Friday, May 20, 2022, was the last day for fiscal committees to hear and report to the floor bills introduced in their house. This marks another deadline to determine which bills continue to move through the legislative process. This Friday, May 27, 2022, marks the deadline for bills to pass out of their house of origin.

On May 19, 2022, CASBO’s Legislative Committee deliberated on another round of legislative proposals, and this report highlights the status of the proposals the committee has taken throughout the year.

 

Budget/Finance

AB 1948 (Ting): Education Finance: local control funding formula: low-income pupils: pupils experiencing homelessness. Commencing with the 2022-23 school year, this bill would:

  • Increase the grade span adjusted base grant and increase the Local Control Funding Formula (LCFF) base grant by 15%.
  • Increase the number of low-income pupils who generate supplemental and concentration grant funding by raising the household income eligibility threshold from 185% of the federal poverty level to 250% of the federal poverty level and requires schools to use a specified data collection form to acquire household income data.
  • Allow, for apportionment purposes, a school district to use the average of the three most recent years’ average daily attendance (ADA).
  • Add, for apportionment purposes, “a pupil experiencing homelessness” to the definition of “unduplicated pupil.”

Fiscal Impact: Legislative Analyst’s Office (LAO) estimates ongoing costs of $7.6 billion.
Position: Watch
Location: Assembly Floor
Staff: Andrea Ball

 

AB 1973 (McCarty): Education finance: base grants: adjustments: kindergarten: minimum school days. As a condition of receiving the portion of the K-3 grade span adjustment associated with the ADA in kindergarten, this bill would allow a school providing a kindergarten program to provide a minimum day for the kindergarten program equivalent to the length of the minimum school day for grades1-3, beginning with the 2027-28 school year for schools with an enrollment of 50% or more of unduplicated pupils, and with the 2030-31 school year.

Fiscal Impact: The Assembly Appropriations Committee estimates that there is no cost to Proposition 98 General Fund (GF). School districts and charter schools would absorb the cost.
Position: Informational Only
Location: Assembly Floor
Staff: Andrea Ball

 

AB 2774 (Weber): Education finance: local control funding formula: supplemental grants: lowest performing pupil subgroup or subgroups. Commencing with the 2023–24 fiscal year, this bill would adjust the definition of “unduplicated pupils” to include pupils who are included in the lowest performing subgroup(s) based on the most recently available mathematics or language arts results on the California Assessment of Student Performance and Progress.

Fiscal Impact: The Assembly Appropriations Committee estimates ongoing annual Proposition 98 GF costs of about $662 million to provide additional LCFF funding for the lowest performing subgroup or groups. (Costs would be higher if this bill and AB 1948 [Ting], which is pending in this committee, are both enacted. AB 1948 increases the LCFF base by 15%, which would add to the cost of this bill.) This could result in additional ongoing funding in the hundreds of millions of dollars if multiple subgroups qualify for funding in future years.
Position: Informational Only
Location: Assembly Floor
Staff: Andrea Ball

 

SB 3 (Caballero): Education Finance: Local control and accountability plan portal. This bill would require the California Department of Education (CDE), on or before July 1, 2023, to develop a local control and accountability plan (LCAP) portal that contains a database connected to a data entry tool that allows comprehensive analysis of LCAPs adopted by local education agencies (LEAs).

Fiscal Impact: The Senate Appropriations Committee estimates this could potentially be in the low hundreds of thousands in Proposition 98 GF each year.
Position: Oppose
Location: Assembly Education Committee
Staff: Andrea Ball

 

SB 579 (Allen): Education finance: local control funding formula. For the 2022-23 fiscal year, this bill would require apportionments to LEAs under the LCFF to be calculated based on the greater of each LEA’s 2019-20, 2021-22 or 2022-23 ADA.

Fiscal Impact: The Senate Appropriations Committee estimates Proposition 98 GF costs in the high hundreds of millions, potentially over $1 billion, per year. The current year changes for charter schools will result in additional unknown Proposition 98 GF costs, which are likely to be significant.
Position: Watch
Location: Assembly Education Committee
Staff: Andrea Ball

 

SB 830 (Portantino): Education finance: additional education funding. Commencing with the 2022–23 fiscal year, this bill would require that LEAs receive supplemental education funding in addition to their LCFF entitlement in an amount equal to the difference between what the LEA would have received under the LCFF if it were based on average daily membership instead of ADA and what the LEA received under the LCFF based on ADA for that fiscal year. The bill defines “average daily membership” as the quotient of the aggregate enrollment days for all pupils in an LEA from transitional kindergarten to grade 12, inclusive, as applicable, divided by the total number of instructional days for the LEA in an academic year. The data used for this calculation shall be from the same fiscal year used to calculate the LEA’s ADA. The bill also:

