Senate Floor

Secretary, please call the roll.

[Roll Call].

Members, a quorum is present. Would the Members and our guests beyond the rail and in the gallery please rise? We'll be led in prayer this morning by our chaplain, Sister Michelle Gorman, after which we're going to ask you to remain standing for the Pledge of Allegiance to the flag.

And let us center ourselves in God's presence, and on this Harvey Milk Day, we pray, Merciful God, grant us the grace to follow the example of our brother Harvey Milk, that we might fearlessly contend against evil and make no peace with oppression.

May we employ our freedom and our privilege in the maintenance of justice in all our communities and among the nations. We pray to be agents of change and proclaimers of the hope that will never be silent. We ask this in your name, you who have called us to walk in love together. Amen.

Members, join me in the pledge. 'I pledge allegiance to the flag.' All right, Members. We're moving to privileges of the floor. I want to take this opportunity to introduce Senator Hurtado's husband, Gerbet Hikinbosh. Welcome to the California State Senate. All right now, Members. We're moving to messages from the Governor. They will be deemed read.

Messages from the Assembly will be deemed read. Reports of Committee will be deemed read, and amendments adopted. Motions and Resolutions and notices: now is the time to remove any bill from the calendar today from the file. Seeing no Member wishing to do that, we're moving on. Now we're on consideration of the Daily File. Senate Second Reading. Secretary, please read.

Assembly Bill 347.

Second Reading complete. Now we're moving to Senate Third Reading. Members, are you prepared? We have a full agenda today, and we'll be starting with File Item 56 by Senator Caballero. She's prepared. Secretary, you may read.

Senate Bill 1420 by Senator Caballero, an act relating to energy.

Senator Caballero.

Thank you, Mr. President. Members, California has some of the finest educational research institutions, the most ambitious climate goals in the country, and the highest number of electric vehicles and residential rooftop solar in the country. California has invested billions of taxpayers' dollars in these industries in support of our climate change goals.

However, we still require a diverse set of solutions to ensure California can actually achieve our carbon reduction goals by 2045. Despite robust investments, some hard to decarbonize industries will be unable to continue to operate and decarbonize in time without necessary policy changes and support. And the institutional research that's being done has supported this.

The shipping industry, including the port operations, heavy trucking, aviation, and heavy industry all need pathways to meet our state's goal. Additionally, as we transition to a zero carbon economy, we have an obligation to include high road employment opportunities and economic development for our state's workforce.

And I know you've heard me say numerous times that the number one issue in my district that people talk about is the ability to be able to earn a livable wage, a good earning capacity, and to be able to buy a house and provide for their families. Let's be clear.

The California Air Resources Board, after much research and analysis, determined in their 2022 scoping plan that California could not attain its climate goals to decarbonize without utilizing hydrogen as a fuel source. CARB quite clearly states that California cannot reach its emission goals without expanding hydrogen production by 1,700 times the present rate of production. 1,700 times.

That is where SB 1420 comes in, a hydrogen bill that would establish the highest emission standards for hydrogen in the world. It expressly prohibits resource shuffling during production and requires the annual carbon intensity of the produced hydrogen fuel to be equal to or below that of our energy grid.

Collectively, the bill ensures the continued decarbonation of hydrogen fuel while maintaining protection against emission impacts. The definition of qualified clean hydrogen now explicitly prohibits hydrogen produced from fossil fuel feedstocks and meets specific emission reduction limits as determined by the California Air Resources Board, or CARB, aligning with California's environmental sustainability goals.

Specifically, SB 1420 requires that on a statewide basis, at least 60% of the hydrogen used in transportation be renewable by 2030 and by 2045, in line with our current statutory goal of a zero carbon economy, the remaining 40% must be a mix of renewable and clean.

The amended definition explicitly includes electrolytic hydrogen produced from RP's eligible resources, emphasizing the importance of renewable energy sources in hydrogen production. SB 1420 would also consolidate the definitions of hydrogen into a single definition for qualified clean hydrogen projects, ensuring clarity and consistency in the eligibility criteria for CEQA and permit streamlining.

I want to be very clear and emphasize that the bill does not allow any project to proceed outside of the CEQA process or have any impact on the public's ability to provide comment and input on each individual project. SB 1420 would enable California to meet its goals, allow a transition in the aviation, heavy truck duty, trucking and maritime industries away from diesel and jet fuel to a cleaner, locally produced product that would not only decarbonize the fuel but eliminate the production of air pollution contaminants such as sulfur oxides, sox, and nitrous oxide, or nox.

SB 1420 would also enable California to leverage the $1.21 billion in federal funds from the Inflation Reduction Act awarded to the Arches Coalition for a hydrogen hub grant by unlocking private sector investment estimated to bring $10 billion into our state, creating jobs, economic development, and underserved community and new energy resources.

And folks, if you'll remember from our budget discussions, one of the areas that California saw a decline of was investment in new products in the state. The ability for companies to go public and the ability for them to bring in private investment is what has hurt us over the last two years.

This bill would allow us to re-energize that sector. In conclusion, the bill, as amended, fulfill the commitments I made in both the Senate environmental quality and Senate energy committees, and I want to thank all of the stakeholders that have been meeting with me over the past year and as well as the consultants for their input and language.

Hydrogen is a critical part of California's transition to a zero emission transportation and energy system. I agree with the California Air Resources Board and the California Energy Commission that by expanding hydrogen production, we can better decarbonize industries, make our energy grid more reliable, stabilize costs for consumers, and create high road jobs to transition workers to the new green economy. I respectfully ask for your aye vote.

Thank you. Any further discussion or debate on this item? Senator Newman.

Thank you, Mr. President. I rise in support of the measure. I want to commend the author for her approach, which is a very practical and pragmatic set of policies that will be necessary and will enable California to meet its very ambitious set of clean energy goals. And these goals, as she noted, are especially in line with CARB's scoping report and other findings.

I want to emphasize that the bill does respect CEQA, it does allow for public input, it emphasizes high road employment and leverages the $1.2 billion that the Department of Energy recently awarded California for the Arches program, which will catalyze up to $50 billion in new market activity around clean energy. For those reasons, I urge your support today for this measure.

Thank you. Any further discussion or debate on this item? Senator Becker.

Thank you, Mr. President. I just want to say I really appreciate the author's work on this, and I think it's absolutely vital topic and have had a couple bills on the topic as well. We've been in conversations. I have a couple specific things I'd like to, I think, see going forward.

We do have, as I think if you know, by 2045 we're supposed to be net zero. And I think currently there's a requirement for 60% clean hydrogen in 2045. So I think there's probably some balance that, and I think I've got some specific suggestions around the carbon intensity standard. I think that could help us clarify that when we get to 2045 that we have the majority of clean hydrogen, or at least require the same carbon intensity standard.

So we look forward to continue working on this, maybe staying off the bill today, but I think it's a vitally important topic and I think we can hopefully get there going forward.

Thank you. Senator Stern.

Thank you, Mr. President. I guess I would echo my friend from Palo Alto and some of his outstanding questions, but I think it's worth noting that the author, whether it's here in Sacramento, in tough forums within the UN, and basically anywhere she's invited, she's been open and working with stakeholders in a way that we can all sort of refer to rhetorically and say, I'm working with all parties. I really trust her that she's going to be working on this legislation going forward.

That definition of clean, this big question mark of whether California is in fact going to double down on what I consider a misguided effort for this light duty future to have, and no offense to the Mirai drivers out here, but this push for light duty vehicles to somehow become a never ending subsidy I think is a misguided effort. However, those of you who live near any port or near any industrial facility in California know that something's got to change and we have to keep making things in California.

We're not just going to shut down industry. We're not going to just shut down our refineries. We're not going to stop doing business. And so I truly view, especially in the industrial context and the context of our heavy duty fleet that's literally killing people right now, that we've got to find a way to.

Yes, I know this bill still needs work and it doesn't yet have my full support today, but I think this author is up to the task of getting us to a place where we don't just default to the state of existing law, to a state of confusion, or even just to the Federal Government, but in fact, to a framework here that California can put our stamp and say this is the California way.

We're going to see ourselves to a green hydrogen future. And I think this bill is a meaningful step in that direction. Unfortunately, I won't be able to support today, but I do think it earns the merit to move forward. And I hope that as it comes back and as we work through the process, that I'll be able to cast that aye vote. So, thank you.

Thank you. Any further discussion or debate on this item? Hearing and seeing none. Senator Caballero, would you like to close?

Look, Members, we can continue on the path that we're on right now. 2035 will get here and we won't have met our goals. And as a matter of fact, the socks and knocks continue to get worse. And we have the worst air quality in the south coast air basin and also in the Central Valley. People are dying. And if they're not dying, they're getting really sick. Or what we can do is we can believe in what science says.

The Arches collaborative is made up of our best and brightest from our universities, as well as entrepreneurs that have put the money where their mouth is and that are in a position to help us get rid of waste that we have in our community and to do it in a way that's responsible and that will help us to meet our climate goals, reduce air quality, and create good jobs.

If none of that is important to you, then don't worry about it, don't vote for it today. But the Arches project brings in $1.2 billion of federal IRA money. And in order to build, they need at least $10 billion in private equity.

And we have funds that are coming to California that are saying we want to invest because we know California produces the best. So we're at this precip. We either move with due deliberate intelligence, or we just let it go and say we're not going to do anything, and we'll continue to exacerbate the situation that we see globally.

The exciting thing about these projects. Well, and let me just say that part of the challenge is we have to use that federal grant by 2030. The plant, whatever the facility, whatever it is that's being built, has to be built and operational for two years or the grant does not pay out. So think about that.

How many of you know of a construction project that got done in three years when they haven't even pulled the permits yet and there's no expedited process? Doesn't happen in California. We gotta move. And what I will commit to you, and I've spoken to my good friend from Malibu, is we gotta get this right.

Which means all hands on board working on it. I have taken tons of amendments that do what I think we want to do. And two committees that were tough to get through that gave me a charge about what I needed to amend in order to be able to get their sign off. And we've done that. That's not easy to do in an industry that's new. So this is a really important time. This really is our opportunity to seize the moment. I have traveled internationally and had an opportunity to look at different projects.

And I can tell you the whole world is looking at California and they're saying, what are you guys going to be doing to meet your energy needs, and how can we work together in partnership? We need to be there. We need to be in a position to be able to act. And so I respectfully ask for your aye vote.

Thank you. All discussion and debate having ceased, Members, we're going to go through the roll one time because we have Members off the floor, and then we're going to put those items on call. Secretary, please call the roll on file item 56.

[Roll Call]

We will go through the roll one more time. We have a full house. Secretary, please call the absent Members.

[Roll Call]

Ayes 30, noes one. The measure passes. Now, Members, we're moving on to file item 44. Senator Archuleta, he's prepared. Secretary, you may read.

Senate Bill 1081 by Senator Archuleta. And accolades to vehicles, Senator Archuleta.

Thank you, Mister President. My colleagues, today I am presenting Senate Bill 1081, which will establish optional driver's license legislation in California. In doing so, California will join over 40 states and territories that utilize DMV to effectively ensure that residents comply with federal selective service requirements.

Specifically, Senate Bill 1081 would allow a person that is required to to be registered under the federal Military Selective Service act and who submits an application for the driver's license, identification card, or renewal through the DMV will be deemed to have consented to registration with the United States Selective service system.

However, an individual who does not wish to be enrolled with the selective service will be given the choice to opt out of the registration. Senate Bill 1081 would automatically and additionally prohibit the DMV from making or distributing a list of those who did not consent to the registration.

Recent amendments were taken to exempt undocumented Californians from the Bill, delay implementation and condition that the Bill, upon receiving federal funds in an amount sufficient to pay for all initial startup and implementation costs. It is legal it is a legal requirement that most all males register with the selective service between the ages of 18 and 26.

Men who fail to register with the selective service cut themselves off from future benefits and opportunities. If they do not register between 18 and 26 years of age. Men permanently become ineligible for all federal jobs as well as federal job training programs, including those funded by the Workforce Innovation and Opportunity act.

Failure to register may additionally cause delays in citizenship application for immigrants who do not have and did not register. California currently has one of the nation's lowest rates of eligibility residents who have signed up for the selective service. As of October 2023. The selective service system estimates that only 74% of eligible Californians have registered.

In contrast to other large states, including New York, Texas, Florida, that have implemented driver's license enrollment, they've reached the enrollment rates of over 90% with the implementation of FAFSA Simplification act.

There is sufficient concern that the gap between California and states with driver's license legislation will widen if action is not taken to increase registration levels for states like California. FAFSA was a significant tool for making young men aware of their legal obligation to sign up for the selective service.

With the tool now gone, it is important that California implements and implements Senate Bill 1081 and joins the overwhelming majority of states that have streamlined the registration process. California must take action to ensure that our residents do not disproportionately make themselves ineligible for jobs and benefits because of our inability to enroll people through the DMV process.

I respectfully ask your I vote and thank you for your time.

