Senate Standing Committee on Rules

All right, ladies and gentlemen. Good afternoon. Thank you so much for attending the Senate Rules Committee here on this Wednesday, May 8th. We have a packed agenda. What we'd like to be able to do is establish a quorum. Madam Secretary, can you please call the roll?

[Roll Call].

All right, ladies and gentlemen, we have a full house. We welcome our Committee Members. It's a busy week in the Capitol, and it's a bit of a sprint between now and the end of the month, so we're grateful that each of you are here today.

What we'd like to be able to do is take up what we call our housekeeping agenda where we're going to be taking up some administrative items, and we're going to call those who are required to appear up, and we welcome each of you to Committee today. Thank you so much for taking time out of your busy schedules.

So it will take us just a few minutes, if it's all right with each of the potential appointees, and let's start with governor appointees not required to appear. We'd like to be able to see if there is any discussion on Items 2E through J, and if no discussion, we'll also take a motion. We have a motion by Madam Vice Chair. Madam Secretary, can you please call the roll?

[Roll Call]. Five to zero.

That's a five/zero vote. That motion passes. Thank you so much, Members. We're now going to be moving on to the issue of bill referrals. Bill referrals. This is Item Three. Any discussion or we'll entertain a motion. We have a motion by Madam Vice Chair. Madam Secretary, can you please call the roll?

[Roll Call]. Five to zero.

Members, thank you so much. It's a five/zero vote. The motion passes. Ladies and gentlemen of Committee, we're now going to be moving on to Committee appointments. This is Item Number Four, to appoint Senator Cortese as a Member of the Senate Committee on Budget and Fiscal Review.

And I want to take a moment to say thank you so much to the chairperson who does an amazing job on behalf of the people of California on that Committee. Senator Cortese would be replacing Senator Min. Would like to be able to see if there's any discussion, and we'll look to the chairperson--

Can I ask, can we do four and five together?

We absolutely can do four and five together. Madam Secretary, if you're cool with that, we'll do Item Four and Five together. We'll say that out loud. That's Item Four, which is Committee appointments, and then Item Five is Subcommittee ratification to be able to replace Senator Min with Senator Cortese. Mr. Chair, on Items Four and Five, would you like to make the motion?

I move that, the four and five.

We have a motion by Senator Laird on Items Four or Five. Madam Secretary, can you please call the roll?

[Roll Call]. Five to zero.

Motion passes. Five/zero vote. Thank you so much. We're on our last item on Administration here, and that's floor acknowledgments: Items Six through 11. Any conversation? And we'll also welcome a motion. We have a motion by Madam Vice Chair. Madam Secretary, can you please call the roll?

[Roll Call]. Five to zero.

That's a five/zero vote. Look at that. Motion passes. I'm going to close the roll. All right. We're now going to get into the bulk of our business today. Thank you so much, Members, for the efficiency on that, and we're going to welcome Secretary Moss. Why don't you come forward, Madam Secretary? It's so wonderful to see you.

Thank you so much for being here. Madam Secretary, first and foremost, I just want to say thank you so much for your service to the people of California. And let's be honest, you're taking on an agency at probably one of the most critical times in our state's history when it comes to housing and the issue of homelessness.

We're grateful for your hard work. We're going to ask you to keep your comments and opening remarks to about one to two minutes. We welcome you to thank and acknowledge any family members that may be here in the hearing room or online. I'll give you a 32nd prompt as you get close to that two minutes--not trying to be rude or pushy--and then we'll open up for questions and comments from the Committee. Again, Madam Secretary, it's wonderful to see you. The floor is yours.

Thank you so much, and good afternoon, Chair McGuire and Members of the Committee. First, I'd like to acknowledge my family who is with me here today, my wife Guthrie, and my aunt Vanita, who, without them, I don't know that I would be here without their love and support. I am honored Governor Newsom appointed me Secretary of Business, Consumer Services, and Housing Agency, and to all of you to be considered for this confirmation.

I bring to this role more than 20 years of experience fighting for economic and social justice, most recently as founder and CEO of All Home, an organization that advances regional solutions to disrupt poverty and homelessness in the Bay Area. I have also worked in local government as Chief of Staff to Oakland Mayor Libby Schaaf and as Executive Director of HOPE SF, an initiative in the mayor's office to revitalize public housing in San Francisco.

BCSH touches the lives of nearly every Californian, from defending civil rights of those who have experienced discrimination in housing and employment, to licensing more than four million businesses and professionals, and to addressing our housing and homelessness crisis here in California. As Secretary, I am committed to leading the 12 departments and 36 boards with a sense of mutual accountability, shared vision, and a sense of urgency.

As the Co-Chair of the California Interagency Council on Homelessness, I will work with our state partners to embed a coordinated strategy across all of government to prevent and end homelessness in our state. I'll be looking at strategic solutions to strengthen our civil rights protections so that people can have more access to dignified homes and jobs free of discrimination. I want to expand the pathways to licensure so more Californians can earn higher wages and have a place to call home in our great state.

And I want to translate the sense of urgency that you all feel every single day from your constituents into outcomes that Californians expect and deserve from their government. Let's leave from a place of abundance, build on efficiencies, and scale those solutions that we all know work. I am really eager to partner with all of you. Thank you so much, and I look forward to your questions.

Madam Secretary, thank you so much. Again, you have been in this role for about 60 days now, and you have incredible experience. And I also know it's a firehouse in the beginning, now to speak for myself on that. And I think it's really important to be able to note, as co-leading the Interagency Council on Homelessness, being in this role for only about 60 days, you have a very important report that I know the Legislature, the Senate, and this Rules Committee is looking forward to seeing, and we've heard loud and clear that we want to be able to focus on accountability.

We would respectfully request that Rules Committee sees that report in the next 30 days, and I know that the Department under your leadership is already working on that. I just want to be very clear, though, through that report, you have been on this job for 60 days, and so you are inheriting that.

And I know that's a top priority for you, Madam Secretary. So what we'd like to be able to do is start out with questions, comments from the Committee. I'm going to start with Senator Jones, then we'll open it up for the remainder of the Committee. And again, thank you so much for being here.

My pleasure.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Welcome, Secretary Moss, and I will back up all the comments that the Chairman opened with and kind of is raising some of the concerns that I'm going to address a little bit here today. I will recognize that this is a huge undertaking and a big department.

You're going to be in charge of several departments, so agency of the government, recognizing that, you know, 12 departments, being the head of either, any single one of those departments is a big job. I have the opportunity to interact with the Department of Real Estate on a regular basis.

I'm a licensed agent, not active right now, but, you know, and never had a bad experience; always had a good experience with them and the other agencies through the Legislature that I've had to deal with. Because there's such a focus, I think, with your appointment specifically to housing and homelessness, those are the issues I'm going to specifically address today, recognizing that there's probably hundreds of other issues with all these other departments we could address--

Certainly.

We don't want to be here till next Wednesday addressing all those, and in fairness to you, recognizing that also you've been on the job for 60 days, so you may not even have a chance to meet with all the department heads yet. I don't know. That's not one of my questions. So I want to--as the Secretary, you're specifically a representative of the Governor.

And when he's not available, that's your job, to be available for him. So I'm going to raise some concerns that maybe are more fair asked of the Governor, but you're the one sitting here today. In 2020, in the Governor's State of the State Address, when he was specifically speaking on homelessness, he was raising the concern about accountability.

And I'll read you a couple of quotes and then maybe--I'll read a couple of quotes and then you can just respond to how you would handle this in addressing the statements that he's made. So he wants to track results, and the favorite line is--because one of his lines from the State of the State was--'because you can't manage what you don't measure.' So we need accountability. So here's some of the quotes. 'Because it's all about accountability, matching resources to results.'

'So instead, we're proposing strict accountability, comprehensive audits, and a quote, 'do it or lose it policy' to hold local governments responsible for results.' Next quote. 'Take action or lose access to this new funding.' Next quote. 'To track progress, the state will establish a unified homeless data system to capture accurate, local information.'

And the last quote that I will raise from that State of the State Address--this is in 2020, just four years ago, and I think we're still waiting for the 2024 State of the State Address--'because you can't manage what you don't measure.'

You've are obviously up to speed on the media and the press and the 24 billion dollars that has been talked about being spent over the last four years to address homelessness, and an audit that was recently done that they couldn't even complete the audit because these things that the Governor was talking about, the data systems, the accountability, the reports that weren't even available for the audit to be completed and come up with a reasonable result.

And I think that's disappointing to a lot of us in the Legislature, me for sure, and I just wanted to present that to you, and with 60 days of experience, how would you respond to that? Us not living up to the Governor's expectations from 2020?

Well, thank you, Senator. I think it is a valid question, and I guess I would start off by saying, prior to this administration, we had not seen the level of investment in housing and homelessness from any other Governor for as long as I've lived in the State of California, which is now 21 years. And because we hadn't seen those resources dedicated to this issue, we have inherited a challenge that is decades in the making.

And so when the Governor gave his speech in 2020, the primary issue of everybody, I think, in this room, certainly, and everybody in the State of California, is that we are indeed experiencing a housing and homelessness crisis that is, I personally believe, is the social issue of our time. And so I just want to start by saying the urgency and magnitude of this challenge didn't originate in 2020. It didn't originate during this administration.

So I think it's important to recognize the contributions that this administration has made to the problem, not just in funding, but actually in creating the infrastructure at the state level to be able to stand up a data system that has never existed across any place in the country, where you are aggregating data from 44 continuums of care and trying to synthesize that--and that's personal level data--to synthesize that data, to give input, and frankly, information, not just to the state partners, but to local government about how these resources are actually serving people who need those services and housing the most.

And so that infrastructure just started to be built in 2021, and so it is going to take us time to really see the fruits of the labor that the Governor talked about in his speech. I think accountability isn't just about who's responsible for spending their money well or who's responsible for doing the work.

It's actually mutual accountability about who is actually responsible for addressing the degradation of 180,000 citizens, Californians, who are unhoused every single day in our state. And so when I think about accountability, you asked how I would react to those statements.

I really think about having worked in local government, looking to the state for guidance about how do we leverage and utilize our resources to have the most impact that we can on the ground. That actually is happening. We house thousands of folks every single day. We disrupt that housing crisis for them every single day.

In the City of Los Angeles, they house 227 people every day. And during that same period of time, almost double that becomes unhoused during the same period of time. So I think the challenge that we're confronted with is systemic, where our inflows into homelessness is outpacing our exits. We can't house people fast enough for all of the folks that are falling into homelessness across the state, and so I think the audacity of what the Governor was talking about is exactly at the right level.

It's going to take us time to make sure we have the infrastructure, the staffing, the training, the expectations across all levels of government, and frankly, the entire ecosystem to make sure we are really organized, coordinated, and holding ourselves accountable to the goals that we set because the solutions are not a mystery.

But we have not been able to see enough resources at scale to be able to attack the problem at the size of the problem. And we need time and accountability, but we certainly need time to make sure that local jurisdictions, state infrastructure actually knows how are we reaching our goals? How do we iterate?

I am someone who believes in continuous improvement. I am not intimidated by the audit findings. I welcome them, the Governor welcomes them, because it makes us better. And nobody wins when we just point our fingers and say, it was your fault that that person is unhoused, especially the person who's unhoused. So it's our responsibility to ensure that accountability is shared, we're acting with that sense of urgency, and we're living up to those aspirations that the Governor referenced in his address because I believe them.

Great. Thank you, and I think the one in the report that you're going to be providing to the Legislature and, you know, additional audits, I think that, you know, speaking for my constituents, taxpayers and voters in the 40th Senate District and as Minority Leader, hearing from other constituents around the state, Californians are very frustrated with the homeless situation in California.

Of course.

They're frustrated that we've spent 24 billion dollars in four years, which is a lot of money. That's the equivalent to some states' entire annual budget and per year also. So they're expecting results. They're expecting us to be able to tell them where this money went.

And sitting here today, the Governor cannot tell the taxpayers of California where that 24 billion dollars went, what it did, how many people it served, how many people got off the streets into temporary housing or into rehabilitation or into any kind of support, and then furthermore, from that situation into permanent housing, and so we've got a long ways to go on this, and I'm hoping the Governor will give you the tools that you need to do it, but, you know, so far, I don't think he's done that. So that's it for me. Thank you.

