BILL NUMBER: AB 1225 AMENDED
BILL TEXT
AMENDED IN ASSEMBLY JANUARY 24, 2012
AMENDED IN ASSEMBLY JANUARY 4, 2012
INTRODUCED BY Committee on Veterans Affairs (Cook (Chair), Atkins,
Block, Beth Gaines, V. Manuel Pérez, and Williams)
FEBRUARY 18, 2011
An act to add Chapter 6 (commencing with Section 8122) to Part 1
of Division 8 of the Health and Safety Code, relating to cemeteries.
LEGISLATIVE COUNSEL'S DIGEST
AB 1225, as amended, Committee on Veterans Affairs. Cemeteries:
veteran's commemorative property.
Existing law establishes the Cemetery and Funeral Bureau within
the Department of Consumer Affairs.
Existing law prohibits a cemetery owned and operated by a city,
county, or city and county from engaging in the business of selling
monuments or markers, and also prohibits the cemetery's officers and
employees who manage, operate, or otherwise maintain the cemetery on
a day-to-day basis from engaging in the private business of selling
monuments or markers.
This bill would prohibit the purchase, sale, or transfer
of any veteran's commemorative property, as defined, except that the
bill would authorize an unincorporated association and specified
corporations that own or control a cemetery where veteran's
commemorative property has been placed to any person
or entity, except a municipal corporation, as specified, that owns or
controls a cemetery where veteran's commemorative property has been
placed from selling, trading, or transferring veteran's commemorative
property, except as provided. This bill would require any person or
entity, except a municipal corporation, as specified, that owns or
controls a cemetery where veteran's commemorative property has been
placed that wishes to sell, trade, or transfer veteran's
commemorative property to petition the bureau for permission to
sell, trade, or transfer all or any part of the veteran's
commemorative property. The bill would establish procedures for the
bureau to grant this permission. The bill would make the violation of
its provisions a misdemeanor. By creating a new crime, the bill
would impose a state-mandated local program.
The California Constitution requires the state to reimburse local
agencies and school districts for certain costs mandated by the
state. Statutory provisions establish procedures for making that
reimbursement.
This bill would provide that no reimbursement is required by this
act for a specified reason.
Vote: majority. Appropriation: no. Fiscal committee: yes.
State-mandated local program: yes.
THE PEOPLE OF THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA DO ENACT AS FOLLOWS:
SECTION 1. Chapter 6 (commencing with Section 8122) is added to
Part 1 of Division 8 of the Health and Safety Code, to read:
CHAPTER 6. VETERAN'S COMMEMORATIVE PROPERTY
8122. For purposes of this chapter, the following definitions
shall apply:
(a) "Bureau" means the Cemetery and Funeral Bureau established
pursuant to Section 7602 9603 of the
Business and Professions Code.
(b) "Veteran" means a living or deceased person who meets all of
the following conditions:
(1) Either served in the active military or naval service of the
United States during a war in which the United States was engaged, or
served in active duty in a force of any organized state militia, not
including the inactive National Guard and not including the
California National Guard when in an inactive, full-time status.
(2) Was released from the service otherwise than by dishonorable
discharge or was furloughed to the reserve.
(c) "Veteran's commemorative property" means any monument,
headstone, marker, memorial, plaque, statue, vase, urn,
decoration, flagholder, badge, or shield
, item of memorabilia, or other embellishment that
meets all of the following conditions:
(1) Is over 50 years old.
(2) Identifies or commemorates any veteran or group of veterans,
including, but not limited to, any veterans' organization or any
military unit, company, battalion, or division.
(3) Has been placed in any cemetery.
(3) Is located in any cemetery.
8123. (a) Except as provided in subdivision (b), a
person shall not purchase, sell, or transfer any
person or entity that owns or controls a cemetery where any veteran's
commemorative property has been placed, including an unincorporated
association, a cemetery corporation, or a religious corporation, and
except a municipal corporation described in Section 8137, shall not
sell, trade, or transfer veteran's commemorative property.
(b) An Any person,
unincorporated association, cemetery corporation, or religious
corporation, except a municipal corporation described in Section
8137, that owns or controls a cemetery where any veteran's
commemorative property has been placed may
that wishes to sell, trade, or transfer veteran's commemorative
property shall petition the bureau for permission to sell,
trade, or transfer all or any part of the veteran's commemorative
property. The bureau may approve the sale, trade, or transfer of the
veteran's commemorative property under any of the following
conditions:
(1) The veteran's commemorative property is at reasonable risk of
physically deteriorating so that it will become unrecognizable as
identifying or commemorating the veteran or group of veterans
originally identified or commemorated thereby and the veteran's
commemorative property that is to be sold, traded, or transferred is
replaced at its original site by a fitting replacement commemorative
property, monument, or marker that appropriately identifies and
commemorates the veteran or group of veterans.
