On July 14, 2023, the legislature had its Policy Committee deadline. The committees acted on hundreds of bills that had to be heard before making it through the legislative process. Bills have to be heard in policy committees of the opposite houses to evaluate the total impact they can have on the state. The bills then move forward to the Assembly Floor or Senate Floor, or appropriations committee, based on their fiscal impact. However, if the bills are held in committee, they become known as two-year bills and can proceed forward in the next legislative session.
Most of the bills in the policy committees advanced. The following report lists CASBO’s active bill portfolio, and any amendments provided to get off the suspense file.
Active Bills
Budget/Finance
AB 721 School districts: budgets: public hearings: notice. This bill would modernize the statutory requirement for county superintendents to publish district budget meeting notices to either their website, newspaper, or both.
CASBO Position: Support
Committee: Senate Education
Votes: Y:6 N:0 A:1
Next Location: Senate Appropriations Commitee
Amendments: Assemblymember and the sponsor of the bill accepted Senate Education Committee amendments. The amendments continue to require posting in newspapers until January 1, 2027. Authorize school districts to also post on their websites until January 1, 2027; beginning in 2027, require districts to post online and authorize districts to also post in newspapers. Require CDE to select three school districts of various sizes in geographically diverse areas of the state to annually submit to CDE, until January 1, 2027, information about how the school districts communicate with the school community and include recommendations about how the districts can improve communication with the school community.
AB 938 (Muratsuchi): Education finance: local control funding formula: base grants: classified and certificated staff salaries. This bill would establish Local Control Funding Formula (LCFF) funding target levels for the 2030-31 fiscal year with the purpose of increasing school site employee salaries.
CASBO Position: Support if Amended. CASBO is waiting on additional clarifying amendments and looks forward to moving to a support position.
Committee: Senate Labor, Public Employment and Retirement
Votes: Y:4 N:0 A:1
Next Location: Senate Appropriations Committee
Note: CASBO appreciates the bill’s most recent amendments reflected on pages 11 and 12 on the committee analysis found here.
Career Technical Education/Workforce Development
AB 377 (Muratsuchi) Career technical education: California Career Technical Education Incentive Grant Program: Strong Workforce Program. This bill would combine the California Career Technical Education Incentive Grant (CTEIG) Program and the K-12 Strong Workforce Program into the CTEIG program administered by the California Department of Education (CDE). This would provide $450 million in General Fund, beginning in the 2024–25 fiscal year, to be made available for this purpose.
CASBO Position: Support
Committee: Senate Education
Votes: Y:7 N:0 A:0
Next Location: Senate Appropriations Committee
Facilities
AB 247 (Muratsuchi) Education finance: school facilities: Kindergarten Through Community College Public Education Facilities Bond Act of 2024. This bill would create the TK-14 Act Bond as a state general obligation bond act that would provide $15 billion to construct and modernize education facilities. This bond would become operative only if approved by the voters in the 2024 election.
CASBO Position: Support
Committee: Senate Governance and Finance
Votes: Y:7 N:2 A:0
Next Location: Senate Appropriations Committee
AB 249 (Holden) Water: schoolsites: lead testing: conservation. This bill requires a community water system in Title 1 schools to test for lead in each of the schoolsite’s potable water system outlets before January 1, 2027, except for water system outlets in buildings that were either constructed after January 1, 2010, or modernized after January 1, 2010, to report the results to the State Water Resources Control Board (SWB), and, if lead levels exceed 5 parts per billion, to report its findings to the applicable schoolsite or local educational agency and to the state board. This is the exceedance standard adopted by the Department of Social Services for the lead testing of water in licensed child care centers directives, pursuant to AB 2370. This bill would require the State Water Resources Control Board to allocate $10 million each fiscal year from the federal Bipartisan Infrastructure Law (BIL) to pay for sampling and remediation in schools. The bill would require a community water system to prepare a sampling plan for each schoolsite where lead sampling is required.
