BILL ANALYSIS ----------------------------------------------------------------------- |Hearing Date:June 28, 2010 |Bill No:AB | | |2130 | ----------------------------------------------------------------------- SENATE COMMITTEE ON BUSINESS, PROFESSIONS AND ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT Senator Gloria Negrete McLeod, Chair Bill No: AB 2130Author:Huber As Amended:June 22, 2010 Fiscal: Yes SUBJECT: Professions and vocations: sunset review. SUMMARY: Abolishes the Joint Committee on Boards, Commission, and Consumer Protection and would instead make "eligible agencies," as defined, subject to review by the Joint Sunset Review Committee. Initially specifies five agencies which would be subject to review and have a sunset date of December 2012. Requires the Joint Sunset Review Committee to report to the public and the Legislature on whether an agency should be terminated, or continued, or whether its functions should be revised or consolidated with those of another agency, and include any other recommendations as necessary to improve the effectiveness and efficiency of the agency and any proposed legislation to carry out its recommendations. NOTE : This measure is a companion measure to AB 1659, which was passed out of this Committee on June 21, 2010 by a vote of 6-0. The provisions of this measure will not become operative unless AB 1659 is enacted and establishes the Joint Sunset Review Committee. Existing law, the Business and Professions Code: 1) Establishes the Department of Consumer Affairs (Department) within the State and Consumer Services Agency, and provides that the Department is under the control of the Director of Consumer Affairs (Director) who is appointed by the Governor, subject to Senate confirmation. 2) Provides that the Department consists of 40 boards, bureaus and a commission, as defined, that have been created by law to license and regulate members of various professions and vocations. AB 2130 Page 2 3) Provides that the boards under the Department are made up of appointees of the Governor and the Legislature who perform, among their duties, licensing and regulatory functions such as appointment of an executive officer, setting educational and experience requirements for licensing and regulatory activities, and taking enforcement and disciplinary actions against licensees for violations of law or their individual practice acts. These boards are considered as separate and independent from the control of the Department. 4) Provides that the bureaus are created and operate as part of the Department and under its administrative control, and generally provides that the Director may appoint a chief for each bureau to carry out the powers and duties placed upon the Director in regards to that bureau. 5) States that it is the intent of the Legislature that all existing and proposed consumer-related boards or categories of licensed professionals be subject to a review every four years to evaluate and determine whether each board has demonstrated a public need for the continued existence of that board in accordance with enumerated factors and standards as specified. (Commonly referred to as the "Sunset Review" process.) 6) Established in 1994, the Joint Legislative Sunset Review Committee , and in 2004 changed the name to the Joint Committee on Boards, Commissions and Consumer Protection (Joint Committee). 7) Specifies that the Joint Committee shall consist of three members appointed by the Senate Committee on Rules and three members appointed by the Speaker of the Assembly. No more than two of three members appointed from the Senate or the Assembly shall be from the same party. The Joint Rules Committee shall appoint the chairperson of the Joint Committee. The Joint Committee is authorized to act until January 1, 2012, at which time the committee's existence shall terminate. 8) Provides that the Joint Committee shall have and exercise all the rights, duties and powers conferred upon investigating committees and their members by the Joint Rules Committee and that the Assembly and the Senate Committee on Rules may designate staff for the Joint Committee. 9) Provides that all boards under the Department that are scheduled to become inoperative and repealed on a specified date or established pursuant to initiative act, or certain specified bureaus or other AB 2130 Page 3 programs of the Department, are subject to review by the Joint Committee. 10)Provides that in the event that any board becomes inoperative or is repealed (sunsets) that the Department shall succeed to and is vested with all the duties, powers, purposes, responsibilities of that board, and provides that when the regulatory program is taken over by the Department, that program shall be designated as a " bureau ." 11)Provides, as of January 1, 2004, all administrative or regulatory boards, commissions, committees, councils, associations, or other authorities who have appointed membership, are subject to review by the Joint Committee. 12)Provides for a process of review and evaluation conducted by the Joint Committee which includes the preparation of an analysis and report by the board submitted to the Joint Committee which describes in detail the activities of the board and its programs, evaluation of the board by the Joint Committee based on specified factors and minimum standards of performance, public hearing(s) conducted by the Joint Committee and final recommendations of the Joint Committee included in a published report on whether each board or function scheduled for repeal shall be terminated, continued, or reestablished, and whether or not its functions should be revised. If the Joint Committee deems it advisable, its report may include proposed bills to carry out its recommendations. 