2017 Bills
Updated 10/16/17
At the end of the 2017 legislative session, Governor Brown signed 859 bills and vetoed 118. Results for our highest-priority bills are below.
Follow @CAStateStrong on Twitter to stay up to date with happenings in the California legislature. We will keep you updated about upcoming votes in committees and inform you about how the sausage-making happens!
Bills That Passed
These bills have been signed by Governor Brown. Most become law in January of next year. Resolutions become law right away and don’t require Governor Brown’s approval.
Environment
- Signed 10/06 SB50 – Establishes a statewide policy of discouraging transfer of federal public lands in California to third parties
Conflicts of Interest & Corporate Responsibility
- Signed 10/04 SB33 – Permits customers of financial institutions to sue instead of entering into forced arbitration
- Passed 03/06 SR23 – Calls on Congress to conduct investigation on Trump’s ties to Russia
- Signed 10/07 AB249 – Requires groups that oppose or support ballot measures to disclose major donors
Criminal Justice
- Signed 10/14 AB1008 – Ban the Box: employers may not ask about felony convictions (with particular exceptions)
- Signed 10/11 SB180 – Repeals the 3-year sentence enhancement for defendant’s prior convictions for certain drug offenses
- Signed 10/06 SB239 – Treats exposure to HIV in the same manner as exposure to other serious communicable diseases
- Signed 10/11 SB394 – Parole after 25 years for offenders who committed crimes as juveniles
- Signed 10/11 SB620 – Allow consideration of defendant’s individual circumstances before imposing life or virtual life sentence
Economic Justice
- Signed 10/12 SB63 – Requires employers to allow up to 12 weeks of unpaid parental leave
Education
- None
Healthcare
- Signed 10/09 SB17 – Requires health plans and insurers to report drug prices to regulators
- Signed 10/09 AB265 – Prohibits prescription drug manufacturers from offering discounts to patients if a lower cost therapeutically equivalent brand or generic drug is available
Immigration
- Signed Into Law in Budget Bill SB6 – provides legal counsel to undocumented immigrants
- Signed 10/05 SB29 – Prohibits local governments from contracting with private companies to detain immigrants for profit
- Signed 10/05 SB54 – California Values Act: makes California a sanctuary state
- Signed 10/05 AB21 – Establishes policies to be implemented by institutions of higher education in California that safeguard against immigration enforcement activities on campuses
- Signed 10/05 AB291 – Immigrant Tenant Protection Act: landlords may not threaten to report undocumented tenants
- Signed 10/05 AB450 – Protects against ICE in workplace
- Signed 10/05 AB699 – Protects against ICE in schools
LGBTQ Rights
- Signed 10/15 SB179 – Simplifies the process to change name and gender on state-issued identity documents
- Signed 10/15 SB310 – Permits inmates and parolees to petition the courts for a change of name and official gender identification
Privacy & Civil Rights
- Signed 10/15 SB31 – Bars state and local governments from participating in religious registries
- Passed 09/12 AJR7 – Encourages the federal government to protect net neutrality
Voting Reform
- Signed 09/27 SB568 – Moves the date of California primaries to March
Women’s & Reproductive Rights
- Signed 10/12 AB41 – Speeds up DNA testing in rape cases
- Signed 10/12 AB168 – Prohibits an employer from seeking salary history information about an applicant for employment
- Signed 10/12 AB280 – Creates Rape Kit Backlog Voluntary Tax Contribution Fund to accept voluntary donations from tax returns
- Signed 10/12 AB1312 – Provides additional rights to victims of sexual assault
- Signed 10/07 SB743 – Protects MediCal coverage for family and reproductive services
- Signed 01/19 SR12 – Affirms support for access to comprehensive reproductive care
- Signed 01/30 HR6 – Affirms support for access to comprehensive reproductive care
Zombie Bills
These bills either died in committee, got held in the Appropriations suspense file, were moved to the inactive file, or failed a vote.