Any further discussion or debate on this item? Any further discussion debate?

Senator Durazzo, I just want to make my concern very, very simple. It should not be the role of the State of California to facilitate the select service registration. This should be the role of the individual to do so and of the Federal Government to promote it as needed. So I will not be supporting.

Thank you. Any further discussion or debate on this item. Entertain none. Senator artillery, would you like to close? I respectfully ask for your. I vote. Secretary, please call the roll on file item 44.

[Roll call]

[Roll call]

Aye. Secretary, please call the APPC Members.

[Roll call]

Eyes 23, noes to the measure passes now, Members. We're moving on the file. Item nine. Senator Min, are you prepared? Yes. Secretary, please read Senate Bill 1126 by Senator Minn. Inaccurately into child abuse and neglect.

Pass on file.

He's going to pass on file. All right, Members, we're going to file. Item 15. Senator Becker, he's prepared. Secretary, please read Senate Bill 935 by Senator Becker, enacting to crimes. Thank you. Senator Becker, the floor is yours.

Thank you, Mr. President. Rise to present SB 935. This is a kind of simple common sense measure. Addresses a loophole in statute regarding peace officer testimony. In a recent case, a detective with over 20 years of service resigned from LAPD before reaching the age of 50, making them ineligible for retirement status.

The officer was called back to testify at a hearing, but because the discrepancy currently in statute, the judge was unsure whether to admit the witness. This would address this problem by allowing honorably separated law enforcement officers with the requisite experience to also provide such testimony. I respectfully ask for an aye vote.

Any further discussion or debate on this item? Hearing and seeing none, Secretary, please call the roll on File Item 15.

[Roll Call].

Please call the absent Members.

[Roll Call].

Ayes: 38; noes: zero. The measure passes. Now, Members, we're moving on to File Item 17: Senator Nguyen. She's prepared.

Secretary, you may read.

Senate Bill 1478 by Senator Nguyen, an act relating to healing arts.

Senator Nguyen.

Thank you, Mr. President. Animals in shelter doesn't have a voice, so we will, and we have to be their voice. SB 1478 simply provides guidance to veterinarians who practice in animal shelters by outline, basic but essential elements necessary for the proper and safe care of these animals that are being housed in these animal shelters. This bill puts on the record common sense practice veterinarians are trained to utilize. With that, I respectfully ask for an aye vote.

Any discussion or debate? Senator Newman.

Thank you, Mr. President. I'm proud to be a co-author of this bill. This is one of two bills the author brought in response to a grand jury report and other reporting that highlights the abysmal conditions in California's animal shelters. Passing this bill is not only good for pets, it's a validation of our concern for those pets and a commitment to the values that we show as the Legislature. I respect the urge an aye vote.

Thank you. Any further discussion? Hearing none. Senator Nguyen, would you like to close?

Again, SB 1478 will provide basic guidance to improve the management and operation of animal shelters in California. And I appreciate and thank my colleague, Senator from Fullerton, for being a co-author and for championing the welfare of animals. I respectfully ask for an aye vote.

Thank you. Members, this is eligible for unanimous roll call. Is there any objection to applying the unanimous roll call of this item? Hearing none. 38 ayes, zero noes. The measure passes. Now, Members, were moving on to file item 20. Senator Newman. He's prepared. Secretary, you may read.

Senate Bill 1372 by Senator Newman, an act relating to aviation.

Senator Newman.

Thank you, Mr. President. I rise to present SB-1372, which would ensure equal access and consistent fair treatment at the airport security checkpoints for all travelers by limiting the expansion of so-called third-party expedited screening services unless they operate in a dedicated security screening lane.

Some of you, especially the Members of the LA delegation, might recall a controversy earlier this year which involved brokers buying up tee times at area public golf courses on behalf of clients who were willing to pay extra to play golf on public courses.

As a member of the city's Public olf Advisory Committee put it, this is a public good. It would be like if someone took over a public swimming pool and said there would be surge pricing to swim in it.

When this practice in LA was exposed, the local media attention was intense, the outrage was immediate, and the response was appropriate. The LA Department of Recreation Parks launched an investigation and subsequently installed controls to prevent future similar abuses.

And as the spokesperson for the Rec and Parks Department put it at that time, at the end of the day, it's not right, it's not fair. This Bill, which has gotten more than its share of attention, actually revolves around the exact same principle.

In the aftermath of 9/11, a massive security system was developed and installed at our nation's airports to prevent another similar catastrophe, so far successfully. The cost of building and operating that system was borne by taxpayers across the nation, rich taxpayers, poor taxpayers, and in between taxpayers.

It stands to reason then, that everyone should be treated the same by that system if and when they have to travel. Unfortunately, that's not currently the case. At nine of California's busiest airports, travelers paying a fee to a private company are granted line cutting privileges at the expense of those who don't pay such a fee.

This is, I think you'll all agree, not fair. It's also something that can easily be fixed.

So CLEAR, the company which runs this very profitable concierge traveler service, and the association representing California's airports, which enjoy a share of the profits generated by the CLEAR system, claim they lack the influence to persuade the Transportation Security Administration to amend its processes to allow for a dedicated lane for travelers who pay for the service.

This is clearly not true. Delta Airlines recently launched just such a service called Delta One, which offers premium travelers expedited access to airport screening without intersecting with any other line.

All that this Bill seeks to do is create a sufficient level of shared motivation between CLEAR and its airport partners to petition TSA to do the exact same thing. We have a letter to the Secretary of Transportation and the Secretary of Homeland Security urging them to do exactly this.

And to be clear, no pun intended, this Bill is not about banning or even harming CLEAR, its employees, its customers, or any of its partners. This is not an attack on free enterprise or the profit motive either.

This is simply about finding a better basis for conducting the operations of expedited screening programs like CLEAR so that those who participate can enjoy the benefits of membership, I'm looking at you Members, without adversity affecting those who do not.

In that spirit, as a result of negotiations facilitated by the Chair and agreed to by CLEAR. Amendments were taken and senate transportation. CLEAR has removed its opposition. In the post-9/11 era, travel has become a gauntlet of challenges and burdens in so many ways.

By passing SB-1372, this body will have made those challenges just a little bit more bearable and a little bit more fair. I am respectfully asking for your help in doing just that with your aye vote today.

Thank you. Senator Cortese.

Thank you, Mr. President and Colleagues. I rise in support of SB-1372. I just wanted to clarify and perhaps reiterate, because some of it was covered in the author's remarks that the Bill, this Bill was amended significantly, amendments were taken in transportation Committee that changed the Bill dramatically from where it started off.

The Bill would have been disruptive, I believe, and I think most of you would have had the same reading when it was first put in print in terms of the current use of CLEAR, the current contracts and existence of CLEAR at airports where there are agreements in place right now.

Instead, the Bill was amended so that if there was an agreement in place at the airport before January 1, 2025 this Bill has no effect whatsoever.

So those customers, your constituents, my constituents who are currently using CLEAR at airports in California, will not be disrupted by this Bill because this Bill reaches out to those airports that are not yet under contract and essentially puts a moratorium unless they're able to follow the direction of the Bill, which is to set up the separate line.

With that, I urge an aye vote. Thank you.

Thank you. Senator Seyarto.

Thank you, Mr. President. I speak in opposition to this Bill because the Bill simply is not needed. I think the author made it clear what this is about, n1o pun intended again, and it's line cutting is not fair. The Legislature should not be used because line-cutting is not fair.

This is no different than TSA Pre, but what they do is they use biometrics to make sure that your identity is the same person that is on the ticket, and that's it. And then they walk you up, you go over to the TSA line, and you go in and get your stuff screened.

TSA is the people that are in, that's a federal government, federal agency. They're in charge of deciding what lines should be available for people to walk through. This is an intrusion into the federal government space. It's not delaying customers at all.

It provides 600 jobs for people, and I hope they can expand and provide 600 more jobs for other people. So for me, I've been to, obviously, a lot of us fly every week, and there has never ever been an instance where somebody getting CLEAR has delayed what I'm doing in TSA Pre and made my day worse.

So, you know, the premise that somehow it's not fair. Well, if it's not fair, then they should do away with TSA Pre and put us all on the other line, because it does exactly the same thing. They are just responding to a market. If there wasn't a market for it, it wouldn't exist.

And if the TSA administration didn't feel that it was warranted, they wouldn't have it. They wouldn't allow it. So with that, I would say that this Bill, because of the premise in which it was drawn up, is not about fairness to other people in line.

It's about somebody cut in front of us, and that's not a good idea. That's not a good reason to bring legislation forward. So with that, I would ask for a no vote on this and put this baby to bed. Thank you.

Thank you. Any further discussion or debate on this next item? Hearing and seeing none. Senator Newman, would you like to close?

Thank you. Thank you for those robust comments. Let me make one point and I'm resisting the urge to make the pun, but to be clear, CLEAR is very different than TSA PreCheck. TSA PreCheck is a trusted traveler program. You pay dollar 78, it gets you five years of eligibility.

What that does is it runs you through and verifies that across a whole bunch of systems that you are, in fact, a safe traveler. And therein lies the basis for that expedited line for TSA PreCheck. CLEAR does no such thing.

All it does is match your ID to your identity, and it is not, in fact, connected to any of the systems that actually ensure that we're safe when we travel. That's one of the reasons why among the supporters of this Bill are the Flight Attendants Union, who have every reason to be fearful of another 9/11 situation, and the TSA Employees Union, who in addition to the safety concerns, are just as exposed as anybody to the frustration that the line cutting causes.

So I say to my colleague, who's never been party or witness to any of this, you got to travel more. And you'll notice that especially in some of the crowded airports, the frustration levels. I'm looking to my colleague here from Santa Clarita, who's nodding his head, are really high. And to the question, you know, what about fairness?

Should we legislate fairness? We do it every day here in the Legislature. So this Bill is about creating an incentive shared by the CLEAR company and the airports simply to go to TSA and say, hey, allow us to make money reselling access to a public service, but do it in such a way that it's not adverse to the average traveler. Who either can't afford that or cannot do it.

I respectfully ask for your aye vote today.

Thank you. All debate having ceased, Secretary, please call the roll on file item 20.

[Roll Call]

Please call the absent Members.

[Roll Call]

Ayes 25. No is 6. The measure passes. Senator Newman, we still have you on a roll and schedule. You have File Item 47. We're going to take a pause for the calls real quick.

Senator Portantino, can you state your vote on 1372? Was that Portantino no? 1372. Members, we're going to ask you to stay calm, stay put for a few minutes as we fix this technical glitch we got going on. All right, we stand corrected. Ayes 25, noes seven. The measure passes in regards to file item 20. Now we're moving, one second. All right, we're back at it. We're now. Next up is file item 47. Secretary, please read.

Senate Bill 1164 by Senator Newman, an act related to taxation to take effect immediately. Tax levy.

Senator Newman, floor is yours.

Thank you, Mr. President. A less emotional issue this time. I rise to present SB 1164, which would defer the property tax assessment on a newly constructed ADU for a period of 10 years or until the property is sold, if the homeowner attests that the ADU will be used for housing.

Over the past decade, the Legislature has adopted a series of measures in relation to adus intended to reduce barriers that have been identified as hindering the pace of ADU creation across the state. Those barriers, which include administrative, zoning and other issues, have been, for the most part, on the municipal or the supply side.

Where much less has been done and where this bill is focused is on the demand side of the equation. Incentivizing homeowners for whom an ADU may be a good investment, but to whom the finances may seem daunting.

When a new addition to a home or an ADU is built, the newly constructed portion of the property is immediately assessed at 1% of the value of the square footage just added, an amount that is then appended to the property owner's next yearly property tax bill. As a typical example, an ADU assessed at a value of $300,000 would incur an immediate property tax increase of $3,000 per year.

The prospect of such an increase, especially on top of the expense and complexity associated with the construction of an ADU, appears to serve as a substantial disincentive for homeowners, particularly working class homeowners, to build ADUs, even if they might otherwise reap the benefits over a longer term.

By pausing the property tax increase associated with the construction of ADU, owners will be incentivized to increase the overall production of ADUs across the state. Such an allowance will better align market forces with the state's broader housing goals by enhancing an individual homeowners cost benefit considerations as they relate to considering the construction of an ADU.

In addition to the work that this Legislature has done removing administrative hurdles to construction ADUs, we should also lower real and perceived cost barriers so as to make ADUs a more appealing and feasible option for middle and working class homeowners.

SB 1164 was amended in sound appropriations to reduce the property tax waiver for new adus from 15 to 10 years, and the bill will sunset in five years. This bill has strong support from the California Association Realtors and the California Apartment Association, who agree this could be an important additional mechanism to accelerate housing production across the state. I am respectfully asking for your aye vote today.

Thank you. Any further discussion or debate on this item? Any further discussion or debate? Hearing and seeing none. Secretary, please call the roll on file item 47.

[Roll Call]

Please call the absent Members.