13)Allows the chairpersons of the appropriate policy committees of the Legislature to refer to the Joint Committee for review of any legislative issues or proposals to create new licensure or regulatory categories, change licensing requirements, modify scope of practice, or create a new licensing board. Existing law, the Government Code: 1)Provides that the Legislature finds and declares that California's multilevel, complex governmental structure today contains more than 400 categories of administrative or regulatory boards, commissions, committees, councils, associations, and authorities and that these governmental entities have been established without any method of periodically reviewing their necessity, effectiveness or utility and as a result the Legislature and residents of California cannot be assured that these existing or proposed governmental entities adequately protect the public health, safety and welfare. 2)Provides that it is the intent of the Legislature that all existing AB 2130 Page 4 state boards be subject to review every four years to evaluate and determine whether each has demonstrated a public need for its continued existence in accordance with enumerated factors and standards. 3)Requires the Joint Committee to review all state boards every four years and to evaluate and make determinations as specified. This bill: 1)Abolishes the current "Sunset Review" process and the ability of the Joint Committee to review boards and bureaus under the Department of Consumer Affairs. [It is intended that the review of boards scheduled for sunset will now be the responsibility of the Senate and Assembly Business and Professions committees. The same evaluative and review process performed by the former Joint Committee will be continued jointly by these committees as part of their oversight function.] 2)Repeals provisions which allow a board to become a bureau under the Department in the event that any board becomes inoperative or is repealed (sunsets). [This will require the Legislature to take an affirmative action to decide on the appropriate changes and continuation of the board prior to its sunset date.] 3)Abolishes the authority granted to the Joint Committee in January of 2004, to review all existing state boards and other entities every four years. 4)Makes instead all "eligible agencies," as defined, subject to review by the new Joint Sunset Review Committee (JSRC) which would be established pursuant to AB 1659. 5)Specifies that the following four agencies would be subject to review by the JSRC in its first year of operation and would have sunset dates of January 1, 2013: a) The State Race Track Leasing Commission. b) The Capitol Area Committee. c) The Continuing Care Advisory Committee. d) The California Recreational Trails Committee. 6)Provides that the JSRC shall make a report available to the public and the Legislature or whether an agency should be terminated, or continued, or whether its functions should be revised or consolidated with those of another agency, and include any other recommendations as necessary to improve the effectiveness and AB 2130 Page 5 efficiency of the agency. 7)Provides that if the JSRC deems it advisable, the report may include proposed bill to carry out its recommendations. 8)Specifies that the provisions of this measure would not become operative unless AB 1659 is enacted and establishes the JSRC. FISCAL EFFECT: Unknown. This bill is keyed "fiscal" by Legislative Counsel COMMENTS: 1.Purpose. According to the Author who is the Sponsor of the measure, this bill serves as the implementation bill for the JSRC created by her companion bill AB 1659 which creates the JSRC and outlines its duties and responsibilities in reviewing "eligible agencies," as defined in AB 1659. As indicated by the Author, this bill seeks to establish accountability and oversight for government entities by requiring systematic review and evaluation of state entities. Under current law, as explained by the Author, the Joint Committee is granted the power to hold public hearings at specified times and to evaluate whether a board or regulatory program under the Department has demonstrated a need for its continued existence, and to also review all other 400 plus categories of administrative or regulatory boards, commissions, committees, councils, associations, and authorities. Joint Committee members have not been appointed to this committee since 2006, and the Joint Committee never implemented their new authority granted to it in 2004, to review all other types of appointed governmental entities. The Author further indicates that this bill would abolish the Joint Committee and move the functions of the Joint Committee as it relates to review of appointed governmental entities to the JSRC. The JSRC would not , however, review those boards and bureaus under the Department. As earlier indicated, these agencies would continue to be reviewed and evaluated by the Business and Professions committees of the Senate and the Assembly. However, if at any time these committees no longer reviewed these agencies, then the JSRC would have the authority to continue such reviews. As stated by the Author, "the purpose of AB 1659 and AB 2130 is to establish a long term process through which the state can conduct routine reviews of entities and determine if they are still necessary. It is not the intention of AB 1659 or AB 2130 to prohibit standing committees from conducting their own periodic AB 2130 Page 6 reviews of boards and commissions under their jurisdiction." 