Thank you so much. Madam Secretary, I'm going to have you respond if you'd like, and then we're going to turn the floor over to Senator Eggman. Madam Secretary, if you'd like to respond to Senator Jones.

Certainly, and I just want to acknowledge that it is absolutely true that Californians are frustrated with our housing affordability and homelessness crisis. We all should be. It is unacceptable what's happening in our state with regard to this issue.

And I think we have to be much more strategic about how we're trying to solve the problem so that when we are allocating resources, we certainly want to know what happened to those resources. And I have some of the data points that the report that you referenced.

We will have that to this Committee by the end of the week, next week. So we will, we are absolutely urgent in that response. But we do know some things, Senator, and I just want to share a couple of things from our HDIS system that you referenced earlier.

So between, in the years of 2022-2023, more than 349,000 Californians access services through the system. That is the data that is shared with us across all of the 44 CoCs that we receive. 184,000 folks were newly experiencing homelessness during that same year, and the outflow into permanent housing was about 72,000 people receiving permanent housing solutions.

So again, when we talk about the inflows into homelessness and the exits, we must look at prevention. We must figure out how, in fact, we are preventing folks from falling into this crisis in the first place and doing that in a targeted way. So we look at the indicators that tell us who's most likely to experience homelessness.

And we have some partners, both from UCLA, in the policy lab down there, that are doing some predictive analytics to help us understand who, in fact, are most at risk of homelessness so that we can provide financial assistance, case management services, house--legal services, to make sure that those folks don't fall into homelessness.

So I understand the frustration. I honor that. I sit in this seat with a sense of urgency. It is not new to me just 60 days ago that this crisis is the crisis of our time. I've been at this a long time, and I have witnessed families who--when I was the CEO of Hamilton Families in San Francisco, we were working very hard to resolve homelessness for families and children, and for every family I would house, three more would become homeless during the same period of time.

So I think we have to be much more comprehensive in the solutions that we are bringing to the table and make sure that we are working in partnership with our local jurisdictions and the state to have those mutual accountability outcomes that we're all looking for. So I really appreciate your question.

Thank you, Madam Secretary. Let's turn it over to Senator Eggman.

Thank you.

The Governor should make you his PIO. I'm just saying. Cause you broke down the--yeah, in a way that people could understand, and like you, I have worked at all levels of government and directly in the field, and this is incredibly complicated stuff. I remember.

So I'm a social worker, and so I worked in and around homelessness and housing issues and mental health issues. Let's add that in, and let's add in addiction issues and every different system that intersects with all of those, as well as the nonprofits all getting in there to do their part, and it just makes it incredibly complicated.

When I was in City Council in 2010, I had my interns, and I started working on the first ten-year plan to end homelessness. First one in 2010. We failed. But also right after that, the bottom fell out in Stockton, and we ended up spiraling into bankruptcy and had, you know, it was a horrible time. So, since 2010, I'm just thinking about that as we were trying to just begin to stand up the systems, like how did you enter the data, right?

How did you make sure there was a central location amongst all the nonprofits in town and the cities and the county and the shelters? Incredibly complex network, and then we just, you know, multiply that up. So I am glad you are going to be there.

I'm glad you're going to have your very practical experience, lived experience as you bring it to from every level of government, as well as your urgency that you feel, because I think it is urgent. So my question is kind of at a broader level.

So one of my first hearings when I was here was on, I was on the B&P hearing, and the people were lined up out the door. Lined up, lined up. And it was for the Department of Cosmetology, the Board of Cosmetology and Barbering, and I'm like, oh, my goodness, I didn't know this was so important.

But for each profession, something is, like, so important. You line up and people pay for buses to bring you up so you know it's an important issue. People are lobbying on generally a scope of practice. So how, with everything under this agency, are you going to balance consumer fares? I mean, all of the boards that are under that, homelessness and housing, how do you balance all those and prioritize?

It's a great question, and maybe I'll respond first to your comments, because we are kindred spirits. I started my work here in California as a social worker with the Tenderloin Neighborhood Development Corporation, and so that is the spirit in which I do this work.

So I really appreciate all the work you've done and how you approach your role. The other thing I wanted to comment on was the idea that, as you described the system as a complicated web, BCSH is just one entity in the scope of an ecosystem responsible for addressing our homelessness and housing crisis.

And so as the Co-Chair of the Interagency Council on Homelessness, we have 14 of our departments and agencies at the helm. I Co-Chair that Committee or that council with Secretary Ghaly, who oversees our Health and Human services.

And even within that agency, there is a tremendous amount within our welfare and mental health and health systems, right, that all need to come together so that we are having an all government, all hands-in approach to addressing this crisis.

So I just wanted to lift up the importance of not only what we need to be doing with accountability for our HAP funding and our Encampment Resolution Funding, but frankly, there are resources across all of those agencies and departments that also need to be coordinated and really aligned so that we're getting the maximum impact with all of our state's investments.

So I just wanted to lift that up. In terms of how I approach the sort of diverse portfolio of BCSH, I think it's amazing in some ways. As I came into this role, I've obviously spent a lot of time in the housing and homelessness space, but I was so excited to get to know about the consumer protection side because we actually license four million individuals and businesses throughout the state. And when I think about the other side of housing affordability, it's economic mobility and opportunity.

And if we are able to maximize access to those professions, creating livable wage jobs, frankly, that will allow people the incomes that can help them secure the housing that they need and take care of all the other household and family needs that they might have, I see a really direct connection there.

I think about our civil rights work and how important it is to make sure that people are free of discrimination, both in their jobs and in their housing, right? Those rights need to be protected. So in some ways, as eclectic as this agency is, I see the mosaic of opportunity. We're building on our workforce and economic mobility strategies, while also making sure that those folks have a safe and stable place to live. That is the power of this agency.

In addition to being able to work with my colleagues across the Administration to look in their pockets also, because my transportation colleagues, it matters when housing is close to transit. We want to reduce greenhouse emissions. We also want to reduce sprawl, right? It matters when we look at our environmental protections.

The people most impacted by natural disasters are people of the lowest incomes, folks who are unhoused. And so I see interconnectedness across the entire ecosystem, and some people might call that my Achilles heel, but I kind of see the world in Technicolor, and if we are able to break down those silos and utilize the assets, the power of all that we have to offer, that's how we scale the impact that we're looking for.

Thank you. Thank you. I like your metaphor better than mine. Mine's a web where people get stuck. Yours is a Mosaic. We're gonna make some art. You can have it, right? All right. So you make that one work. I'm for the art. Thank you. Thank you so much.

Thank you. Thank you, Madam Secretary, for being here today. I did. I have some questions on my scheduled version of questions that I wanted to ask, but I want to follow up on a couple of questions that you just answered, if that's okay.

You looked down at your notes, and you said you do have some numbers that you were able to release to us today, but the full report would be at the end of this week. And that's your goal of making it happen. You said we had 349,000 people. Seek services. Seek services out of the 44 coCs, that you are over, correct, or no?

No, no. The 44 cocs provide data to our state system quarterly. We synthesize that data, and that's how we assess how many Californians are utilizing services across the state.

And the other number you gave us was 184,000 people. And you'll have to give me the reason for it. I didn't get it.

184,000 folks in that system data set were newly experiencing homelessness, and 72,000 receive housing. Yes.

How much did all that cost, or just the 72,000 to get housing?

Well, so we are currently in our fourth round of HAP funding, and it's $1.0 billion total. We've administered the first half of that. So 500 million to jurisdictions across the state, and we will administer the second half of that funding once jurisdictions have expended up to 75% of the first tranche.

But I will say that the cost is just. That's just our HaP funding and our emergency, our encampment resolution grant funds. Those are only two programs. These numbers also incorporate local, federal, and state dollars. So the system itself is, again, a mosaic of resources.

But the funding streams that we monitor within BCSH are the HaP funds in the emergency or the encampment resolution funds.

Thank you. I think that where I'm coming from on this question is that I'd like to correlate the dollars with helping homelessness. Do I think that we have a homeless crisis? Absolutely. And we have a difference of opinion on where or how why it happens.

I think it's policies that come out of this building that inflate the cost of living, the cost of fuel, the cost of food, and then people have to make choices because they can't afford everything that they used to be able to afford in California.

But I think the most phone calls that I get in my office are the frustration that $1.1 billion was spent in San Francisco and 31 people got housed, 2.8 billion from 16 to 17, and even just a fairly larger number got housed.

And I think that Calmatters and some other articles were put out, about $179,000 per tent for homeless people. And I wish I had that article here. I could be glad to provide it to your office. I appreciate the fact that you're only on the. Only here for 60 days.

I appreciate the fact that you are abiding a whole. I mean, I don't want to be awful, but it's like you're going to try to eat the whole elephant at the same time.

And the reason why I say that is because it's like it's the biggest monster in the State of California right now, besides inflation is homelessness, and you're going to tackle it. And so I think that's a big bite of the apple. So I applaud you for that.

I do have concerns about your predecessors and what happened in the past about spending a tremendous amount of taxpayer dollars and not solving the problem.

There was an article in the Los Angeles Times, which is not the most conservative paper in the state, and they were talking about the continuous departments that are housing homelessness, and they don't really talk to each other. And it's, most of the funding goes to admin and stuff, but nothing goes to direct services to the housing population.

So I don't know if those are things that are on your radar that you're going to be looking at in the future. In the real world, I guess as a business owner, you would call it a root cause analysis.

Find out what the root cause is and why homelessness is happening and what resources need to be allocated to fix that situation. I'll let you respond there, and then I'm gonna go into my questions that I really had for you. Subject matter.

Thank you, Senator. And I first want to say I agree. It is, it takes us too long to build housing in California, and it costs too much.

And so one of the things that I look forward to is building on the work that the Legislature and the Administration has done to streamline housing, getting housing built in all parts of California. It really does require that level of direction and leadership so that local jurisdictions can streamline those projects and get built as quickly as possible.

We can't have the average cost of a home costing almost $1.0 million, like we're never going to be able to solve our crisis. So I do not disagree that there is so much more to do. But I have to say I'm not starting from scratch.

I'm inheriting a legacy of work that I can build on, that we can expedite. I think we have some opportunities to leverage existing resources with the passage of Prop one.

Those are new resources that will be available to counties and local jurisdictions so that we can be much more surgical in terms of how we are delivering those services to folks and how we're building the housing that people so desperately need.

I will say, though, that I think the primary issue that causes homelessness is housing, a lack of it. So for every 23 people who is eligible for deeply affordable housing, sorry, for every hundred people who is eligible for deeply affordable housing, we only have 23 units of housing.

So we have a really long way to go in terms of meeting deeply affordable housing needs that we have across the state. And that's not only my priority. I actually think we need housing at the full continuum of housing.

Our Calhfa, which is also under the agency, is providing for first time homebuyer opportunities from our dream for all program. We want to make sure that people aren't just subsisting in California. They're not just maintaining, but they're thriving.

So once you get out of that horrible situation of being unhoused, we want folks on a trajectory, finding employment, restoring their lives, finding dignity, so that perhaps they may own a home in California again. But that dream feels really far away for a lot of people.

So I'm really interested in making sure that we are providing housing interventions, data informed housing interventions, frankly, at every income level, so that wherever you are in the State of California and this is a place you want to call home, there's a place for you. And yes, I think we can point to stories. I've lived it.

I've only been in this job for 60 days. But, you know, I was out there doing the work of advocacy and trying to actually get our systemic responses much more coordinated.

All of that is going to take us some time, but if we are guided both by continuous improvement and that sense of urgency and accountability, I know we, this Committee and all of us can get there. So I appreciate your partnership.

Thank you. I do. My colleague from Stockton asked you or made a comment about, you know, all these people in BNP coming up, and it was the Cosmotali and barber, you know, blocking the hallways, coming up to have their opinions.

One of the things that I liked what you said that you said, it's a full faceted thing that you want to make sure that people get those licenses because they need to have jobs. And so that put a little glimmer of hope in my heart for what you're doing.

And because I think a lot of times we don't look at the business aspect of it, and, you know, we're continually, we're the highest litigated state in the state, you know, a nation for business.