CASBO Position: Oppose unless Amended
Committee: Senate Education
Votes: Y:7 N:0 A:0
Next Location: Senate Appropriations Committee
SB 28 (Glazer) Education finance: school facilities: PK–12, and College Health and Safety Bond Act of 2024. This bill would place a $15.5 billion bond on the 2024 ballot for facilities at public preschools, K-14 and University of California (UC) campuses, and California State University (CSU) campuses. Schools can use the bond monies to construct, reconstruct, and remodel existing or new facilities.
CASBO Position: Watch
Committee: Assembly Education
Votes: Y:4 N:2 A:1
Next Location: Assembly Appropriations Committee
SB 499 (Menjivar): School facilities: School Extreme Heat Action Plan Act of 2023. This bill would create the School Extreme Heat Action Plan Act of 2023, which would require all schoolsites, the next time outdoor surfaces are resurfaced or replaced, to replace low specific heat surfaces, such as cement, asphalt, brick, pebbles, and rubber amongst others, with high specific heat surfaces such as cool pavement technologies, natural grass, shrubs, and trees. This bill would require on or before January 1, 2025, all schoolsites, to develop an extreme heat action plan, and, by January 1, 2027, to begin implementation of their extreme heat action plan.
CASBO Position: Oppose
Committee: Assembly Education
Votes: Y:4 N:1 A:2
Next Location: Assembly Appropriations Committee
Health and Safety
AB 19 (Joe Patterson) Pupil health: opioid antagonists. This bill would require each individual public school operated by an LEA to maintain at least two units of naloxone hydrochloride or another opioid antagonist for purposes of those authorizations..
CASBO Position: Support
Committee: Senate Appropriations
Votes: Y:6 N:0 A:1
Next Location: Senate Appropriations Committee – Suspense File
Amendments: This bill requires each school that has elected to make a school nurse or trained personnel available to maintain at least two units of naloxone hydrochloride or another opioid antagonist on its campus.
SB 10 (Cortese) Pupil health: opioid overdose prevention and treatment. This bill would expand statewide prevention and education efforts to combat overdoses and fentanyl-related deaths that have plagued youth statewide.
CASBO Position: Watch
Committee: Assembly Health
Votes: Y:15 N:0 A:0
Next Location: Assembly Appropriations Committee
SB 509 (Portantino) School employee and pupil training: youth mental and behavioral health: mental health education. This bill requires an LEA, on or before January 1, 2027, to certify to CDE that 75 percent of its classified and certificated employees who have the direct contact with pupils at each school have received specified youth behavioral health training.
CASBO Position: Concern
Committee: Assembly Education
Votes: Y:6 N:0 A:1
Next Location: Assembly Appropriations Committee
SB 868 (Wilk) Pupil safety: trauma kits.This bill would require LEAs to equip each classroom with a trauma kit and to offer training to employees on the use of such kits. Employees who render emergency care with such kits are granted qualified immunity from civil damages.
CASBO Position: Support
Committee: Assembly Judiciary
Votes: Y:11 N:0 A:0
Next Location: Assembly Appropriations Committee
Healthcare
AB 483 (Muratsuchi) Local educational agency: Medi-Cal billing option. This bill will require the Department of Health Care Services to establish a revised audit process for claims submitted through the Local Education Agency Medi-Cal Billing Option Program (LEA BOP), a program that allows schools to claim reimbursement for a portion of the cost of delivering health services to Medi-Cal eligible students.
CASBO Position: Support
Committee: Senate Health
Votes: Y:11 N:0 A:0
Next Location: Senate Appropriations Committee
Human Resources
AB 383 (Zbur) California Classified School Employee Teacher Credentialing Program: leave of absence for student teaching. This bill would modify the California Classified School Employee Teacher Credentialing Program (CSETCP) to require a LEA receiving grant funds from CSETCP to provide a classified employee participating in CSETCP with a leave of absence of up to 600 hours to complete a teacher training program, wage replacement for that leave of absence, and benefits during that absence. The bill also requires a classified employee participating in CSETCP to reimburse these costs to an LEA if the employee does not complete a teacher training program or honor a commitment to teach at the LEA after completing a teacher training program.
