BILL ANALYSIS Ó ------------------------------------------------------------ |SENATE RULES COMMITTEE | AB 1707| |Office of Senate Floor Analyses | | |1020 N Street, Suite 524 | | |(916) 651-1520 Fax: (916) | | |327-4478 | | ------------------------------------------------------------ THIRD READING Bill No: AB 1707 Author: Ammiano (D) Amended: 8/21/12 in Senate Vote: 21 SENATE PUBLIC SAFETY COMMITTEE : 6-0, 6/12/12 AYES: Hancock, Anderson, Harman, Liu, Price, Steinberg NO VOTE RECORDED: Calderon SENATE APPROPRIATIONS COMMITTEE : 7-0, 8/16/12 AYES: Kehoe, Walters, Alquist, Dutton, Lieu, Price, Steinberg ASSEMBLY FLOOR : 54-18, 5/14/12 - See last page for vote SUBJECT : Child Abuse Central Index SOURCE : Public Counsel Childrens Law Center of California DIGEST : This bill revises the law concerning the Child Abuse Central Index (CACI) to provide that a person listed in the CACI when they were under 18 years of age at the time of the report shall be removed from the CACI 10 years from the date of the incident resulting in the CACI listing, if no subsequent report concerning the same person is received during that time period, as specified. ANALYSIS : Existing law establishes the Child Abuse and Neglect Reporting Act (CANRA), which generally is intended CONTINUED AB 1707 Page 2 to protect children from abuse and neglect. (Penal Code Section 11164.) Existing law requires the Department of Justice (DOJ) to maintain an index of all reports of child abuse and severe neglect submitted by specified reporting agencies. CACI is required by statute to be continually updated and not contain any reports determined to be unfounded. (Penal Code Section 11170(a) (1).) Existing law states that the DOJ shall act only as a repository of the suspected child abuse or neglect reports that are maintained in CACI, and that the reporting agencies are responsible for the accuracy, completeness, and retention of reports. (Penal Code Section 11170(a)(2).) Only information from reports that are reported as substantiated shall be filed, and all other determinations shall be removed from the central list. (Penal Code Section 11170(a)(3).) This bill requires that if a person listed in the CACI was under 18 years of age at the time of the report, the information shall be deleted from the CACI 10 years from the date of the incident resulting in the CACI listing if no subsequent report concerning the same person is received during that time period. Existing law generally provides that persons listed on the CACI have the right to a due process hearing before the agency that requested his or her inclusion in the CACI, as specified. (Penal Code Section 11169(e).) Existing law also provides that any person listed in the CACI who has reached 100 years of age shall have his or her listing removed from the CACI. (Penal Code Section 11169(f).) This bill provides that any person listed in the CACI as of January 1, 2013, who was listed prior to reaching 18 years of age, and who is listed once in CACI with no subsequent listings, shall be removed from the CACI 10 years from the date of the incident resulting in the CACI listing. Prior Legislation SB 1022 (Steinberg), 2008, which was vetoed. CONTINUED AB 1707 Page 3 FISCAL EFFECT : Appropriation: No Fiscal Com.: Yes Local: Yes According to the Senate Appropriations Committee: Ongoing state-reimbursable costs, likely in the range of $25,000 to $100,000 (General Fund) statewide to local agencies for additional reporting requirements. Ongoing minor, absorbable costs (General Fund) to DOJ to purge ten-year old CACI listings with no subsequent reports. SUPPORT : (Verified 8/17/12) Public Counsel (co-source) Children's Law Center of California (co-source) California State Association of Counties California Public Defenders Association National Association of Social Workers, California Chapter California Attorneys for Criminal Justice County Welfare Directors Association of California Conference of California Bar Associations OPPOSITION : (Verified 8/17/12) California District Attorneys Association California Police Chiefs Association, Inc. ARGUMENTS IN SUPPORT : According to the author's office: Children can be listed on CACI as perpetrators of physical abuse if they injure another child in circumstances other than a mutual fight or an accident. Children can also be listed on CACI as perpetrators of sexual abuse due to any reported sexual behavior