[Roll Call]

All right, final count. Ayes 29, noes six. The measure passes. Now, Members, we're going to move to our Safer California Bill package. I want to recognize the PT. Floor is yours.

Mr. President.

Mr. President and Members, I thank you for this. Colleagues, I rise today in support and to kick off the presentation of the bipartisan, the bipartisan Safer California Plan, which will be presented here this morning. Senators from both sides of the aisle have come together to advance a series of 15 bills.

This data-driven policy package will help curb--can help curb California's fentanyl crisis and the rising rates of retail theft and community-based crime. Ten of the bills are focused on expanding evidence-based prevention and treatment solutions aimed at the deadly fentanyl epidemic, impacting countless individuals and families, the other five bills that are going to help prevent, deter, and prosecute retail theft and community-based crimes that have impacted the safety and quality of life in communities big and small across the Golden State.

Today, what we're going to hear is about real solutions that address acute challenges impacting California. This critical policy package will help make our state safer, it's going to help make our state healthier, and it's supported by law enforcement, firefighters, and Smart Justice. And just today, several big city mayors.

And as I said early on, none of the Senate's theft bills would mean revisions to Prop 47, ensuring we never repeat the mistakes of the past. Mass incarceration is not the answer. Not today, not ever. And this package would advance strategic enhancements implemented on specific retail and community-based crimes.

The passage of the Safer California Policy Package will mean more Californians who are fighting addiction will get evidence-based treatment, setting them up for a healthier future, and it builds upon more than a billion dollars, more than a billion dollars that this Legislature has invested to expand programs for enforcement, public health, and community-based education.

And the retail theft package bills on more than 100 million dollars worth of investment by the State of California that has been made in the last several years to help law enforcement tackle retail theft, that includes 85 million dollars for local police to crack down on theft, along with six million dollars on ongoing funding for the CHP to increase their presence in local communities. I'd like to wrap it up right here and turn it over to the authors with this: a thank you.

You know, it's not every day where--in this nation--where Democrats and Republicans can come together, and I'm grateful. I'm grateful to Leader Jones for his partnership in this. And I want to say thanks to every member of the working group who spent the greater part of their year last year advancing this evidence-based approach.

With permission, Mr. President, I'd like to be able to recognize those working group members, including Senator Skinner, Senator Umberg, Senator Eggman, Senator Roth, Senator Wahab, and Senator Wiener.

I also want to say thank you to our bipartisan group of authors who will be presenting here today: Senator Wahab, Senator Roth, Senator Ashby, Senator Cortese, Senator Min, Senator Newman, Senator Ochoa Bogh, Senator Skinner, Senator Umberg, and Senator Wiener. Californians, they deserve a united approach to tackling these challenges, and the Senate is doing just that. Colleagues, I respectfully ask for an aye vote on the Safer California Plan.

Thank you, Mr. President. Now we're going to move on to our first item under this package. It's File Item 30 by Senator Roth.

Secretary, please read.

Senate Bill 1385 by Senator Roth, an act relating to medicare.

Senator Roth.

Thank you, Mr. President. Before I get to the matter of the bill, I'd like to make a couple comments. I was privileged to serve on the fentanyl working group with many of you sitting on this floor, and I don't have to tell you that fentanyl is the latest opioid crisis that's plaguing our country and this great state and has been for decades. And it's decidedly the most dangerous of all of them.

It's easily produced in labs and probably in garages, and is more powerful, more addicting, and more dangerous than any other opioid. Sadly, over 150 people die every day from overdoses related to synthetic opioids like fentanyl.

As a former air force officer, my sense of duty extends even beyond the general public to our men and women who serve our great country and the military, I'm sad to tell you, is not immune to the rising fentanyl crisis. Parents of soldiers, airmen, Coast Guard personnel, sailors, marines, space guardians now.

They're not exempt from the fear their child could die from an overdose. I remember reading an article in the Washington Post last year that stated that the army lost 127 soldiers to fentanyl between 2015 and 2022. That's more than double the number of army personnel killed in combat during that time.

When we say that many of these policies, these fentanyl policies, are evidence-based, we mean it. Some here have spent months meeting with the nation's top experts, and they agree that expanding treatment is more effective, much more effective, in reducing crime and addiction than incarceration.

Now, to be clear, we need to be tough, and law and order is important. That's what we are about in the military, the rule of law. But if we want long term results, we need to rely on what's working, not temporary fixes. Doing the right thing is often not the easiest thing to do, but doing the right thing is 100% what we need to do in this case. And the right thing is to look at the problem of substance abuse as a whole and build support systems for those who are truly suffering.

Studies show the vast majority of people will accept treatment when it is easy to access and offered in a convenient location. That's why this approach is designed to intercept people where they are, in emergency rooms, in jails, prisons, in courts, and connect them to treatment. And connect them to treatment now.

We also have proposals to incentivize more medical providers to treat addiction, expedite the construction of treatment sites. And we intend to continue to push for an increase in the number of medical and behavioral health workers in this state to do the job. People with substance abuse disorders need treatment, not punishment.

And drug use disorders should be approached with a demand for high quality care and compassion for those affected. Again, let me be clear. California law already lets us throw the book at drug criminals. What we're proposing here is a new chapter for those suffering from addiction.

It's the right approach, and I'm proud to support it, but it's also just the beginning. We don't plan to stop working on this issue until our state is safer for all Californians. Now, with respect to the bill, it's Bill SB 7 1385.

It's part of our Safer California policy platform, and it requires Medi-Cal managed care plans to create a billing pathway for substance abuse navigators placed in the emergency department to build the Medi-Cal program under the newly implemented community health worker benefit.

In order to sustain these substance abuse navigators, who are very, very important in steering people to substance abuse treatment, a funding source is needed, and this bill creates that funding source by allowing the substance abuse navigators to build a Medi-Cal program for services provided to a Medi-Cal recipient during emergency department visit or as an outpatient follow up to an emergency department visit. Respectfully ask for an aye vote.

Any further discussion or debate on this item? Any further discussion or debate? Hearing and seeing none. This is eligible for unanimous roll call. Is there any? No, we don't have 39. Okay, so we need a roll call on this one, Members. Secretary, please call the roll on file item 30.

[Roll Call]

Ayes 39, noes zero. The measure passes. Now, Members, we're moving on to file item 75 by Senator Wahab. She is prepared.

Secretary, you may read.

Senate Bill 1319 by Senator Wahab in accolade to behavioral health

Senator Wahab.

Thank you. SB 1319 will direct the Department of Healthcare Access and Information, the Department of Public Health, and the Department of Healthcare Services to receive and process applications for behavioral health treatment facilities more efficiently. This bill will not change the application requirements, but simply directs departments to coordinate related application processes to expedite approvals.

SB 1319 is a part of the Senate's Bipartisan Safer California plan, which includes an evidence-based approach to the fentanyl crisis that increases access to treatment. Skilled nursing facilities, or SNFs, serve an elderly and or disabled population, most of whom are either MediCal or Medicare beneficiaries or both.

There's also a segment of SNFs that provide behavioral health services in addition to traditional SNF care to residents that have co-occurring behavioral health needs in addition to their physical nursing needs.

There is a significant demand for behavioral health SNF services, but it can be challenging for SNF providers who wish to expand or convert existing SNF facilities to provide behavioral health care and skilled nursing services in addition to the physical facility modifications that are required to offer SNF behavioral health services.

The process for obtaining the necessary approvals from the multiple state departments that regulate different aspects of the process can be time consuming and delay the provision of much needed services in the community.

SB 1319 will streamline the process for expanding and converting a whole or a part of the skilled nursing facilities to behavioral health facilities by reducing the amount of time needed for facilities to obtain the necessary approvals from state agencies to be a licensed and operating MediCal provider.

I do also want to highlight that our fastest growing substance abuse victims tend to be older Californians, and as much as possible, we need to provide the resources that they need to get the treatment that they need. Thank you.

Any further discussion or debate on this item? Any further discussion or debate hearing and seeing none. Members, this is eligible for a unanimous roll call. Is there any objection to applying the unanimous roll call on this measure? Seeing nonen. Ayes 39 Noes 0. The measure passes. Next up is Senator Wahab with file item 69.

Secretary, you may read.

Senate Bill 982 by Senator Wahab, an act relating to crimes.

Senator Wahab.

Thank you. I rise today to present SB 982, which is part of the Senate's Safer California plan and Governor Newsom's retail theft package. This bill simply eliminates the January 1, 2026 sunset to sustain the crime of organized theft permanently.

Despite the likelihood of underreported retail theft, especially low value theft data shows a 29% jump in reported retail theft from 2019 to 2022. Aside from big retailers, many small businesses are suffering the consequences of organized retail theft and oftentimes do not have the same resources to protect themselves.

In California, nearly half of small businesses are owned by racial and ethnic minority groups. When retailers are affected by these crimes, they typically make up those losses by raising prices, reducing hours or closing their stores completely, ultimately impacting other consumers and the community as a whole.

SB 982 will ensure organized theft remains a crime to give prosecutors and law enforcement the effective tools they need to combat organized theft. SB 982 is a bipartisan effort that will keep our community safe by making sure law enforcement can respond to the crime of organized theft. I respectfully ask for an aye vote.

Great. Any further discussion or debate? Senator Niello.

Thank you. Thank you, Mr. President. I rise as a joint author in support of SB 982. As a result of the Hoover Commission hearings held last year, I learned, number one, that this bill, originally authored by Assembly Member Jones-Sawyer, was going to be sunsetting.

And the district attorneys in my area here, both my district and close by, found this to be a very useful tool, as was very well articulated by my colleague from Hayward. And so I sought to eliminate the sunset also.

I introduced a bill that turned out to be identical, and my colleague from Hayward graciously welcomed me onto her bill so that we don't only have one doing the same thing, but it is a very valuable tool for local law enforcement that otherwise would go away shortly. I urge an aye vote.

Thank you. Any further discussion or debate on this item? Hearing and seeing none. Senator Wahab, would you like to close? She's no longer there.

Senate Bill 1416 by Senator Newman, an act relating to crimes.

Senator Newman.

Thank you, Mr. President. I rise to present SB 1416, which is also a component of the Senate's Working Together for a Safer California package, and which creates a set of escalating enhancements for middlemen found guilty of profiting from the sale, exchange, return, or attempted resale of items obtained through organized retail theft.

Organized retail theft operations often involve multiple people collaborating in a coordinated effort to obtain stolen merchandise from multiple stores in order to aggregate the amount of stolen goods for eventual resale. In recent years, organized retail crime operations have increasingly targeted specific types of merchandise with high resale value and for which there is demonstrated demand.

One very problematic byproduct of the intersection of the power of social media and the growth of online marketplaces is the ease with which individuals and syndicates can seamlessly coordinate the activities of others to steal, consolidate, and then resell stolen goods, often at levels of scale, which have begun to compete with the legitimate businesses from which these goods are often stolen from in the first place.

The enhancements created by SB 1416 will add another set of tools to support the work that the Legislature is doing in this area as part of the Working Together for a Safer California package. By enhancing the criminal penalties associated with organized retail theft, SB 1416 will better safeguard California's businesses by deterring those who would stoop to profit from it. I am respectfully asking for your. aye vote today.

Thank you. Any further discussion or debate? Senator Rubio.

Thank you, Mr. President, ladies and gentlemen of the Senate. I also stand here in support of SB 1416, and I just really want to commend the author and all of those that are working collectively on these public safety packages. I know that our communities have been struggling for a while. Just want to share one particular instant.

I have an individual in my community who's been arrested almost, I think it's 14 times at this point for the same exact crime, and our communities are struggling not being able to do anything about it. So this bill in particular is very valuable, not only as a community member, but to public safety.

And I think it's about time that we give them the tools they need to be able to tackle this problem. And this in particular is organized retail theft, which is really harming our businesses. On behalf of our businesses and public safety in our communities, it was much needed. So with that, I also ask for an aye vote. Thank you.

Thank you. Any other Member desires to speak on this issue? Seeing none. Senator Newman, you may close.

I appreciate the comments of my colleague from Baldwin Park, and I respectfully ask for an aye vote.

Members, this is eligible for unanimous roll call. Is there any objection to applying our unanimous roll call to file item 55? See none. Ayes, 39, noes zero. The measure passes. Next up is file item 68 by Senator Skinner.

She's prepared. Secretary, you may read.

Senate Bill 950 by Senator Skinner, an act relating to reentry.

Senator Skinner, floor is yours.

Thank you very much. Very pleased that SB 950 is part of our Safer for California Package. We know that the vast majority of those who we have incarcerated in our state prisons go home, and when they go home, we want them to be successful in that reentry, and we do not want recidivism.

So in 2015, our Department of Corrections launched a program called the Male Community Reentry Program. Now, there's also the female community reentry program, but these are collectively known as CCRPs, and what CCRPs are are facilities in the community where a person who is still in custody under CDCR, but they are in a program for one to two years before they're released that provides much more focused rehabilitative services and really assists them in being successful at reentry.

