote, as specified. This bill would expand these provisions to require persons convicted on or after January 1, 2025, of soliciting, agreeing to engage in, or engaging in an act of prostitution with a minor, as specified, in exchange for providing money or compensation to the minor to provide buccal swab samples, right thumbprints, and a full palm print impression of each hand, and any blood specimens or other biological samples required for law enforcement identification analysis. By imposing additional duties on local law enforcement agencies to collect and forward these samples, 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, 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.
Existing law, the Political Reform Act of 1974, prohibits a public officer from expending, and a candidate from accepting, public moneys for the purpose of seeking elective office. This bill would permit a public officer or candidate to expend or accept public funds, as defined, for the purpose of seeking elective office unless the funds are earmarked by a state or local entity for education, transportation, or public safety. The bill would require candidates to abide by specified expenditure limits and meet strict criteria, as defined, to qualify for public funds, and it also would prohibit public funds from being used to pay legal defense fees or fines. The bill would prohibit a candidate receiving public funds from using those funds to repay personal loans to their campaign at any time. The bill would permit a statute, ordinance, or charter to establish standards to increase the expenditure limits for each qualified, voluntarily participating candidate pursuant to a specified formula. The bill would provide that the Fair Political Practices Commission is not responsible for administering or enforcing a system of public funding of candidates established by a local governmental agency. Existing law prohibits a foreign government or foreign principal, as defined, to make a contribution, expenditure, or independent expenditure in connection with the qualification or support of, or opposition to, any state or local ballot measure or in connection with the election of a candidate to state or local office. Under existing law, a person who violates this prohibition is guilty of a misdemeanor and subject to a fine equal to the amount contributed or expended. This bill would specify that a person who violates the prohibition above is guilty of a misdemeanor and must be fined an amount at least equal to the amount contributed or expended but not exceeding a maximum amount of 3 times the amount contributed or expended. The Political Reform Act of 1974, an initiative measure, provides that the act may be amended by a statute that becomes effective upon approval of the voters. This bill would require the Secretary of State to submit the provisions of the bill to the voters for approval at the November 3, 2026, statewide election, as specified.
Existing law vests the Public Utilities Commission with regulatory authority over public utilities, including telephone corporations. Existing law requires the commission to develop, implement, and administer the California Advanced Services Fund to encourage deployment of high-quality advanced communications services to all Californians that will promote economic growth, job creation, and the substantial social benefits of advanced information and communications technologies, as specified. Existing law establishes the Broadband Infrastructure Grant Account in the fund to approve funding for infrastructure projects that will provide broadband access to no less than 98% of California households in each consortia region, and establishes the Federal Funding Account in the fund to expeditiously connect unserved and underserved communities, as specified. The Get Connected California Act of 2024 would require the commission to ensure all deployment grant awardees, defined as all internet service providers that receive funding from the Broadband Infrastructure Grant Account and the Federal Funding Account within the California Advanced Services Fund, offer internet service that costs no more than $30 per month and meets certain minimum speed requirements, as specified. The bill would require a deployment grant awardee to allow any household in a project area, as defined, to switch to the above-described low-cost broadband service option in the billing cycle immediately following the household's enrollment in the low-cost broadband service option. The bill would not apply these requirements to applications submitted to the commission before January 1, 2025. The bill would make the above-described provisions severable. This bill would also require the commission, on or before January 1, 2025, to issue a draft resolution to award a total of at least $1,000,000,000 in project funding from the Federal Funding Account and the Broadband Infrastructure Grant Account. The bill would require the commission, on or before January 1, 2027, to adopt updated rules for the Federal Funding Account and the Broadband Infrastructure Grant Account, and related programs, to conform with each other in terms of project eligibility, applicant requirements, and eligible technologies, as provided. Under existing law, a violation of the Public Utilities Act or any order, decision, rule, direction, demand, or requirement of the commission is a crime. Because the above provisions would be part of the act and a violation of a commission action implementing this bill's requirements would be a crime, 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 requires the Transportation Agency to prepare a state freight plan every 5 years to govern the immediate and long-range planning activities and capital investments of the state with respect to the movement of freight. Existing law requires the state freight plan to include, among other things, a description of needed infrastructure, projects, and operations for the deployment of zero-emission medium- and heavy-duty vehicles and the development of freight corridors identified in a specified assessment. Existing law requires the State Energy Resources Conservation and Development Commission (Energy Commission) , working with specified state agencies, to prepare a statewide assessment of the electric vehicle charging infrastructure needed to support the levels of electric vehicle adoption required for the state to meet its goals of putting at least 5,000,000 zero-emission vehicles on California roads by 2030, and of reducing the emissions of greenhouse gases to 40% below 1990 levels by 2030. This bill would require the Transportation Agency and the Energy Commission to jointly convene the Zero-Emission Freight Central Delivery Team, composed of representatives from various state agencies, to lead the statewide coordination of zero-emission freight infrastructure planning and implementation, including carrying out specified actions. The bill would require the Zero-Emission Freight Central Delivery Team, in consultation with the Transportation Agency and the Energy Commission, to submit a report to the Legislature on or before March 1, 2026, and every 5 years thereafter, that includes, among other things, a description of the actions taken by the Zero-Emission Freight Central Delivery Team.
