BILL ANALYSIS Ó
Senate Appropriations Committee Fiscal Summary
Senator Kevin de León, Chair
SB 49 (Lieu) - School Safety Plans
Amended: May 1, 2013 Policy Vote: Education 9-0
Urgency: No Mandate: Yes
Hearing Date: May 23, 2013 Consultant: Jacqueline
Wong-Hernandez
SUSPENSE FILE. AS PROPOSED TO BE AMENDED.
Bill Summary: This bill requires school safety plans to include
procedures related to response to a person with a gun on campus,
extends from annually to every third year the frequency of
review of safety plans, and requires charter school petitions to
include a description of a school safety plan.
Fiscal Impact (as approved on May 23, 2013): Provisions of this
bill create new costs and new savings for the state. The
realization of savings in certain provisions does not depend
upon incurring the costs in other provisions of the bill.
Extending frequency of school safety plan reviews:
Extending the frequency of required reviews from annually to
every three years will likely significantly reduce the costs
associated with an existing reimbursable state mandate.
New requirements for school safety plans: Significant costs
to expand the scope of an existing reimbursable mandate for
which the state currently pays in excess of $3 million,
annually.
New requirements for charter petitions: Significant costs
for charter petitioners, and for existing charter schools to
the extent that they do not have school safety plans in
place. New requirements may result in a reimbursable mandate
on school districts and county offices of education (COEs)
in their capacity as charter authorizers. See staff
comments.
Background: Existing law requires each school district and COE
to be responsible for the overall development of all
comprehensive school safety plans for its schools. The
schoolsite council is required to write and develop a
comprehensive school safety plan relevant to the needs and
resources of that school. (Education Code § 32281)
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School districts and COEs, in consultation with law enforcement,
are authorized to elect to not have schoolsite councils develop
and write portions of the school safety plan that include
tactical responses to criminal incidents. Portions of the safety
plan containing tactical responses may be developed by school
administrators in consultation with law enforcement. Governing
boards are authorized to approve the tactical response portion
of the safety plan in a closed session. (EC § 32281)
Existing law requires the comprehensive school safety plan to
include: (1) an assessment of the current status of school crime
committed on school campuses and at school-related functions,
and (2) identification of appropriate strategies and programs
that will provide or maintain a high level of school safety and
detail procedures for complying with existing laws; disaster
procedures; policies regarding suspension or expulsion; a
discrimination and harassment policy; and, a safe and orderly
environment conducive to learning. The comprehensive school
safety plan is required to be evaluated at least once a year.
(EC § 32282)
Existing law further requires each school to submit its school
safety plan to the school district or COE for approval and
requires a school district or COE to notify the California
Department of Education by October 15 of every year of any
school that is not in compliance. (EC § 32288)
Existing law requires governing boards to grant a charter
unless: 1) the charter school presents an unsound educational
program; 2) the petitioners are demonstrably unlikely to
successfully implement the program described in the petition; 3)
the petition does not contain the number of required signatures;
4) the petition does not contain specified affirmations; or, 5)
the petition does not contain reasonably comprehensive
descriptions of among other elements, the procedures that the
school will follow to ensure the health and safety of pupils and
staff. (EC § 47605)
Existing law requires the State Board of Education (SBE), in its
capacity as a charter authorizer, to develop criteria to be used
for the review and approval of charter school petitions
presented to the state board. It specifies that the criteria
shall address all elements required for charter approval, and
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shall define "reasonably comprehensive," for purposes of the
required descriptions. (EC § 47605)
Existing law requires charter schools to comply with the
provisions of their charters and provisions of the Education
Code that apply to charter schools. Charter schools are exempt
from most laws governing school districts except where
specifically noted, including establishing minimum age for
public school attendance, specified building code regulations,
availability of coverage in a public retirement system, and the
Charter School Revolving Loan Fund. (EC § 47610)
Proposed Law: SB 49 makes changes to mandatory comprehensive
school safety plans. Specifically, this bill:
1) Adds to the required components in school safety plans
the inclusion of procedures related to individuals with
guns on school campuses and at school-related functions,
including training programs related to active shooters and
active terrorists.
2) Requires the adoption of a plan with the changes
proposed by this bill by March 1, 2014, and requires plans
to be reviewed and updated by March 1 of every third year
thereafter.
3) Modifies the existing requirement that schools report
annually in the school accountability report card the
status of school safety plans, to require the status of
plans for the upcoming school year to be accurately
reported no later than July 31 of every third year.
4) Allows school districts to keep confidential information
relating to planned tactical responses to criminal
incidents from being included at the public meeting
currently required prior to the adoption of a school safety
plan.
5) Requires each school principal or administrator of a
school without a principal to provide written or electronic
notice to each teacher and classified employee that the
adopted school safety plan is readily available for
inspection.
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6) Requires each superintendent of a school district or
COE, or each administrator in charge, to annually provide
written notification, by October 15, to the Superintendent
of Public Instruction (SPI) identifying each school that
has not accurately reported the status of plans in the
school accountability report card.