CASBO Position: Watch
Committee: Senate Education
Votes: Y:7 N:0 A:0
Next Location: Senate Appropriations Committee
Note: The bill would make the implementation of these provisions contingent upon an appropriation in the annual Budget Act or another statute for these purposes.
AB 452 (Addis) Childhood sexual assault: statute of limitations. This bill would eliminate time limitations on when people may file civil lawsuits seeking damages for childhood sexual assault against specified defendants, including state and local agencies and public schools. The bill specifies the change in time limit would apply only to causes of action arising on or after January 1, 2024.
CASBO Position: Oppose
Committee: Senate Judiciary
Votes: Y:9 N:0 A:2
Next Location: Senate Appropriations Committee
AB 897 (McCarty) Certificated school employees: probationary employees: service credit. This bill would require adult education teachers to earn permanent status after a two-year probationary period; requires certificated employees working at least 60% of a full time position and who have served for at least 75% of the number of days of their assignment to be considered to have served a complete school year for purposes of attaining permanent status; and, requires employees hired using “categorical” or restricted state funding to be notified of the following at the time of hire: the expected end date of employment, the source of funding, and the nature of the categorically funded program or project.
CASBO Position: Oppose
Committee: Senate Appropriations
Votes: Y:7 N:0 A:0
Next Location: Senate Appropriations Committee – Suspense File
AB 1699 (McCarty): K–14 classified employees: part-time or full-time vacancies: public postings. This bill would require vacancies for part-time or full-time positions of an education employer to be open only to current regular and hourly employees, before the vacancy may be posted publicly for the general public to apply. The bill would require an interested part-time employee who does not meet the minimum qualifications for a vacancy to be offered paid on-the-job training for that vacancy. The bill would also require an education employer to accept a current part-time employee’s number of years of service with the education employer, regardless of the capacity in which they were earned when that part-time employee applies for an additional part-time assignment that requires a certain number of years of service.
CASBO Position: Oppose
Committee: Senate Labor, Public Employment and Retirement
Votes: Y:4 N:1 A:0
Next Location: Senate Appropriations Committee
Amendments: vacancies for part-time non-probationary classified employees who could meet the minimum job qualifications after 10 or fewer hours of paid training. Post any new classified position at least 10 business days before the general public is authorized to apply for the position.
SB 433 (Cortese): Classified school and community college employees: disciplinary hearings: impartial third-party hearing officers. This bill would require an impartial third-party hearing officer to determine, on appeal, if a classified school or community college employee should be subject to disciplinary action.
CASBO Position: Oppose
Committee: Assembly Higher Education
Votes: Y:8 N:3 A:1
Next Location: Assembly Appropriations Committee
Transportation
AB 579 (Ting) Schoolbuses: zero-emission vehicles. This bill would require, commencing January 1, 2035, all newly purchased or contracted school buses of a LEA to be zero-emission vehicles.
CASBO Position: Oppose
Committee: Senate Education
Votes: Y:6 N:1 A:0
Next Location: Senate Appropriations Committee
SB 88 (Skinner): Pupil transportation: driver qualifications. This bill would place various requirements upon a driver who provides certain transportation services for pupils, including, among others, by requiring these drivers to be mandated reporters and to submit and clear tuberculosis risk assessments, as provided. The bill would require any vehicle used to provide pupil transportation for compensation by a local educational agency, as defined, to be inspected, as specified, and to be equipped with a first aid kit and a fire extinguisher.
CASBO Position: Neutral
Committee: Assembly Education
Votes: Y:5 N:2 A:0
Next Location: Assembly Appropriations Committee
Amendments: The bill was amended in Assembly Education Committee. The amendments remove the prohibition on TNCs, delay the implementation to July 1, 2025, expand the driver exemptions, expand the LEA employer exemption, remove minimum training hours, remove the mandated reporter requirement, and soften the drug and alcohol testing as it pertains to marijuana.
Technology
AB 1637 (Irwin) Local government: internet websites and email addresses. This bill would, come January 1, 2027, require a local agency, that maintains an internet website for use by the public to ensure that the internet website utilizes a “.gov” top-level domain or a “.ca.gov” second-level domain and would require a local agency that maintains an internet website that is non-compliant with that requirement to redirect that internet website to a domain name that does utilize a “.gov” or “.ca.gov” domain. The same would apply to an email of the local agency employee.