Last six years in a row, we have, you know, some of the toughest regulatory processes, and we have businesses fleeing the state almost every single day.

So without those jobs and being able to provide jobs to people that are looking for that, I work with a nonprofit in my district where we do homeless to housing, and we actually are building housing, 136 units.

But we had to go, I mean, jump through some hurdles, and we had to bring stuff in from out of state so that we could just stack it up and then put the wrapper on the outside.

Because of all the restrictions here in California, there is a way around all of this stuff, but it does take a whole lot of out of the box thinking to make it happen for an affordable price.

The bottom 13 units are going to be for foster care, kids that are emancipated, and then, of course, homeless and housing off the M Street navigation center.

And it's going to be very, very affordable rent, fully furnished, fully stocked, kind of like a walk in, and you're there, and it's not just a walk in and you're there, and this is your house. It's like, what color do you like? What color do you like?

If you like a yellow kitchen, they're going to make it yellow because they want that person to feel whole and accepted. But it does require accountability. No drugs, no violence, no, none of those things. They have wrap around services. And, you know, there's, there's.

So I like your whole hearted approach, and I think that will work very well. I do have a couple of questions regarding, like my colleague said, it's a whole broad of spectrum, whole broad spectrum that you are over. One of the things that you're over is a CRD. Are you familiar with the CRD?

Yes.

Okay. Are you familiar with the CRD's case against Cisco alleging caste based discrimination?

Yes.

I guess my question is, and again, I know you've only been over the CRD for the last 60 days, but the lead plaintiff or the lead opponent or the person who was being sued. So I apologize. I'm not an attorney, but the person that was being sued was alleged to be a hierarchy Hindu. And he was.

He was characterized by the CRD as raping, raping, spitting on, gosh, actively opposing what they would call a Dalit in this particular class of people. And that the lawsuit alleged, basically that he was doing all this stuff because he was Hindu, and he's not even hindu.

But the CRD cost this company that was doing nothing but providing jobs in the Bay Area, thousands of jobs, to all kinds of people, Dalits, Hindus, doesn't matter. All kinds of people that were qualified to do the job. So now that you're familiar with it, do you agree with CRD's characterization of their complaint alleging the following.

That Indians are overrepresented? At Cisco, that was CRD's complainant Department, that you're over. They said Indians are overrepresented. And, I mean, why can't Indians have jobs?

Well, I am not as familiar with the level of detail that you're asking about Senators, so I'm happy to get back to you on this particular case.

I will say one of the things that I have been really impressed about CRD is that they do follow up on every complaint that comes to the civil rights Department, and it is not. There are thousands of complaints that come before that Department every year. And our team investigates all of those complaints.

We respond to the complaints, and certainly not every complaint goes to litigation, but there is a response to the complainant. And I think that level of customer service, that level of responsiveness, is critically important.

I want to make sure that our civil rights Department is certainly following through with the law and making sure that we are protecting the rights of Californians from discrimination and employment. All. Absolutely.

And as the mission of CRD, it is not common practice for the Department to discriminate in itself, but actually protect those rights of people, no matter what their cultural identities are. And so I will definitely look into that situation and get back to you.

I appreciate that there were 20 years of documents produced that this individual was not a Hindu, was not Hindu, had no agnostic for all that matters. Came here to America to do a startup company, was very successful. And actually, the discrimination case was just for background.

It was a Dalit saying that he didn't get the job, but another doll it did, if you're going to use the characteristics of the caste system. But the CRD made horrific accusations. And this is, like I said, a Department under your. Under your tutelage now, I guess. But some of the things that were actually.

And the questions that are. My phone is just blowing up right now because they know you're here. Right. So I'm just telling you that I'm in a recent lawsuit. Over the past four years, the CRD repeatedly called for the. For a called or platform. The following 20 plus remarks. This is publicly based on the CRD.

What they said, calling upper caste Indian Americans as dominant, hostile, oppressive, privileged, carrying casteist bias, insinuated them of dual loyalty to the United States and accused them of being bigoted and tribal.

That was the accusations made by a government Department to a company that is here just trying to make a living and provide people jobs, thousands of people's jobs in this particular thing. And then once they.

In this particular company, and once they found out and it was proven and he was dismissed from the case, he was dismissed because it was proven that he was agnostic and had no ties to Hinduism whatsoever. So the case was kind of falling apart. He was dismissed. The CRD came back and doubled down.

That's the type of stuff that I'm worried about. Of the departments, one. Just one of the departments that you oversee that this. I agree that the CRD was placed in a. In statute or regulatory processes because they wanted to address, you know, racism. They do. They want to address this. But the bottom line, for a state agency to go after a business, and I can provide you with all these documents.

I can provide you with the court case that dismissed the lead individual, and I can provide you with the lawsuit that the Hindu American Foundation has now to have some type of restorative justice because of what happened. And this is a state agency or an agency that you're in charge of only for 60 days. But I would expect you to at least look at that agency as you move forward in this position.

Absolutely. And please do get me the information that you have. I have, actually, I think it was maybe someone who said, have you even met with all of your Department directors? I have, and I meet with them regularly.

And when concerns come up from anyone, not just our fair Senators, but anyone in the public or anyone who has an issue about how we are administering the services and programs that we are responsible for to the State of California, I want to know about it.

So I'm most certainly happy to follow up very specifically about this case. But I also know that our CRD Department is about protecting citizens of California from discrimination. So I want to make sure that I understand all of the nuance of this case and respond to you when I have that information. I appreciate that.

Well, I was just going to say, Madam Secretary to the Vice Chair, I think on this specific issue, I think we have two follow ups thus far in the hearing. Madam Secretary, you're going to be following up with Madam Vice Chair. You're going to dig deep, a little deeper into this issue.

Direct follow up, if you don't mind, with Madam Vice Chair. And then we'll also do a follow up on the report as well. I know you're saying by the end of this week, but. End of next week. Next week. Yes, ma'am. Thank you. And please, Madam Vice Chair, on your next subject.

Thank you. So there's also, and just these are some things that I really want to address. The CRD also put out there publicly that Hindu Americans are assaulting and raping thousands of American Dalits. I want that proof that your CRD Department has, that Hindu Americans are raping thousands, thousands of dollars. That's a public statement from your CRD.

So I want that proof, because if that's happening, we need to protect those women or those individuals that are being raped, but there's no evidence of that. And for a state agency to go and say that is completely absurd. And I guess other things. And I can get these to you. They're. I can get these to you.

I guess, you know, they have a huge problem with, you know, non Indian workers engaging in caste based discrimination. They have, I mean, this is a whole Indian community that caused almost an uproar in the capital last year under this.

And it was based on this basically one case where the, like I said, the individual who's being accused wasn't even hindu and was dismissed from the case. And the CRD doubled down on making sure that that individual suffered and paid more money.

I believe that they'll be justice served in restitution because I think the documents are on their side. But again, I know you're just coming into this for 60 days, and I think that you'd be a wonderful person at the top as long as you could go through the weeds at the bottom and make sure that people were doing what they were supposed to be doing. And I would like the.

I'm looking forward to that report that the whole Committee is looking forward to as well. Thank you, Mister chair, for allowing me to ask those questions.

Thank you so much, madam Vice Chair. Senator Laird, are there any items?

Thank you. And thanks for the meeting beforehand. I appreciated the conversation. And even though a mention of my prior job makes Senator Grove jump out of her chair, I was similarly up for confirmation. At about the same time, it was a wonderful thing to not have had responsibility for everything in the Department yet.

Yet, and be able to do it. So congratulations. I think my colleagues have done a great job of getting into some of the places where I wanted to go.

But let me add with a questioner, a couple on the unhoused, and one is, I know there was a statement that people aren't getting services, and you talked about the task force that sort of has all the different departments. How do you make sure that there is a level of coordination between all of them?

Because I know they're people that deliver services out of representatives on the task force. How do you make sure that there isn't that duplication, that people are working together, that it's all moving ahead in one direction?

It's a great question, Senator. I think we have an opportunity with the expanded authority of our Interagency Council on Homelessness through AB 977 that will really, it has expanded the data collection that we will be having across all of our Member agency Member council Members on Cal ICH. It's allowing us, as we update our action plan.

We are in the midst of updating our homelessness action plan for the state, and it's my goal as one of the co chairs to really get into goal setting. Right. Really understand what are we collectively doing across all of those departments and agencies that touch this work?

What are we collectively doing and holding ourselves accountable to in demonstrating outcomes on the ground? And so that process is underway. I sat on Cal ICH as a Member, a Senate appointee prior to being appointed to secretary, and I was so excited to see our desire.

I was on the council for two years, and we wanted to see the state take more of a leadership role in setting the performance metrics that were then adopted by, thanks to the Legislature and the Administration, into hap three and hap four. Right.

We want to make sure that, as all of you have requested, that we're not only tracking our resources, but we want to see reductions in the number of our neighbors who are unhoused in our community, and we want to see that quickly.

And so I think the council's work ahead is making sure that that action plan gives us the blueprint for how to do that, that we are utilizing our data system in a way that is publicly facing. That's one of the things that I'm looking forward to, sort of a dashboard that folks can track our progress.

How are we actually doing when we make concurrent investments? And this is another thing you can't just do one thing at once, it's not enough. We actually need to be investing in prevention, interim housing and permanent housing all at the same time.

And I know that we have budgetary constraints that we all have to live with, but the fact of the matter is we're not going to be able to get to that inflow and outflow challenge that I spoke of earlier, unless we're making those concurrent investments.

And that's the level of detail we'll be able to see at the council level and with the staff. And I have to just say it has been extraordinary to come into this agency and see the dedication, expertise and passion of the thousands of workers that are doing this incredible work every day. And I get to represent them.

But it is amazing to know that we have talented professionals who are as committed as I am to addressing this crisis, and we will be able to really lean in and support our staff, certainly with an agency. But also I want to provide much more local support. That technical assistance is critical when we provide those resources.

We want to make sure that local jurisdictions are looking under the couch cushions and the hood and trying to braid all of the resources that they have at their disposal with our state investments so that the impact can go further.

And that level of technical assistance will deepen once our grants, management of our HAPP funds and our ERF funds go over to HCD, which is also in the portfolio.

And I think by creating this accountability unit that the Governor announced last week, it's going to build on our housing accountability unit that was started just a couple of years ago, and that, paired with our surplus Land act, has unlocked 20,000 units of housing that otherwise wouldn't have been available to local jurisdictions to build affordable housing.

We are bringing that level of accountability and partnership into and sort of expanding this unit into what we're calling HAARP. And I'm really excited for that because it's going to give local jurisdictions the tools that they need to deepen their impact and us a pathway towards some of our collective goals.

And one of the things you said you had in there, you mentioned interim housing as part of it, and the continuum of care that you mentioned, usually the federal money, and we have not talked about the Federal Government in this yet. The federal money doesn't cover the continuum of care, doesn't cover interim housing.

And we talked of the fact that my hometown, where I was once my rambunctious hometown, where I was once the mayor, has arguably the highest per capita homeless population in the state, and we got money to them for interim care because it didn't come through any state program, and now it's going to end on July 1, and they have a few hundred people that are housed, will go on the street.

We can't continue. And the Federal Government does not recognize interim care. How do you then work when you're already trying to coordinate all these agencies and services in making sure certain things are met when you know that that has to be part of the solution?

Yeah, I mean, I think it's a really important question because I think jurisdictions, providers have had to make these hard choices. It's either permanent or nothing. And so we know that the ultimate goal is to ensure that everyone has a permanent home.

But we also know that we have many of our brothers and sisters who are outside on the sidewalk waiting for housing. And so we need to have an interim solution for them so that they can come indoors, heal. That's why housing first matters, right.

We need to be able to, to ensure that we can create that baseline of stability. And that's not the end point. We need a flow into permanent housing, working with those folks to stabilize, to get on medi Cal, to figure out what their benefits and jobs prospects are, right.

So that they are healthy enough so that they can transition and succeed in permanent housing and living independently.

Excuse me for interrupting. I totally agree. It's just that sometimes the state or government does not financially support the interim housing, which has the role that you just said of the value of stabilizing and bringing the services in. And that is a challenge.