  • Requires the Superintendent of Public Instruction (SPI), for the purpose of the supplemental education funding calculation, to apply the funding difference to the LCFF base, supplemental and concentration grants for each LEA.
  • Specifies that LEAs are eligible for the supplemental education funding if they meet the following requirements:
    • Submit to the SPI by January 15 the unduplicated primary and short-term enrollments for their first term enrollment totals and final enrollment data for the entire academic year under timeframes and procedures established by the SPI.
    • Demonstrate a maintenance of effort, subject to annual audit, to address chronic absenteeism and habitual truancy by maintaining at least the same per-pupil spending level on staff who address these issues as the LEA did in 2019-20.
  • Requires that at least 30% of the supplemental education funds be used for LEA expenditures to address chronic absenteeism and habitual truancy by providing services and supports that have been determined to improve school attendance or addressing the root causes that contribute to pupils being chronically absent or habitually truant.
  • Requires LEAs to continue to implement a system to accurately track pupil attendance to raise the awareness of the effects of truancy and chronic absenteeism, identify and address factors contributing to habitual truancy and chronic absenteeism, and ensure that pupils with attendance problems are identified as early as possible to provide applicable support services and interventions.
  • Requires the SPI, for purposes of calculating average daily membership, to issue directives and guidance on determining the date of withdrawal for a pupil deemed habitually truant.
  • Requires the LAO, by November 1, 2028, to submit a report to the Legislature on the implementation of the funding provisions of this section that includes information from LEAs selected by the LAO.

Fiscal Impact: CDE estimates that allocating LCFF funds based on enrollment instead of attendance could increase overall LCFF costs by up to 5%, or approximately $3 billion each year (Proposition 98 GF).
Position: Oppose
Location: Senate Floor
Staff: Elizabeth Esquivel

 

SB 1431 (Rubio): Local control funding formula: base grants: adjustment: class size reduction. Commencing with the 2022–23 school year, this bill would require, for a school district that maintains an average class enrollment of not more than 20 pupils for each school site for kindergarten and grades 1-3, an adjustment of 32.5%, instead of 10.4%, to the kindergarten and grades 1-3 base grant.

Fiscal Impact: The Senate Appropriations Committee estimates this bill could result in Proposition 98 GF cost pressures of about $3 to 4.1 billion for increased LCFF entitlements each year.
Position: Informational Only
Location: Senate Floor
Staff: Andrea Ball

 

Governance

SB 924 (Glazer): School districts: annual compensation: reporting. This bill would clarify that school districts are not exempt from reporting information on annual compensation of their employees to the California State Controller for annual publishing on the Controller’s internet website.

Fiscal Impact: The Assembly Appropriations Committee analysis shares that cost is unknown, but it could be in the low hundreds of thousands of dollars (Proposition 98 GF) each year.
Position: Watch
Location: Senate Floor
Staff: Elizabeth Esquivel

 

Human Resources

AB 2573 (McCarty): Certificated school employees: probationary employees. This bill would require the following groups to attain permanent employee status after completing a probationary period: adult education teachers, school district regional occupation center and programs (ROCP) instructors, certificated employees at school districts with an ADA of 250 or less, and certificated employees in a teaching position at county offices of education (COEs) with an ADA of 250 or less. The bill also would make changes to code sections that differentiate employment practices for school districts with less than 250 ADA and employees who were in their probationary period prior to the 1983-84 fiscal year.

Fiscal Impact: The Assembly Appropriations Committee estimates the cost to be a significant amount (Proposition 98 GF) to school districts and COEs to the extent newly permanent employees at school districts, COEs and ROCPs seek due process related to dismissal. Costs associated with due process hearings or other dismissal proceedings can range from $10,000 to over $100,000 per case, depending on the scope.
Position: Oppose
Location: Assembly Floor
Staff: Elizabeth Esquivel

 

Labor

SB 931 (Leyva): Deterring union membership: violations. This bill would require the Public Employment Relations Board (PERB) to impose civil penalties on public sector employers if it finds they deterred or discouraged workers from exercising collective bargaining rights and directs public sector employers to pay the union’s attorney’s fees and costs if the union prevails in a legal action to enforce those rights. The bill also includes a provision that upon a finding by PERB that the public employer violated those provisions, the public employer would be subject to a civil penalty of up to $1,000 for each affected employee, not to exceed $100,000 in total, and subject to attorney’s fees and costs.