CASBO Position: Neutral
Amendments: This bill was amended to local agencies to mean: city, county, or city and county.
Bills That Stalled in Committee
The following bills stalled in the policy committees and did not meet their statutory deadline to continue moving forward this year and therefore, have become 2-year bills. In 2024, these bills will get a second opportunity to be heard.
AB 533 (V. Fong) Charter schools: establishment of a charter school. This bill would allow a petition to establish a charter school application to be appealed to a county board of education when it is not otherwise approved nor denied by the governing board of the local school district within 90 or 120 days of receiving it.
CASBO Position: Concern
Bill Location: 2-year bill
AB 1555 (Quirk-Siva) Transitional kindergarten: teacher assignments: qualification requirements. This bill would extend the requirement, for credentialed teachers assigned to transitional kindergarten (TK) classrooms to meet specified early childhood education (ECE) requirements from August 1, 2023, to August 1, 2025.
CASBO Position: Support
Bill Location: 2-year bill
SB 811 (Jones) Teacher credentialing: Interstate Teacher Mobility Compact. This bill would enter California into the Interstate Teacher Mobility Compact (ITMC), requiring member states to grant licenses to teachers with licenses from other member states without having to meet additional requirements, except for a criminal background check.
CASBO Position: Support
Bill Location: 2-year bill
SB 739 (Alvarado- Gil) School accountability: charter schools: term of operation. This bill would require all charter schools whose term expires between January 1, 2024, and June 30, 2027 to have their term extended by an additional year and indefinitely allow charter schools to submit verified data as part of the charter renewal process.
CASBO Position: Oppose
Bill Location: 2-year bill
SB 691 (Portantino) Dyslexia risk screening. This bill would have required LEAs serving students in kindergarten to grade 2 to annually screen all students for risk of dyslexia using state-approved instruments, unless objected to in writing by a student’s parent or guardian, beginning in the 2024-25 school year.
CASBO Position: Oppose
Bill Location: 2-year bill
SB 765 (Portantino): Teachers: retired teachers: teacher preparation. This bill would, until December 31, 2026, exempt a classroom teacher or administrator, who has returned to work after retirement to fulfill a critical need in a classroom teaching position due to the teacher shortage, from the 180-day break in service requirement and the postretirement compensation limitation.
CASBO Position: Support
Bill Location: 2-year bill
SB 98 (Portantino) Education finance: additional education funding. This bill would define “average daily membership” as the measure of the total enrollment days for all pupils in an LEA from TK-12, divided by the total number of instructional days for the LEA in an academic year. This bill would require an LEA’s average daily membership to be calculated using data from the same fiscal year or years that the LEA used to calculate its ADA. The bill also requires at least 30 percent of the funds be used to address chronic absenteeism.
CASBO Position: Oppose
Bill Location: 2-year bill
Gut and Amends
AB 95 (Hoover) Intradistrict and interdistrict transfer of pupils. This bill required a school district of residence to also approve an intradistrict transfer request for a pupil of that school district if the school of attendance is in the red or orange performance band in 2 or more of the state measures for 3 consecutive years on the California School Dashboard.
CASBO Position: Concern
Note: The bill was gutted and amended on April 17, 2023. Current version of the bill authorizes a school to sell the entrée portion from a federally reimbursable school meal to a pupil, after the pupil receives a federally reimbursable school meal.
SB 532 (Wiener): Ballot measures: local taxes. This bill would improve financial disclosures for local bonds and create new disclosures for tiered tax rates in the voter information guide, helping voters better understand the potential financial impacts of a proposed tax measure. This change would enable local jurisdictions to provide enhanced information in the voter information guide rather than on the 75-word ballot label, which does not provide enough space for appropriate context and explanation, ultimately causing confusion among voters.
CASBO Position: Support
Note: This bill was gutted and amended on June 7th, 2023. The current version of the bill authorizes San Francisco Bay area toll bridges: tolls: transit operating expenses.