Assembly Standing Committee on Appropriations

Good morning and welcome to the July 9, 2025 Assembly Preparations Committee hearing. We have 22 bills to consider this morning as part of our regular order hearing. We encourage the public to provide written testimony before the hearing by visiting the Committee website at apro Assembly C. Please.

Note that any written testimony submitted to the Committee is considered public comment and may may be read into the record or reprinted. The hearing room is open for attendance. All are encouraged to watch the hearing from its live stream on the Assembly's website.

We will accept public comment on any bill placed on the suspense file by the Committee today and for which the author waived presentation before the close of the regular order hearing. Testimony on any such bill will be limited to a statement of name organization if any imposition bill.

The Committee will allow no more than 40 minutes of testimony in total. As you came into the hearing room today, the sergeants directed your attention to the rules for public attendance and participation which were posted outside the door. I encourage members of the public who are in attendance to be aware of and observe those rules.

Please be aware that violations of these rules or other violations of General courtesy or decorum may subject you to removal or other enforcement processes. Let's establish a quorum.

[Roll Call]

We have a quorum. Okay, I'd like to dispense with the consent calendar. We'll take the bills up on consent calendar in two motions. The first motion is due passed to consent. Applies to bills that enjoy unanimous support in this Committee and are eligible for the Assembly floor consent calendar. Consistent with the Assembly rules.

Do we have a motion for that? A motion and a second.

Consent calendar motions due pass to consent. Senate Bill 255 Seyarto, 361 Becker, 385 Seyarto, 387 Rubio, 428 lead, 602 Cortese, 648 Smallwood Quavers, 652 Richardson and 693 Cortese.

Great. Those are out. The second motion to pass applies to bills that also enjoy unanimous support in this Committee but are not eligible for the Assembly floor consent calendar consistent with Assembly rules. Do we have a motion for this? We have a motion for that.

Consent calendar part two motions do pass. Senate Bill 788. Nehler.

Those are all. Those are both out on an A roll call. Okay, let's. We'll just keep rolling here, team. Okay. Suspense calendar. I'd like to dispense with the suspense calendar. Madam Secretary. Please read the suspense calendar.

Senate Bill 1925-337,379,442,451,491,553,567,553. Sorry. 653,759.

The suspense calendar is deemed approved. Okay. Okay. I'm going to go present now.

It.

Our first bill today is AB 1533. Assemblymember Wicks, your bill enjoys a do pass as amended recommendation. Would you like to present your bill?

Great. Thank you, Madam Vice Chair.

AB 1533 as amended would appropriate. 672, I assume million. No. $672. Wow. $672. I thought that was a typo. From the General Fund to the Department of General Services for the payment of claims against the state accepted by the claims government program. This bill also includes an urgency clause.

AB 1533 is one of several annual bills authored by the chair of either the Assembly Appropriations Committee or the Senate Appropriations Committee to provide appropriation authority for legal settlements approved by the Department of Finance and the Department of General Services.

I have representatives from the Department of Finance and Department of General Services with me today to answer any questions from committee members. I respectfully ask for an aye vote.

Are- Are there any witnesses speaking in favor? Are there any members of the public in the hearing room who would like to speak in favor? If so, please approach the microphone. Are there any members of the public wishing to speak against the bill? Department of Finance, do you have any comments on the bill?

Thank you. Good morning, vice chair and members of the committee. Millie Yan with Department of Finance. Finance is in support of this bill. It appropriates $600 General Fund to the Franchise Tax Board and $72 MVA to the DMV for stale claims.

Thank you. Are there any questions from committee? Dixon?

Thank you, Madam Chair. Well, I think we were all surprised to see $600. $72. It begs a larger question. Obviously, I will support this bill today. My understanding in doing some quick digging into the history and our. And our finance member can explain it perhaps better than I know, but the facts that I understand that this.

This claim was initiated in 2021 and there. This is very typical and there are many claims that go back. In fact, there's another claim that may go back to 2001. I think it's appropriate that the finance department has a process to review the claims.

If checks are sent out, they're not cashed and to verify that they have not been improperly cashed and then claimed for another payment. I get those processes. But in 21st century financial services, check clearance methodologies and stop payments. I mean this goes on in financial world and the consumer world every day.

I'm just wondering here we are and apparently it costs the state $17,000 to process any bill and this is costing the state now $17,000 in addition to the $600 or the $72.

So my for the record, just to say, can we create a better system in our finance Department in dealing with claims to verify claims, legitimize the claims, make sure they're legitimate, but then process them more expeditiously. Is that possible? That's my question. To your witness.

Assemblymember Dixon. Matt Bender, Deputy Director from the Department of General Services, which includes the government claims program. These although the claims date back to payments that were issued or that were that were owed earlier, the claims themselves are fairly recent.

I know that the one claim for $600 which is actually from your district was approved last year by DGS and reserved for the next claims Bill. In General, state law and policy is to pay claims, approve claims out of available appropriations to the maximum extent possible.

That limits the number of claims that need to wait for the next claims bill. And as a result we have made. We actually have fewer claims bills than we did before that system was initiated.

However, these are two claims that because of their age and because there is no current appropriation out of which they can be paid, do need a fresh appropriation in order for the state to be legally able to pay them.

That sounds good. I understand. I mean I'm not trying to thwart any established practice and that sounds appropriate. It just as you can understand. I think we're all really I think the time of here I just even having a hearing on this one bill in addition to the other matters on the agenda for $600.

I'm glad it's in my district. So thank you. Some constituents probably very happy but has been very frustrated for the last five years. So anyway I just put it on record that maybe we could look for ways to improve that process. All right, thank you very much.

Do we have a motion on the bill? Okay. And a second. Okay. This bill gets out on a. A roll call.

Okay. I would now like to open up the hearing to comments by members of the public on any bill not presented to the Committee today. Please be sure to limit your comments to name organization, if any, and your position on the bill.

If there's anyone in the hearing room who would like to state their position on the bill, please approach the microphone. Anyone in the room. It's a riveting hearing today. Team. Okay.

Okay, sorry. Any members from the general public wish to. Okay. We, I think Assembly Member Elhawary is going to come. I'll leave the role open for a little bit. We'll see when she arrives. So we'll just wait a second to adjourn here. Senate Member Elhawary has joined us. Thank you.

And we're adding her onto the a roll call for the consent calendar and AB 1533. Okay. With that, we are. We are meeting adjourned.