2.Background. a) The "Sunrise" of Sunset Review in California. The concept of sunset review law first began back in the 1970's. There are now about 35 states which have some sort of sunset review law on the books. Basically, the genesis behind all sunset laws is to place a termination date on a particular program or agency, and in the meantime, review it to determine if it is still operating in an effective and efficient manner, and whether it should continue. When one talks about sunset or sunrise laws, they are usually referring to a review of regulatory licensing agencies. There are certainly other specific programs which may be subject to sunset, but the idea of subjecting an agency to a more formalized review process, before allowing it to continue, or be established in the first place, is unique to this type of law. California was sort of a "Johnny-come-lately" to this process. There had been prior attempts by the Legislature to pass a sunset law, but in those instances the legislation would have sunset both the board and the licensing program of the particular profession. The law which was passed in 1994, only sunsets the board - not the licensing of the occupation. There are basically two reasons for this, the first is obvious - in most instances there is a continued need to license those professions currently regulated by boards under the Department of Consumer Affairs. To automatically terminate the licensing requirements would have provided no benefit to the review of these boards under the sunset law. The second reason, however, is more important. Throughout 1993 and 1994, both the Senate Business and Professions Committee and the Assembly Consumer Protection Committee began a review of some of the 32 regulatory boards under the Department. There was more concern with the boards' operation and activities (or lack thereof) than whether there was a need to continue the licensing of a particular profession. A number of problems with these boards were identified and a report was issued by Senate Business and Professions Committee Subcommittee on Efficiency and Effectiveness in State Boards and Commissions titled, Reforming and Restructuring California's Regulatory Agencies which detailed a number of changes and recommendations regarding these boards and also strongly recommended the establishment of a Joint Legislative Sunset Review Committee to provide specific review criteria and minimum standards of evaluation for legislative and state agency use, and AB 2130 Page 7 subject all licensing agencies and regulatory programs of the Department to periodic review and sunset. For all these reasons and more, both the Legislature and the Administration believed the more immediate task at hand was to review these consumer boards at regular intervals. If it was determined the board should sunset, then there would be adequate time to determine if the entire licensing program should be eliminated as well. (It should be noted that the Hoover Commission and the LAO at that time both recommended establishing a sunset review process for all regulatory consumer boards.) In 1994, SB 2036 was signed into law which established the Joint Legislative Sunset Review Committee. The Joint Committee reviewed all boards and other programs under the Department for a period of 10 years on an ongoing basis, until its final review in 2005. b) Brief Description of the Sunset Review Process. The law, which went into effect on January 1, 1995, set in place a schedule for review of all of the 32 independent boards and programs under the Department. It allowed for an initial review of all boards beginning in 1995 and ending in 1998. A re-review of these boards was required after four or more years from the initial review, and began in 1999 and ended in 2005. All 32 boards and certain other programs and bureaus of the Department were reviewed and re-reviewed during the10-year period. The sunset date for each board allowed enough time for the board to be reviewed by the Joint Committee, and for legislation to be passed to extend the sunset date of the board and make appropriate changes. The actual review process for the Joint Committee began with sending boards a detailed questionnaire and a request for information which covered every aspect of the board's operation for four years. The boards were required to respond to this request by September 1 of the year they were scheduled for review. During this time, staff of the Joint Committee, Senate Business and Professions Committee, Assembly Consumer Protection Committee, and the LAO worked together to prepare an analysis and report on each board. (Staff also met with boards to review documents and information provided, and seek input from various consumer groups, and the Health and Budget committees of the Legislature.) The report provided a brief overview of the board's functions and programs, identified issues or problem areas concerning each AB 2130 Page 8 board, and included preliminary recommendations