And in fact, the data shows that those--so far--those programs, the recidivism rate of MCRP residents is about a tenth of those who are just released from our state prison without that--without having participated in such a program.

Now, one of the benefits of an MCRP is that we can--we, the state, can enroll those individuals in things like Medi-Cal so that we can fully take advantage of CalAIM, and in CalFresh and in other supportive, other benefits programs so that there's a seamless transition. Once they are released, they already have--they're covered by Medi-Cal, they have their health care, they have food benefits.

They have the things they need while they get their feet on the ground and succeed. Now, we know that many of the folks that are rereleasing from CDCR have substance use disorder. And while they may be clean, for example, while they're in the MCRP Program, they need those supports.

They need either continued substance abuse support programs or they need maybe the medically assisted treatment. Those variety of things can be provided to them through Medi-Cal, and through CalAIM further, we even have the ability to provide, for a very temporary transitional time, housing supports.

So what this bill does is directs CDCR, to the extent possible, pre-enroll the residents in our CCRP programs into all those programs that I described, those benefit programs, and so that we can maximize their use and thus maximize the success.

And this does have a direct impact on our fentanyl addiction problem because those with substance use disorders, if they do not have the continued support they very commonly--and this is people across the board, regardless of what your circumstances--you fall back in to your addiction.

The additional thing that SB 950 does is create a working group within our Department of Corrections, our BSCCs, and our Department of Aging--our meaning that's our Social Services Department--to look at ways to create additional reentry facilities for those with advanced age and with disabilities. With that, I ask for your aye vote.

Thank you. Any further discussion or debate on this item? Hearing and seeing none, Members, this, too, is eligible for unanimous roll call. Is there any objection to applying unanimous roll call to File Item 68? Hearing and seeing none, ayes: 39; noes: zero. The measure passes. Next up is Senator Skinner again with File Item 46. Secretary, you may read.

Senate Bill 1144 by Senator Skinner, an act relating to business.

Senator Skinner, floor is yours.

Thank you. Again, very pleased that SB 1144 is part of our Safer for California package. In 2022, SB 301 was signed into law, and it is established regulations for online marketplaces. And let me preface this with, you know, we all know, increasingly, goods are purchased online through the Internet. We do it. Everybody does it.

And, you know, if people are buying their goods online, then you can imagine that online sales are also increasingly becoming the source for retail thieves to use to, in effect, fence those stolen goods. So the purpose of that original law, SB 301, was to require online marketplaces to validate the legitimacy of the sellers so that we could help reduce this use of our online services for selling stolen goods.

So it required the seller, high volume sellers, to show that they had a business license, that they had a tax ID, various things like that, that most thieves don't like to, you know, don't like to have track record with government. Now, the bill has been very effective.

It's working great, but it works most effectively when the seller has the transaction for the sale directly on the marketplace, or rather on the platform. So, in other words, if I'm buying that good than I am paying through that platform, and the seller is getting the money through the platform.

Now, what we've seen is a very large rise in what's called online marketplaces, where the seller advertises the good and I, the buyer will say, zero yeah, I want that good, but I don't make the cash transaction actually through that platform. I might do it through PayPal or through Venmo or something like that.

I'm not using that platform. So what happens there is those sellers are not being required to legitimize that they are legitimate sellers. They're not giving tax ID, they're not showing that they have business licenses. So we, what's happened is, you know, thieves are clever.

They're moving many of their sales of stolen goods over to the marketplaces that don't have these requirements. So what this bill does is put very comparable requirements onto the online marketplaces for their sellers, high volume sellers, and we need it because we need to disincentivize these organized retail theft operations. And with that, I ask for your aye vote.

Any further discussion or debate on this item? Senator Jones.

Thank you, Mr. President. Members, retail theft in California absolutely is a problem and I appreciate the steps that we're taking this morning to begin addressing that issue.

In contrast to some of the comments that have been made this morning, I do believe that Prop 47 does need a complete overhaul and some reforms that would be beneficial to all Californians. But this bill, specifically SB 1144, I have voted no on this bill in Appropriations.

I believe that there's still some concerns about the bill, specifically federal law, some details of the enforcement, and details of how the online platforms are going to comply. But I got a very compelling, I received a very compelling letter from my District Attorney in support of the bill.

So that this morning I'm prepared to abstain on a vote on this bill, watching how it moves through the Assembly, and hopefully have a bill that I can fully support when it comes back for concurrence if it does. I just thank you, Mr. President, for the time this morning.

Thank you. Senator Dahle.

Question to the author, Mr. President.

Senator Skinner, will you take a question?

Yes.

What is considered a high volume seller? I couldn't find the number. Is it a dollar number or item number?

It's a dollar number. Apologies while I look for that. It is both the dollar amount and the number of transactions. It's 5,000 minimum and 200 transactions over the course of 12 months.

Okay, thank you. I wanted to know what that number was.

Thank you. You satisfied? All right. Any additional questions or concerns or comments on this measure? Hearing and seeing none. Senator Skinner, would you like to close?

Thank you. In addressing the issue of why do we need to go after the entities that are selling large amounts of these stolen goods? I'll give you a great example. Some of you may have seen this newspaper article where a wealthy couple from San Diego area were busted by the FBI.

And some, I think, their local law enforcement was also involved. And they were an organized retail theft ring. They themselves didn't go to any store and steal anything. They employed low income people to steal things for them, which they then unloaded online.

So the point of that story is, and they actually, when they were busted and the newspaper article showed it, there were many email and text messages where they were directing these low income people, like, go to Sephora. We need this much. We need this kind of thing.

So, you know, here's all the Sephora locations. We need, you know, this kind of makeup or, you know, whatever we need in different locations of places. So the point being that, yes, we want to. We do not want to have anyone stealing anything from stores.

But if we don't get at the source of the unloading of these goods, we can arrest and incarcerate any number of people that are doing what might be called the shoplifting. But if there's still organized retail theft rings like this couple in San Diego, that will just continue to find some person in need of money to go and steal things from Sephora, we don't end the problem. So bills in this bill and others in this package are aimed at getting right at the source of the problem. And with that, I ask for your aye vote.

Thank you. Secretary, please call the roll on file item 46.

[Roll Call]

Secretary, please call the absent Members.

[Roll Call]

Ayes 33, noes one. The measure passes. Now we're moving on to file item 66. Senator Umberg, he's prepared. Secretary, you may read.

Senate Bill 909 by Senator Humberg. And according to physicians and surgeons, and making an appropriation. Therefore, Senator Humberg Humberg, the floor is yours. Thank you, Mister President and colleagues.

SB 909 is a Bill that strengthens our healthcare workforce by removing the maximum loan repayment limit of the $105,000 current limit for the Stephen M. Thompson Physician Corps Loan Repayment program.

This enables physicians and other healthcare professionals to be able to serve in medically underserved areas by increasing the amount by which they may seek and receive loan repayment. I urge and I vote.

Thank you. Any further discussion or debate on this item? Hearing no members is eligible for unanimous roll call. Is there any objection to applying a unanimous roll call to file item 66? Seeing no ayes, 39 knows zero. The measure passes. Next up is Senator Umberg would file item 67. He's prepared.

Secretary, you may read.

Senate Bill 910 by Senator Umberg in accolade into courts.

Senator Umberg, the floor is yours.

Thank you Mr. President. Colleagues, this Bill is a critical component of the making California Safer Initiative. Collaborative courts are the courts that you see in your localities that address, for example, drug issues, veterans issues, homeless issues, mental health issues, DUI issues.

There are a variety of collaborative courts, and the purpose is to take often a young person who's committed a crime to steer them in the right direction by putting them in a program, a process that is quite rigorous. It is quite rigorous.

For example, you have to do both random drug testing and often drug testing once a month. You have to demonstrate to the court that you are on a pathway to productive citizenship, either through education or job or both. It is a program that is highly, highly, highly effective in terms of recidivism.

Sadly, though, some counties don't have collaborative courts for whatever reason, and other counties have collaborative courts that are highly dependent upon the passion, the dedication of the bench officer. If the bench officer is dedicated, if the bench officer is focused, then the results are very, very good. If not, the results are not so good.

What this Bill does is this Bill applies best practices as established nationally. Collaborative courts have been in existence nationally for four decades, and there are best practices, and we should employ them here in California. This Bill simply says, that's what we're going to do, is we're going to promulgate, use, and train in terms of best practices. I urge an aye vote, thank you.

Any further discussion or debate on this item here? You can see none. This, too, is eligible for unanimous roll call. Is there any objection to applying a unanimous roll call to file item 67? Seeing none. Ayes 39. No. Is at zero. The measure passes. Next up is file item 79 by Senator Senator Ochoa Bo. Secretary. Please read.

Senate Bill 1442 by Senator Ochoa Bogh in accolade to public health. Senator, floor is yours.

Thank you, Mister President and Members. As someone who's been dedicated to promoting the safety and well being of our communities, I believe it is crucial for policymakers to work together in a bipartisan manner to create policies that protect all Californians.

I am grateful for the opportunity to collaborate with our Democrat Senate pro Tem McGuire, also with our Republican Senate Minority Leader Brian Jones, and in the other House as well with the leaders there.

If we're going to make impactful change, it is imperative that we bring all stakeholders to the table and not work in silos creating echo chambers that may prove or have been proven detrimental to our community safety. It is within that spirit that I am here to present the following two bills.

In October 2023, the FDA approved the first over the counter point of care fentanyl test. In as little as five minutes. This test can be can indicate to a provider that whether their patient has used fentanyl. This indication through preliminary could save precious time in directing treatment, leading to improved outcomes.

Such information is critical given that many victims have no idea that the substance they were using contained fentanyl. SB 1442 will expand access to point of care fentanyl test by authorizing the California Health and Human Services Agency through the CalRX initiative, to enter into partnerships to develop, produce, purchase and distribute such tests.

By ensuring that more providers can test for fentanyl use as soon as possible, SB 1442 will expand our efforts to reduce fentanyl overdose deaths. SB 1442 is part of the Senate's working together for a safer California package and has no registered opposition. I respectfully ask for an aye vote.

Thank you. Any further discussion or debate on this item? Any further discussion or debate hearing and seeing none. Secretary, please call the roll on file item 79.

[Roll Call]

Please call the absent Members.

[Roll Call]

Call the roll again.

[Roll Call]

38. Aye. 38. No. Zero. The measure passes. Now, Members, we're moving on to file item 61 again by Senator Ochoa Bogh. She's prepared. Secretary, you may read.

Senate Bill 1468 by Senator Ochoa Bogh, in accolade to healing arts. Senator, floor is yours.

Thank you, Mister President. Members, Senate Bill 1468 will educate and encourage providers to make use of the 2023 Drug Enforcement Agency rule that allows practitioners to dispense a three day supply of narcotic medication to start detoxification or maintenance treatment for people who use opioids.

Licensed practitioners will receive a notification provided by boards under the Department of Consumer affairs that will provide helpful information on how to prescribe this medication. The provided resources will increase awareness about the life saving benefits regarding existing medication that assists treatment for substance use disorder.

Opioid withdrawal symptoms can be intensely uncomfortable, and in certain situations, there can be life threatening complications. This annual notification will help ease the burdens placed on patients struggling with opioid use disorder, giving them a better chance of success. SB 1468 is part of the Senate's working together for a safer California package and has no registered opposition. I respectfully ask for an aye vote.

Thank you. Any further discussion or debate on this item? Hearing, seeing, none. Members, this is eligible for unanimous row call. Is there any objection to applying the unanimous row call to file item 61? Hearing, seeing none. Ayes 38. No, zero. The measure passes. Next up is Senator Cortese with file item 65.

Secretary, you may read.

Senate Bill 908 by Senator Cortese in accolade to public health. Senator, floor is yours.

Thank you, Mister President. Members, appreciate the opportunity to present SB 908, which is included in the package. I'm grateful for that. In barely more time than I've been in the Senate, in three and a half years, we have lost 25 children five and younger from fentanyl poisoning in California.

In fact, more than 100 infants younger than age one, younger than age one, have died over the last two decades. Even more recently, in my own district, baby Phoenix, who was three months old when she died from a fentanyl overdose, and she was the first of three South Bay toddlers younger than two killed within six months.

908 will require the California Department of Public Health to utilize all of its available data to spread awareness and develop guidelines to protect and prevent fentanyl related deaths of children. Zero to five. This will take confusion out of local situations currently where people are grappling and debating over how to deal with the problem.

These findings and recommendations will be distributed annually, beginning June 12, 25 to local public health departments, county boards of supervisors, and to the Legislature as well. I respectfully ask for your aye vote.

Thank you. Any further discussion or debate on this item? Any further discussion or debate? Hearing, seeing none. This is eligible for unanimous roll call. Is there any objection to applying a unanimous roll call to file item 65? Hearing, seeing non ayes 38. No, zero. The measure passes. Next up is file item 80 by Senator Ashby. She is prepared. Secretary, you may read.

Senate Bill 1502 by Senator Ashby in accolade to control substances.

Senator, floor is yours.