Budget
- SB726 – Taxation: estate, gift, and generation-skipping transfer taxes
Environment
- Failed AB378 – Extends California’s cap & trade program
- SB49 – Prohibits the state from enacting environmental policies less stringent than federal standards
- AB1000 – Prohibits pumping the groundwater underlying deserts in protected areas (e.g. the Mojave Desert, national and state parks) if doing so will have an adverse impact
- SB57 – Keep Aliso Canyon closed due to gas leak
- SB71 – Requires solar systems be installed on all new residential construction
- SB100 – California’s energy must be supplied by renewable and “zero-carbon” generating facilities by December 31, 2045
- SB700 – Energy Storage Initiative. Requires PUC to provide rebates to customers who install energy storage systems
- SB705 – Prohibits a food provider from dispensing prepared food to a customer in an expanded polystyrene food service container
- SB709 – Oil spill response and contingency planning
- SB740 – Expands graywater recycling efforts in California
- SB560 – Requires CalPERS/CalSTRS to consider climate risk in their investments
- SB584 – Expedites timeline for CA renewable energy
Conflicts of Interest & Corporate Responsibility
- Vetoed 10/15 SB149 – Presidential Tax Transparency Act: requires presidential candidates to release 5 years of tax returns to appear on ballot in California
- AB1089 – Establishes campaign contribution limits
Criminal Justice
- Failed AB42 – California money bail reform
- AB43 – Tax on private prisons to set up after school programs to prevent incarceration
- AB282 – Requires implicit bias training for police
- AB284 – Requires the Department of Justice to write and publish a public report on peace officer-involved shootings resulting in death or serious injury in CA in 2015 and 2016
- Failed AB298 – Forces law enforcement cooperation with ICE
- AB386 – Provides legal representation to honorably discharged veterans with ties to California who have been deported
- AB535 – Restores right to serve on a jury once felons serve their sentences
- AB748 – Limits the length of time law inforcement agencies can withhold video recording of a peace officer’s use of force to a maximum of 90 days
- Gov says: Postponed till next year SB10 – California Money Bail Reform
Education
- Failed AB155 – Media literacy curriculum required in schools
- SB135 – Requires the Instructional Quality Commission to develop, and the state board to adopt, modify, or revise, a model curriculum in media literacy for social sciences for grades 1 to 12
- AB1356 – Taxes income over $1,000,000 to provide financial aid for students in the UC, CSU, and CC systems
Economic Justice
- AB71 – Removes mortgage deduction on second homes and boats to fund affordable housing
Healthcare
- Special Committee will convene to discuss universal healthcare SB562 – CA single payer healthcare
- AB587 – Expands an existing program to coordinate bulk purchasing and cost-saving practices for provision of prescription drugs through public programs
- SB790 – Prohibits a drug manufacturer from offering or giving a gift to a health care provider
Immigration
- AB578 – Makes threatening to report immigration status a felony
- AB946 – Resist the Wall Act; Prohibits state from doing business from any company that bids on Trump’s border wall
- SB785 – Prevents immigration status being revealed in open court in civil cases unless so directed by the judge
Privacy & Civil Rights
- Vetoed 10/13 SB51 – Whistleblower protection: provides protections public employees who reports improper governmental activity
- AB165 – Exempts K-12 students from CA Electronic Communications Privacy Act
- AB375 – Gives consumers greater control over their personal information when accessing the Internet through an Internet service provider
- AB800 – Requires the Attorney General to establish a public hotline for hate crimes
Voting Reform
Women’s & Reproductive Rights
- SB309 – Creates a fund for reproductive care from license plate sales
- Vetoed 10/15 AB9 – Exempts tampons, sanitary napkins, menstrual sponges, and menstrual cups from gross receipts tax and state and local sales tax
- Failed AB479 – Exempts diapers/feminine products from sales tax, funded by liquor tax
- Vetoed 10/15 AB569 – Prohibits an employer from taking any adverse employment action, as defined, against an employee based on the employee’s reproductive health care decisions
- Vetoed 10/15 AB1209 – Requires companies with more than 500 employees in CA to report gender-related pay differentials