for members of the Joint Committee to consider. This included whether each board scheduled for review should be terminated, continued, or reestablished, and whether its programs or functions should be restructured or revised. The Joint Committee then conducted public hearings to review the issues and preliminary recommendations. The boards were provided an opportunity to respond, along with the regulated industry, consumer groups and the public. The Department participated in these hearings as well. After the hearings, the Joint Committee provided the Department with copies of all testimony and analyses prepared by staff. The Department then had 60 days to provide its own recommendations to the Joint Committee. Once received, the Joint Committee then met to review the recommendations of the Department and make final recommendations to the Legislature. c) Results and Accomplishments of Sunset Review. The overall goal of the Joint Committee was to provide for improved and effective service to California consumers, and to the board's current and potential licensees. The process of sunset review provided an opportunity for legislative staff and members to focus on the operations of these state regulatory programs and to consider changes which could improve their overall performance in protecting the consumer. The specter of termination served to galvanize most of these agencies and the professions they regulate, so as to make necessary statutory and administrative changes to increase the efficiency and effectiveness of these programs under review. If a regulatory program is considered as unnecessary, or performance of the board is exceptionally poor, a recommendation was made to either sunset the agency, reconstitute the board membership, or shorten its time frame for another review by the Joint Committee. In the past, the Legislature had often struggled to make some changes to a particular board, or to deregulate certain programs. It has spent an inordinate amount of time and energy reviewing one or two issues concerning a particular regulatory program, without the ability to effectively evaluate the entire operation of the agency. Prior to sunset review only three agencies were ever eliminated by the Legislature, they included the Board of Fabric Care (licensing dry cleaners), the Auctioneer Commission and the Board of Polygraph Examiners. In the meantime, the Legislature continued to create new boards or programs and licensure categories with little, if any, assessment of their AB 2130 Page 9 need or viability. From 1995 to 2005, the Joint Committee reviewed all boards and programs under the Department of Consumer Affairs and then re-reviewed them again to ensure that suggested changes and recommendations of the Joint Committee were implemented. The Joint Committee also reviewed proposals to create new boards or licensure categories and generally found that there was no need for creating a new agency for purposes of licensure or to regulate a particular profession. Some of the accomplishments of the Joint Committee included the following: (1) the elimination of boards or regulatory programs which were unnecessary, or did not operate in the best interest of consumers; (2) merger or consolidation of boards or regulatory programs to improve overall efficiency and effectiveness of the boards programs and provide cost savings; (3) changes in board composition to increase overall public representation on boards and in some instances creating a public majority; (4) improvements in the enforcement processes of boards by increasing the number of disciplinary actions taken against licensees, reducing the backlog of cases and the time frame to prosecute cases; (5) improvements in the operational efficiencies for individual boards by requiring strategic planning, critical measures of performance in the areas of cost, quality of service and speed of service, and adoption of policies, standards, procedures and guidelines for boards' licensing, examination and enforcement programs; (6) removal and close examination of artificial barriers of entry into the profession by requiring standardization and uniformity of licensing requirements, eliminating excessive requirements and providing comity between states; (7) expansion of licensing programs to assure the continuing competency of licensed professionals; (8) close examination of budgetary needs and resources for boards and proposed fee increases when necessary to properly fund these boards; (9) ongoing resolution of proposals for expanding or changing scope of practice for licensed professionals; and, (10) requiring additional and more accurate information to be provided and disclosed to the public regarding the activities of the board and the status of the licensee. d) The "Sunset" of Sunset Review. In January 2004, pursuant to SB 364 (Figueroa, Chapter 789, Statutes of 2003), the Joint Committee received new authority to review all state boards (generally, any administrative or regulatory board, commission, committee, council, association, or authority consisting of more AB 2130 Page 10 than one person, whose members are appointed by the Governor or the Legislature), every four years or over another time period as determined by the Joint Committee. At that time the Joint Committee was granted two new staff positions from the Senate who began to identify those entities for possible review. The original list identified