between the child and another child, even if the behavior is consensual. Children in the foster-care system are especially vulnerable to being listed on CACI because they may act out due to past abuse and because their behavior is subject to closer scrutiny by child welfare agency case workers than that of children in the general population. CONTINUED AB 1707 Page 4 AB 1707 provides an avenue for the removal of single-offense minors from the CACI. Specifically if a person is listed in the CACI as a perpetrator of abuse due to an incident that occurred when the person was under 18 years old, the listing shall be removed from the CACI 10 years after the incident, if no other incidents have occurred. By removing non-reoffending minors, AB 1707 would protect youth from suffering life-long restrictions on job opportunities and licensing eligibility due to misbehavior that occurred when they were under 18. AB 1707 will also improve the use and operation of CACI by providing important clean up. Listing conduct of non-reoffending minors can make CACI less effective because it loads CACI with questionable data and wastes the time of subsequent investigators that rely on in conducting investigations and background checks. The sponsors of this bill submit that the lifetime consequence of a CACI listing for children is inappropriate and unfair. Children's Law Center of California states: A CACI listing can have a severe impact on a child's future. If a child listed in CACI later seeks to become a foster parent, an adoptive parent, or to work in law enforcement or a child-care facility, the licensing agency or prospective employer would be notified that the individual is listed as a suspected abuser. Though the child, now young adult, may have long since healed from and/or received the appropriate services to address the underlying issue that led to the reported incident, they can be forever disadvantaged by the listing. The effects of the CACI listing can truly impact the youth for years into the future. ARGUMENTS IN OPPOSITION : The California District Attorneys Association and the California Police Chiefs Association, which oppose this bill, state: It is important to have records of abusive acts against children for both law enforcement and CONTINUED AB 1707 Page 5 employment purposes. Often, substantiated acts of abuse do not result in the filing of criminal charges, but it is nevertheless essential to have a repository for reports of these acts. CACI reports can be very useful in criminal investigations and prosecutions by providing information about prior acts including child protective services (CPS) reports and records. The facts that an act of abuse was committed by a juvenile and 10 years has passed since that act are not valid reasons to remove this vital information from the CACI, especially since the reports now in the CACI are limited to those that are substantiated. In fiscal year 2010-2011, there were a total of 276,985 CACI search requests. Of those, 90 percent were regulatory, and less than 10 percent investigatory. Of these investigatory requests made last fiscal year, nearly 80 percent were made by one agency, the Los Angeles Department of Children and Family Services (DCFS). Regulatory requests resulted in 2.74 percent possible matches; investigatory matches resulted in 18.09 percent possible matches. The highest percentage of possible matches - 21.30 percent - came from citizen inquiries, which comprised only 0.3 percent of all CACI search requests. ASSEMBLY FLOOR : 54-18, 05/14/12 AYES: Achadjian, Alejo, Allen, Ammiano, Beall, Bill Berryhill, Blumenfield, Bonilla, Bradford, Brownley, Buchanan, Butler, Campos, Carter, Cedillo, Chesbro, Davis, Dickinson, Eng, Fong, Fuentes, Galgiani, Gordon, Halderman, Hall, Harkey, Hayashi, Roger Hernández, Hill, Huber, Hueso, Huffman, Jeffries, Jones, Lara, Bonnie Lowenthal, Ma, Mendoza, Miller, Mitchell, Monning, Nestande, Norby, Olsen, Pan, V. Manuel Pérez, Skinner, Smyth, Swanson, Torres, Wieckowski, Williams, Yamada, John A. Pérez NOES: Charles Calderon, Conway, Donnelly, Feuer, Beth Gaines, Garrick, Gatto, Gorell, Grove, Knight, Logue, Mansoor, Morrell, Nielsen, Portantino, Silva, Solorio, Wagner NO VOTE RECORDED: Atkins, Block, Cook, Fletcher, Furutani, Hagman, Perea, Valadao CONTINUED AB 1707 Page 6 RJG:n 8/20/12 Senate Floor Analyses SUPPORT/OPPOSITION: SEE ABOVE **** END **** CONTINUED