BILL ANALYSIS Ó
SENATE COMMITTEE ON PUBLIC SAFETY
Senator Loni Hancock, Chair A
2013-2014 Regular Session B
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AB 508 (Ian Calderon)
As Amended April 9, 2013
Hearing date: May 14, 2013
Penal Code
MK:mc
DEBT COLLECTION:
HOMELESS VETERANS
HISTORY
Source: Author
Prior Legislation: AB 1111 (Fletcher and Mitchell) - Chapter
466, Stats. 2011
AB 2264 (De León) - Vetoed 2010
Support: National Association of Social Workers - California
Chapter; California Public Defenders Association;
Housing California; AMVETS-Department of California;
VFW-Department of California; Vietnam Veterans of
America-California State Council; Taxpayers for
Improving Public Safety
Opposition:Unknown
Assembly Floor Vote: Ayes 77 - Noes 0
KEY ISSUE
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WHEN, IN THE COURSE OF ITS ROUTINE EFFORTS TO COLLECT FINES, THE
COURT OBTAINS INFORMATION INDICATING THAT A PERSON WHO HAS AN
OUTSTANDING UNPAID CITATION FOR LOITERING, CURFEW VIOLATIONS OR
ILLEGAL LODGING IS A HOMELESS VETERAN, SHOULD THE COURT BE
PROHIBITED FROM GARNISHING THE WAGES OR LEVYING AGAINST A BANK
ACCOUNT OF THAT PERSON FOR A PERIOD OF FIVE YEARS?
PURPOSE
The purpose of this bill is to delay garnishing wages or levying
against the bank account of a veteran to pay for specified
violations when a court determines that the person is homeless.
Existing law authorizes a county or court to establish a
comprehensive collections program to enhance the collection of
delinquent court-ordered debt and improve recovery efforts, and
requires the comprehensive collection program to include at
least 10 of a possible 16 characteristics, as specified. Among
the characteristics provided are:
a) monthly bill or account statements to all debtors;
b) telephone contact with delinquent debtors to apprise them of
their failure to meet payment obligations;
c) issuance of warning letters to advise delinquent debtors of
an outstanding obligation;
d)requests for credit reports to assist in locating delinquent
debtors;
e) access to Employment Development Department employment and
wage information;
f) the generation of monthly delinquent reports;
g) participation in the Franchise Tax Board's Interagency
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Intercept Collections Program;
h) the use of Department of Motor Vehicle information to locate
delinquent debtors;
i) the use of wage and bank account garnishments. (Penal Code §
1463.007.)
Existing law provides that if a court, during the course of its
routine process to collect fees, fines, forfeitures, or other
penalties imposed by a court due to a citation issued for the
violation of a state or local law, obtains information
indicating that a person under 25 years of age, who has been
issued a citation for truancy, loitering, curfew violations, or
illegal lodging that is outstanding or unpaid, is homeless or
has no permanent address, the court shall not garnish the wages
or levy against bank accounts of that person until that person
is 25 years of age or older. (Penal Code § 1463.011.)
Existing law defines a "homeless person" as any person who lacks
a fixed, regular, and adequate nighttime residence, or has a
primary nighttime residence in one of the following:
a) a supervised publicly or privately operated shelter designed
to provide temporary living accommodations, including, but not
limited to, welfare hotels, congregate shelters and
transitional housing for the mentally ill;
b) an institution that provides a temporary residence for
individuals intended to be institutionalized;
c) a public or private place not designed for, or ordinarily
used as, a regular sleeping accommodation for human beings.
(Health and Safety Code § 50582(b).)
This bill provides that notwithstanding any other law, if a
court, during the course of its routine process to collect fees,
fines and forfeitures, or other penalties imposed by a court due
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to a citation issued of the violation of a state or local law,
obtains information including that a person who has been issued
a citation for loitering, curfew violations, or illegal lodging
that is outstanding or unpaid served in the military within the
last eight years and is homeless or has no permanent address,
the court shall not garnish the wages or levy against bank
accounts of that person for five years from the date that the
court obtained that information.
This bill provides that a person is to be considered "homeless,"
or as having "no permanent address" if that person does not have
a fixed, regular, adequate nighttime residence, or has a primary
night time residence that is one of the following:
A shelter designed to provide temporary living
accommodations.
An institution that provides temporary residence for
individuals intended to be institutionalized.
A public or private place not designed for, or
ordinarily used as, a regular sleeping accommodation for
human beings.
This bill provides that nothing in this section shall be
construed to prevent a court from engaging in any other lawful
debt collection activities.
This bill provides that nothing in this section shall be
construed to require a court to perform any further
investigation or financial screening into any matter beyond the
scope of its regular duties.
This bill provides that nothing in this section shall be
construed to prevent the Judicial Council from altering any best
practices or recommendations for collection programs.
This bill provides that nothing in this section shall be
construed to prevent a court from garnishing a person's wages or
levying against a person's bank accounts if the court,
subsequent to its initial determination that the person was a
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homeless veteran exempt from wage garnishment or levy, obtains
evidence that the individual is no longer homeless, or that the
court had, on a previous occasion, suspended garnishment of that
person's wages or levying against that person's bank accounts.
This bill makes legislative findings and declarations relating
to homeless veterans.