Well, we have been very fortunate in making sure that the Hap funds allow for interim uses. Our project room key, as you know, was an interim housing solution with the hotels and motels. It was sort of really demonstrating that this model worked.

What came then from room key came home key, which was the transition of those interim hotels and motels into purchasing those for permanent housing. That is the solution set ThaT is necessary for us to tackle this crisis. And we are certainly talking with our federal partners to ensure that HUD has that same flexibility.

Because until we can get folks into housing, permanent housing that they need, I do not resign to the fact that our sidewalks should be the waiting room for our neighbors to die on. I refuse to believe that. And therefore, we need interim solutions. But we need to assess how much interim is Necessary. Right.

You don't need to house everybody in interim housing. Some people just need financial assistance and can rehouse quickly. That's why prevention matters. Somebody who has an economic or health emergency needs to be able to just get you know, $5,000 to pay their rent.

Let's do that, rather than waiting till they are so destitute and in need of much more intensive services. So I want to be able to customize those interventions, including interim, demonstrate that this is a proof of concept that works, and making sure that the Federal Government understands that jurisdictions and states need that level of flexibility.

Well, just to put one thing on the record that we talked about, and it's interesting, looking at the Committee Members, I think a lot of our programs are very urban centric, and you're looking at a Committee that of people that don't represent necessarily urban areas. And the point in time, time count, which drives me completely crazy.

As we talked, if you have the tenderloin and you're doing a point in time count, you generally know where everybody can go.

If you are in the middle of an atmospheric river and you're in a town that's surrounded by forests on three sides that go for miles, you're not sure where to find people, you're not getting an accurate count, because that happens. And so I had somebody argue with me from an agency and said, it's equally flawed to everybody.

It was like a distinctly unsatisfied response. And so I would just suggest that's something you should think about over time.

And then, and I really appreciate Senator Egman's on the agencies, and we talked about that, and I was intrigued by her, because I've been married for over 40 years to somebody that was regulated by the board of cosmetology. You can imagine their interest. And he is one of the most opinionated people in the universe.

So good luck with it, with all the regulation. The one last thing I'll ask about that hasn't come up yet is you have cannabis in your portfolio. And we have problems of making the legal system work and making it disadvantaged to stay on the illegal side.

How do you see with the wisdom of 60 days, how to balance that and try to move toward making the legal system work to the exclusion of there still being economic disadvantage to be.

Yeah, it's a great question. And I did want to respond first, though, to your comment about how our point in time count kind of favors urban areas. I do think it's really important for us to look at how homelessness is impacting our rural communities as well. We saw, when I referenced, I ran Hamilton Families and we were housing folks as far as Sacramento just to find housing. And so we see poverty kind of moving east.

And in cases like that, it's when you're able to apply the solutions that we know work to those communities, it makes a transformative impact where, if, you know, I met with the mayor of Bakersfield recently, and they have folks, they have about, I don't know, I think she said, 1100 unhoused people in Bakersfield. I was like, mayor, we can fix that. I mean, those are, they have.

You should have said that before.

I mean, they're doing some extraordinary things in Bakersfield, but they are also, those are the number of folks experiencing homelessness in that community. If we are able to get the permanent housing permitted in those communities, get through the red tape at the local level, through the zoning, all of the streamlining that's been done, and activate all of the work that the city and county are already doing together, that's how you get there.

And so targeting resources and solutions to communities where you can get some economies of scale, I think is critical. And that's certainly happening in our rural communities, as well as strengthening our partnership with our tribal communities, because that's another place where the disproportionate impact for our indigenous brothers and sisters is extraordinary. And I think that there's a lot to do with partnering with our tribes and making sure that we are getting housing and services to those communities as well.

You know, it was said by one person in the Administration in a conversation I had - not you - that there was concern that money was going in and it was displacing money that cities and counties were already putting in for sheltering on the house. And I just want to say that's not my experience.

Mine either.

That is just not my experience.

Thank you.

So you were going to get to the cannabis?

Yes. So cannabis. So we know that two thirds of the cannabis market is illegal, and so it is really the work of the Department and the Agency to figure out how we can incentivize more of our market to come into the legal market. I think it is true that there are challenges for folks to get into the legal market that sometimes makes the illegal market more attractive. I think Director Elliott is doing some really amazing work with her team to figure out how do we reduce those barriers, how do we make it more.

We're doing sort of a marketing campaign to let folks know the benefits of being a part of a California supported cannabis market where you get the protections of it being regulated. And we have some equity efforts within the Department that is targeting, you know, folks who have been disproportionately impacted, negatively impacted by the carceral system for the use of Marijuana and trying to incentivize those folks to start businesses and access the legal market. So I think we have a lot more work to do there.

But I am inspired by the, you know, that Department just stood up three years ago, and the fact that we have regulations in place, we have enforcement in place, and we have a third of the market that's in the legal space is extraordinary, given just the timeline and the laboriousness of setting up such an agency or such a department. So I look forward to figuring out ways to make those, the equity programs much more targeted.

Like, how do we really reduce the barriers for those who want to come into the market, not just just by waiving fees, but getting access to capital if they want to come into, you know, banks are not necessarily providing that kind of capital for this market just yet. So I think there's some opportunities, frankly, for us to work together and others on how to streamline some of those activities and grow that third to at least a half.

And then. Thank you very much. I appreciate the responsive and comprehensive answers. Mister chair.

Thank you so much.

Full disclosure, a comment. Because my former Secretary of Natural Resources made a comment about my city. I have the most incredible mayor ever in Bakersfield.

You do.

It makes me happy that you have been speaking to her because she is very well balanced and she is elected to a very conservative city and still very well balanced the needs of our community. So thank you.

You're welcome.

I want to make sure that that wasn't.

Thank you, Madam Vice Chair. I want to see if there's any additional follow up. I have a few comments and questions, but Madam Secretary, thank you so much. A few items that I'd like to be able to advance and on homelessness, and then also would like to talk about cannabis as well. And by the way, Director Elliott does phenomenal work and grateful to have the opportunity to be able to work with her. I think one is controlling expectations on the issue of homelessness, and I think we need to be able to focus on accountability. Absolutely public disservices.

I think that we can all agree the homelessness crisis, whether you live in a large community or small town, is appalling and it's unacceptable. For those who are living on the street and for those who are living in the community as well. And I think that at times the state has over proclaimed how quickly we're going to be able to move. And I think that is dangerous. And anyone that sells a quick fix to homelessness is selling snake oil. If I could just be so blunt.

And I also believe that the public, as we've heard from the esteemed Senators, want answers. And I know that is - accountability is really important to you, and I'm grateful for that. But I think it's, homelessness is not a sound bite. It's not a post on Facebook, and it's going to take time. You're dealing with humans. And I also believe that we have not talked about the story and how we got here. It's decades in the making. And I'm not trying to be political about it, but I think that when you saw then Governor Reagan shut down mental health facilities across the state, we've never returned.

That HUD has never kept up on the federal level when it comes to investment, whether it's homeless services and or affordable housing. The state has done a poor job of keeping up with housing linked to jobs. We've had tremendous growth in our economy over the last 40 years, and everybody loves affordable housing until it's next to them. And we all talk about how important affordable housing is. But when it comes to streamlining, there are many that will look the other way. So I think we really have to be real with folks in a time of crisis.

And at times, I believe that this state has sold a quick fix when it comes to homelessness, and it's just simply not the fact. I think we have to be true to our word that we're going to be continuing to focus in on it and controlling expectations. I'd like you to talk about Prop 1. Firm believer that we desperately need these resources and, you know, 11,150 behavioral health beds, 26,700 treatment slots. What do you see as you take on this new role over the next 36 to 48 months on what that's going to mean for those who are on the streets?

Well, what I'm excited about for Prop 1 is that it gives us not just additional resources for building deeply affordable housing across the state. So we will be administering about $2 billion of the Prop 1 fund through serving our veterans experiencing homelessness and other folks experiencing homelessness.

But I think what it gives us a chance to do is really work much more strategically with our cities and our counties in particular to look at how do we ensure that the programs that we have within our Human Services Agency paired with the programs that we administer, how are they actually being leveraged to have the kind of impact that you all and others expect.

And so we have an interagency strike team that is working on this. We are expediting the guidance for the funding that it's not due until July of 2025. That's not fast enough for us. So we are moving forward with getting the guidance and those resources out for some of the funding on the bond funds. But I think there's a much more strategic piece of Prop 1 that I'm excited about, which is, again, not all folks experiencing homelessness have severe health, physical or mental disabilities.

And so for those that do, let's make sure that we are targeting the interventions through these resources and others that truly disrupts the cycle of homelessness for them, whether it's, you know, targeted bridge housing through CARE Court, whether it is facilities that actually people might need for a higher acuity of care, or whether it's making sure that we have deeply permanent supportive housing in our community.

So, again, this opportunity gives us a chance to really look at the continuum of need for those experiencing homelessness. I'm really excited to work with Secretary Sin, with CalVet to make sure that our veterans are prioritized. As we know that is what the voters expect. And we also know that the Federal Government has put a lot of resources into reducing veterans homelessness across the country, and we want to take advantage of that. You mentioned the Federal Government sort of disinvesting in housing and homelessness.

I think that that is another example of we need all levels of government if we're going to solve this complex problem. And it's not good enough to just have the HUD allocations that we receive statewide. Right? We need the tax credits. We need the Bill that's going through this Congress right now. We are deeply supportive of, that would unlock more than 300,000 units of housing over the next decade for us. And so we appreciate the leadership that the Biden Administration has shown in terms of prioritizing housing and homelessness. And we need to go further because we've had, as you said, more than 20 years of disinvestment from the Federal Government. So I look forward to working with our federal partners to restore some of those resources and take advantage of what's in the pipeline.

I appreciate that. Another comment on homelessness and I'm gonna transition to cannabis. Represent primarily, if you take a look at landmass, rural district, if you take a look at population, suburban district, Golden Gate Bridges, Oregon border, you know, back in 2015, not one dime of state homelessness dollars, not a single penny went north of Sonoma county.

And you take a look at the highest rates per capita of homelessness, not just in the state, but in the nation. It's in Mendocino, Lake and Humboldt counties. Lake has the highest unsheltered rate in the state. Mendocino County now is the fifth largest homeless population per capita in the nation. And I know that there are.

We can always do better, especially when it comes to accountability, how public dollars are being spent and how many folks are getting off the street into housing, 110%. And that's why excited about your leadership, because I know that is where you want to lead. And this Governor, unlike any other, has invested. And we are approaching now over 600 million in rural part of the north coast. 600 million and literally hundreds of folks coming off the street into housing in some of the most challenging behavioral health issues that I've ever seen.

So I also think it's important, the numbers are important to be able to talk about with the public, because there is really good work happening and good stories to tell. And I think that's just really critical. I think we spent a lot of time in government in a bit of a doom loop, and there is a lot of, I think, some positive stories that we can be telling, and we need better accountability. And I know that's important. I would just say, see the change.

Sonoma county has reduced our homeless population year to year by 22%. So there is some movement happening on cannabis. Again, this is not an area in grievances or festivus here, but here's what I'll say, is that I would call the north coast cannabis capital of North America, and what happened with Prop 64 does not work.

It's not working. I think I wouldn't want to put words into Director Elliott's mouth, so I won't. And you take a look. The vast majority of cannabis farmers on the north coast are small family farmers, just like you may have an almond grower or a grape grower, or a tomato farmer. They've been growing cannabis for 34 generations. And the hurdles that have been put up in this initiative simply doesn't work. To be able to expect a family farm to go through a full environmental impact report and on a 10,000 square foot cannabis farm is cockamamie. It doesn't work. So the other issue is.

Cockamamie is not what he meant.

Hey, there we go. You take a look at enforcement. Director Elliott is working day and night to be able to get additional law enforcement officers into her Department, to be able to get folks out enforcing the laws that we have. Over the last three years, only 1.5 million, and we got it. 1.5 million has gone into special enforcement to be able to go after the worst of the worst who are growing illegally. If there is no consequence for growing illegally or opening up and putting a shingle out and selling cannabis, folks are going to keep doing it.