Thank you, Mister President. Honored to be one of the Senators addressing the deadly fentanyl crisis in this safer California package today. SB 1502 will prevent the illicit use of xylazine while creating guardrails for the drug's continued use in veterinary medicine practice. This bill is part of the Senate's working together for a safer California legislative package.

This component addressing the fentanyl crisis. Commonly referred to as Tranq or the zombie drug, xylazine is a potent sedative with increasingly prevalent in our country. There is a growing trend of mixing fentanyl and xylazine, rendering it the deadliest drug combination in the United States of America.

SB 1502 adds Xylazine to the list of schedule three controlled substances, which enables the Drug Enforcement Agency to restrict access to it. Xylazine is considered unsafe for human consumption. It renders its user into a zombie-like state, often leading to amputation from severe wounds and fatal overdoses. Unlike other opioids, Xylazine overdoses cannot be reversed by Narcan.

It's crucial that we protect Californians from the negative impacts of xylazine, and particularly its deadly combination with fentanyl, by regulating its availability and preventing its misuse. I urge an aye vote, thank you.

Any further discussion, Senator Rubio?

Thank you, Mister President, ladies and gentlemen of the Senate, I rise in strong, strong support of SB 1502. We already have a really big crisis on our hands, which is the use of fentanyl and adding xylacine to the mix. It's a problem on top of the problem.

And so this bill is critically important to prevent the illicit use of xylazine, especially as we see across our nation. If some of you have not witnessed what's happening in other states, for example, the state of Philadelphia has complete zones that are now referred to as zombie communities.

Because you see people walking around not aware of their surroundings, most often they're slumped over, not being able to get up. And if we don't stop this here in the State of California, we will see that continue to be used in our state.

And again, we are seeing people that are daughters, mothers, brothers, and this is where we stop it. So I'm very thankful to the working group as well as the great Senator from Sacramento for introducing this. I know that there's concerns about what an intendant uses.

There is safeguards to ensure that it is used for our animals, which is what the intent was. But again, we need to keep it away from the use of fentanyl because our kids are getting a hold of this and we're not going to be able to stop it.

So again, I'm so thankful that this bill, along with the other bills presented by the Senate's working group for a safer California, will help curve the use of this deadly drug. It should not be consumed by humans. And with that, I also urge an aye vote. Thank you.

Thank you. Any further discussion or debate hearing and seeing none Senator Ashby, would you like to close? Senator Ashby, would you like to close?

Thank you. Urge an aye vote.

Thank you. This is eligible for unanimous roll call. Is there any objection to applying a unanimous roll call to file item 80? Hearing and seeing none. Ayes 38 Noes 0. The measure passes. Now, next up is Senator Wiener with file item 64. He is prepared.

Secretary, you may read Senate Bill 905 by Senator Wiener Enact relating to crimes. Senator Wiener?

Thank you very much, Mister President. Colleagues, some of you may recognize SB 905, because this is my third effort at this Bill going back to, I believe, 2018. SB 905 does two things. First, it has to do with auto break-ins.

And first, it closes what we call the locked door loophole, a nonsensical barrier to holding auto burglars accountable under existing law, in order to prove the crime of breaking into a car. It's not enough to show that you forcibly entered the car.

The DA also has to prove that the doors to the car, that all of them were locked. So even if you have incontrovertible evidence that someone broke into the car, if you can't prove the doors are locked, that can cause the entire prosecution to collapse. Some people may not remember if they locked their car door.

In situations where someone is visiting California and their car gets broken into, they may now be thousands of miles away and they're not going to come back and testify in court. It makes no sense. If you can prove that the car was broken into, that should be sufficient, and this Bill will close that loophole.

The second thing that the Bill does has to do with organized resale of goods that are stolen from cars. Auto burglars often seek valuable items such as laptops, cameras, cell phones, and then resell them.

Under this Bill, individuals can be prosecuted if they have more than $950 worth of stolen goods stolen from vehicles intended for resale, even if these goods were stolen in multiple incidents. This Bill is part of the pro tems working together for a safer California package, and I respectfully ask for an aye vote.

Thank you Senator Jones.

Mister President and members, California's auto break in challenges are world known. Tourists even know of this challenge. So, I'm very happy that we are addressing this this morning with SB 905. I am a co-author and will be voting aye and ask for the entire body to join me in supporting this, Bill. Thank you.

Thank you, Senator Durazo.

Thank you, Mister President. I rise to also say I will be supporting and I appreciate the author's work on some unintended issues that are being resolved. So for that I want to thank and sales support.

But I want to take advantage of this moment to give a big shout out to Detective Michael Ventura of the Northeast division of LAPD. On Saturday, we partnered to do an event in Los Angeles. The services were free vin etching, free steering wheel locks and software updates for the Hyundai vehicles.

LAPD and trap, the task force for regional auto theft prevention. It's a state funded, multi agency task force that consisted of officers from different areas that were working together. So I want to give them a shout out because this addresses the issue of prevention not only after the fact. Thank you.

Thank you, Senator Ochoa Bogh

Thank you, Mister President and Members. I rise as a proud co author of SB 905, which seeks to address the rising car break ins and burglaries across our state. Under current law, a victim of a car break in must prove that they locked their car door in order for the perpetrator to be charged with a crime.

SB 905 will make car breakings easier to prosecute and keep perpetrators accountable for their actions. I want to thank my colleague, Senator from San Francisco, for this work on this critical issue, and I respectfully ask for an aye vote.

Senator Wiener, any further discussion or debate? Seeing none. Senator Wiener, would you like to close?

I agree with the comments. Car break ins are a significant problem in California. I do want to stress that I know law enforcement is working very hard with innovative strategies to address this issue, and we should make sure that we are doing our part and this Bill will help do that. Respectfully, ask for an aye vote.

Thank you, Members. This too is eligible for unanimous roll call is there any objection to using the unanimous roll call on file item 64? Hearing says none. Ayes 38. No, zero. The measure passes. Now we're moving to our last Bill on our safer California package. And that's file item 72 by Senator Minn. He is prepared.

Secretary, you may read.

Senate Bill 1242 by Senator Min, an act relating to crimes.

Senator Min.

Thank you, Mr. President. This is the last bill in the Senate's Safer California Plan. I'm the closer here. SB 1242 would also try to address the rising problem of retail theft. We're all aware that retail theft is growing dramatically in this country, in this state, and becoming increasingly sophisticated. One tactic that has increasingly been used is arson. Yes.

Setting a fire to distract retail staff so that mass retail theft can then occur. This dangerous diversion endangers lives and disrupts business operations. Stores not only lose the stolen merchandise but suffer damages to their buildings and the merchandise, sometimes having to close for weeks to make repairs.

SB 1242 would specify that for the crime of reckless arson, the fact that the offense was carried out within a merchant's premises in order to facilitate organized retail theft shall be a factor in aggravation at sentencing. Respectfully ask for your aye vote.

Thank you. Any further discussion or debate on this item? This is eligible for unanimous roll call, but we have an objection to it, so we will call the roll on file item 72. Secretary, please call the roll.

[Roll Call]

Secretary, please call the absent Members.

[Roll Call]

Ayes, 36, noes zero. The measure passes. Now, members, we're going to break for lunch. We're going to thank you for a very productive morning. We're going to ask that we stay in the building and not go back to your office. We will have a 30-minute lunch break, and we'll be working late this evening.

So we want to get back as soon as possible from lunch so we can continue the work that we have begun. So we're going to ask again that you stay here in the capitol and the Senate will be in recess until 1230 members. The Senate will convene in 30 seconds. The Senate will convene in 30 seconds.

All right, Members, we're back at it. We're going to start off with file item 23. Is Senator Wilk at his desk and ready to go? Senator Wilk? Secretary, please read.

Senate Bill 1194 by Senator Wilk in accolade to elementary and secondary education.

Senator Wilk?

Thank you, Mister President. I appreciate that. Members, I present to you SB 1194, which is a transparency measure that requires the California Department of Education to post the names and County of residents for members that sit on its parental Advisory Committee.

The council was first created in early 2022 at the direction of state Superintendent of Instruction Tony Thurman, so that, quote, diverse parents can directly work with policymakers and educational partners to provide equitable change to California's education system through authentic parent voices.

In January of 2023, applicants began to receive rejection letters, but were not able to find information on who was selected for the Committee. When my staff reached out to the CDE, they were told that the names would be posted of the selected council members. They estimated that the information would be announced by the end of 2023.

However, we sit here in the middle of May and that information is yet to be posted and no other additional information has been provided as well. So this bill simply requires the CDE to provide the public with basic information about who was chosen to represent parents on this council and what county they represent.

I thought this measure was a common sense transparency policy, but last Monday was pulled from the consent calendar. A couple of centers have informed me that their primary concern was that the bill with the bill was the potential compromise of the council members privacy or safety.

These are considerations that I take seriously as well, so I'd like to provide some clarification for those who may share this concern. It is common practice for similar CDE advisory committees to voluntarily post the names, employers and position of their members.

For example, the Instructional Quality Commission, the Advisory Commission on charter Schools, and the Advisory Commission on Special Education all post this information. Some committees even post short biographies in the emails of their members.

For the few boards that don't disclose this information, they all include a media archive of previous meetings, upcoming meetings, and instructions on how the public can participate. There is no evidence that any of these members ever experienced any harassment or violence because their name was public on a committee's website.

There's no reason why the PAC should be held to a different standard when it comes to public access and transparency.

If someone chooses to become a representative for the group, the people they speak to, they speak for have a right to know who they are and if their community is being represented Superintendent Thurmond stated that the council was created to help ensure the CDE is, quote, reaching out to our families to make sure they are included in the conversation about what education looks like for children.

That was from the April 5, 2022 press release, and it's now been over two years, and no additional information has been made public. Parents can't be included in the conversation if they have no idea who's participating and what's being discussed.

This bill simply brings the practices of the Parental Advisory Committee Commission in greater alignment with the Superintendent's stated mission to ensure families are at the center of all the CDE does. With that, respectfully ask for your aye vote.

Thank you. Any further discussion or debate on this item? Any further discussion or debate? Members, this is eligible for unanimous roll call. Is there any objection to using our unanimous roll call on this item? We have an objection by a member. Secretary, please call the roll.

[Roll Call]

Ayes 33 Noes 1. The measure passes. Now, Members, we're moving on to file item 25 by Senator Portantino. He's prepared.

He is prepared. Secretary, you may read.

Senate Bill 1128 by Senator Portantino enact relating to sex offenses.

Senator Portantino, the floor is yours

Thank you, Mister President and Members. SB 1128 would require tier one sex offender registration if an offender engages in unlawful sexual intercourse with a minor and the offender is more than 10 years older than the minor, failing to require registration for offenders engaging in unlawful sexual intercourse of a minor is inexplicable, and this undercuts efforts to prevent sexual exploitation, trafficking of children throughout all our communities.

Existing law requires sex offender registration for other forms of sexual contact, but not actual intercourse. That loophole needs to be rectified, and that's what this Bill seeks to do. Many minors engaging in these relationships are exploited, manipulated, and fall victim to trafficking and other types of abuse. The vast majority of victims come from marginalized communities.

Human trafficking is $150 billion a year global industry and over 24,000 victims have been identified in California. California consistently ranks number one in the nation for reporting human trafficking cases. SB 1128 is essential to protecting vulnerable youth for holding sexual offenders accountable. Please join me in supporting this. It was sponsored by the Los Angeles City Attorney and respectfully ask for your aye vote.

Thank you. Any further discussion or debate on this item? Hearing and seeing none. Secretary, please call the roll on file item 25.

[Roll call]

Ayes 34, noes 3. The measure passes. Now, members, we're going to move on to file item 78 by Senator Caballero. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. My bad. My bad. We're going to go to 27 first by Senator Cortese. He is ready.

Senate Bill 1299 by Senator Cortese enact relating to workers compensation.

Thank you, Mister President and colleagues, I'm pleased to present SB 1299. Some of the largest agricultural counties in the state are experiencing record breaking heat waves. In 2022, King City in Monterey County broke its hottest temperature ever recorded at 116 degrees. Fresno recorded an all time high at 114 degrees.

The increased frequency of extreme heat conditions and its growing risk to workers highlight the importance and necessity of employer compliance with California's existing outdoor heat regulations to keep workers safe. SB 1299 promotes compliance with the existing outdoor heat regulation through a rebuttable presumption for heat related injury and death.

Farm workers who suffer injury, illness, or death while working for a non compliant employer will be treated and compensated expeditiously. SB 1299 does not create any additional workers comp benefit level beyond what is otherwise available under the existing workers comp law, nor does it apply to compliant employers.

Employers who are compliant are not subject to the remedies in this Bill at all. Finally, it does not create a penalty for noncompliant employers at all. I respectfully ask for an aye vote.

Any further discussion or debate on this item hearing, seeing none, secretary, please call the roll on file item 27.

[Roll call].

We're going to go through the world one more time. The measure passes now. Members were moving to file item 78 by Senator Caballero. She is prepared.