RECEIVERSHIP/OVERCROWDING CRISIS AGGRAVATION
For the last several years, severe overcrowding in California's
prisons has been the focus of evolving and expensive litigation
relating to conditions of confinement. On May 23, 2011, the
United States Supreme Court ordered California to reduce its
prison population to 137.5 percent of design capacity within two
years from the date of its ruling, subject to the right of the
state to seek modifications in appropriate circumstances.
Beginning in early 2007, Senate leadership initiated a policy to
hold legislative proposals which could further aggravate the
prison overcrowding crisis through new or expanded felony
prosecutions. Under the resulting policy known as "ROCA" (which
stands for "Receivership/ Overcrowding Crisis Aggravation"), the
Committee held measures which created a new felony, expanded the
scope or penalty of an existing felony, or otherwise increased
the application of a felony in a manner which could exacerbate
the prison overcrowding crisis. Under these principles, ROCA
was applied as a content-neutral, provisional measure necessary
to ensure that the Legislature did not erode progress towards
reducing prison overcrowding by passing legislation which would
increase the prison population. ROCA necessitated many hard and
difficult decisions for the Committee.
In January of 2013, just over a year after the enactment of the
historic Public Safety Realignment Act of 2011, the State of
California filed court documents seeking to vacate or modify the
federal court order issued by the Three-Judge Court three years
earlier to reduce the state's prison population to 137.5 percent
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of design capacity. The State submitted in part that the, ". .
. population in the State's 33 prisons has been reduced by over
24,000 inmates since October 2011 when public safety realignment
went into effect, by more than 36,000 inmates compared to the
2008 population . . . , and by nearly 42,000 inmates since 2006
. . . ." Plaintiffs, who opposed the state's motion, argue in
part that, "California prisons, which currently average 150% of
capacity, and reach as high as 185% of capacity at one prison,
continue to deliver health care that is constitutionally
deficient." In an order dated January 29, 2013, the federal
court granted the state a six-month extension to achieve the
137.5 % prisoner population cap by December 31st of this year.
In an order dated April 11, 2013, the Three-Judge Court denied
the state's motions, and ordered the state of California to
"immediately take all steps necessary to comply with this
Court's . . . Order . . . requiring defendants to reduce overall
prison population to 137.5% design capacity by December 31,
2013."
The ongoing litigation indicates that prison capacity and
related issues concerning conditions of confinement remain
unresolved. However, in light of the real gains in reducing the
prison population that have been made, although even greater
reductions are required by the court, the Committee will review
each ROCA bill with more flexible consideration. The following
questions will inform this consideration:
whether a measure erodes realignment;
whether a measure addresses a crime which is directly
dangerous to the physical safety of others for which there
is no other reasonably appropriate sanction;
whether a bill corrects a constitutional infirmity or
legislative drafting error;
whether a measure proposes penalties which are
proportionate, and cannot be achieved through any other
reasonably appropriate remedy; and
whether a bill addresses a major area of public safety
or criminal activity for which there is no other
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reasonable, appropriate remedy.
COMMENTS
1. Need for This Bill
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According to the author:
According to the National Survey of Homeless Veterans,
a new study of 23,000 homeless veterans, homeless
veterans are more likely to die on the streets than the
average homeless person. Those who return from serving
and become homeless are 11 percent more likely to
develop life-threatening diseases than non-veteran
homeless.
( http://100khomes.org/sites/default/files/NationalSurvey
ofHomelessVeterans.pdf )
Also, according to the U.S. Department of Housing and
Urban Development's most recent annual survey for
point-in-time estimates of homelessness, there were
16,461 homeless veterans in California in January 2012,
of whom 11,949 were considered unsheltered and living
on the streets.
( http://www.hudhre.info/CoC_Reports/2012_ca_pops_sub.pdf
)
The homeless are frequently ticketed for offenses
synonymous with their homelessness, such as loitering,
illegal lodging, and curfew violations. The inability
of homeless veterans to pay for tickets and subsequent
fines for offenses related to their homeless status may
lead to the garnishment of their wages and bank
accounts, damage to their credit history, and create
other barriers to their establishing financial
stability and independence. By making it harder for
homeless veterans to save money to end their
homelessness, such garnishments paradoxically as well
increase the likelihood that the public safety offenses
the tickets are meant to dissuade will in fact occur.
The purpose of this bill is to temporarily prohibit
courts from garnishing the wages or levying against
bank accounts of a veteran, who has served in the
military within the last eight years, who has not paid
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a ticket for curfew violations, loitering, or illegal
lodging where, in the course of its routine efforts to
collect fines, the court obtains information indicating
that veteran is homeless. The veteran is still guilty
of the offense and obligated to pay the fines but the
garnishment is postponed for five years from the date
the court obtained information the veteran is homeless
in order to give the veteran a chance to earn their way
out of homelessness.
2. No Garnishment of the Wages of Homeless Veterans
If a homeless veteran is cited for loitering, curfew violations,
or illegal lodging, this bill would not allow the court to
garnish his or her wages or levy his or her bank account for
five years. The bill only is triggered if the court learns of
the person's homelessness "during the course of its routine
process" to collect fines. It is modeled on a similar statute
which applies to homeless youth and applies to offenses that are
related to being homeless.
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