Assembly Standing Committee on Arts, Entertainment, Sports, and Tourism

After we have heard from the primary witnesses, members of the public that are here in the room will be given an opportunity to state their name, the organization they represent, if any, and a position on the Bill. I want to note that we will also be accepting written testimony through the position letter portal on the Committee's website. I think we're going to go ahead and establish a quorum here.

[Roll call].

[Roll call].

All right. With that, we're going to take our first bill. Assembly Member Friedman, AB 8, ticket sellers.

Thank you, Madam Chair and Members. My joint author, Ms. Irwin, is on her way over to the building right now. So I'll talk really slow.

Your witnesses can come sit at the table if they'd like. Is the microphone not on? Now it's on.

First of all, I want to thank you and your Committee for your work on the Bill. We are accepting the suggested Committee amendments on page eight, section seven of the analysis, eliminating Section 22505 of the Bill. I understand this amendment will be adopted in the Assembly Committee on Privacy and Consumer Protection. This is a Bill that has come to us through many complaints that we've had over the years from constituents of my district and across California.

And this is something that we've heard people talk about for a number of years. And let me be clear. I represent in Los Angeles a number of film studios, a number of live performance venues. Most of my constituents, or many of them, work in the entertainment industry or related fields. So the industry is very, very important to me. But consumer protection is also important to me, and I believe that we can have both consumer protection and a robust entertainment industry.

Now, in the past, if you wanted to buy a ticket to an event, you'd go to a box office at the venue or the ballpark. The box office would tell you where your seats were, where the seats were available, and with the price of the tickets, you'd get a paper ticket that then you would then use to enter the venue, or you could give them away or sell them as you see fit.

It was thought that the Internet would make ticket selling even easier and promote greater transparency for consumers. However, it appears that the opposite has been happening.

These days, it's pretty normal that you won't even find out what the final price or the cost of a ticket is until you've been online for hours and finally gotten your ticket and put it through many different layers and where you watch the ticket's price increase as you go from layer through layer on the Internet, specifically designed to keep you clicking and to then have you pay a higher price than you might have originally intended.

That ticket, often purchased several months in advance, may come with a variety of restrictions on transfer if you could no longer attend the event. If you're sick, your dog is sick, your plumbing backed up, whatever happens, you might have no way of giving that ticket away to a friend or selling it to your neighbor who might want to attend, and you certainly can't return that ticket for a refund.

Average ticket prices have more than tripled since the mid-'90s, and the fees that are tacked on to each ticket can be as high as 78% of the ticket price. While consumers certainly feel the pinch, ticket retailers are doing just fine. Last month, Ticketmaster Live Nation announced record profits, reporting a 2022 operating income of up 125% from pre-pandemic levels to $732,000,000 and revenue up 44% to $16.7 billion.

The laws governing ticket retailers were passed before the Internet even existed, a fact that's becoming exceedingly clear as mega ticket sellers and resellers have used those rules to basically rip off consumers eager to see their favorite artists. We need to update the laws for how tickets are sold today to make sure artists, performers, and venues can reach their fans and sell tickets in an easier and more transparent way.

AB 8 adds new, important consumer protections the consumer protection provisions would apply to all primary and secondary ticket sellers. Current law only regulates secondary ticket brokers, but exempts primary ticket brokers and doesn't include secondary ticket sellers or resale platforms. AB 8 will require that the full price of a ticket, including all fees, should be known to the consumer when they select the tickets they wish to purchase, and the price will not increase during the purchase process. It's just transparency.

It will also require platforms, either original or re-sale, to disclose an exact location, a section, row, and seat number of the tickets so that you're not surprised to find out that those tickets that you thought were going to be excellent are obstructed or somewhere much further away than you had thought. Finally, AB 8 protects consumers from discriminatory, anticompetitive, and deceptive practices that make it harder to buy, sell, and use tickets. We can keep the entertainment industry thriving in California and protect consumers at the same time.

I think Ms. Irwin is just waiting for the elevator, if you will indulge, or we can go to a witness and then come back to her. Whatever your pleasure, Madam Chair.

Let's go ahead and go to a witness and then we'll go back to.

Thank you.