So I firmly believe we have to have a carrot and a stick. And you take a look at the type of folks who are growing. It is organized crime in some multinational cartels on the north coast, and it's well documented through state OES, local and law enforcement. I say all that is. I really think that we need to relook at the way we are advancing cannabis. If it's truly an agricultural commodity. We're not asking a tomato farmer to be able to do full EIR, to be able to grow, especially in 10,000 sqft. I'll leave it there. Those are comments, and you can just give a wink and say, let's move on.

Amen.

So it is something that I'm going to follow up with you on, and the last this thing, and I don't mean to do this to you as well, we've already consolidated the taxes on it. We got rid of the cultivation tax, which hosed these small family farmers. It's now just one excise tax. It is going to take going back to the voters. The taxing system in this state is too damn high.

Washington, Oregon, Colorado have all looked at tax reform in regards to cannabis, and I think that's another issue that we're going to have to look at. Madam Secretary, this is for another day, and I welcome your comments, if you have any. And I look forward to having an offline conversation with you on this, and I appreciate your patience with me.

Great. I look forward to partnering with you on this. No, I would just say, you know, what's unique about BCSH is I want to promote good business practices and make sure we are providing pathways into opportunity for the diversity of people who live in the State of California. And so consumer protections are critically important for us.

It's our North Star, and I want to make sure that people have a place to live. And so those things, as I said, sort of intertwine and hearing some of the challenges you raised about cannabis. This is why we have to iterate on implementation. Once these laws pass, we implement, we see how challenging it might be in real time, and we come back and we figure out what are the alternatives to those barriers that are undermining our intended consequences.

So I really look forward to hearing more of your thoughts about what we can do to move more folks into the legal cannabis market and make it a sustaining business for those 3 to 4 generation growers who are now ready to take their business to the next level and are stymied by some of the challenges that they face.

I think one of the most important parts of life is admit when you're wrong. We were wrong in regards to passing a Proposition that's going to saddle a small family farm, like what we would do with a multibillion dollar corporation. And so that's what it's going to take, and we're going to have to ultimately go back to voters because some of this is now mandated by initiative. So it's an item that we'd like to follow up with you on, as I said, and I'm going to get off my soapbox and open it up for public comment Madam Secretary.

Thank you.

So what we'd like to be able to do, and she says, thank goodness. We're going to open it up for any and every one of you who would like to be able to speak in support of the Secretary. What we're going to ask if you could please state your first and last name in the organization that you're with. We're going to welcome folks to be able to come forward at this time, we're looking for those who are in support. Those in support. 30 seconds, please. First and last name. Hot damn. Rolling deep here today. My goodness. Come on up.

Hi, everyone. Darby Kernan, representing Leading Age California and Rediff in support of Secretary Moss.

Good to see you, Kernan. Thank you.

Good afternoon. Nevada Merriman with MidPen Housing. I'm here in support of Secretary Moss's confirmation. Thank you.

Thank you. Good to see you. Hey.

Good afternoon. Graciela Castillo-Krings. I am here on behalf of two organizations in strong support of the Secretary's confirmation for All Home and also for the California Housing Consortium. Thank you.

Thank you so much. Good to see you and good afternoon.

Good afternoon, Mister Chair and Members. Michael Gunning here, Lighthouse Public Affairs on behalf of Habitat for Humanity and for SPUR in support of Secretary Moss. Thank you.

Gunning. Good to see you. Thank you so much. Good afternoon sir.

Justin Garrett with the California State Association of Counties in strong support of the confirmation of Secretary Moss.

Thanks, Justin. Hey, good afternoon.

Good afternoon. Mister Chair and Members. Andres Ramirez, on behalf of Oakland Mayor Sheng Thao, Emeryville Mayor Courtney Welch and Berkeley Mayor Jesse Arreguín, as well as the Nonprofit Housing Association of Northern California, all in support.

Thank you so much. Appreciate it. Good afternoon.

Good afternoon. Danny Kando-Kaiser, on behalf of the California Low Income Consumer Coalition in strong support.

Thank you so much. Good afternoon.

Good afternoon. Tim Schmelzer with Wine Institute. Did you know that you also oversee the Department of Alcohol Beverage Control? I had a great opportunity to meet the Secretary, strongly support her confirmation. Thank you for listening to my tale of woe about the California wine industry, and we look forward to your partnership and getting ourselves back up. Thank you very much.

Good to see you, sir. Thank you.

Good afternoon. I'm Sarah Karlinsky. I'm the Research Director at the Turner Center for Housing Innovation at UC Berkeley. I'm speaking in my personal capacity and not on behalf of the University. And I'm speaking in strong support of Secretary Moss. Thank you very much.

Thank you. Good afternoon.

Julie Snyder with the Metropolitan Transportation Commission and Association of Bay Area Governments. We're sad to lose you in the Bay Area, but it's the state's victory, so thank you very much.

Well said. Thank you so much. Hey, how you doing?

Elizabeth Kim with PICO California in strong support.

Thank you so much. Good afternoon.

Good afternoon. Susannah Parsons here on behalf of Enterprise Community Partners and as a former staff member in strong support of the confirmation of the secretary.

Thank you so much. Hey, good afternoon.

Good afternoon. Kim Lewis representing the California Coalition for Youth, who has many members in the Bay Area, in particular Larkin Street Youth Services, who are here in support of the secretary's confirmation. Thank you.

Thanks. Good to see you. Good afternoon.

Good afternoon. Kathryn Charles here with Housing Action Coalition and the Bay Area Council in strong support. Congratulations.

Thank you so much.

Hi. Indira Mc Donald here on behalf of the California Mortgage Bankers Association in strong support of the confirmation of Miss Tomiquia Moss. Under her leadership this year in her role with the Department of Financial Protection Innovation, she has provided critical engagement with the industry on licensing issues and just keeping integrity and confidence in the mortgage market. So we are in strong support today. Thank you.

Thank you so much.

Hi, Emily Pappas. Niemela Pappas Associates on behalf of our client Sales Force. They are thrilled for you. In support.

Good to see you.

Mark Stivers of the California Housing Partnership and also speaking on behalf of Housing California today. We are thrilled to have a housing and homelessness expert in the business, consumer services and housing agency secretary position. Thank you.

Thank you so much, Stivers. Ladies and gentlemen, we're going to do a last call. A last call for those who may be in support. We're going to do a last call for those in support. If you could please step forward to the podium at this time here. Hearing and seeing no one rise, we're now going to welcome anyone who may be in opposition. If you could please come forward. We're now taking opposition comment in Committee. We're going to do a last call please. Last call for opposition. All right. Why don't we bring it back to Committee to be able to see if there's any additional comments or questions. Please. Mister Jones.

Thank you Mister Chair. Secretary Moss, you've done a great job today. Obviously you've got overwhelming support from the community. My vote today. I'm going to abstain today. This, I've got an article today from Cal Matters that I think Dan Walters has done. And on Monday the Assembly had an oversight Committee of Cal ICH. And I'm just going to read a quote from the Chairman of the Assembly Committee, Phil Ting. He said you and this is to the Director of ICH. Not to you, obviously, but for a Department that's under your purview at this point in time, you come to a Budget Committee and there's no numbers.

Phil Ting, a San Francisco Democrat, told Marshall. How many people have we helped? How many people are off the street? Because that's what the public want to know. What's the money been spent on? What's the $24 billion been spent on for the last four years? I'm going to abstain today on the vote, and I've voted no on confirmations before with the opportunity for people to prove me wrong. And so I want to give that disclosure again. I'm also going to make a recommendation to the Committee that we don't bring the full recommendation to the floor until we have that report that has been promised. And I believe that you'll bring it. I think that's something that this Committee should consider as we move forward. So I'll be abstaining today. Thank you.

Thank you so much Mister Jones. I appreciate that. Please Madam Vice Chair.

I move the confirmation at the appropriate time.

All right, we have a motion on the, we have a motion on the floor. Two follow ups before we go to vote. Madam Secretary. So again, Madam Secretary, you'll be following up with Madam Vice Chair.

Yes.

And that will be on the issue, on litigation. And then what I had said originally was 30 days in regards to getting the Committee report that would then be distributed to each of the offices. You believe a week from this Friday?

Yes.

Is when you'll have this to the Committee?

Yes.

Okay. Thank you so much. So we'll have that back, please, Mister Laird.

No, there was a - was there a second report back as well?

Yeah, the two. The one with Madam Vice Chair and then with their report coming back on them. I appreciate that.

And just to confirm, mine was on the CRD.

Yes, ma'am. Yes.

Thank you, sir.

Yeah, thank you so much. All right, we have a motion on the floor by Madam Vice Chair. Madam Secretary, can you please call the roll.

[Roll Call]. 4 to 0.

4 to 0. The confirmation passes, you'll be heading to the floor. Congratulations.

Thank you so much.

Ladies and gentlemen, we're going to be taking a five minute break. Five minute break. This is going to be a recess. Committee will be in recess for five minutes. In the meantime, we're going to be welcoming our Members from the Civil Rights Council. If you all want to be able to come forward, we welcome you. Thank you so much for your patience. Five minutes. Five minute recess. Senate rules will reconvene in 60 seconds. We're going to reconvene in 60 seconds.

All right, ladies and gentlemen, Committee, and those who are in attendance, again, welcome back. First and foremost, we want to say thank you so much to Mister Garcia. It's good to see you. Thank you for being here today, Mister Glater, thank you for both of you, for your service to the State of California.

What we're going to do is that we're going to provide each of you up to two minutes of opening comment. We welcome any acknowledgement of family and friends who may be here in the hearing room and or watching virtually.

What we'll then do is open it up for questions or comments from the Committee, and then we'll put it up for a vote. And again, we're grateful to both of you for your service. Mister Garcia, why don't we start with you, sir?

Yes, you have up to two minutes and I'll give you a 30 second prompt as you get close to the time. Floor is yours.

Thank you. Good afternoon, Chair Mcguire and Members of the Committee, thank you for the opportunity to testify regarding my appointment to the Civil Rights Council. It's an honor to serve the people of California in this role.

I have experience in the public, private, and nonprofit sectors, and I believe my varied experience will really inform me as chair of this body. During the 10 years as Director of investigations at Edison International, I personally investigated numerous allegations of discrimination, harassment, and retaliation.

I am now working for inner city Law center, where every day I focus on tenants rights and hopefully prevent evictions for my clients. And was really informative listening to the prior testimony, and I appreciate this body's really hard work trying to solve that issue.

It's a really important issue for the Californians as well as employment issues, and those issues are constantly evolving, and the Civil Rights Council will be ready to engage in statutory duties in an efficient manner. My goal as chair is to work in a collaborative manner and ensure all viewpoints from various stakeholders are considered.

I'm also committed to continuing our outreach and training efforts. Thank you again for the opportunity to serve.

Thank you so much, Mister Garcia, again, we appreciate your time today. Now, Mister Glater, welcome. I'll give you a 30 second prompt as you get close to the two minutes. The floor is yours. Thank you so much for being here, sir.

Thank you General Wire, and good afternoon, Members of the Committee. Thank you for the opportunity to provide this brief opening statement and respond to your questions related to appointment to the Civil Rights Council by Governor Newsom.

I'm a law Professor, have been since 2011, and prior to that was a journalist, and both of those have shaped some of my perspectives about ways to approach the council. It would be a privilege and an honor to serve the people of the state through joining the council, and I'm grateful to the Governor for the opportunity.

And it's been a real privilege getting to know folks at the Civil Rights Department. In the course of serving for more than 10 years in the legal academy, I've had the privilege of time to study the distribution of opportunities, especially, but not only educational opportunities.

Before becoming a law Professor again, I was a journalist and among other things, had a chance to write about discrimination and inequality.

So the council addresses issues that have concerned me for many years, and one reason I'm excited about the position is it affords the chance to go beyond study, to try to do something constructive, not to just offer critiques of statutory drafting or regulatory drafting, but to take a stab at it.

I admit it's a somewhat intimidating prospect as well. This is a remarkable moment to focus on discrimination, thanks to the increasing availability and use of technology to inform and aid all manner of transactions.

Technologies such as artificial intelligence or AI hold great promise, but also present risk in that they have the capacity to enable discrimination through complex and often opaque processes. The widespread use of AI means that this discrimination can occur in different contexts, from renting an apartment, to applying to a loan, to seeking employment, and in different ways.

