BILL ANALYSIS Ó
Senate Appropriations Committee Fiscal Summary
Senator Kevin de León, Chair
SB 840 (Lara) - Local Educational Agencies: Policies Against
Bullying
Amended: March 27, 2014 Policy Vote: Education 7-0
Urgency: No Mandate: Yes
Hearing Date: April 7, 2014
Consultant: Jacqueline Wong-Hernandez
This bill meets the criteria for referral to the Suspense File.
Bill Summary: SB 840 requires each local educational agency
(LEA) to develop, in collaboration with stakeholders, and
implement a policy against bullying containing specified
components. This bill also requires LEAs to provide
documentation of incidents to the California Department of
Education (CDE), as specified.
Fiscal Impact:
Mandate: Policies and procedures - One-time reimbursable
mandate, likely in the high hundreds of thousands to low
millions of dollars (General Fund) for each of the
approximately 1,000 school districts to develop and approve
the required policy and implement the required procedures.
Mandate: Certificated staff training - Potentially
substantial one-time reimbursable mandate, likely $10-15
million (General Fund) to provide mandatory training to the
approximately 300,000 certificated staff statewide.
Potentially significant ongoing mandate to train new
certificated staff each year.
Reporting: Likely minor costs to LEAs to report, and the
CDE to retain, required data on bullying incidents.
Background: Existing law defines bullying as any severe or
pervasive physical or verbal act or conduct, including
communications made in writing or by means of an electronic act,
and including one or more acts committed by a student or group
of students directed toward one or more students that has or can
be reasonably predicted to have the effect of one or more of the
following:
1) Placing a reasonable student or students in fear of harm to
that student or those students' person or property.
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2) Causing a reasonable student to experience a substantially
detrimental effect on his or her physical or mental health.
3) Causing a reasonable student to experience substantial
interference with his or her ability to participate in or
benefit from the services, activities, or privileges
provided by a school. (Education Code § 48900(r))
Existing law authorizes LEAs to suspend or recommend for
expulsion a student who has been determined to have committed an
act of bullying. (EC § 48900(r))
With regard to data collection and reporting, existing law
requires:
1) LEAs to maintain documentation of complaints of
discrimination, harassment, intimidation or bullying based
on actual or perceived characteristics and the resolution
of each incident. (EC § 234.1(e))
2) The Annual Report on Dropouts in California to include,
when it is available, behavioral data by school and
district, including suspensions and expulsions. (EC §
48070.6)
3) Local control accountability plans to include information
addressing specific state priorities, including school
climate as measured by suspension and expulsion rates, and
surveys of students, parents and teachers. (EC § 52060 and
§ 52066)
4) The school accountability report card to include an
assessment of specific school conditions including
suspension and expulsion rates for the most recent 3-year
period. (EC § 33126)
5) School districts to specifically identify in a student's
official records each suspension or expulsion, by offense
committed. (EC § 48900.8)
Existing law requires the CDE to monitor adherence of school
districts to the following requirements: a) Adopt a policy
prohibiting discrimination, harassment, intimidation and
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bullying based on specified actual or perceived characteristics;
b) Adopt a process and timeline for receiving and investigating
complaints of discrimination, harassment, intimidation and
bullying based on those actual or perceived characteristics; c)
Publicize anti-discrimination, anti-harassment,
anti-intimidation and anti-bullying policies; d) Post the policy
in all schools and offices; e) Maintain documentation of
complaints; f) Ensure that complainants are protected from
retaliation; g) Identify a responsible school officer to ensure
compliance. (EC § 234.1)
Proposed Law: SB 840 requires each LEA to develop and implement
a policy against bullying, in collaboration with stakeholders.
The policy must include, at a minimum:
1) A procedure for referring victims of bullying to
counseling, mental health or
other health services, as appropriate.
2) Mandatory training for certificated employees on the
prevention of, and how to address, bullying.
3) A procedure for the documentation of all incidents of
bullying that take place within the LEA and the responsive
actions taken, if any.
This bill requires LEAs to provide documentation of bullying
incidents to the CDE, as specified. This bill codifies
legislative findings and declarations relative to bullying.
Related Legislation: SB 231 (Correa) 2013 would have established
the California Bullying Prevention Clearinghouse and required
the Superintendent of Public Instruction to convene an advisory
council to provide technical assistance on best practices that
reduce bullying. That bill was held on the Assembly
Appropriations Committee's suspense file.
Staff Comments: This bill builds on existing law, and increases
requirements on all LEAs with respect to the way they address
bullying. It specifically requires an LEA to have an official
policy which, at a minimum contains a procedure for referring
victims of bullying to counseling, mental health and/or other
health services and a procedure for documenting all incidents of
bullying that take place within the LEA and any responsive
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actions taken. This bill goes beyond the scope of existing law,
and its required activities would likely be deemed reimbursable
by the Commission on State Mandates. If the more than 1,000
affected LEAs each incurred the minimum $1,000 threshold in
costs (likely staff time), and sought reimbursement, it would
cost the state $1 million General Fund.
This bill also requires that LEAs provide mandatory training for
their certificated employees on the prevention of, and how to
address, bullying. The new mandatory training would also likely
be deemed reimbursable by the Commission on State Mandates, and
the costs would depend on the scope of the training and the
amount of staff time (for both trainers and trainees) it takes
to comply. Training would likely include both education about
the LEA's policy and practical training for preventing bullying
and dealing with incidents as they arise at a school. Initially,
the 300,000 certificated staff statewide would need to be
trained, and their staff time would be reimbursable. If the
state had to reimburse even one hour of staff time per
certificated employee to complete the training (at an average
total cost rate of $50 an hour), the mandate would be $15
million. Once all existing staff are trained, the ongoing
mandate would be substantially decreased. However, any new
certificated staff would have to be trained each year, and their
significant training costs would be reimbursable.