over 524 separate entities which included boards, bureaus, commissions, advisory bodies, authorities, etc. From that list, another list was compiled which dealt with those entities which included members who were appointed by the Governor and the Legislature. This list included 156 separate entities with 108 which included Governor's appointees only. A final list was complied by February 2004 which included 46 entities which would be reviewed by 2005 by the Joint Commission. In February 2004, the Governor began what he titled as the "California Performance Review" (CPR) to examine all state operations and agencies and recommend reforms. Part of this review included a review of all the boards and bureaus under the Department of Consumer Affairs, and a review of a number of other boards and entities as already identified by the Joint Committee. At that time, CPR sent a request to the Chair of the Joint Committee asking if at least one member of the staff of the Joint Committee could join with the CPR to assist in their review and in the meantime hold-off on the review by the Joint Committee. The Chair agreed to provide assistance to the CPR but decided to proceed for that year with only reviewing those boards under the Department of Consumer Affairs which were slated for sunset. The staff of the Joint Committee worked with CPR for six months in formulating recommendations regarding the boards under the Department and other boards and entities as identified. On August 3, 2004, the CPR issued a lengthy 4-volume report which included specific recommendations regarding each, including elimination and consolidation of some, transferring certain boards or programs to new agencies or departments, and consolidating enforcement programs of the boards. After the CPR Report was issued, the LAO provided its own assessment of CPR's recommendations on August 27, 2004, and concluded that in many areas, including the consolidation or discontinuation of boards and commissions, that the reorganization recommendations of the CPR lacked a strong rationale. The proposals lacked sufficient detail to evaluate whether a proposed consolidation or elimination of a board would improve efficiency and coordination of their state functions, and could have the potential of significantly reducing legislative oversight and control in key AB 2130 Page 11 budget and policy matters. The CPR reorganization emphasized a transition away from independent boards and towards executive/department program management. LAO pointed out that among the benefits of independent boards is that they can include experts in the policy field to offer a variety of policy perspectives. They can also offer more independent, forward-thinking proposals than might be typical from a state department and provide for a public forum where meetings are open to the public rather that having an isolated and somewhat closed department decision-making process. The Legislature also has the ability to make direct changes to boards' operations and structure versus a department run program, and to oversee board management through the appointment and approval process of board members. (More checks and balances.) A CPR Commission was also established to conduct eight full-day hearings throughout the state to provide review and comment on the CPR recommendations. In November 2004, the CPR Commission provided a report regarding the hearings they conducted and recommended that the professional licensing functions of health related boards should remain within the new Commerce and Consumer Protection Department and should not be transferred to the new Health and Human Services Department. It also recommended that the investigative functions of the boards be retained and that they not be moved to new Public Safety Department. Finally, that because boards and commissions enable public participation and subject matter expertise in particular fields, that the Administration more thoroughly evaluate the proposed elimination of the specified boards based on their suggested criteria and that all boards and commissions should be reviewed and/or authorized on a regular basis to ensure that the original purpose for their creation still exists. The Little Hoover Commission also conducted three public hearings to review the CPR proposals and made its report available on December 2004. The report made rather broad statements regarding the consolidation or elimination of boards and commissions and basically said the "If nothing else, some boards that are not working well, need to work well, rather than being eliminated." In other cases, well functioning boards need to be focused on activities that only boards can perform. The Hoover Commission agreed with the CPR Commission that criteria should be established that would allow policy-makers to make consistent and rational decisions whether to eliminate or consolidate certain board functions. AB 2130 Page 12 On January 6, 2005, the Governor's Office put forth their "Governor's Reorganization Plan #1" and within this plan was the recommendation to eliminate all independent boards under the Department of Consumer Affairs and transfer their functions to the Department as bureaus . This proposal completely ignored the recommendations of the CPR, the LAO, the CPR Commission and the Hoover Commission as indicated above. The Governor's Reorganization Plan was strongly rejected by the Legislature and was finally withdrawn by the Governor in March. However, the Governor then began to leverage changes he wanted to make regarding the boards by taking an "oppose unless amended" position on all the sunset bills which were introduced by the Joint Committee in 2005. By threatening to veto all sunset bills, and basically turning all boards into bureaus, the basic trust which had been established between the Administration and the Legislature for over 10 years of sunset review was broken and resulted in the "sunset" of sunset review. 