Hello. My name is Sandra Cushion and I am the consumer advocate with CALPIRG. We're the statewide consumer watchdog and advocacy group working to protect Californians and ensure a fair marketplace. And we're proud co-sponsor of AB 8. One of the most basic tenets of consumer protection is transparency and complete pricing information specifically is really critical to help inform consumers' purchases and ensure a fair marketplace and just allow simple comparison shopping.

But more and more ticket sellers are violating this principle by blindsiding consumers with hidden fees and other unfair tactics that can make it very difficult to find the true price of a ticket. AB 8 addresses this by ensuring a ticket's advertised price is the actual price and ensures that seat location information and refund policies are available to the consumer at the time of purchase. In addition to proper transparency, AB 8 gives consumers control over their ticket after they purchase it.

So currently, ticket sellers can prevent ticket owners from reselling tickets through any site besides their own. And once someone purchases a ticket, it should be theirs to do with as they please. Additionally, AB 8 would better protect the data of consumers who use ticket seller platforms. And just to wrap it up, broad public support for reform in this ticket-buying and selling process has been brewing for quite some time now.

As we emerge from the worst days of the COVID pandemic, Californians are looking for more and more opportunities to go to live events and enjoy them. And as people are buying tickets more and more, this broken nature of this ticket-selling system is becoming more and more apparent. So AB 8 offers common sense solutions to this broken system. Consumers should know the true price of a ticket and have control over what they do with that ticket once they own it. Thank you and I respectfully request your Aye vote.

Thank you, Assemblymember Irwin.

Thank you very much, Madam Chair. I would like to begin by thanking Madam Chair and your Committee staff for working diligently with my staff and Assembly Member Friedman's office on amendments that we will be accepting this afternoon. Assembly Member Friedman and I are here today because there is no disputing that live events, whether they are concerts, music festivals, or sports games, bring fans together in excitement.

However, consumers continue to as consumers continue to attend live events, it's become apparent that they are being deprived of transparency in the ticket purchasing process. Not only are consumers being overcharged when they're buying tickets, but they're often paying an upward of 20% to 50% of the ticket's face value in hidden fees that are not being disclosed until a consumer is in the last step of purchasing their ticket.

These deceptive practices harm both consumers financially and undermine the trust that consumers must place in the ticketing industry in order for it to continue to thrive. To address the overdue need for transparency and regulation in both the primary and secondary ticketing marketplace, I'm proud to be a joint author of AB 8 with Assembly Member Friedman.

AB 8 will ensure that consumers are provided with transparency in ticket prices, fees, and seating location prior to checkout, and that they will be given flexibility on how to purchase and use their tickets. With AB 8, Californians will continue to protect consumers from deceptive workplace practices that have no place in our state. Finally, with us today in support. Well, I think we've already done the support, right? Have we done all the support?

No.

Okay.

Two minutes each, please.

Thank you. Madam Chair, my name is Brian Hess. I'm the Executive Director of Sports Fans Coalition, and thank you for the opportunity to testify today. Founded in 2009, SFC is a national nonprofit advocacy group devoted to representing fans wherever public policy impacts the games we love. We've worked in the states and the federal level to pass equal pay for women Olympians, youth athlete health and safety reforms, and sports betting consumer protections.

AB 8 will positively impact the fan experience, which is why we enthusiastically support. In the wake of a disturbing trend of poor fan experiences during the ticket-buying process, Sports Fans Coalition, the National Consumers League, Consumer Federation of America, Fan Freedom, Consumer Action, Public Knowledge, and the National Association of Consumer Advocates developed a set of principles to protect fans known as the Ticket Buyer Bill of Rights.

AB 8 has many of the principles of the ticket buyer Bill of Rights, the rights transferability, where ticket holders decide how to use, sell, or give away their tickets if they wish, and not the entity that previously sold the tickets. Fans don't just buy tickets, they sell tickets, too. Season ticket holders, for example, want the freedom to sell their tickets if they can't make a game due to illness, work obligations, or any other reason.

The ease of resale encourages fans to invest more in California's home teams and allows consumers to purchase season tickets they otherwise would not be able to afford. The right to transparency, which includes all in pricing, and disclosures of relevant information for the purchasing decision. Fans do need to be informed when making purchasing decisions, and that starts with all-in pricing. AB 8 provides for that, but we also support holdback disclosures.