7) Adds to the required elements of a charter school
petition development of a school safety plan, which must
include specific topics.
8) Requires each principal or administrator in charge of a
school without a principal to keep and maintain a copy of
the most recent school safety plan for that school, and
requires each superintendent of a school district or a COE,
or each administrator in charge, to keep a copy of the most
recent school safety plan and a copy of every notification
sent to the SPI of schools that have not developed school
safety plans.
9) Requires all related books, documents, records, and
other papers kept and maintained to be open for inspection
and copying, as specified.
10) Requires the CDE to monitor compliance using an
existing monitoring framework.
11) Modifies the requirement that all safety-related plans
and materials be readily available for inspection to strike
"public" and instead specify that plans are to be available
for inspection by law enforcement and school employees.
Related Legislation: SB 634 (Price) requires schools to conduct
specific safety drills, and adds standards for safety drills to
the required elements of school safety plans.
SB 634 is also scheduled to be heard in this Committee on May
13, 2013.
SB 755 (Lieu) 2011 made numerous changes to the requirement that
each school have a school safety plan, and how those plans
should be updated, and required the SPI to publish on the CDE
website the name of each school reported as not complying with
the requirements to adopt, review, and update a comprehensive
school safety plan. That bill was held under submission in this
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Committee.
Staff Comments: This bill makes statutory changes to the
existing state mandates regarding comprehensive school safety
plans. The state has paid nearly $10 million over the past three
years in local reimbursements for the 1,450 mandate claims
related to mandatory comprehensive school safety plans.
This bill adds new requirements for comprehensive school safety
plans, and new administration, reporting, and notification
requirements on school administrators. These new duties and
requirements will expand the reimbursement level for the
existing mandate. Since the mandate has already been approved
and the reimbursement methodology determined, it will be
relatively simple for school districts and COEs to show that
this bill further increases their mandated duties with respect
to comprehensive school safety plans.
This bill extends frequency of required reviews from annually to
every three years. This provision will likely reduce the costs
associated with the existing reimbursable state mandate, because
it reduces some of the annual workload to only being required to
occur every third year. While this reduction of duties will
likely offset the mandate expansion in other provisions, the
reduction does not depend on that expansion. In other words, the
frequency of reviews can be extended, leading to state savings,
without placing in law new requirements that will lead to new
state costs.
Charter school petitions are currently required to include "a
reasonably comprehensive description of the procedures that the
school will follow to ensure the health and safety of pupils and
staff." This bill adds, as part of that requirement, that a
charter school petition specifically include a comprehensive
school safety plan that adheres to the requirements of this
bill.
The fiscal impact of this requirement on charter schools will be
determined by local decisions and actions regarding the
evaluation of a charter's comprehensive school safety plan as
part of its petition. The fiscal impact on the state, in turn,
will be determined by the extent to which authorizers (often
school districts) that do incur significant new costs file
successful mandate claims seeking state reimbursement. While the
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bill's requirements appear to be on charter schools, they have a
ripple effect that necessarily results in requirements on the
authorizers.
The local costs incurred by existing charter schools have been
deemed by the Commission on State Mandates to not be
reimbursable state mandates because charter schools choose to
form and operate. Similarly, groups attempting to establish new
charter schools would bear these costs themselves. It is not
clear, however, if new requirements on school districts that
have authorized charter schools and are statutorily bound to
consider their renewal or revocation would be eligible for
reimbursement for the cost of any new activities that could
result from this legislation. Any school district or COE that
may receive a new charter proposal in the future may have to
take on new activities in anticipation of receiving charter
proposals, whether or not it ever does. Associated costs across
school districts can be aggregated in a mandate claim.
Charter petitions are very extensive documents which lay out a
charter's goals, the details of how its proposed education
program would be implemented, and descriptions of various
aspects of how the school itself will run. While there are
statutory requirements for what must be included in a charter
petition, those elements are subject to local interpretation as
to whether a proposed charter has met all of the requirements. A
school district receiving a charter petition may deny a charter
after determining, using its own standards for evaluating the
statutory components, that a charter does not meet certain
criteria, only to have the SBE decide that the charter does meet
that criteria because the SBE has evaluated the same component
in a different way.
Charter schools are statutorily bound to operate consistent with
the policies, procedures, and educational programs committed to
in the charter proposal; thus, numerous areas of the proposal
can be subject to scrutiny and discussion, and can potentially
become reasons for denial. If a charter is denied, the denial
can be appealed to the COE or the SBE.
At a minimum, authorizers would have to formally develop
criteria for evaluating whether a charter has provided a school
safety plan that meets the requirements of this bill. As a
practical matter, charter authorizers will also need to
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communicate their expectations for fulfilling the provisions to
existing charter school administrators (who will need to include
new information in renewals), and individuals proposing new
charters. This bill changes the work of charter petitioners; new
charter schools will have to commit to a school safety plan very
early in a school's planning process, and possibly before the
school has secured a physical site for locating the school.
The committee amendments would remove the provisions of the bill
related to placing school safety plan requirements in charter
school petitions.