3.Resuscitating Sunset Review. The Legislature has basically kept the sunset review process on basic "life support." Since 2006, no new Chair or members have been appointed to the Joint Committee and, therefore no reviews conducted by the Joint Committee. Each year a bill or bills are introduced to extend sunset dates of boards under the Department. There have been attempts to revive the sunset process, by hopefully addressing some of the primary concerns regarding the process, but to no avail. To more fully explain, in 2007, SB 963 (Ridley-Thomas, Chapter 385, Statutes of 2008) was amended to revise and recast the sunset review law to remove the provision that a board automatically become a bureau under the Department if the board sunsets, and instead provided for the removal (reconstitution) of a board's members and appointment of a new successor board upon the sunset date. It eliminated the Joint Committee and instead authorized the appropriate standing policy committees of the Legislature to carry out the sunset review functions. The measure also streamlined the reporting requirements for the boards and the Department. The basic reasons for these changes were as follows: a) Reconstitution of the board rather than becoming a bureau. In recent years, when problems have been identified with a variety of boards, the most effective means of achieving resolution and change has been by reconstitution of the board. This essentially creates a new board by allowing appointing authorities to appoint new members to replace problem members and to reappoint effective members. The new board may then replace the executive officer if the executive officer has been ineffective in managing the AB 2130 Page 13 operations. This has happened with the Dental Board, the Board of Optometry, the Acupuncture Board, the Athletic Commission and most recently the Board of Registered Nursing and has proven to be an effective method for initiating needed changes. Currently, by operation of law, when a board does actually sunset it automatically converts to bureau under the Department. Converting a board to a bureau was always considered as the last thing either the appointing authority or the professions wanted and therefore provided a means to achieve needed changes to these boards. However, as earlier explained, eliminating all consumer boards and converting them to bureaus became part of the Governor's Reorganization Plan in 2005 and was strongly rejected by the Legislature and others. The one alternative to the sunset of a board appeared to be appointing all new members to a board if their were serious concerns with its current operation. b) Transferring the sunset review responsibilities to the policy committees. Transferring responsibilities for sunset review from the Joint Committee to the standing policy committees of the Legislature was considered as a cost-savings measure which would eliminate the costs for an additional legislative committee. Furthermore, over the years, the sunset review process has relied heavily upon the expertise and staffing of the standing legislative committees for much of the sunset review work that the Joint Committee performed. [This change seemed to be also in keeping with the recently announced efforts of the Senate President pro Tem and the Speaker to re-invigorate the oversight functions of the standing policy committees and to evaluate the conduct and work of an entity or system of entities with a view to determining facts about the current activities and operations of the organization. It is intended that the committee focus will be on those areas of state government administration or program responsibility within the committee's subject matter jurisdiction and to research and examine whether, for the effort and resources being expended, appropriate results are being obtained, and if changes or improvements can be made to achieve better, more needed, or different high-value outcomes.] The Legislature was unable to come to agreement with the Administration on the changes proposed in SB 963 and in 2008 the bill was eventually amended to simply provide for sunset extensions for only those boards that were being sunsetted the following year. SB 638 (Negrete McLeod) was a similar measure introduced in 2009 and passed out of this Committee, but was held in Senate Rules AB 2130 Page 14 Committee. SB 1171 (Negrete McLeod) was introduced in 2010 and passed out of this Committee, but was again held in Senate Rules Committee. Even though consensus on modifying the sunset review process has not been reached, the Committee plans as part of its oversight function (as described above) to begin a review of all boards and bureaus under the Department of Consumer Affairs over the next four years. On March 1, 2010, at least nine boards were chosen for review this fall and a request for information was sent out to these boards. SB 294 (Negrete McLeod) is currently being amended in the Assembly to change sunset dates of all boards under the Department to correspond to their sunset review over the next four years. 