The New York Attorney General found that 46% of popular tickets are never made available to the General public. This is a deceptive trade practice that is used to generate false scarcity. I understand the Committee is considering an amendment that would strike the current disclosure requirements under the Bill. We hope to continue those conversations.

We also support the right to set the price so that companies who originally sold tickets can't dictate to fans for what price they can or cannot resell their tickets, and the right to a fair marketplace where fans compete with actual humans, not illegal bot software for tickets. Fans shouldn't have to compete with computer software designed to scoop up tickets, and thankfully, federal law and this Bill will prohibit that action. But we do support adding mandatory bot reporting.

The companies that stop the bots, they say, are the ones that can actually help enforce the Bots Act, which has only been enforced once in its entire history. If you require these companies to report that activity, we can actually get an idea of how many bots are actually buying tickets and the harm that they are causing consumers. The last right is the right to recourse so that fans have their day in court if they suffer harm from a ticket issuer and not be forced into arbitration.

California has the opportunity today to lead the nation in consumer protection for live event ticket goers, and I urge a Yes vote on AB 8.

Next witness.

Thank you very much. Good morning, Madam Chair and Members. My name is Robert Harrell. I'm the Executive Director of the Consumer Federation of California. We're one of the co-sponsors of this measure. Just briefly, what the joint authors have discussed in this Bill is what we refer to as five-click syndrome. That is to say, companies hire behavioral economists. This is science. And what they have found is that the further along you get into that transaction, the more committed you are to whatever that item is.

Now, unlike, say, the lodging industry, where if you don't like the add on fees that Marriott is piling on your hotel room, you could theoretically switch over to Hilton or another chain. When you're going to go see Taylor Swift or Beyonce, you don't have that opportunity. You're not going to substitute a Taylor Swift cover band. Most fans won't for Taylor Swift herself.

So this five-click syndrome, what it winds up doing is costing consumers billions and billions of dollars. We're coordinating a six-bill junk fee package. This is a key component of it. And many of these fees that we see in various industries are what's known as because we can. And in this case, the because we can is because, let's be honest, you basically have a monopoly player in this market. When Live Nation bought Ticketmaster, they have exerted since that transaction was completed in 2010, monopoly power.

One could argue that they're not following the consent decree that they agreed to, but that's another conversation for another time. Our view is that once a consumer buys a ticket, they own and control that ticket. I say that candidly, even if I might not personally love every single decision that every single consumer makes, but it's their ticket, and this is a bipartisan issue. Anybody who's paid attention to this has seen that the U.S. Senate had a recent hearing.

Senators such as Josh Hawley, Marsha Blackburn, and Ted Cruz were very clear that this is monopoly power and this is manipulating consumers. And consumers are paying dearly because of it. So it's not just a democratic or Republican issue. We are also a co signer of the ticket buyer Bill of Rights. We think those are important principles that are embodied in this Bill. We understand, of course, that conversations will continue on this matter and we are always ready, willing and able to conduct those conversations.

Just a quick story. I have a 12 year old daughter. She's a big fan of kpop. Two of the most infuriating hours of my life were spent recently trying to secure tickets to see a band called Twice that's going to be playing a couple shows in Oakland in June. That process is broken for the regular fan, and I even signed up for the verified fan pre-sale code. It was a nightmare.

I wound up going on the secondary market, paying a little bit above face to get something. Give consumers some power back. Support AB 8. Thank you.

Thank you. Do we have anybody in our attendance that would like to speak in support?

Hello, my name is Sean Auyash from Stubhub and I'm here to support the Bill.

Madam Chair and Members Courtney Jensen, on behalf of Seatgeek and Tickpick in support.

Morning, everybody. Timothy Burr, on behalf of Vivid Seats in support.

All right, seeing nobody else, let's go ahead and start with opposition. If we have witnesses? Do we have any Members that would like to ask questions to the witnesses here before? Any Members wanting to ask questions? We could always bring them back if we need to. Thank you.

All right, we have Members. Two minutes each please.

Sure. Members of the Committee, Chair Quirk-Silva. My name is Andrew, Govenar. I'm here today on behalf of the San Francisco 49ers, Los Angeles Dodgers, San Francisco Giants, Oakland A's, Los Angeles Angels, San Diego Padres, and the Morongo Band of Mission Indians, all of who were opposed to the I know, all of whom are opposed to the measure.