Senate Bill 1432 by Senator Caballero an act relating to health facilities.

Senator, floor is yours.

Thank you, Mister President and Members, I rise to present SB 1432, which creates transparency, accountability, and a viable pathway for health facilities to achieve seismic compliance. As many of you are aware, healthcare access for all is in jeopardy given the distressed financial condition of California hospitals, some of which are in your districts. The Alfred E.

Alquist Hospital Seismic Safety act requires that by January 12030 all hospital buildings must have the capacity to provide patient services following an earthquake. Pursuant to current law, hospitals that do not comply with this 2030 seismic standard will be required to close their doors to patient care. Let me repeat that.

If you are not seismically, if you have not fixed your seismic issues and your healthcare facilities by 2030, you are required to close your doors to patient care.

All of you know that I had a hospital that closed in my district, and those of us that had hospitals at risk understood completely what it means to lose a hospital to a region and did not have emergency healthcare available. This is why this Bill is so important.

According to a 2019 Rand Institute, the estimated cost of upgrades and construction for all California hospitals to comply with the 2030 seismic standards range from 34 billion to 140 billion, depending on compliance approach.

In other words, whether they're retrofitting an existing building or constructing new ones, the time frame and cost to meet the 2030 standards are a major challenge, especially for financially distressed hospitals.

The Rand study suggests that the cost of upgrades would put 40% of California hospitals in, quote, severe financial distress, in immediate risk of bankruptcy, community and public hospitals would take the most significant hit, further hindering access to care for the many medi Cal and Medicare patients who depend on them.

And this is why increasing Medi Cal reimbursement rates become so important. Because with those increased rates, hospitals can plan for the future and put together the resources that they need. Financial strain severely impacted hospitals during the Covid-19 pandemic as they experienced new financial and operational challenges, leaving many hospitals in distress.

From 2019 to 2020, California's hospital total net income decreased by $9.49 billion. More than 50% of California hospitals lose money every day to care for patients. Furthermore, as hospitals continue to face significant cost pressures, many are forced to reduce services to keep their doors open.

And you've probably heard of hospitals that are abandoning prenatal care and maternity services, labor and delivery services, and think about a community with no labor and delivery services. That'd be absolutely untenable. And yet it's happening as we speak.

Hospitals are essential to our community's health and well being, and California must act quickly to prevent further loss of access to care. That's why SB 1432 is critical to improve seismic safety in our local hospitals.

Hospitals by establishing a framework that is not a one size fits all approach, but recognizes regional healthcare challenges that enhances transparency, demands accountability, and creates a viable pathway for our hospitals to meet seismic compliance standards according to each unique circumstances while they continue to provide critical healthcare to our communities.

I want to greatly appreciate the collaboration with my good friend. Okay, now, I can't remember your city Senator, but my good friend, the Senator Riverside. That's correct. Thank you so much. You saved me. The Senate Health Committee. He was chair of the Senate Health Committee and his Committee was fabulously important.

And the many stakeholders that we met a number of, we met with a number of times. This is a major effort and look forward to continuing to craft a solution that moves us forward. The cost of doing nothing is hospital closures and lack of healthcare access to communities across the state. California simply can't afford that.

SB 1432 is a solution that allows hospitals to see a viable pathway to compliance without eliminating critical transparency and accountability and to ensure that the intent of the hospital seismic Safety act is met. I respect you. Ask for your aye vote.

Thank you, Senator Roth.

Thank you, Mister President. I want to thank the author for agreeing to tackle this thorny issue. Maybe our pro Tim would have another word for it, squishy. But we've been dealing with this issue in a haphazard, one off manner for decades and decades and decades. In this state. And we need to get this process organized.

We need to guide hospitals toward the development of a master plan for seismic compliance, all of them that lists goals and objectives and sets milestones that can be monitored, measured, and, frankly, enforced. And then we need to help hospitals move down their master plan through their goals and objectives, hitting their milestones.

And when they hit a bump in the road, we need to provide additional extensions to them, all the while marching them down the road to full compliance. Because we know that most all of the hospitals in the state won't collapse on our residents, our constituents, and they won't be killed if we have an earthquake through the collapse.

But we also know that many, many, many hundreds, if not thousands of them won't be functioning because they don't meet the non performance criteria that are required. The gas lines won't stay. The water lines won't work. The emergency power plants won't operate. The food won't be available to patients.

So in the end, without this and without the author's Bill. Bill, and the author's Bill making sure the author's Bill works, we won't have hospitals that continue to operate in this state, which will be a disaster. So again, I want to thank the author for her hard work, and this is a great Bill, and I urge an aye vote.

Thank you, Senator Grove.

Thank you, Mister President. I rise in support of SB 1432, and I want to thank the author for her commitment on our financially distressed hospitals. She often is serious, but it kind of almost sounds like a joke when she says, I had no intention of working on hospital issues.

And then we all get trapped into things that happen, that happened to our constituents in our district. And she had a hospital that closed, which impacted our hospitals in the Central Valley because a lot of the people seeking care were going six or 40 miles south to my district, which is impacting my hospitals.

So I want to thank the author for engaging in this process, because it is a multifaceted process. The rates, obviously, that have been promised to our providers and our hospitals that should have taken place January 1, that are still not being paid at the correct rate yet.

We have got a commitment that it is going to be retroactive back to January 1, but the providers or the hospitals are not getting those rates as of yet.

I know she's actively working on that and then also addressing the seismic issue, you know, billions of dollars being put into either the construction or the revitalization of some hospital wings and hospital areas, and it doesn't matter. I just think that when we do policy.

I don't think we think about what happens on the ground because it doesn't matter if you are a hospital and you have an emergency situation, you need a viable emergency room and need a viable labor and delivery and a viable cardiac room.

But those people that are doing elective surgeries, I mean, they can wait if that makes sense, if they're elective surgeries. So to foolproof the entire hospital is not something that should be required, especially by the end date that we have before us, because it's almost impossible to comply with, especially when our hospitals are having financial difficulties.

I want to thank the author for working on the high, financially distressed hospital Bill where we were able to, all of us voted to put money into a Fund so that these hospitals, most, all of our districts, did apply for those resources and get them, and it saved a majority of our hospitals.

And I think that we have been working on this issue, and this is just one more thing that we have to tackle. I'm the only Senator in the last, I believe, decade that has a 7.1 earthquake in my district in Ridgecrest. Then a 6.96.2. The earthquakes went on for quite a while.

A week after, I believe, in July 51920. 192019. On July 5, and they went on for a week after. And again, the highest, I believe, was 6.0 or, excuse me, 7.1. The lowest was 6.2. I can tell you that the old, I want to call it Adobe brick, part of the hospital stood.

Stood the test of time, man. They had to move everybody, even from the new seismic compliant rooms and the seismic compliant tower that was built just a few years before there was cracks in that foundation. They had problems with that.

They still don't have everybody back into that facility, but that cost them billions of dollars to comply with the seismic that was signed off on by the State of California. And that particular tower did not stand the test of time with this earthquake. So I realize that we need to keep staff safe.

We need to keep our patients safe. We need to make sure that buildings don't collapse on top of people. But we also cannot put a deadline out there that's out there like it is right now that you will close.

Because I can tell you, with the earthquakes and the things that happened out in our community, if Ridgecrest wouldn't have had that seismic non compliant building, the noncompliant building that actually help people, wouldn't have been there to help people in my district that desperately needed it.

And I just sent my colleague from the San Fernando Valley a video. She's going to go on a trip. Sorry to out you, but she's going to go on a trip in my district. And I was driving down the canyon because I went to. Pardon me. She's already outed. zero. So I was coming down the canyon.

And why the Ridgecrest hospital is so vitally important is that it is the medical facility for the South China Sea protector, the China Lake Naval Air Warfare center, which is the largest research and development arm for the United States military. We all, all of our constituents need this base.

And when I hear people say, zero, it's only 50 miles to the other hospital, it's 50 miles down a two lane road that is often blocked off because of rock slides.

There's a 50 foot wall on one side of the canyon and then a 50 foot drop going down to the river where my colleague is going to be whitewater rafting soon. It's not like a highway 58 or a 210 drive.

So all of that to say that I think that whether you're in rural California or you're in urban California, our constituents have the right to go to a hospital and have it available to them.

And I think that pushing this out further and making sure we still hold hospitals accountable, but making sure that they can still stay open to provide the services that our constituents needs is vitally important. And I want to applaud the author for tackling this issue.

Even though it wasn't in her top legislative priorities, she has been a champion on the issue. Thank you, ma'am.

Thank you, Senator Newman.

Thank you, Mister President. I also rise in speech of the measures as a co author. You know, everybody here is probably aware since the passage of the original legislation governing seismic retroverting, our healthcare system, especially California's hospitals, have been massively impacted by a whole host of unexpected events to include the pandemic.

And so this Bill, along with at least two others that we've heard this week, makes sensible allowances while retaining provisions for accountability and transparency as part of that process. And so we do appreciate the legitimate concerns expressed by some of the organizations representing both healthcare and public safety workers.

But to the Senator from Riverside points, this measure will create a responsible, workable roadmap to full compliance while ensuring access to critical care during that period. And I respectfully ask for your aye vote.

Thank you, Senator Cortese.

Thank you, Mister President. I too, rise in support of the Bill, but I have a question for the author, if she would be willing to entertain it.

Yes, I will.

There was a little bit of confusion on my end, Senator, as to the proposed length of extension and how that works. And I apologize if you've explained that or felt like you've explained it already, but I just wanted to get it clear on the record.

And I know, amongst other opposition, that CPF particularly had an interest in continuing to work to try to just resolve any differences of opinion on the length of extension. And so the second part of the question is whether you're willing to continue to work on that issue to the extent there's disagreement.

Thank you very much for the questions, if I may, Mister President. Peter Chairman so first of all, is that the way that the Bill works is current law requires you to have, be seismically compliant by 2030. This would give the HKI the ability to extend the period three years between now and then.

There's a whole series of requirements that hospitals have to meet. There are planning documents and then more than planning documents, if you are in a, you have to provide financial information about all of these.

Most of the hospitals are private, nonprofit, and so they don't necessarily have to share their information about their financial capabilities or what they're spending their money on. But HKI has the ability now, as part of the plan, to start looking at their financial information.

Clearly, some are capable of starting a project, and if you are, then you have to start designing it, getting your planning documents, getting your permits. In other words, you have to start lining up the requirements in order for you to be able to get started and then show how you're going to finance what will be massive construction.

We're talking about millions of dollars and in many instances, hundreds of millions of dollars. If you require more information, then HCI will determine how much longer you need. And they can give you up to five years, but they can do it in smaller increments depending on where you are in the planning and building process.

Some of the hospitals are huge hospitals and have a number of campuses. And so it's a question of making sure that they're bringing up the seismicity of all of the buildings.

But the other thing is, if there may be hospitals that will have to discontinue providing services for a period of time because they don't have any room on their campus to build, and they need to tear down and demolish buildings before they build new buildings. And the whole point of that is that it may impact the region.

And so HKI will be looking at the region to determine whether the region can afford for that hospital to lose the services of that hospital as well. So the whole idea in the Bill is to make sure that we're again, one size doesn't fit all.

Some may be very simple, like some of our small hospitals in rural California, but some may be part of a bigger healthcare system. Number one, and number two is we will continue to meet. We've had a number of all hands on Board Meetings that have involved all of the stakeholders.

We will continue to do that because we want to make sure we take into consideration as many of the comments as possible. And many of the amends were taken in direct response to some of the issues raised.

For example, one of the issues raised is that the local electeds had no clue what was going on with the hospital. They had no idea that the hospital was under the requirement to start doing the seismic planning.

And so the Bill now requires that local government be contacted, that there be a public process for locals to be involved in, not just local government, but other organizations and individuals, so that they can let HKA know what they think about this hospital and what the concerns are.

So public input and transparency is an integral part that was brought to us by, by some of the groups.

Thank you Mister President. I urge support for the Bill.

Thank you, Senator Eggman.

Thank you Mister President. And Members, how do you eat an elephant? One bite at a time. And I think that this Bill is a good example of trying to tackle a really big issue and breaking it down into bites and chunks that we can all understand.

I rise today as a former chair of health, and this has been an issue that we've all been working on as long as I've been around. This has been a longstanding issue.

And just to say to Members, when tragedies strike, oftentimes we rush to write legislation that we think is going to fix it in the moment and then don't often realize that things take time and processes and we are a very big state with a lot of very different issues.

It's analogous to an issue I've been working on in my district who just finally got it done. After Katrina. We passed a lot of things about levees and levy safely, but at the same time people kept developing and building and then we were not going to have any coverage for them.

So you had to bring it back and say, what can we do that makes sense, that keeps people safe, acknowledges the regional issues, and are able to move forward. In a way.