Fiscal Impact: PERB indicates that it would incur annual GF costs of $129,000 to implement the provisions of the bill, offset to an unknown extent by potential penalty revenue and recovery of attorney’s fees. The University of California anticipates annual administrative costs of up to $2.8 million (GF).
Position: Oppose Unless Amended
Requested amendment: Reduce the violation to $10,000 and add criteria to validate violation.
Location: Senate Floor
Staff: Elizabeth Esquivel

 

Pension/Retirement

AB 1667 (Cooper): State Teachers’ Retirement System: administration. This bill would make various changes related to the California State Teachers’ Retirement System (CalSTRS), including, among other things, in connection with employee liability for system errors in payments, guidance provided by the system later determined to be erroneous, changes to interpretations of creditable compensation laws and system audits.

Fiscal Impact: The Assembly Appropriations Committee estimates loss of revenue to CalSTRS due to its inability to retrieve overpayments. CalSTRS reports it recaptured $74.4 million in overpayments in the 2020-21 fiscal year.
Position: Support
Location: Assembly Floor
Staff: Elizabeth Esquivel

 

Privacy

AB 1711 (Seyarto): Privacy: breach. In instances of data breaches, this bill would require a public agency to post a notice of said breach on their agency’s website (if they have one), for a minimum of 30 days, even when the vendor maintaining the data was the source of the data breach.

Fiscal Impact: The Assembly Appropriations Committee analysis shares that there are likely minor and absorbable costs to a public agency to post a security breach notification on its website.
Position: Oppose Unless Amended
Requested amendment: Remove the online posting requirement for the agency.
Location: Senate
Staff: Elizabeth Esquivel

 

AB 2677 (Gabriel): Information Practices Act of 1977. This bill would require LEAs to abide by the Information Practices Act of 1977 (IPA) and makes several changes to the act.

Fiscal Impact: The Assembly Appropriations Committee shares that those reimbursable costs (local funds and GF) can be in the millions of dollars to tens of millions of dollars to local agencies, including cities, counties and special districts, to comply.
Position: Oppose Unless Amended
Requested amendment: Exempt LEAs
Location: Assembly Floor
Staff: Elizabeth Esquivel
Note: The bill was recently amended to exempt LEAs which addresses our concern.

 

Transportation

SB 878 (Skinner): School transportation. Beginning in the 2027-28 school year, this bill would require LEAs to offer transportation to all pupils to and from their neighborhood schools. The bill also would:

  • Require LEAs not currently providing transportation to all pupils it serves to implement a plan.
  • Require LEAs to ensure that all drivers providing home-to-school transportation meet the qualifications enumerated in subdivision (e) of Section 39800.2.
  • Specify that an LEA may partner with a municipally owned transit system to provide supplementary service pursuant to this section to middle school and high school pupils if all of the specified conditions are met.
  • Prohibit all LEAs from charging pupils a fee to be transported to school from their residence or to their residence from school.
  • Authorize LEAs to receive a state reimbursement for the transportation of preschool or nursery school pupils if funding for that travel has been appropriated.

The bill would make all these provisions operative only upon an appropriation of funds for these purposes.

Fiscal Impact: CDE estimates a minimum of $1.4 billion each year, but it is likely to be higher because existing law does not currently require LEAs to provide transportation to all students.
Position: Concern
Location: Senate Floor
Staff: Elizabeth Esquivel

 

AB 2933 (O’Donnell): School transportation services. Commencing with the 2022-23 fiscal year, and subject to an appropriation for this purpose, this bill would require the SPI to apportion to each school district, COE, entity providing services under a school transportation joint powers agreement or ROCP that provides pupil transportation services, either 100% of its school transportation apportionment for the 2020-21 fiscal year or 100% of its reported home-to-school transportation costs.

Fiscal Impact: The Assembly Appropriations Committee estimates ongoing cost of $1.4 billion to Proposition 98 to fully fund home-to-school transportation costs. This is the difference between $1.9 billion in reported costs and current state funding for home-to-school transportation of $500 million.
Position: Support
Location: Assembly Floor
Staff: Elizabeth Esquivel

 

Health

AB 2034 (O’Donnell): Local education agency: Medi-Cal billing option. This bill would expand access to school-based health and mental health services by encouraging more schools to participate in the Local Educational Agency Medi-Cal Billing Option Program (LEA BOP) and to bill for more eligible services, thereby increasing funding available to support student services. The bill would require the California Department of Health Care Services (DHCS) to reform the process by which it audits claims from the LEA BOP program in various ways, including ensuring that schools are reimbursed for all eligible services that are not precluded by federal law.