On behalf of their clients, we must respectfully oppose to the measure because there are still a host of issues that must be addressed if we to change our position, including paper tickets, marketing, resale, and transferability to other platforms, all that are contained in Section 22507. Having said that, we appreciate the authors, Friedman and Irwin, and their staff for taking the time to meet with us last week and also taking out one of the most objectionable issues to us, which was Section 22505, the dynamic pricing and the holdback issue.

They've also committed to working on resale and transferability, and for that we thank you and appreciate that you making those amendments. And while we do appreciate that you know that we still do have other concerns. Again, most of those concerns are in 22507.

Our teams and California venue operators contribute millions of dollars in state and local taxes, provide millions in support to nonprofits and charitable causes throughout the state, and we also employ thousands of people at our stadiums and venues, both directly and indirectly through our employment, but also for those services that supply our fans and our customers and our venues. We try to ensure our fans get access to the best possible tickets at the best price, and we don't see this measure helping that cause.

We remain opposed because we believe this measure simply rearranges the current system to the benefit of the secondary market and does nothing to help consumers get cheaper tickets, but rather would lead to increased prices as a result of the secondary market. We believe restructuring California's ticketing market, especially for sports, doesn't make sense to our teams or help our fans. Our teams and venues span the state, contributing to the economic and social fabric of our communities, bringing fans of sports and entertainment together.

We believe that AB 8 is unnecessary and will simply benefit the secondary market to the detriment of California based teams, venues and our fans, and must respectfully remain opposed. But again, I just want to reiterate, if 22507 were removed, that takes care of most of the major issues of the sports teams. And while that wouldn't remove our opposition because our technical and definitional changes, removing 22507 takes care of most of the issues that we've brought up to this Committee and to the Members. So thank you.

Good morning, Chairwoman Quirksilva.

You want to pull it a little closer just so we can hear.

Thank you. Thank you. And thank you, Members of the Committee for the opportunity to speak today and authors of AB 8, thank you for your efforts towards ticket selling. I'm Victoria Von Soliski. I'm SVP and General Counsel for AXS Tickets. We are what's known as a primary ticketing company, a much smaller version of Ticketmaster.

We provide computerized software and ticketing hardware, like access control systems, to our venue clients to make the process of ticket buying and using your ticket safe, easy, and to avoid counterfeit and fraudulent tickets. We appreciate the efforts of the authors here on AB 8. However, AB 8 does not go far enough to actually address the consumer issues. California already has robust consumer protection measures that would assist for deceptive practices and fraudulent practices.

We appreciate the efforts to modernize the existing ticket seller statutes, which, as noted, are very old. However, we noticed that AB 8 does not. It still exempts ticket brokers from the bill on some sections. For example, there's an exception that allows the seller who has less than six tickets to any event to not be subject to the Bill. This makes no sense. A ticket broker could buy five tickets for every single event on the primary market. I want to just pause for a minute.

We distributed an infographic just to talk a little bit about the primary market. It is confusing to consumers because there are so many different types of ticket sellers. So I just want to pause for a minute and explain a little bit about the ecosystem and the folks who are in favor of the Bill are on the ticket broker side of the house or secondary market. And we are opposed.

We are the folks that represent the rights holders of the entertainment events that spend the money to bring the concerts to fans. So the tickets and fees, the primary market ticket seller sells tickets on behalf of our clients. The secondary market sells tickets on behalf of ticket brokers or other fans who have an extra ticket to sell. And we've distributed a graphic which shows the average fees in the primary market and the secondary market.

I think this is important because the way to actually stop the abuses that everyone reads about and everyone, especially our clients, who have to deal with receding fans when they show up at an event with a counterfeit ticket. The way to stop this is to really stop bots. Unfortunately, reporting bots is not going to help the problem. AXS as on a recent SZA on sale, 30% of all traffic was bots. So what is a bot? It's a broker. It's a broker that.

We also distributed some examples of websites that sell ticket bots. So brokers use bots so that they can buy thousands of tickets. The reason why sorry, fans are left out is because they can't get a primary market ticket at the face priced up by the artist. That's why the restrictions on resale are also very important for us to be removed from the Bill because those are contractual terms between the rights holder, the entertainment event presenter and the fan.

They're disclosed, they're agreed to, and we believe that the folks who pay for the event should determine how their tickets are priced and sold. Thank you for your time. Thank you.