I want to thank the author for really coming on and tackling this problem and standing with all of us represent Central California and the more rural areas and really be able to common sense approach using the new agencies we have at our disposal, like HCI, to really do regional planning, to provide transparency for people, local officials, and allow the services to still be provided in especially areas where scarcity is a real deal.

I ask for your aye vote on this Bill.

Thank you, Senator Skinner.

Thank you, Mister President. Members. I will be supporting the Bill today with some reluctance. We enacted this requirement for seismic safety on earthquakes because we are in a state that is highly earthquake prone. Let me use the Bay Area.

The Bay Area, and this is by the USGS and by all the different seismologists, indicate that there is a 63% chance of a 6.7 magnitude earthquake or greater in the Bay Area before 2036. And note, the deadline on this Bill is 2038. And just the Hayward fault in my district has a little lower chance before 2036.

But still the magnitude earthquake is 6.7 or greater. And we know that the hospitals that need seismic upgrade are all ones that could not or not likely be able to survive or function with that magnitude of earthquake.

And some, we have some of our, and I won't go and name names so we don't have to say one health entity is better than others. But we have a number of hospital operators that have met our seismic requirements, but we have others that have not and have dragged their feet.

And there's some, one in Berkeley in particular, that is put, anybody who goes to that hospital is at risk because it has not done this seismic upgrade and has been cleared that they do not want to for years, and yet they're still open and operating.

Now, of course, we don't want them closed because we have a hospital shortage, but we need these upgrades because we need to be safe. Yes, we need hospitals. Yes, we have a shortage.

But a hospital doesn't do you a lot of good, if it will, if you and everybody in it can be seriously harmed in an earthquake and then in an earthquake, it's not functional to serve the people who are injured in these kind of high magnitude earthquakes.

So I look to the author to making improvements as this Bill moves forward so that we can, and I know this is your intent, to get the seismic safety we need and to hold these hospitals to the accountability that they need because it is important for all of our safety.

And with that, I will support the Bill today.

Thank you. He's ready. Yes, Senator Laird.

Thank you very much, Mister President. There was a time when I was on the City Council that our chief building inspector came to us and said there are an amazing number of buildings in the downtown that are not seismically safe. And I sort of think you should consider red tagging them right now.

And we had a state mandate that said that within two years we had to do a complete inventory of the buildings downtown. And so we did it. And it was set for a Tuesday council meeting. And what happened? Before we could get to the Tuesday council meeting, we had a 7.1 earthquake.

And that study was a perfect index of what was not safe in the downtown. In fact, people were killed in some of the buildings that were identified as not being safe.

And for those of you that, and I know the author and I worked to save Watsonville Hospital, and one of the reasons we had to save it is that very earthquake made it uninhabitable, and they had to find a new location which set them back economically over time in that disadvantaged community.

So I know there's some opposition to this Bill, and the opposition is from friends of mine. And my message is just, the clock is ticking. Some of the people that opposed the Bill said, we want a conversation. So my message here is that conversation has to happen.

This is not a time to have a conversation with no end. And the author has offered the perfect vehicle for it. And so I'm going to support this Bill because we have to have that conversation, but we have to get to the end. There are hospitals that are in the red that don't have the money to upgrade.

There are. I was asked to the Senator from Berkeley's point after we had the earthquake, the media in the Bay Area did a mock exercise of if there was an earthquake on the Hayward fault at 841.

One morning, I went and played the mayor, and there were all these media emergency people, and they, when they did the scenario, one of the things was, is most of the hospitals near the earthquake fault would be uninhabitable, would not be able to take people from that earthquake. So we can't keep talking about this forever.

We have to have a solution. And I, and for whatever reason, the author may need to have her head examined because she has taken this on, but we have to bring people together and get to the end. This offers us the opportunity to do it. And that's why I asked for an I vote.

Thank you, Senator Wahab. Senator, for those of you who seem to bother. Senator Wahab.

Thank you. Yeah. You know, so I rise in support of this effort. I think Senator Caballero has, of course, taken this on, and it's a complicated issue. We want to, obviously, ensure that the hospitals are up to standard, especially as I represent the City of Hayward with the Hayward fault that we have mentioned a number of times.

And in my city, we have a hospital called St. Rose Hospital. It is a safety net hospital. It largely serves medical patients, undocumented individuals, people of color, and people of lower income backgrounds. This hospital has already highlighted and was one of the beneficiaries of the distressed loan that were given out roughly a year ago.

And at the same time, there is a sister Bill that my colleague in the Assembly is caring to support that hospital even further as it's in negotiations to get purchased.

There's significant concerns when we're talking about, again, seismic safety, but then also just the safety net hospitals that serve our most vulnerable today right now, if they are struggling already, especially with COVID and a three year period where a lot of things were more focused on serving the community, extending this temporarily or shortly, I should say, is sufficient.

So again, I respectfully support this Bill. I ask that you all support the Bill, and I trust that the good Senator will be working with opposition to address any future concerns as it moves through this legislative body. Thank you.

Thank you, Senator Smallwood-Cuevas.

Thank you, Mister President. And I also rise, and I want to thank the Senator for her work on this. We had a very robust conversation in Health Committee.

And, you know, I have a lot of concerns about this Bill because every minute we wait to the good Senator from Santa Cruz's point, we risk potentially losing more life whenever the moment strikes.

And any loss is going to be too great because we've waited over 30 years to now have yet another extension for what will be another eight years. My main concern is that we have not put any enforcement mechanisms on this eight years.

Along each benchmark, there is no real skin in the game that gives us an indication for when a hospital does, doesn't meet the benchmark and the deadline in ways to incentivize those hospitals to do the right thing.

The other thing I pointed out is that it was mentioned by the author that there were some hospitals that were ready to take action and to move forward with the retrofit. However, we didn't put in a mechanism to guarantee that they actually, in fact, moved, move forward with the retrofit.

They, in fact, now can have the opportunity to backslide back into this extension process. And again, we, it will remain to be seen whether or not these commitments will be met for workers, for patients, for others. I have grave concerns, and with that, I am going to lay off of the Bill today.

Thank you, Senator Roth.

You know, of course, the alternative to this Bill is the next time a hospital in one of your districts comes in for an extension, a Committee either denies it and leaves the hospital to its own devices, or we bring to the floor and you all get to decide whether you want to grant the extension, and then you are put to the test and you can deny the extension for the hospital in your districts.

For those who are concerned with the list of opponents on this Bill, I'm a little disappointed that some of them didn't modify their opposition, because this author has convened several meetings with virtually every opponent listed on the back of the analysis on this Bill.

And I know because I was there participating with the opposition in the conversations, and they actively participated in discussing modifications to this Bill, how we could make it work for them. And I'm talking about labor, and we spoke about the three year extension that was initially provided in this Bill.

And we discussed the fact that some hospitals, particularly the larger ones with assets and resources, are probably close and could complete their renovations in maybe a year.

The tasking, as we left the last meeting was labor was going to get together with the government agency and with the author in this Bill and determine we ought to know where they are, because the hospital construction business is a pretty specific thing that requires approval at every phase.

Determine which hospitals are that close and then make a list. And those that only needed one year would get one year. Those that needed two years would get two years.

And with respect to the conversation about whether there's enforcement in this business, no hospital gets any extension unless a master plan for seismic compliance, setting out goals, objectives and milestones is submitted in advance. And without the master plan, I guess they'll figure it out.

Maybe mobile field hospitals we can rent from the army when they don't meet the deadline. And then if you do not meet your milestones, there's no automatic eight year extension.

If you get a three year extension, because they think it's going to take you three years to get a little further down the road, you didn't meet the one or the two year test, then the next set of milestones you have, maybe it's construction design or the higher retention of a contractor.

If you don't meet that, you get no further exposure extension. So if that's not an enforcement mechanism to move hospitals down to the finish line, I don't know what is, because a $100,000 fine or a $300,000 fine or a half $1.0 million fine is not really going to do it.

So this architecture is designed to move hospitals down to the line. And if at the end of the day they don't meet it, we'll have to deal with how we provide hospitals, hospital essential medical services, healthcare services in some of these areas without a hospital. Thank you, Mister President.

Thank you. And after a healthy discussion and robust debate, Senator Caballero, would you like to close?

Thank you very much, Mister President. I'm going to thank my colleague from Riverside and say that he's absolutely right. We've been trying to set up milestones.

I, like him, are very disappointed that there weren't modifications in some of the opposition because we've been working really hard at trying to bring them in, being very specific and taking a lot of the recommendations.

Let me just say that in regards to the story that my good friend from Santa Cruz recounted, what happened is that state law changed because of those earthquakes and because of the death and destruction that happened in our old downtowns.

And the law that changed basically said that cities were responsible for insisting on the seismic retrofit of buildings in their old downtowns. They were unreinforced masonry buildings. And so the first step was a report and the second step was now do something about it.

We spent years, and I want to say years, giving the business community time to retrofit the downtown. At the time, it was very difficult to close businesses in a struggling downtown that looked like K Street, quite frankly, where there were lots of homeless, where there wasn't very, very great economic development.

And so what we ended up doing in our city is we went to our local banks because we had been doing extensions and extensions, and we said, we need you to do a Low interest loan program and the city will stand as security for loans to small businesses so that if they couldn't pay the debt that the city would step in and pay, every single building got retrofitted so that it is now seismically safe.

The city paid out no money and the bank was the hero in the story. So let me be very clear. This does not anticipate any money. But what I know is that we've put little pieces of money together. Part of the vape tax goes towards hospitals to help them plan, do their planning for retrofits.

And at some point we're either going to need a bond or we're going to need some resources out of our budget in order to help some of these hospitals. Are there some hospitals that have dragged their feet? Absolutely.

But that's going to become very clear with the new authority that we give HKI to be able to look at their finances and to determine whether they're doing the right thing. I agree with my good friend from Oakland. Reluctantly, I'm voting on this as well. Because, reluctantly, I decided to do this, Bill.

Because we got to get this done. And if we don't get it done now, the problem becomes worse. And you will see hospital after hospital come in here one offs asking for relief. And I think we need to deal with it as a planned, organized way.

And make sure that we're getting all the hospitals retrofitted as quickly as possible. I respectfully ask for your aye vote.

All discussion and debate having ceased. Secretary, please call a roll and follow item 78.

[Roll call].

Ayes 37 noes zero. The measure passes. Now, Members, we're going to move on to file item 50 by Senator Glazer. He's prepared. Secretary, you may read.

Senate Bill 1287 by Senator Glazer an act relating to public post secondary education.

Senator, floor is yours.

Thank you, Mister President. Members, on this Bill, I want to start with the basics, and it's contained in the analysis that each Member has been given. The Bill does four things.

It requires the trustees of the state universities, the Board of Governors of the California community colleges to adopt and enforce policies in institution based student codes of conduct that prohibit violence, harassment, intimidation, and discrimination that interfere through force or intimidation with First Amendment rights, including calling for genocide.

The second thing it does is that they maintain and enforce reasonable time, place, and manner restrictions. Three, that they develop mandatory training programs for students, and four, they require that each student who should acknowledge their obligation to comply with that code of conduct.

So this Bill, Senate Bill 1287, affirms the role that California public colleges and universities must take to ensure that students can exercise their free speech rights and exchange views respectfully. In recent months and weeks, we've witnessed an alarming trend of escalating harassment, intimidation, and violence targeted at marginalized groups on our campuses.

This obviously threatens the safety and well being of our students, our faculty, and our staff, and it threatens the educational environment, and it threatens the free exchange of ideas. Our colleges have a responsibility to promote free speech while preventing discrimination and harassment. But where does free speech cross the line into speech that is not protected?

Now, we have specified that speech that calls for the destruction of a group, in whole or in part, based on nationality, ethnicity, race, or religion, crosses the line. Free speech also does not extend to calls for genocide, but only if the speaker subjectively intends for his or her speech to be understood that way and if the speech would lead to an objective observer to the same conclusions.

As the Supreme Court has said, free speech provides strong protection against the arbitrary or over broad application of laws affecting speech. We worked in the Judiciary Committee, thanks to chair Umberg, to address First Amendment scrutiny, especially for public universities whose student conduct code includes such provisions, ensuring that they're firmly rooted in constitutional principles.

Now, in addition, case law has affirmed that colleges need not tolerate speech that is inconsistent with their basic educational mission. This Bill aligns with this responsibility by requiring campuses to Institute policies that explicitly prohibit violence, harassment, intimidation, and discrimination, including calls for genocide.

SB 1287 also requires universities to develop programs to educate students on how to exchange views respectfully, even when we're dealing with divisive issues. All student voices have the right to be heard. None should be silenced. This Bill is about the safety of students and the safeguarding of their free speech rights. Rights.

I believe this legislation will help restore an environment of civil discourse on our campuses, something that we all desperately want. For those reasons, I urge your support of Senate Bill 1287. Thank you.

Senator Wiener.

Senator. Thank you very much, Mister President. I rise today in strong support of SB 1287, and I do so as co chair of the legislative Jewish Caucus. SB 1287 is a Jewish caucus priority Bill, and I want to thank the Senator for, for his leadership.