4.Related Legislation This Session. SB 1171 (Negrete McLeod) is a similar measure to the current bill and revises the sunset process by changing the default action of sunset to reconstitution rather than elimination of a board and creation of a bureau, and transfers the responsibility for sunset review from the Joint Committee to the policy committees in the Legislature. That bill passed this Committee and was referred to Rules Committee and has not been moved. SBX8 60 (Harman) enacts the Jobs Protection Act, renaming the Joint Committee on Boards, Commissions, and Consumer Protection as the Joint Committee on Boards, Commissions and Consumer or Business Protection. Creates a new legislative procedure for any bill that may have a statewide economic impact affecting business. Requires the Assembly and Senate Committees on Rules to refer any bill that may have a statewide economic impact affecting business, as specified, to the joint committee for the preparation of an economic impact analysis and a hearing and approval, and requires the joint committee to make an annual report. That bill was heard in Senate Rules Committee on March 10, 2010 and held under submission. SB 954 (Harman) is nearly identical to SBX8 60 (Harman). That bill has not been set for hearing. AB 1659 (Huber) recasts existing law governing the periodic review (known as "Sunset Review") of departments, administrative or regulatory boards, commissions, committees, councils, associations, authorities, or other offices of state government, however denominated, by creating a new Joint Sunset Review Committee with the responsibility to review and evaluate these state agencies based on specific criteria and information provided by these agencies. This measure was heard in this Committee on June 21, 2010, and was AB 2130 Page 15 passed out of this Committee by a vote of 6-0. 5.Prior Legislation. SB 638 (Negrete McLeod) in 2009, is a similar measure to the current bill and would have revised the sunset process by changing the default action of sunset to reconstitution of the board rather than elimination of the board and creation of a bureau, and transferring the responsibility for sunset review from the Joint Committee to the policy committees in the Legislature. That bill was made a two-year bill and subsequently was not moved in 2010. SB 963 (Ridley-Thomas, Chapter 385, Statutes of 2008) as amended August 8, 2008, contained many of the same provisions that are in this bill. In addition to reforming the sunset process, this bill was complicated by several additional provisions relating to specific board operations and raised strong objection from several boards and professional associations. Ultimately, the Legislature was unable to come to agreement with the Administration on the policies, and the bill was eventually amended to simply provide for sunset extensions for only those boards that were being sunsetted the following year. AB 1467 (Negrete McLeod, Chapter 33, Statutes of 2004) revised the law to rename the Joint Legislative Sunset Review Committee to the Joint Committee on Boards, Commissions, and Consumer Protection confirming what was done through the passage of Senate Concurrent Resolution No. 56 (Resolution Chapter 14 - 2004). The name was changed to better reflect the jurisdiction of the Joint Committee that was modified by the enactment of SB 364 (Figueroa, Chapter 789, Statutes of 2003). SB 2036 (McCorquodale, Chapter 908, Statutes of 1994) created the sunset review process in California. This measure established the Joint Legislative Sunset Review Committee to provide specific review criteria and minimum standards of evaluation for legislative and state agency use, and to subject all boards of the DCA to periodic review and sunset. 6.Policy Issue : Should the Joint Committee on Boards, Commissions and Consumer Protection be abolished and the current requirements under the sunset review process pursuant to Section 473 et seq. of the Business and Professions Code be eliminated? As earlier indicated, it is the intent of this Committee to do a thorough review of all boards and bureaus under the Department over the next four years. For now it does not seem necessary for the Joint Committee to be continued, at least in name only, since there have been no AB 2130 Page 16 appointments to the Joint Committee since 2006, nor has the Joint Committee convened since 2005. With the experience that this Committee has along with the Assembly Business and Professions Committee, and with the efforts of the Senate President pro Tem and the Assembly Speaker to re-invigorate the oversight functions of standing policy committees in regards to the agencies and departments under their jurisdiction, it would seem appropriate that the Joint Committee be abolished along with the sunset review process and that the standing policy committees assume this responsibility. If at some future date the policy committees no longer review boards and bureaus of the Department, then the newly created JSRC would have the authority to continue review of these agencies. NOTE : Double-referral to Rules Committee. SUPPORT AND OPPOSITION: Support: None on file as of June 21, 2010. Opposition: None on file as of June 21, 2010. Consultant:Bill Gage