(2) The veteran's commemorative property is proposed to be sold,
traded, or transferred to a suitable person that will preserve the
current condition of the veteran's commemorative property and place
the veteran's commemorative property in a suitable place that will
commemorate the veteran or group of veterans.
(3) The petitioner needs to sell, trade, or transfer the veteran's
commemorative property to ensure that sufficient funds are available
to suitably maintain the cemetery where the veteran's commemorative
property was placed, and the specific lot, plot, grave, burial place,
niche, crypt, or other place of interment of a veteran or group of
veterans, so that the place will retain the respect that these
hallowed places deserve.
(4) If the veteran's commemorative property to be sold, traded, or
transferred is reasonably known to the petitioner to have been
donated to the petitioner by any veterans' organization, the sale,
trade, or transfer shall have been consented to by that veterans'
organization.
(5) If the petitioner is not the owner of the veteran's
commemorative property that is to be sold, traded, or transferred,
the petitioner is authorized by the owner of the veteran's
commemorative property to engage in the sale, trade, or transfer.
(6) By operation of any other law authorizing the sale, trade, or
transfer of the veteran's commemorative property.
(c) A petition under subdivision (b) shall be delivered to the
bureau. Upon receipt of the petition, the bureau shall fix a date,
time, and place of the hearing. The date fixed for the hearing shall
be within a reasonable time, not to exceed 100 days, after the
petition is received.
(d) The petitioner shall serve notice of the hearing and a copy of
the petition upon the persons and entities mentioned in paragraphs
(1) to (6), inclusive, of subdivision (e) who could reasonably be
ascertained and contacted by the petitioner and upon any other person
as may be directed by the bureau. Service of the notice of hearing
and petition shall be made in a manner and by a date as shall be
specified by the bureau.
(e) At the hearing held pursuant to subdivision (c), the following
persons and entities, or their representatives, may be heard:
(1) The petitioner.
(2) Any person, other than the petitioner, who is the owner of the
veteran's commemorative property in question.
(3) Any veterans' organization that donated the veteran's
commemorative property in question to the petitioner.
(4) The family of each veteran at whose lot, plot, grave, burial
place, niche, crypt, or other place of interment the veteran's
commemorative property in question is or was placed.
(5) The Division of Veterans Services within the Department of
Veterans Affairs.
(6) The Department of Parks and Recreation.
(7) Any other member of the public who would like to offer written
or oral testimony.
(f) Testimony may be heard in person or by counsel or submitted in
writing.
(g) The bureau shall render its decision in writing, within 60
days of the hearing, and shall forward a copy of the decision to each
person who appeared at the hearing. An order or determination of the
bureau granting the petition, in whole or in part, may, at the
discretion of the bureau, specify the manner in which the petitioner
is to use or apply the proceeds of the sale, trade, or transfer. In
particular, but not by way of limitation, if the petitioner is an
unincorporated association or corporation that is subject to the
Nonprofit Corporation Law (Division 2 (commencing with Section 5000)
of Title 1 of the Corporations Code), any order or determination of
the bureau granting the petition, in whole or in part, may, at the
discretion of the bureau, specify that the petitioner deposit the
proceeds of the sale, trade, or transfer in the permanent maintenance
fund maintained by the petitioner pursuant to the Nonprofit
Corporation Law.
(h) The bureau shall adopt any regulations regarding petitions,
hearings, and procedures under this section as may be appropriate to
further the purposes of this section.
(i) A person who violates any provision of this section is guilty
of a misdemeanor punishable by a fine of not less than one hundred
dollars ($100) or more than one thousand dollars ($1,000) or by
imprisonment in a county jail for not less than 10 days or
more than six months, or by both that fine and imprisonment; and in
addition is liable for all costs, expenses, and disbursements paid or
incurred by the person prosecuting the case.
SEC. 2. No reimbursement is required by this act pursuant to
Section 6 of Article XIII B of the California Constitution because
the only costs that may be incurred by a local agency or school
district will be incurred because this act creates a new crime or
infraction, eliminates a crime or infraction, or changes the penalty
for a crime or infraction, within the meaning of Section 17556 of the
Government Code, or changes the definition of a crime within the
meaning of Section 6 of Article XIII B of the California
Constitution.