Thank you.

Thanks for having me, everyone. My name is Jordan Bromley and I'm here on behalf of Music Artists Coalition. We also go by MAC, so I'll use that. MAC is a coalition comprised of all music creators. We're dedicated to protecting and advocating for artists' rights without conflict or compromise. We work closely with other advocacy groups like Black Music Action Coalition, Songwriters in North America, Future of Music Coalition, SAG-AFTRA, and the Recording Academy, all of whom are in opposition of this Bill for a very important reason.

And while we understand that the authors of AB 8 do not intend for this Bill to be bad for creators, as experts in the industry, we need to point out the devastating consequences of the Bill because it would strip artists of their rights to protect their fans. I want to focus my comments on 22507 which prohibits transferability. Artists work hard to find innovative ways to protect their fans from price gouging.

To do that, we need to be able to attach terms and conditions to these tickets. These conditions do not hurt the fan who gets sick and can't make a show. They do prevent scalpers from driving up prices. Artists want their fans to be able to afford to come to their shows. AB 8 without with this transferability in the Bill would take that ability away. And this is at an important juncture where the future is very bright for touring artists and their fans.

Various nascent technologies have been tested and successfully implemented to protect fans and their artists. Bands such as Pearl Jam, the Cure, Queen, Paramore have set up fan-to-fan face-value exchanges where tickets can only be resold for the original purchase price. AB 8 inexplicably kills this ability for artists as well. We finally see a future where an artist can truly protect their fans from an inflated secondary market.

It is just around the corner, but with the restriction of transferability, like an AB 8, we can't even get to go. In conclusion, I want to say that fans are best served when artists are in control. When artists thinks of pricing, they have the fan in mind. When resellers and scalpers think of pricing, they only have profits in mind. Without artists, there is no music. But without our fans, there is no music business.

No one cares about the music fan, the concertgoer, more than the artist. And the artists are telling you, today, that the problem is the unregulated scalpers and the secondary platforms who benefit from exorbitant prices. The anti-transferability restrictions in AB 8 is objectively anti-artist. The Bill will harm both fans and artists. It will embolden and enable scalpers. And for those reasons, MAC strongly opposes this Bill and hopes the Committee will, too. Thank you.

Thank you. With that, if we have anybody in attendance wishing to register opposition.

Good morning. Tim Lynch on behalf of the Golden State Warriors, we appreciate the author's willingness to take out the 22505 section and.

Just name an organization. Thank you.

Thank you. We remain opposed.

Thank you.

Morning. John Gunton on behalf of the National Independent Venue Association, representing independent brick-and-mortar venues throughout the state and California capitol. We're also a part of. I'm representing the California Capital Venue Coalition, which represents Sacramento region independent venues. We're in respectful opposition. Also here to express opposition on behalf of Alex Torres of the Bay Area Council.

Good morning. Mckay Carney on behalf of the San Jose Sharks, respectfully in opposition.

Thank you. Anybody else? Not seeing anybody. We'll bring it back to the Committee for questions or discussion. Assembly Member Hart?

Yeah, I have a question anybody can answer. If I'm sitting in a venue and looking around at the other fans, what percentage. What percentage of the fans are there with resold tickets?

Good question.

If we have somebody in the audience that wants to answer resold tickets, what percentage of fans are in a venue with resold.

Can we bring on of our witnesses up to help answer questions?

Yeah it's behind you.

I will say just generally that it varies by event. The concert events that are most popular, where the bots are employed and fans are unable to get tickets in the primary market, it's quite high. I mean, we could certainly get statistics for you, but on something like Taylor Swift or Beyonce, it's quite quite high. On events where tickets are more readily available, such as sporting events, it's not as common, but the secondary market is growing and there are certainly statistics available.

I think perhaps the New York Attorney General report, which folks cite a lot, is quite old, but we could certainly provide some other information for you.

Assembly Member. It depends on the show, is the short answer, but I would just note that the dominant player in the secondary ticket selling market is life, nation and Ticketmaster. They have 75% to 80% of that market. So with all due respect, these crocodile tears for the secondary market, they're the dominant player in that market. They control that market. In many cases, we'll just add, this.