Existing federal law, the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA) , establishes certain requirements relating to the provision of health insurance, including provisions relating to the confidentiality of health records. Existing state law, the Confidentiality of Medical Information Act, prohibits a provider of health care, a health care service plan, a contractor, a corporation and its subsidiaries and affiliates, or any business that offers software or hardware to consumers, including a mobile application or other related device, as defined, from intentionally sharing, selling, using for marketing, or otherwise using any medical information, as defined, for any purpose not necessary to provide health care services to a patient, except as provided. This bill would prohibit a participating entity of a closed-loop referral system (CLRS) from selling, renting, releasing, disclosing, disseminating, making available, transferring, or otherwise communicating orally, in writing, or by electronic or other means, social care information stored in or transmitted through a CLRS in exchange for monetary or other valuable consideration, except as specified. The bill would further prohibit a participating entity from using social care information stored in, or transmitted through, a CLRS for any purpose or purposes other than the social care purpose or purposes for which that social care information was collected or generated, except as specified. The bill would define "social care" to mean any care, services, goods, or supplies related to an individual's social needs, including, but not limited to, support and assistance for an individual's food stability and nutritional needs, housing, transportation, economic stability, employment, education access and quality, childcare and family relationship needs, and environmental and physical safety. The bill would also define "social care information" to mean any information, in any form, that relates to the need for, payment for, or provision of, social care, and the individual's personal information, as specified.
The Unruh Civil Rights Act (Unruh Act) requires persons within the jurisdiction of the state to be free and equal and, regardless of the person's sex, race, color, religion, ancestry, national origin, disability, medical condition, genetic information, marital status, sexual orientation, citizenship, primary language, or immigration status to be entitled to the full and equal accommodations, advantages, facilities, privileges, or services in all business establishments, as prescribed, and makes a violation of the federal Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 (ADA) a violation of the act. Existing law imposes liability upon a person who denies, aids, or incites a denial of, or makes any discrimination or distinction contrary to, rights afforded by law for actual damages suffered, exemplary damages, a civil penalty, and attorney's fees, as specified, to any person who was denied the specified rights. Existing law also imposes liability upon a person, firm, or corporation that denies or interferes with admittance to, or enjoyment of, public facilities or otherwise interferes with the rights of an individual with a disability, as specified, for damages and attorney's fees to a person who was denied those rights. This bill would provide that statutory damages on the basis of a specific accessibility barrier on an internet website under these provisions shall only be recovered against an entity, as defined, if the internet website is not accessible, as defined. The bill would require, for a plaintiff to be entitled to statutory damages on the basis of a specific accessibility barrier that constitutes a violation of the Unruh Act by violating the ADA, the plaintiff to prove either that the plaintiff personally encountered a specific barrier that caused the plaintiff to experience a difference in the plaintiff's access to, or use of, the internet website as compared to other users because the internet website was not accessible or that the plaintiff was deterred from accessing or using all or part of the internet website or the content of the internet website because the internet website was not accessible. The bill would prohibit, in a civil action seeking statutory damages under the Unruh Act and the other provisions described above therewith on the basis of a specific accessibility barrier, as defined, on an entity's internet website that is a violation of the ADA, the entity from being liable for those damages if the entity establishes, as an affirmative defense to the claim, certain elements, including that the entity identified the specific accessibility barrier in a digital accessibility report posted on the accessibility page, as specified, of its internet website. This bill would make it unlawful for a resource service provider, as defined, in exchange for remuneration, to intentionally, negligently, recklessly, or knowingly construct, license, distribute, or maintain for online use an internet website that is not accessible or any resource or part of an internet website that, when used by the entity in accordance with any instructions provided by the resource provider, causes an entity's internet website to be inaccessible. The bill would also make it unlawful for a resource provider to intentionally, negligently, knowingly, or recklessly make certain false representations, including that the internet website is accessible or conforms to the internet website accessibility standard, as defined. The bill would authorize a civil action by, among others, an individual or entity that pays, compensates, or contracts with a resource service provider to construct, license, distribute, or maintain an internet website that is accessible who is injured as a result of the defendant's violation of the bill and reasonably relied upon the resource provider to ensure that the internet website, or a part of the internet website, is accessible, with remedies as prescribed. The bill would also authorize the Attorney General, the Civil Rights Department, or a district attorney, county counsel, or city attorney to bring an action to obtain injunctive or declaratory relief and attorney's fees and costs. The bill would provide, subject to an exception, that a provision within a contract between an individual or entity and a resource service provider that seeks to waive liability under these provisions, or otherwise shift liability to a person or entity that pays, compensates, or contracts with the resource provider, as provided, is void as a matter of public policy and subject to specified provisions of the Ralph Civil Rights Act of 1976 relating to waiver of rights.
Existing law establishes the Department of Veterans Affairs (CalVet) and as part of its duties, requires it to increase awareness regarding professional licensing benefits available to veterans and their spouses. Existing law requires CalVet, in consultation with the Department of Consumer Affairs, to post information and resources regarding licensing benefits on their respective internet websites. This bill would require CalVet, upon appropriation by the Legislature, to create and advertise an internet website, as specified, that matches veterans and their military skills and training with an employer, as provided.
Existing law establishes the California Mosquito Surveillance and Research Program, which is administered by the University of California, Davis, and requires the university to maintain an interactive internet website for management and dissemination of data on mosquitoborne virus and surveillance control and coordinate with the State Department of Public Health, among other functions, to the extent the program receives federal, state, or private funding for those purposes, as specified. This bill would require the program to consult with partners at the University of California and the California State University about the most up-to-date research pertaining to mosquito abatement, including sustainable pest management, as defined.