Unfortunately, there has been an enormous amount of misinformation about what this Bill does, at times falsely claiming that it will somehow stop people from being able to protest when it will do no such thing. This Bill is about protecting free speech and diversity of viewpoints on our college campuses.

It's about allowing these various perspectives to flourish without silencing people because of who they are. It's imperative that students from all walks of life be free and able to express themselves in their beliefs without fear of harassment, bullying, and intimidation.

And that is what is happening now, colleagues, this does not in any way mean that students can't protest. Of course, they will obviously be able to continue to protest. It doesn't mean that they can't disagree. We want them to be able to disagree.

It doesn't mean that students will be somehow prohibited from saying things that make people feel uncomfortable. That's not what this Bill does. This Bill fosters free speech. But it's free speech by various people. And not just free speech for me, but not for thee, which is what is happening at times right now.

And let's be clear, there is a difference between being made to feel uncomfortable and being coerced, bullied, and intimidated and harassed into silence. When I have more than one student on campuses, tell me I no longer wear a kippah or Star of David on campus because I will get harassed. That is not undermining free speech.

That is promoting people's ability to express who they are, whether they are Jewish, whether they are Muslim, whether they are Trans people, being able to express who they are without fear of being harassed and intimidated. I want to be clear. The intimidation and bullying we are seeing on our campuses right now, it's not happening everywhere.

It's not happening all the time. And most people are not engaging in that behavior, but some are, and it's created an atmosphere of fear, and that is the opposite of free speech. It says, name the elephant in the room.

Much of the current moment that we're experiencing in some of these challenges is fueled by the October 7 Hamas massacre and mass rape in Israel and the resulting horrific war, both of which have claimed an unconscionable number of innocent civilian lives.

It is my sincere hope, and the hope I know of many, many, many Jews, that this war will end quickly, as quickly as possible, that the hostages will come home, and that Hamas will no longer govern Gaza. But we are not a body this amazing Senate with control over foreign conflicts.

What we can do is make sure that our constituents are safe at home here in the State of California, and this Bill will help to do that.

I want to just name some of the incidents that have happened not just since October 7, but before, and not only relating to Jews, because this Bill is not just about the Jewish community. This is about everyone. At UC Santa Barbara, back in February, the multicultural student center was plastered with posters saying Zionists were not welcome.

That describes nearly 90% of Jews. Zionists means that you believe that Israel is the Jewish homeland. These posters even specifically targeted a particular Jewish student, the student body President, by saying, quote, you can run, but you can't hide. End quote. That is not free speech. That is intimidation and bullying.

Shortly afterwards, also at UC Santa Barbara, a dorm room of a Jewish student with a mezuzah affixed to it. I have a mezoza at my home, as do many Jews, was graffitied with Zionists not welcome and an arrow pointing at the mezuzah.

Sometimes people tell on themselves, like when they're using the word Zionist and they're really talking about Jews. At UC Berkeley, a letter was submitted demanding that a prominent environmentalist is submitted by students.

That a prominent environmentalist and a Member of the Oakland City Council be disinvited to speak in a class about environmental issues because he is Jewish and identifies as a Zionist. This is someone who voted for a ceasefire resolution, but that wasn't good enough. The letter cited his affiliation with Jewish organizations.

Unfortunately, UC Berkeley allowed that demand to be met. At San Jose State, a Professor visiting from CSU Long beach was protested so heavily, a Jewish Professor, that he was unable to finish his lecture on a two state solution, literally a lecture on finding peace. And that was shut down in 2019.

At UC Berkeley, a video went viral of a racist, sexist, homophobic rant targeting black students, claiming they should not have rights. At UC Berkeley earlier this year, two Jewish students had to seek medical attention after one was choked and another was injured as a door was broken open because they were hosting a talk by an Israeli speaker.

Other students at the same event were called nazis and were spat on. We saw at UCLA counter protesters attempting to provoke pro Palestinian demonstrators by playing prison associated music and taunting them with epithets.

At USC, a private University, the Administration canceled their valedictorian due to unspecified security concerns about what was being posted online, and they canceled her and said she couldn't speak.

Last year, UC Santa Cruz at UC Santa Cruz, a group of students celebrated Hitler's birthday, and that's the same week flyers were distributed with anti LGBTQ and anti semitic conspiracy theories.

I will stop there, but I could go on for pages and pages with some of the things that are happening on campus, not just to Jews, but to others that our college administrators have an obligation to put a stop to.

I want to just say one, make one last point, colleagues, and I was not ever planning to have to make these remarks about a specific organization on the floor of the Senate.

But unfortunately, more than one of you have come up to me confused about a purported division within the Jewish community about this Bill, and also about the Holocaust education Bill by my colleague from Los Angeles. Specifically, people wonder why an organization called Jewish Voice for peace, JVP, has some really nice sounding words in its name. Jewish voice.

Everyone loves a voice. Peace. Everyone wants peace. Why is a Jewish community group opposing a Bill like this? Or like a Holocaust education Bill? JBP has been aggressively lobbying against these bills. JVP falsely claims to represent mainstream viewpoints in the Jewish community. It does no such thing.

Rather, it holds what can only be described as fringe viewpoints within the Jewish community. Lobbying against Holocaust education and claiming that you are speaking for the Jewish community. A recent expose on JVP is entitled not so Jewish, not for peace. Indeed. And this is just still blows my mind.

When JVP sent representatives to my office to lobby my staff against the Holocaust education Bill, it turns out that of the people they sent, zero were Jewish. So you have non Jews claiming to speak on behalf of the Jewish community against a Holocaust education Bill?

That is outrageous, and we would not put up with that for any other community. And yet that is what's happening as far as I can tell. Jewish Voice for peace JVP has two primary missions.

One is to advocate for the complete elimination of the State of Israel as Jewish homeland, in other words, for Israel to no longer exist, home to 7 million Jews, and second, to repeatedly and persistently, over time, give cover, tokenistic cover, to people who make antisemitic statements, whether in the Arab world or in this country, on many occasions, JVP has defended anti Semites and people who have committed violence against Jews.

It's outrageous that this group puts the word Jewish in its name and yet includes many non Jews who purport to speak for Jews. And it's outrageous the positions that this group purports to take on behalf of the Jewish community in order to confuse people. And it has to stop. I want to be clear.

The Jewish community, like many communities, holds diverse views on a lot of issues. If you've ever attended a Passover dinner or any dinner at my home, you will know that we have a lot of robust conversations, and that includes the war on Gaza.

There are many, many, many diverse viewpoints within the Jewish community about the war, and I respect that, and that is a healthy and a good thing. But JVP and these extreme positions that it takes that confuse people, that. That crosses the line for me personally, and I just want to express that on the floor today.

I urge an I vote.

Thank you, Senator Durazo.

Thank you, Mister President. This issue raised by the Bill is very personal to me and my life. I have been arrested over 20 times in my life since I was 19 years old. I walked hundreds of picket lines. I've marched as short as three blocks to as long as three days. Over 50 years ago at St.

Mary's College, I and other students took over the chapel, and we stayed there with the issues that were very important to us as Latino and black students. There were no violent actions taken against us, and I'm very grateful for that. I'm grateful to the Administration for treating our right to protest so respectfully.

And it reminds me also of what I've read of the student movement and other causes. The students that played such a critical role in the civil rights movement, the students that have played such a critical role in the anti war movement. Students have played such a critical role in the black and Latino Chicano movement.

Students have played a very extraordinary role in our country and probably throughout the world in reminding us of what we are all about and what we should stand for.

I treasure the right to protest, and so do the housekeepers and the immigrants and students and truck drivers and women and LGBTQ and farm workers who all participated in those actions. My husband told me stories of how Cesar Chavez was continuously stopped from marching and picketing in the fields by the sheriffs doing the work of the growers.

They would demand permits to do a march and a rally at a public park, a tactic to stop their actions. They were jailed for not having a permit. As Doctor King said many times, we must protest for the right to protest.

Once I was extremely upset with the ACLU because they had litigated the right of the KKK and the Nazis to have a march and to have a rally. And I just couldn't understand how could they do that that was so wrong. How could they stand up on the side of clear racism and clear violence?

But it's the constitution. It's what this nation, what we're so proud of in this nation. Today, we are debating the parameters of the constitution, our fundamental rights, which make this nation so great. And while all of this is taking place in different parts of the world, we need to make clear that violence is completely unacceptable.

Last year, I introduced, and with your support, we passed a resolution on nonviolence. Mister President, if I could read permission.

Granted.

Thank you. And part of it says, whereas it is vital to the future and well being of our state and nation to inspire people and students to think, act and dream in the pursuit of the greater good through nonviolence, and to develop the language and the structure necessary to strengthen the connection of all people and to fortify the foundation of our democracy.

And whereas one of the lessons of the civil rights movement is that absent a framework for peaceful Assembly to express discord and discontent, hatred inevitably leads to violence. Both Cesar Chavez and Doctor King were critical of violence, whether it was used by their enemies or used by their own supporters.

In fact, Cesar Chavez, one of his very long fasts of many, many days was because supporters and activists in the farm workers movement and farmworkers themselves were responding with violence to the violence on them. And he said, no matter what, it is unacceptable. I truly believe in those principles. I'm afraid that I believe that this particular Bill falls short of fulfilling our first Amendment protections. Thank you.

Thank you, Senator Min.

Thank you, Mister President. I rise as a co author of this Bill and also on behalf of the API Legislative Caucus. And I want to thank my colleague Marinda in the Jewish caucus for bringing this Bill forward. These are obviously trying times for all of our communities and for those of us who represent college campuses.

I represent UC Irvine as well as a number of community college campuses. This is a particularly difficult time, and you may have seen in the news just last week, the protests at UC Irvine reached ahead and police were called in, and there's still a lot of controversy around exactly what happened.

But we are trying to balance two sacrosanct principles that I believe strongly in. One is the first Amendment and the right to protest. But we have to balance that also with safety. And these, I know, are difficult concerns to try to balance on our college campuses.

And I know that the different deans and chancellors and presidents and administrators at these schools are having a difficult time of doing that. I also know that extremists on both sides are trying to abuse these rights, that you have people who are trying to take their First Amendment privileges and extend these into harassment and intimidation and racism.

We have people, on the other hand, who are trying to equate any legitimate criticism of Israel with anti semitism. And so in trying to carve out what the right balance is between protecting our students and our faculty and our campus Members from hate and intimidation while also trying to respect free speech rights, it's not an easy thing to do. But I just want to say that I respect this effort.

I appreciate the effort in trying to find that right balance. It's important that we just don't duck this issue, that we do try to protect students at this time while respecting the First Amendment, while respecting that long story tradition of free speech that my colleague from Los Angeles mentioned.

So I want to urge you all to vote aye. And I want to, again, thank these folks for bringing the Bill forward. This is not an easy thing to do, but I think it's important that we make that effort at this time when so many of our students are feeling like their rights, their safety are being challenged.

Thank you, Senator Stern.

Thank you, Mister President. I want to point out maybe an unlikely view here on this. And my colleague from East LA, in noting the traditions of free speech, I think gets right to the heart of why it's so important not just that we debate this issue, but that we. We try to legislate in some way here.

My colleague from San Francisco articulated so many instances of awful and demonizing anti semitism that are spreading like wildfire. So I don't need to iterate that. I want to be clear about when you read the language of this Bill, who else is protected and where they're protected?

Not like on the streets of Skokie, where I still believe in the ACLU's litigation to allow the American nazi party to march through a Jewish community on that awful day.

I still believe in the First Amendment, but under this legislation, as I read it, if Jewish students right now were holding a protest at a University, marching through a dormitory, calling for another nakba, calling for the end of the Palestinian state, equating any one Arab American as a Member of Hamas, that kind of intimidation and harassment and threats of violence not just undermines our values, it denies those students who are being targeted access to education.

It makes them not want to go back to school. It makes them want to go home. Likewise, we're seeing more and more targeting of our LGBTQ and Trans community. Anytime someone competes in a sport or shows their face and stands up, they can be followed back to their dorm rooms.

They can be targeted on campus, in their classrooms. And we are seeing this around the country, exploited on the airwaves and made into theater and making these brave young people somehow targets of a hate campaign. They, too, would be protected.

I think this moment is dangerous because it's designed to divide us and make us distrust each other and put somehow one community suffering over another.

I hope what we can start to do is get into a place of an even form of governance so that the UC system and the CSU system are not sort of improvising every time something comes up.

And when we see what happens, when you don't have a good security plan, you don't have clearly written rules of time, place, and manner, you have to sort of react on the fly and enter the political moment, it becomes a mess, and worse yet, it becomes a threat.

And young people have been hurt because of this disorganization that we've seen at a governance level around these critical protections for speech.

So if there are things that need to be worked on in this legislation to make that equal applicability clear, to make sure that the Arab American or Jewish student, frankly, who wants to protest the Israeli government on their campus and even wants to call Benjamin Netanyahu a war criminal, they can do that.