Fiscal Impact: The Assembly Appropriations Committee estimates costs to DHCS are potentially in the low millions of dollars annually to revise the audit process and complete audits and final settlements within the timelines required by this bill (50% GF, 50% federal funds). It could also create increased cost pressure on the state if the revised process and timelines encourage more LEAs to seek reimbursement.
Position: Support
Location: Assembly Floor
Staff: Elizabeth Esquivel

 

Curriculum/Instruction

AB 1923 (Mathis): Partnership academies: science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM). This bill would require the SPI to prioritize proposals for new partnership academies in a manner that addresses the participation of pupils traditionally underrepresented in career technical education or STEM programs or professions. For purposes of this program, “pupils traditionally underrepresented” include but shall not be limited to, pupils from the following areas: rural communities; economically disadvantaged regions; regions with high “at-promise pupil” rates, as defined; and regions with a low to moderate number of existing academic partnerships.

Fiscal Impact: The Assembly Appropriations Committee notes that there is no cost. The bill does not establish a new partnership academy; rather it establishes priorities for the location of new partnership academies if and when a new one is established.
Position: Watch
Location: Assembly Education Committee; scheduled to be heard on June 8, 2022.
Staff: Andrea Ball

 

Bills Stalled
The following bills stalled and will not be moving forward through the legislative process:

AB 1607 (Muratsuchi): Education finance: local control funding formula. Starting with the 2022-23 school year, this bill would have calculated the ADA for school districts based on a three-year average for the current fiscal year and each of the previous two fiscal years. Governor Newsom’s January proposal would authorize either a three-year average on ADA or prior or current year, whichever is highest.

Position: Watch
Location Stalled: Assembly Education Committee
Staff: Andrea Ball

 

AB 1609 (Muratsuchi): Education finance: local control funding formula attendance yields. This bill would have provided a legislative solution to the current year’s ADA decline.

Position: Support
Location Stalled: Assembly Education Committee
Staff: Andrea Ball

 

AB 1614 (Muratsuchi): Education finance: local control funding formula: base grants: aspirational funding level: reports. This bill would have added $4.2 billion into the current base grant funding, using the existing LCFF, for the 2022-23 budget year, with intent language that the Legislature strive to reach the top 10 states in the country in K-12 per-pupil spending. Commencing with the 2022-23 fiscal year, a base grant of:

  • $9,989 for ADA in grades K-3
  • $9,184 for ADA in grades 4-6
  • $9,457 for ADA in grades 7-8
  • $11,245 for ADA in grades 9-12

Position: Support
Location Stalled: Assembly Education Committee
Staff: Andrea Ball

 

AB 1877 (Fong): State teachers’ retirement: retirees. This bill would have removed the compensation limit on state teachers’ defined benefit programs by eliminating the compensation limit for state special education teachers to expand the pool of eligible educators to return to the classroom. The bill also would require an LEA exercising this exemption to submit specified documentation, certified under penalty of perjury, to substantiate a retired member’s eligibility.

Position: Watch
Location Stalled: Assembly Committee on Public Employment and Retirement
Staff: Elizabeth Esquivel

 

AB 1895 (E. Garcia): School employees: substitute employees: Substitute Teacher Support Grant Program. For the 2022–23 fiscal year, this bill would have appropriated $100 million from the GF to the State Department of Education to establish and administer the Substitute Teacher Support Grant Program, which would provide one-time competitive grants to LEAs to develop and implement new, or expand existing, locally identified solutions that address local substitute teacher shortages or needs for professional development for substitute teachers. Of the $100 million in grant funds, it would have awarded funds for school districts as follows, to ensure proportional grant amounts across LEAs:

  • $22 million to districts with 250 or fewer ADA;
  • $55 million to districts with ADA of more than 250 but less than 5,000; and,
  • $23 million to districts with ADA of 5,000.

The bill also would have expanded the program to include classified instructional substitutes, such as paraeducators, and add a reporting requirement and an evaluation of the program.

Position: Watch
Location Stalled: Assembly Appropriations Committee
Staff: Elizabeth Esquivel

 

AB 2924 (O’Donnell): Education finance: base grants: adjustments: reduced class size. Commencing with the 2022–23 fiscal year, this bill would have required the above 10.4% adjustment to be applied to base grants for kindergarten and grades 1-3, inclusive, grades 4- 6, inclusive, and grades 7-8, inclusive, for a school district or charter school that maintains an average class enrollment of not more than 24 pupils for each school site, unless a collectively bargained alternative ratio is agreed to by the school district or charter school, and would make conforming changes.

Position: Informational Only
Location Stalled: Assembly Education Committee
Staff: Elizabeth Esquivel