This is a challenge to longstanding laws drafted before such technologies existed, and I look forward to learning more about them and helping to address them as a Member of the council.

As a lapsed journalist, I also look forward to exploring and developing ways to promote awareness of the council's regulatory activities, whether that's through hearings, reports, or other methods that complement and enhance the core rulemaking function. I hope to contribute to creating accessible plain language resources that help explain the regulations issued by the council.

30 seconds.

Thank you again for the opportunity to speak to you today, and for the opportunity by joining the council to serve my adopted state. And I look forward to your questions.

Mister Glenner, thank you so much. Appreciate it, and grateful for both of your opening statements. What we're going to do is we're going to open it up for the Committee to be able to ask any questions or comments. Why don't we start? Please, Senator Eggman, thank you.

My first question is just to both of you. It seems like neither one of you have served in a public agency before, so tell me how you feel like your private world experience is going to help guide you coming into the world of a public agency.

Want to go first?

That was a good move there.

Yeah, it was a race to see who could defer to. Thank you for the question.

One of the things that I have been studying for many years now is the role that the government can play in leveling a playing field and making opportunities more readily available, particularly to people who historically have not had access to the same kinds of opportunities.

So I hope that the attention that I've had a chance to give over time as a scholar will inform the approach to the kinds of issues that are going to come before the council going forward. Forward.

One of the luxuries of both being a reporter and being a law Professor is there's a healthy distance between me and the people regulating or litigating or whatever. So again, I'm repeating myself now, but one of the particular appeals of this opportunity is to try to put some of these ideas into practice.

And how did you go from journalism to a law Professor?

Oh goodness, that's a long story. Let me try to answer it this way, and please tell me if it's satisfactory.

There are a lot of similarities in the sense that as a journalist, one of the things I was trying to do is learn something complicated under absurd time pressure and turn around and try to explain it to a lay audience in as few words as possible.

And as a law Professor, again, we are trying to explain complex ideas to students with the idea that then they will be able to do the same thing themselves going forward. The virtue is there's more time, you can use more words. The downside is a lot fewer people read them.

I will say being in politics was my first, I think really deeper understanding of the press and journalism, and I thought, oh, it's a lot like politics too, right? You're trying to really figure out what is the problem, what are all the sources leading into that problem, what's the solution?

And then how do you explain it to people in a very short amount of time? That's right. Mister Garcia.

Yes, thank you. You know, I come from a background in the public sector. I've never served in this capacity before. Any type of appointment, governmental appointment. I have worked as a former prosecutor in state and Federal Governments. I do have that public sector experience as well as an Executive at Edison, the utility, and now to nonprofit.

And I really do think those experiences are going to really help inform me here as chair to address these issues in a balanced, thoughtful way with input from a lot of different stakeholders. Because I have been on the employer side as well as now as in the nonprofit side.

And I think it's important to look at all these different perspectives, and I think my broad experience will help inform me in that regard.

Okay. And I talked with my colleague from Kern county just about some of the questions she was asking to our last person. And, you know, if maybe some of the. Maybe some of the information were statements that came from people who were filing claims versus agency itself.

But do you have any thoughts about that, about what you heard? And is that what you thought you signed up for?

You mean in terms of the prior, the Cisco. I have no comment on that. Really? I don't know anything about that. Litigation. This is the first time I heard about it was today. I'm very interested to find out what that's about, but it's not within the purview of the civil rights council.

And so at this point, I don't think I would have any comment on it.

And just a point of clarification that was pointed to the previous nominee because she was over the CRD, and it is separate from the civil rights council versus the division that is the Department that she oversees. So. Thank you.

Of course. Thank you.

Thank you so much, Senator Eggman. Let's see, please. Madam Vice Chair.

Thank you. I am going to focus a little bit on AI, because I know we had a big conference with that, with the caucus this last week, and I know that it's something that is all over on Instagram and the Internet and everything else with movie stars being AI'd on the red carpet, that didn't actually happen and some other stuff that's been coming across my desk about using people's faces and children that really aren't their children.

And so I do have concerns about that. I know that it's going to be your guys Department that you're working on a regulatory package that would apply artificial intelligence driven decisions by employers. And I think it's good if we can manage it.

But I do have concerns on small businesses, like my colleague does, Senate pro tem, about small businesses trying to comply with everything that's layered upon. Layered upon layered of regulatory processes when you're a small business, small mom and pop, just trying to make ends meet.

What are some of the main objectives that you guys have with the artificial intelligence Subcommitee that you're putting together to promulgate these regulations, and what are the takeaways from your time in this Subcommitee?

Sure. I think that one's directed to me. It is?

Yes. I'm sorry, sir. No, no, no. You're off the hook, sir. Yes.

Well done. Thank you. Thank you. Senator, with respect, can I take the first part of your comment first about, with respect to impact on small businesses. Absolutely, sir. One of the roles that we should be playing is listener to different affected stakeholders who stand to be governed by regulations that we are supposed to be drafting.

So if we are doing our job well, and I think we all want to, we will be taking into account what the potential costs of the regulations are, what the implications of particular regulatory design choices are.

Mister Glater, can I have you pull the microphone a little closer? I apologize.

I'm sorry. Could you hear me? Yes. Okay. And also one additional point, and also that the, our role is to implement statutes already in existence, as opposed to making up out of hole cloth what the requirements ought to be.

So again, I hope that we will be mindful of the impacts of the regulations, not just on the groups that we are or the people we are trying to protect from possible discrimination, but also on those who have the burden of compliance. So I wanted to say that first, and I'm sorry, the second part of.

Your question, just on the Subcommitee, what are some of the objectives coming out of the Subcommitee that you guys have already discussed? And I guess the second part of that one is, what are your takeaways? Which would basically be the same question, I guess.

Sure. It's actually premature, I think, for me to answer that.

So I've been on the Subcommitee since our last meeting, and my understanding of where we are in the process is there will be draft regulations out for public comment relatively soon, and at that point, I will have more of a role as we take in all of the comments that I anticipate that we will receive.

But I have only been on or only been to, I think, a total of three council meetings so far, and that's where we are in the process.

I completely understand. Thank you. Thank you, sir.

Thank you, madam Vice Chair.

Please, Senator, thank you. I appreciate what you do. And I thought a lot of it might be technical or process wise. And how do you stand back and sort of feel like you can assess where there's discrimination or issues? For example, you know, I worked hard on my local county's bench.

There were eight men as judges and four women, and we were trying to move to equity. And when I drilled down first, almost every man was appointed and almost every woman had to run. So even that number reflected a greater inequity.

And I found out women were sort of subtly discriminated against in a process because for appointment, because they would have taken time off at times, maybe worked half time for time, and they couldn't compete against men that hadn't done that. So sometimes the discrimination is subtle, or it's something.

How do you feel like you have a background for looking at that in different issues and have it color your decision making? And maybe so that Mister Glater can't defer to you, I'll call on him first.

Okay, thank you for that question. In the context of. I think you're asking me about in the context of AI particularly, but.

Well, that's a manifestation, but in General, it's an issue.

Got it. Let me start. Start there and see if I can work outwards in preparation for speaking with all of you today.

I watched the hearing that the council had back in 2022 on artificial intelligence, and one of the presenters at that gave a terrific example describing an employer that turned artificial intelligence loose to find out what are the characteristics of employees who are going to stay at my business for a longer period of time.

And one of the factors was living near the employer, just where people lived. And the speaker pointed out that given the demographics of different communities and residential housing patterns, what that meant was it affected the demographics of the workforce. And so the solution was, well, we're not going to take that into account in deciding whom to hire.

So the challenge is identifying whether the criterion that you're using to make a decision about distribution of an opportunity is closely enough related to what you actually want, the employee or the tenant or whatever to do. Right.

Am I using something that is closely, sufficiently closely related to what the person is being hired to do, and then ensuring that the use of whatever that criterion is doesn't correlate with a protected characteristic, an aspect of the person's identity, that disaggregation is the challenge. I hope that's.

Yeah. And then how do you. Well, it's interesting because you're sort of examining the discrimination in terms of that disaggregation. Are there times when it's kind of odd, it's almost a technological response to technological discrimination.

Of evaluating discrimination, or evaluating disaggregation, or not having to rely on it technologically to get there?

My own personal experience?

Is there a time when your own personal experience or gives you an ability to analyze that in a way that might reflect a little.

Sure, I guess I'm a results oriented person, so I'm answering this. You're asking me about kind of almost an instinctive response to a disparity that I would observe and I would be worried about the result, about the outcome more than I would be worried about the process. By training, I focus on the process. That's much of what I learned.

I get it. But you were a reporter. Yes. And your instinct as a reporter will take you places that the process might not.

And you say, even though the process hasn't told me at the outset that there's something clearly at issue here, your instinct would tell you that, and then you put it in the process or get there. I mean, is there a way you weigh that back and forth?

Yeah, I guess I would look, if I'm talking about the employment context, I would look at the pool and I would look at the result, and I would ask myself, is there a way that I can understand how the entity, the employer got from pool to result that does not involve discrimination, or is the disparity sufficiently great, or have I heard something about the process sufficiently concerning that I think there's something wrong, and then I can go and look at the process and try to identify what's the source.

Right. What's generating that disparity.

You know, my sense. My reaction is that, you know, I spent 10 years at Edison investigating discrimination. And as a Director of investigations and my staff of a team of investigators, it's not an easy thing to prove in many instances, and I'm talking again on a macro level, stepping aside from AI for a minute, it's a difficult thing to prove what's in somebody's mind when they decided to do something.

So you're going to have to comment on this based on.

Thank you. That's what I was sort of trying to get at. But then, poor Mister Garcia has never been a reporter, so I cannot.

I never have. Yeah.

There could be some innocent explanations, or maybe not, but I think relying on data analytics is part of the answer, but it's not all the answer, because there's a lot of times there's false positives, there's rational reasons why a decision was made.

When you do dig deep into it, to your point, discrimination can be very subtle at times, be very overt, and it's a lot of gray in between. But relying on data analytics on its own can be maybe a useful tool to start looking at something, but it's not the answer.

You know, I always say when I interview people that I'll only talk about what I talked about in the meeting, but if you open a door, I'll walk through it. And there was just a door there a little bit.

And I think with both of you, and the last question here, and that is as somebody that, you know, when I was first elected to office, there were, I think, eight to 10 openly gay elected officials in the entire United States. And so I would know, I could just instinctively feel when, when something was happening.

So how do you deal with the fact that you both just talked about the analytical process, but you're dealing with an individual that probably has a fairly strong sense that they were discriminated against.

And if you were to talk to me about analytics, I would sort of sit there and think, hey, I know it when I see it. I saw it. How do you translate to a person that's involved in this in a way that they feel like they've been heard or their experience isn't validated in what they have felt?

Well, you know, part of it is you have to go through this process again.

You look at the data analytics that points you in a certain direction, but you have to dig, you have to get the facts and each case is going to be different and you have to go get the facts, including talking to the person who's alleged to have been discriminated against.

Make sure that person feels heard, make sure that person understands that their voice, their version of the facts has been really listened to and analyzed. And you have to really look at this methodically, because somebody may feel they've been discriminated against and firmly believe it, but the facts may not bear that out.

So you've got to be really thoughtful about the approach. Look at all the facts and then the totality, not just in isolation.

I actually really appreciate your response. Anything you want to add on that?

Just very briefly, I think I already alluded to the importance of listening. And so listening to the lived experience of whoever is describing the experience that they felt was discriminatory is incredibly important.

And showing a degree of empathy for that experience, even as I think instinctively both of us as lawyers are thinking about, okay, how do I translate that lived experience into whatever the law requires, whatever standards have to be met?

Okay, thank you. I really appreciate these exchanges. I think that we are probably looking, I can't totally speak for the others to know that somebody's thoughtful. They're not having a knee jerk response, they're going to go after things. And I think you've given us a good sense that that's where you are. So thank you very much.

Thank you.

Thank you Mister chair. Gentlemen, I'm noticing on both of your education backgrounds that you've either attended the University of California or received honors from the University of California or the CSU system. I'm a graduate of the CSU system.

Thank you, Senator Laird, let's turn it over to Senator Jones, please.

