BILL ANALYSIS Ó Senate Appropriations Committee Fiscal Summary Senator Kevin de León, Chair SB 1349 (Jackson) - Report on Competitive Athletics Amended: April 23, 2014 Policy Vote: Education 7-1 Urgency: No Mandate: No Hearing Date: April 28, 2014 Consultant: Jacqueline Wong-Hernandez This bill meets the criteria for referral to the Suspense File. Bill Summary: SB 1349 requires public schools to report specific information regarding pupil participation in competitive athletics, beginning with the 2015-16 school year and every three years thereafter. This bill also requires the Bureau of State Audits (BSA) to conduct Title IX compliance audits, as specified. This bill also makes legislative findings and declarations relative to gender equity in athletics. Fiscal Impact: Reporting and posting: Minor and absorbable costs for individual schools to report athletics program information to their respective districts' governing boards. Likely minor, but potentially significant, costs for school districts to receive and post that information on their websites and to update the information every 3 years. Audits: The cost to audit 10 high schools for full compliance with Title IX will depend on the level of investigation needed, and scope violations the BSA discovers. The BSA estimates $160,000 - $175,000 to conduct the audits. See staff comments. Background: Federal law provides that, in part, "no person in the United States shall, on the basis of sex, be excluded from participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any educational program of activity receiving Federal financial assistance." In order to be in compliance with Federal Title IX, relative to athletics, a school must show compliance with one of these three parts. The federal tests are: 1) Athletic participation of women and girls is proportionate to enrollment. SB 1349 (Jackson) Page 1 2) The school has a history and continuing practice of program expansion for women or girls. 3) The school is fully meeting female athletes' interests and abilities in its present athletic program. (Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972 to the 1964 Civil Rights Act) Enforcement of compliance is initiated upon the filing of a complaint alleging a violation of Title IX. State law establishes standards virtually identical to those of Federal Title IX. (Education Code § 230) Proposed Law: This bill requires, beginning with the 2015-16 school year, each public school with students who participate in competitive athletics to report to its school district governing board all of the following information: a) the total enrollment of the school, classified by gender; b) the number of students who participate in competitive athletics, classified by gender; and, c) the number of boys' and girls' teams, classified by sport and by competition level. This bill further requires that school districts post the data from each school within the district on the district's website, and for the data to be retained by the school for at least 3 years. This bill requires, beginning July 1, 2019 and every 3 years thereafter, the BSA to randomly choose 10 high schools that offer competitive athletics with numbers that are not proportionally representative of the male and female participants in the athletic program, and conduct an audit of each school for full compliance with Title IX. Within 6 months of the July 1 initiation of an audit, the BSA must report the results of the audit to the affected schools, their school districts, the California Department of Education, the Governor, and the Education and Judiciary Committees of both the Senate and Assembly. This bill sunsets this reporting requirement on January 1, 2024. Related Legislation: AB 2512 (Bonilla) adds compliance with Title IX, including the total number of pupils, by gender, participating in existing after school athletic programs, to indicators to be included in the Academic Performance Index. That bill also authorizes, beginning January 1, 2018, school districts to include this information in the district's local SB 1349 (Jackson) Page 2 control accountability plan as one indicator of school climate. That bill is pending in the Assembly Appropriations Committee. Staff Comments: This bill requires elementary and secondary schools that offer competitive athletics to report specified information about their athletic programs to their respective school districts in 2015-16, and every 3 years thereafter. School districts, in turn, must post that information on their websites. While the provisions of this bill do not constitute a reimbursable state mandate, because school districts are not required to offer athletics, it functionally mandates new activities for the majority of school districts which provide athletics in one or more schools; they must either comply or cancel their athletics programs. The new requirements of this bill are likely to result in a minor workload increase for individual schools. The workload burden on school districts will vary by the size of the school districts. For example, the Los Angeles Unified School District has more than 900 schools; collecting and posting athletics information for hundreds of schools on the district website could take significant staff time. This bill also requires the BSA to randomly choose 10 high schools that offer competitive athletics, and whose athletics participation numbers are not proportional, by gender, to enrollment, to audit for full Title IX compliance. Auditing a school for Title IX compliance would go beyond competitive athletics, and would require the BSA to investigate numerous academic and extracurricular programs at the schools being audited. BSA staff would travel to schools, conduct the audits, and write a report, and the agency estimates $160,000 - $175,000 in costs for the 10 initial audits. Those expenses would be incurred every 3 years thereafter. Recommended Amendments: Joint Rules of the Senate and Assembly, Rule 37.4 (b) specifies that "any bill requiring action by the Bureau of State Audits shall contain an appropriation for the cost of any study or audit." Staff notes that this bill does not provide for payment of State Auditor costs associated with the Title IX audits, and the author may wish to provide an appropriation in this bill or to make the required audits SB 1349 (Jackson) Page 3 contingent upon a Budget Act appropriation.