We'll just add. This is further evidence that we don't believe this is necessarily a sports issue. Not that we're separating sports and entertainment, but I just went online to go purchase a ticket to a baseball game, both on the primary and secondary. It took me two clicks on the primary through a Ticketmaster website on a secondary site to be named later. I'm still seven clicks in and haven't got a ticket yet. But for sporting events, most of them are seasoned ticket holders.

Thank you. Any other questions from the Committee? Comments? I will make some comments as a Chair. As anybody who is watching this hearing or sitting here can see compelling reasons on both sides to not only listen, but to want to get in a better place. We have been in many committees in the last few days, and part of the conversation at this stage of committees is really to try to shuffle out what we can. I appreciate the authors being willing to work with the opposition.

I think, as been noted, there's still more work to do and we hope that that work can be done. But certainly very different testimonies on both sides, whether you oppose or support, which does make it a difficult vote for our Committee Members. But I am supporting this to move forward with the caveat that you will continue these conversations to get into a better place, as noted. And I know that you'll be moving this Bill directly to privacy this afternoon.

So a very short timeline, we move to a do pass to the Assembly Committee on Privacy and Consumer Protection. We'll go ahead and call the roll.

[Roll call].

That Bill is out. Thank you, for those attending. That vote is 5 to 1, and we will move forward with File Item 2: AB 812, Boerner. Assemblymember Boerner? Housing Development Approvals, Receiving Affordable Units and Cultural Districts for Artists. Welcome.

Good morning, Madam Chair and Members. AB 812 would allow a city, county, or city and county to set aside up to 10% of its very low, low, or moderate-income, deed-restricted housing within a state or locally designated cultural district for artists. Artists are the lifeblood of our cultural communities and help preserve the cultural footprint of those regions.

Last fall, as Chair of this Committee, the Chair of Joint Arts and I toured a number of cultural districts throughout the state, and they all said the same thing. They're all on some version of displacements of the artists that the cultural district created. And this is one of the reasons this is very specific to cultural arts districts. We set them up. We say, you're wonderful. We preserve the culture of that area.

And then just by the fact that they're cultural arts district, we begin the process of gentrification. And we then price out, in housing, the artists that made that cultural district possible. And so it doesn't matter if you're in Nevada City, in Grass Valley, or you're Truckee or you're San Francisco who's already been gentrified, or you're San Pedro, that's maybe five years out, or you're Barrio Logan, which is right on the verge. They're experiencing it as we speak.

Each one of these cultural arts districts are experiencing this. And many cities and counties think they don't have the authority to set aside deed-restricted housing for artists and cultural districts. AB 812 would provide local governments with the flexibility necessary to set aside affordable units for low-income artists to help prevent further displacement of artists that is occurring in cultural districts across the state.

April is arts Cultural Creativity Month, and it's imperative that we support and preserve the culture that has historically been present within our cultural communities. I respectfully ask for your aye vote, and with me here today is Priscilla Quiroz on behalf of California Arts Advocates, the sponsors of the Bill. Thank you.

Good morning, Chair Members. Priscilla Quiroz, on behalf of California Arts Advocates. There is a clear need to increase access to affordable housing for artists, cultural workers and arts organizations within cultural communities. Nationwide, artists are rent burdened in 80% of cultural districts, pushing out the very core of cultural districts itself. A survey in the City of Berkeley in 2021 highlighted the need for affordable housing among artists and cultural workers who are experiencing displacement pressures due to increasing housing prices in cultural communities.

The survey revealed that there's, while there's working artists and cultural workers are highly educated, 60% have low, very low or extremely low income. 77% of respondents indicated that they are rent burdened, with 68% having different sources of part-time work to make ends meet. While low income is prevalent across the group of artists and cultural workers, the rate is disproportionately higher with BIPOC respondents.

In fact, in the same year, LA surveys found that 27% of respondents who identified as BIPOC are more likely to experience food insecurity, housing instability and increased debt. Compared to white respondents, cultural districts are tried and true way of increasing economic vitality while strengthening the cultural fabrics of communities. They promote cultural equity, boost tourism dollars and encourage more local visitors, increase property values and generate more money for the region and state.

The cultural district in Nevada County, California, a rural community, generates 46.9 million in total economic activity per year, 25.7 million by organizations and 21.2 million in event-related spending by their audiences. In supports 869 full time equivalent-jobs, generates 20.9 million in household income to local residents, and delivers 5.1 million in local and state government revenue. It's crucial that we keep the people who create cultural arts in them.