Two of my kids are graduates of the CSU system. All of my kids have attended community college in California. I believe that there's a civil rights crisis right now in our higher education, and none of this is in the background. It was just as I was looking through your resumes. It inspired this thought.

I don't know if you, you know, when you're all coming to us, we get a lot of background material on you. I don't know if you get background material on us or not. It might be a good idea.

No, not quite.

But I've been very critical this week and last week of the University administrations across California and across the country that have allowed their campuses to be overrun with, put simply, civil rights violations, but to the point where they've lost control of their campuses, they've had to call in police support, either from the local police departments or from the state to regain control of their campuses.

I think the most upsetting example for me is UCLA. I've never been to UCLA, but I have friends and close friends that are graduates of there, and the campus in areas have literally been destroyed. And it's going to take multiple millions of dollars to restore some of these campuses back to where they should be or were before.

How do you respond to that when you're looking at this coverage? Or maybe you've experienced it yourself? Maybe you visited a campus in the last couple of weeks or not. If you want to speak to that, certainly share whatever you'd like to.

But I want to get some insight into how you think those situations have been handled and what if things have been handled well? Why? And if you would do things differently, why?

Let me just say that I'm a graduate of UCLA law school and also graduated from Cal State Los Angeles, and I think Cal State system is a great system, gives students a lot of opportunities, opens a lot of doors, and I'm also actually an adjunct there now.

I teach freshman class, introduction to criminal law, have a big affinity to the Cal State system, gave me a lot of opportunities. I think some of the issues that have been prevalent in the media in that regard are, you know, issues that are complex.

And I know that in terms of the Civil Rights Council and its jurisdiction and purview, I know there are, we have a Subcommitee working on facing students the State of hate. I know we're working with one of our submembers. Our Subcommitee is working on that.

And I'd like to hear what they're doing and how they're going to move forward on that issue. But it's something that I believe that Subcommitee is looking into.

Sure. So I've taught at the University of California, Irvine. I've taught at the University of California, Los Angeles, and I'm now teaching at the University of California, Berkeley. So I'm not a product of the system, but I've certainly benefited greatly from its existence.

I like to tell my students that they are proud members of the greatest public University system in the known universe.

So just where I come from in talking about this issue, I want to emphasize what David, just Mister Carrillo, excuse me, Mister Carrillo just said that we are, there is a Subcommitee that is planning a hearing down the road looking at civil rights issues confronting students. So it's an issue that we're attentive to.

And I guess the last thing I want to say is when I talk to my students, I am deeply concerned about how divided our campuses are. I am deeply concerned about the level of anxiety that our students are experiencing at this point in time. Being a student is already enough work, enough of a challenge.

These incredibly polarized times are an additional layer that are not going to contribute to that experience. They are going to add a layer of anxiety, a degree of stress.

Let me be maybe a little bit more direct, because I'm not an attorney, but both of you are. I've played one on judiciary a couple of times on TV.

So, you know, the First Amendment is rallied a lot in these instances on these college campuses that the students have a First Amendment right to make the protests that they're making or make the displays that they're making or participate in the activity that they're participating in?

I would argue, and I'm a huge First Amendment proponent and supporter and protector, I think. Does the first amendment give one student the ability to impede another student from attending class?

Does the First Amendment, is it so strong that a group of students can interrupt a graduation program and upset the rest of the folks that are in that graduation ceremony?

Or is the first Amendment so protected and so strong that a small group of students can shut down the campus entirely and prevent students that the classes have to go online for the remainder of the semester and that the graduations are canceled altogether, remembering that this class of 2024 is the same class that in 2020 had their graduations canceled because of COVID and did, that's a separate editorial on my part.

Did the government overreact then, which I think my state, my position on that is very clear. As a Member of this council, what kind of leadership role can you take in these instances to properly communicate what the First Amendment does allow and does not allow in these instances?

And I think more directly, I'm interested to know is, do you think the administrations in these instances should have stepped in sooner and stopped these? I'm not going to call them protests because they weren't protests. They were active acts of disruption. I'll leave it at that. I'll leave it at that and then let your response.

I appreciate it, and I know you guys are brand new to this, but it's important going forward what kind of leadership we're going to have on this council, because we're going to have more of this.

I think you've identified some really important issues, and like I've stated earlier, I'm really going to try to put an emphasis that we have some outreach and the Subcommitee work on the State of hate. I think it's timely and we should get working on that as soon as we can.

Given our limited resources, I hope we can devote some time to that quickly, get to that issue efficiently, because like you said, it's a complex issue.

It's a wide range of issues here that need to be really explored, and I don't think I can comment specifically about, the only thing I've read is in the news, the press, and I don't have any specific information about any of these processes individually other than what I've read in the news.

So I don't think I can really comment on any specific instance at this point.

So if I might address the question. Thank you, Senator. I'm also, I repeat, very concerned about our students right in a polarized moment, feeling very, but feeling very intensely about.

The issues that they're addressing, you know, to that point of being concerned about them. I'm glad my children are graduating. If they were on campus right now, I would be on the campus with them. That's how concerned I am about it.

I'm a believer, but sounds like we are both believers in free speech and the right of the students to express their views, to show how strongly they feel about the issues that they're addressing. The policy on responses to the on campus protests or potential disruption. Fortunately, not my responsibility.

I don't envy the folks who have to make those difficult calls, balancing the competing interests of supporting right, freedom of expression on the one hand, but protecting the rights of the other students to a safe space to learn on the other hand. So I'm really reluctant to. Was it Monday morning quarterback.

What the other, what decisions have been made? I've never been in that position. I do not aspire to be in that position. One benefit of service on the council is we are implementing statutes that the Legislature has given us and that's our purview.

And that again, is why the interest in hearing from students and other stakeholders about the civil rights issues that they are concerned about at this point in time.

Thank you. And I'm done. I think what I was looking for was specifically one person's rights of expression ends when that expression becomes violent and or causes property damage. That's what I was, that's where I'm at on this situation.

Thank you so much Mister Jones. Appreciate that. I'd like to see if there's any additional comments or questions that we have for the Members at this time hearing. Seeing none, what we'd like to be able to do is open it up for any individual of the public who would like to be able to speak in support.

We're looking in support of Mister Glater. Mister Garcia, if you would like to speak in support, if you could please step forward to the podium. We welcome you. If you could provide your first and last name and the organization that you're with, we respectfully request that you keep your comments at 30 seconds.

We're looking for those who may be in support. Come on down. All right here and see no one rise. We're now going to look to those who may be in opposition, those who are opposed. If you could please come forward to the podium. First and last name and organization, let's bring it back to Committee.

Gentlemen, again, we are grateful for your service and thank you for being here today. We truly appreciate your hard work and let's just be honest, it's a really challenging times and we're grateful for that. We'd like to be able to see if there's any additional comments or questions please. Mister Jones, thank you.

I just want to encourage you as you move forward in this position, because it is a new position for both of you to use your leadership as a voice, especially if you're teaching on the campuses. These students today need leadership and they need direction on what their constitutional rights allow them.

I think many students don't even have a concept of what they're allowed to do, but also what they're not supposed to do, and I hope that you'll use your voice in that manner. Thank you.

Thank you so much. Mister Jones, quickly, Mister Glater, would you.

Like to respond just very, very briefly, if you don't mind. Yeah, please. 30 seconds. Thank you. One of my concerns is that the law is not necessarily the answer here. Right. I have not taught first amendment yet.

I have told my dean I think I need to teach first amendment just so that I can be a functional person in this climate. But part of the challenge is really promoting the conditions under which our students can have a civil discourse about something about which they vehemently disagree.

I and my colleagues have been talking a lot about how do we promote the conditions for that, how do we model that, how do we teach that. So I appreciate the spirit in which the comment was given. Thank you. I'm sorry.

No, you're good. Thank you so much, Mister Clinton.

Please, can I do both of them together? Yes, please. Then I would move the confirmation of both David Garcia and Jonathan Glater to the Civil Rights Council.

Appreciate that. Please do we have a motion to approve for you?

We have a motion, a motion to approve Mister Garcia and Mister Gladder at this time, we're moving both together. Madam Secretary, can you please call the roll?

[Roll Call] On call.

That is a 3-0 vote. 3-0 vote. Will remain on call. Gentlemen, again, thank you. Truly appreciate the opportunity. Thank you for your testimony today. And we're going to keep this on call as the Vice Chair is in another meeting and she'll come back and add on. Thank you so much. Appreciate it.

Thank you so much. We're going to take a 62nd recess, 62nd break. We're going to welcome, please, our next nominee to be able to come forward. We'll be right back with you in 60 seconds.

Open it back up. All good. All right. We want to welcome Jonathan Porat to Committee. Thank you so much. Mr. Porat, we're really grateful that you're here today. You are up for confirmation as the chief technology officer in the Department of Technology. Senator Laird is going to have some questions on his iPhone for you.

They're going to be oral.

Okay, there you go. And Jonathan gets the jokes all the time. He said, let's just move on. So we welcome you. Truly, thank you. This is an incredibly important role in the State of California. And let's just be honest, State of California doesn't do anything easy.

And there's nothing small and there's a lot of stress that comes as a position where we truly appreciate your service to the people of this great state. We're going to provide you with one to two minutes of testimony. We're going to have you welcome any guests, family, friends that may be here in the room or online.

Please advance those welcomes. And then we're going to open it up to be able to have a conversation with Committee. Jonathan, the floor is yours. And thank you so much for being here.

Thank you. President Pro Tem and Senators, my name is Jonathan Porat and I want to thank you for your consideration of my appointment as State Chief Technology Officer. First, I would like to thank Governor Newsom for this appointment, as well as Secretary Tong and Director Bailey Crimmons for their support.

I would also like to acknowledge and introduce my family who are in the audience today to support me. I especially want to recognize my wife, Arielle, for her continued support, my parents, Ron and Diane, and my brother Andrew. Being part of today's hearing is a humbling experience for me.

Throughout my career, I have been dedicated to public service, not just at the state level, but also as part of the Federal Government's Executive office of the President and at the City of Seattle, I am proud to have continually found ways to leverage innovation and technology to make government more responsive, accessible, secure, and inclusive for everyone.

As I am being considered for this significant position, it is important that I acknowledge the many partnerships that continue to promote the state as a national leader in technology, I value the collaborative environment of the state's technology community, including the state's AIOs and CIOs, our counterparts from the Governor's office, and our technology services teams.

Moreover, California's success is greatly influenced by the invaluable relationships we have built with our community, academic and industry partners. I look forward to collaborating with everyone to mature and sustain our innovation culture at the state. This means committing to digital services that transform the way we do business and empower our stakeholders. Our goal is to focus our technology on residents to directly benefit every Californian.

I am committed to our stakeholders and to finding ways to improve the state's technology and government services by promoting innovation through the adoption of best practices, modernizing the state's technology, designing policies and platforms that empower our partners to innovate, and improving the resiliency of the state's technology, platforms and services.

This concludes my opening remarks, and I look forward to answering your questions.

Thank you so much. Thanks for your patience and for hanging out with us. And so we got Ariel here. Nice to meet you. And we got mom and dad right here, and nice to see you. Thank you so much for being here. You must be incredibly proud. So let's open it up for questions or comments, please. Senator Eggman.

Again, this is my last year, and every project I've been involved with, every Committee I've sat on, we've had issues with technology, right? Big technology. Big IT projects. Delay, delay, delay, problem, problem, problem. Breach, breach, breach. Why do you want this job?

Well, first, someone has to help Senator Laird with his iPhone, or else the entire state will come to a halt. So I want to make sure we're able to do our, our government business.

No, we haven't voted yet.

But thank you for that question. And it's a really important question. And one key part about this role is this role really is focused on technology. So to way oversimplify, what I work on at the state and the Department of Technology is I manage kind of the strategy, the offerings, the platforms behind our technology.

And then we have a very qualified Deputy Director that manages kind of the enforcement, the compliance, the control agency aspects. And one thing that I learned when I came in this role is that those teams had been largely separated and siloed. So the technology team was coming up with really innovative ways to help our residents.

The control agency team was making sure that we're utilizing state resources correctly and we're following all of these rules, but we weren't actually talking together. So I'm really proud to have started to break down some of those silos.