Surveys across the state indicate that huge demand for affordable housing for artists, keeping neighborhoods affordable to the culture barriers in our local communities, and avoiding the displacement for artists, protects our cultural heritage and creates robust economic zones. Without them, the special culture of the place leaves with them. A cultural district is no longer a cultural district if those people who made it cannot afford to live and work there themselves. AB 812 would require that 10% of affordable housing in a cultural district is reserved for artists.

While this is no way matches the need, it's a critical step in the right direction at no cost to taxpayers, and it's the easy remedy for a big problem. So we urge your support on this measure. Thank you.

Thank you. Do we have any others in support?

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Eduardo Martinez. On behalf of Actors' Equity, we're a union of theater actors and stage managers nationwide. Proud to be here in support.

And do we have any witnesses in opposition?

Move the Bill.

I have a motion and a second. Any testimony in opposition? Seeing no one. Bring it back to the Committee. Any questions or comments? I just would ask, as this already has gone through housing that I sit on, if you can explain, and you did a great job in housing, of how this applies to somebody who would actually attain a unit. The part that you were discussing about verifying.

Yes. Thank you. So each city will have to have. So one doesn't automatically give a blanket allowance. A city would have to pass an ordinance locally. Because what we want is we want to keep the low-income artists there, low and moderate-income artists there.

So there's a yearly both work verification process and a yearly income verification process, because many of our artists will hopefully, through our culture arts district, grow and succeed, and we want them to graduate out of this housing to make space for the next generation of low-income artists. And I have to say, you guys all know my daughter, Maya. Maya came to me when she was five, and she was like, "I want to be an artist." And I said, "don't do that."

"You won't make any money." And this is a way to keep people working in this profession and give them a place in their cultural arts district and state or local cultural arts district as well. So there's a yearly income verification process in order to really keep the vibrancy of these districts going.

Assemblymember Friedman.

I want to thank the author for bringing this Bill forward. We actually did this in Glendale when I was on the City Council with one of our affordable housing projects. We made it targeted to artists, defined very broadly and including things like culinary arts, et cetera. And the company that built the housing project had experience with this type of specialized housing and understood how to vet people. Even if they were seniors, they still could be artists.

They had to submit sort of samples or explanations or show that they had showed in galleries. And we had no trouble filling what was a very large building, actually several hundred units from people who applied from all over Los Angeles. The particular project was connected with our YMCA, and we thought there was a benefit, since we were attaching affordable housing to a very large YMCA, to have a community of artists that could workshop with our mostly low-income young people who use the facility.

And many of the artists did offer to do classes for free for the Y. There's a gallery in the building so that people in the community can enter this affordable housing project and see work that's on display from the artists. So I'm not saying that it's always the easiest thing in the world to do, but there are definitely benefits that cities might see from combining their low-income project with artist housing.

So I think that this certainly does help push back on one of the real conundrums of cultural districts, which is when they become popular, they gentrify, just like a lot of downtowns. This is a way to answer that and to keep that spirit, that artistic spirit alive in those communities. So thanks for bringing this forward. I'm very pleased to support, and good luck with the Bill.

I, too, support this Bill. I appreciate the verifying. As we know, we have very limited when we can have affordable units, and we want to make sure there's the right fit for the right unit. But this Bill is do pass to the--wrong Committee. This is, the motion is do pass to Assembly, third reading, and we have a motion and a second. Madam Secretary, please call the roll.

[Roll Call]

That Bill is out 51. Thank you. And Members, we're going to do the Consent Agenda. The Committee has three items on its agenda that are proposed for consent. AB 15 or sorry, 1258, Burner Arts Council do pass to the Assembly Committee on Appropriations ACR 60, Holden San Diego State University Aztecs march madness to be adopted and ACR 62, Quirk-Silva, California attractions and parks day to be adopted. Do we have a motion? Motion by a second? By. Okay, we have a motion and a second. Please call the roll.

Okay, we have a motion and a second. Please call the roll. Quirk Silva? Aye Wallace? Mike Fong? Aye Friedman? Aye Hart Lackey? Aye Valencia?

All right. That completes our agenda today, and we have no other business. The consented agenda is adopted with a vote of 7-0.