So now we have technologists as part of that review process for projects or budget control papers or different concepts that the state is interested in conducting. So one of the things that I'm most excited about is really building technology strategy into the way that we manage things like projects and our budget moving forward.

And I think by focusing a little more on what are the needs of Californians? How do different projects, products, technologies relate to those needs? And how can we create a standard and consistent approach across the state to meet that? We'll be able to really hone in on those things.

That would have become a big, hairy project because the technology piece was not in conjunction with the actual project management piece.

Okay. And so you're also talking about using technology to plan for the technology and integrating all those things.

Absolutely. One of the things that we've done with our office of project delivery is we've worked with them to build automated tools, to build dashboards so we can actually analyze the immense amount of data and better use their expertise when it comes to project management in an actual data management function.

So we're able to use information, we're able to look at more specific types of information at once to help them make decisions and analyze things across the state, instead of just managing everything on a case-by-case basis.

And how with our, I don't want to say not overuse, but our very high level of dependence upon data. We shouldn't do anything without data. How do we make sure, especially with the use now of AI, right. That's going to help us be able to use a lot and get a lot more data.

How do we ensure, what are the controls around safety for that, for us as a whole state?

Yeah. And one thing that I'm really proud of is we're looking at that comprehensively. So there are technology and cybersecurity controls that are very important to us.

One thing that I think you all are aware of is that our state data center security requirements are at the close to or at the highest level that the Federal Government recommends.

So when we have data within our infrastructure, it's classified, it's encrypted, we're able to track it, and we ensure that you're not able to do business with the state or you're not able to engage in a project unless you're able to meet that really high bar.

On the other side, we also want to make sure that people are using those data correctly. So as the barrier decreases, to be able to ask questions, analyze data, we want to make sure that people are being able to acknowledge potential biases that might be in the data, potential statistical errors that might be in questions that folks are asking.

So we're thinking about that both in terms of what are those hardline security restrictions that we need in place to protect our residents, as well as how can we train, ask questions, facilitate some creative thinking so that we're not locking ourselves and having the data trick us into a false positive or a wrong solution.

And how, what's your plans, if any, on working with local governments? Right. I mean, we are the state, but we get a lot of our data from local governments, who oftentimes don't have a level of sophistication that we have at the state and how do we make things, and I'm thinking, like, especially during COVID, right. People had to get fax machines because there was just no way to communicate. What are your thoughts about that?

I really appreciate that question because as I mentioned in my opening remarks, the state really is a national leader when it comes to technology, and we have strong relationships with the Federal Government, with the General Services Administration, the Department of Homeland Security, the Department of Commerce, the White House, as well as our local, county municipal governments.

At the state, we meet with security and technology groups of all of the county and city level, CIOs and CTOs, and we also do a lot of outreach directly with cities who are looking to solve some of the technology problems that we have.

One thing that has been really interesting for me to watch is that we've taken an open source approach to a lot of the tools that we develop, meaning that we securely put the code out in the open so that other governments can utilize the hard work that we've done. So you mentioned COVID.

Our team developed the digital vaccine record during that time, and we put that out, and we're able to see successfully other states, cities, other governments be able to utilize that to add capacity to their team where they may not have as many strong technologists that we do at the state, just based on our scale and scope.

So that's something we're definitely going to continue to do. And especially with some of the areas that you mentioned, data, AI, technology, and security, becoming even more of a pressing issue. We're going to continue to prioritize that engagement, not just above us with the Federal Government, but also with our partners at the municipal and county level.

Thank you, Adam, and I'm glad you're so excited about this.

Very excited.

Thank you so much. Please, Senator Jones, we'll go to Senator Laird.

I'm going to shock my colleagues. Sometimes government does stuff very well, and I'll give you an example. So I used to work in the auto industry, in sales, and I know DMV can be a hassle.

And I've heard rumors that some of their computer programs are 40 to 50 years old, and there's only three guys in the whole state that know how to fix it when it breaks down and blah, blah, blah.

But there was a project a couple of years ago that went almost entirely unnoticed, except for those of us that have some auto sales experience. And it was that DMV, there was a bill that authorized DMV to print and process paper plates on new vehicles when they're purchased at the car lot.

And prior to that, you had to wait for your. I mean, you still have to wait for your real plates to show, but you got. Prior to that, you got a little piece of paper that went in the window.

But somehow DMV realized, or somebody told DMV, you're missing out on a certain dollar amount of tolls that aren't being collected for the six weeks that new cars are on the road without their permanent plates.

So DMV or somebody came up with a great plan of making this new paper plate system that they literally developed and put into action in less than six months, I think. Maybe a year. A year to six months. Six months to a year.

So obviously, the government can do these things when they want to, but the examples of things that they've dropped the ball on are fiscal breeze. And the next thing that's worrying us, me, EDD has its next IT project at a price of $1.2 billion.

And this is just a general discussion, I think, more than a pointed question, but how can one agency roll out something so quickly in six weeks or six months to a year that works and functions, and really, as far as I know, has had very few flaws or bumps in the road or anything else, but when we spend $1.2 billion, we can't get it right.

Thank you for both a rare positive example from this side of the panel, as well as your question. And I mentioned some of the ways that we're trying to improve the ways that we're managing these large projects and really focusing on some of those outcomes. There's also work we're doing to really try to invoke a development mindset.

So doing more testing, really focusing on the problem space so that we're not purchasing a solution before we're sure how it's going to work and solve the issues that we're looking at completely.

One thing I do want to highlight, though, is one thing that my teams work on is trying to find those alternative funding mechanisms to promote innovation and innovative projects where they come up. So I'm fortunate to manage our teams, we call them our critical services, teams that manage the state's technology modernization and technology stabilization fund.

And that allows us to do a more streamlined and provide an alternative funding source for smaller scale innovations. Not necessarily part of that program, but similar to what you spoke about at DMV, where we have a really good handle on the technology, there's a lot of solutions out there, but our process, which is really built for these larger programmatic engagements, may not fit as well.

So I'm really looking forward to being able to continue to manage that program and find more ways that we can highlight and advance innovation at the state so that when we have big projects like EDDNext, we're working across our agency, across the state, making sure we're getting all the feedback we need.

But when there are really smart ideas like fixing the way that we provide paper license plates, we can enact that faster and don't necessarily need to be weighed down by the enormous weight of some of these larger projects.

Do you think that there's a, or maybe there is, and I don't know this. On some of these projects, does the state put out RFPs, requests for proposals, or requests for qualifications to developers, to companies that can do these things rather than develop these systems ourselves? Salesforce was in here earlier and testified.

I mean, it just seems like to me as powerful as, and I'm just using them as an example because they came up today, so they're top of mind. Do we do that? Do we offer private companies to bid on these projects?

So I can't speak towards the specific procurements behind the EDD projects or a particular department, but in general, the Governor has announced a new procurement vehicle that really gets at exactly what you're talking about, Senator, which is called a request for innovative ideas.

So rather than starting with prescriptive requirements, we're starting from the problem space and building a challenge-based procurement. So we're coming out there asking the whole community, it could be the academic community, it could be community partners, it could be industry, to tell us how would you solve specific problems?

And then they can come back with those solutions. And what's even better is we have testing and evaluation built in.

So before we spend all that money upfront, we're able to review and see did the solution actually do what it said it could do, could we pilot it to make sure that given the extensive scope and scale of our systems, the complexity of our data that we know this system will result in the way that we're expecting?

So I hope that that's something that we can leverage moving forward to really focus more on those outcomes that you're discussing.

And we can still utilize some of our preexisting procurements for areas where we have a long history of either we know there's a vendor, be it any company, who can solve that problem, or we have a really good idea of what that technology would look like.

When will that new system roll out?

It's already out there and we're already using it.

Thank you so much. Thank you, Mr. Jones. Let's go to Senator Laird.

I think most people, Senator Eggman asked our first question for each of us. So that was good and it's been a good conversation. I think I have one question, and that is, as you know, the Governor is going to release his budget on Friday and it's going to be horrible.

And I know you're doing a rate assessment process in the Department to see if you know the rates can carry the Department and you're not going to have to go to General Fund money or at least lessen the reliance on it. What's the progress on that study and how do you see it coming out?

Yeah, I'm really glad you asked that because we do have a state data center report coming out soon. Last year was the first year that we engaged in that report and the focus was more on identifying what was the situation. What do we really consider as risk factors?

What are things that we think we can control that can make a difference? This year you're going to see some of those strategies and some of the analysis from that identification. And then we're hoping next year to be able to demonstrate that we've been able to find those significant cost savings.

So in the meantime, we've been looking really critically at our business model and thinking about our service catalog and trying to decide are these still the services that benefit the state the most? Are these services that will be able to drive revenue through the chargeback model that we have?

And so we're going to be thinking about how can we realign the way that we provide technology at the state to better meet market trends as well as the demand from our clients, and use that information to make sure that we're setting ourselves up, not just to stabilize the situation that you mentioned now, but to help sustain ourselves for the future so that we're not stuck in a situation where we have outdated business models or outmoded technology structures that don't exactly relate to the way that our clients or other state departments are looking to engage with us when it comes to providing technology infrastructure.

It may be just a wonky, quick follow-up. And that is that when you do that chargeback structure, there's a bunch of departments that aren't on the General Fund fully or CalTrans does it off of gas taxes and other things.

Is there any way that your charges sort of go differently to places that are on the General Fund or have independent revenue sources? Or do you just have to have this completely vanilla charge system that goes for the services to whoever's buying them, regardless of what they're funding source is?

So I'm happy to answer any specific questions on a specific department. But generally, we try to have generic rates so that we can provide the same level of service to all of the state departments. We don't right now price discriminate with departments based on size or volume or anything like that.

I appreciate it. Thank you very much.

Thank you so much. Senator Laird, I'd like to be able to see if there's any additional comments or questions from this Committee. All right, what we'd like to be able to do is open it up for any individual. Who would like to be able to speak in support of Mr. Porat, we're looking for those who are in support.

If you could please step forward to the podium. We're looking for your first and last name in the organization that you're with. If you could please step forward at this time.

And Mr. Chair, we always presume the family's in support.

That's what I'm saying. Yeah, exactly. Nice. That's right.

I like it. All right, we're going to see if anyone is opposed. If you could please come forward at this time. I think that Senator Eggman will be coming forward and saying, what the hell is wrong? I like it. I would like to be able to see if there's anyone opposed.

All right, let's bring it back to Committee. Thank you so much for the conversation today. We wish you the best of luck. We're looking forward to working with you. Your success is the state's success. So thank you. We'd like to be able to see if there is.

All right, we have a motion by the good Senator from Santa Cruz, Senator Laird. Let's call the roll.

[Roll Call], on call.

On call, 4-0 vote. Congratulations. Little premature because we had to close the roll, but thank you so much. And again, we look forward to working with you. We're going to call Senator Grove. Thank you so much. And to the family, thank you very much for being here today. Thank you.

All right, ladies and gentlemen of Committee, we're going to figure out where Senator Grove is, and we're going to call her down. And what we'd like to be able to do is we do have a very brief executive session. So why don't we do this? Let's do a quick recess for two minutes.

We're going to get our paperwork together and we'll be right back with you with a game plan. Be right back. All right, so, ladies and gentlemen, what we're going to do is we're going to recess into executive session. We're going to come back and take final votes on any missing members on those open session items.

So this time we're going to recess into Executive session. We'll then come back and have Senator Grove add on to those open session votes. All right, we'll be back with you here in just a few moments, we're going to start executive session.

All right, welcome back. We're going to come out of recess for the Senate Rules Committee and take up some remaining votes that are on call. We're going to start with item 1B and C. Garcia and Galater for the Civil Rights Council. The current on-call vote is 3-0. Madam Secretary, can you call the missing numbers?

[Roll Call]

That's a 3-0 vote. The motion passes, those individuals will be heading to the floor. We're now going to be looking at item 1D, 1D. Mr. Porat, for the State Chief Technology Officer within the Department of Technology. Current vote is 4-0. Madam Secretary, can you please call the roll?

[Roll Call]

5-0 vote. That motion passes. Thank you so much, ladies and gentlemen. Thanks for your patience. Grateful. And May 29 will be our next hearing. I would bring your sleeping bags because it's going to be a long one. So thank you so much. We are going to be adjourning.