BILL ANALYSIS Ó
SENATE COMMITTEE ON APPROPRIATIONS
Senator Ricardo Lara, Chair
2015 - 2016 Regular Session
AB 63 (Bonilla) - School safety programs: funding
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|Version: May 28, 2015 |Policy Vote: ED. 8 - 0, T. & H. |
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|Urgency: No |Mandate: No |
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|Hearing Date: August 17, 2015 |Consultant: Mark McKenzie |
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This bill meets the criteria for referral to the Suspense File.
Bill
Summary: AB 63 would require the Department of Education (CDE)
to apply to the Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV) to sponsor a
school violence prevention specialized license plate program, as
specified.
Fiscal
Impact:
Estimated CDE costs of $25,000 in 2015-16 for plate design,
and up to $50,000 in 2016-17 for staff time to collect the
initial 7,500 applications and fees for the establishment of
the plate program (General Fund). These costs could continue
into 2017-18 if the requisite applications and fees are not
AB 63 (Bonilla) Page 1 of
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collected within the first year and CDE applies to DMV for a
12-month extension. There could be additional costs if CDE
executes a marketing strategy to attract applicants. If the
license plate program is implemented, CDE would incur ongoing
administrative costs of approximately $119,000.
Assuming 7,500 pre-paid applications are collected by CDE, DMV
would incur initial administrative costs of $135,000 to
process the applications, and an additional $440,000 in
programming and other implementation costs, likely in 2017-18
or 2018-19, partially offset by pre-paid application fees of
$375,000, leaving a net cost of approximately $200,000 (Motor
Vehicle Account). These net costs would be reimbursed in the
following fiscal year by registration renewal fees from
holders of the school violence prevention plates. All ongoing
costs thereafter would be fully offset by fees from renewals
and issuance of new plates.
Upon full implementation of the proposed plate program, there
would be ongoing revenues of approximately $300,000 annually
for use by CDE for school violence prevention programs (based
on 7,500 plate renewals, and not accounting for administrative
costs).
Diversion of funding for personalizing a school violence
prevention plate from the California Environmental License
Plate Fund to the School Violence Prevention Fund. See staff
comments.
Background: Prior to 2007, any new special interest license plate required
specific legislative authorization. This practice was held to
be unconstitutional in that the Legislature approved some of the
plates, and rejected others, using no standardized or objective
criteria for those decisions. Current law, as enacted by AB 84
(Leslie), Ch. 454/2006, authorizes any state agency to sponsor a
special interest license plate, and apply to DMV to establish a
new license plate program after collecting at least 7,500
applications and accompanying fees and submitting them to DMV.
The applications must be collected within one year, with an
option to extend that timeframe by an additional year under
specified conditions. The new specialized license plate must
have a design or contain a message that publicizes or promotes a
state agency, or the official policy, mission, or work of the
AB 63 (Bonilla) Page 2 of
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agency.
In addition to the regular fees for an original or renewal
registration, existing law requires payment of the following
fees for the issuance, renewal, or transfer of the specialized
license plate: $50 for original issuance; $40 for renewal; $15
for transfer to another vehicle; and $35 for substitute
replacement plates. Once a specialized license plate program
has been implemented, all additional fee revenues associated
with the plate, after subtracting DMV administrative costs, are
deposited into the Specialized License Plate Fund, and made
available to the sponsoring agency upon appropriation by the
Legislature for projects and programs that promote the agency's
official policy, mission, or work. A sponsoring agency may not
spend more than 25 percent of its license plate fee revenues for
administrative, marketing, and promotional costs associated with
the plate. If an applicant wishes to personalize a specialized
license plate, the following additional fees would apply: $48
for original issuance, $38 for renewal, and $38 for transfer to
another vehicle. Any fees paid for personalization would be
deposited into the California Environmental License Plate Fund
for expenditure on various environmental protection purposes.
Existing law establishes the School Safety Violence Prevention
Strategy Program for the purpose of promoting school safety and
violence prevention programs for grades K-7 in public schools.
The Superintendent of Public Instruction (SPI) is required to
award competitive grants to provide schools with personnel such
as counselors, social workers, nurses, and psychologists;
install on-campus communication devices; establish in-service
training program for school staff; establish cooperative
arrangements with local law enforcement agencies; or other
strategies for achieving school safety and prevention of
violence. Additional funding to address school safety and
violence prevention was also available to school districts
through the School Safety and Violence Prevention Program
(school safety block grants). Both of these programs were
implemented as school categorical programs. The 2009 Budget Act
imposed a 20% reduction for 39 categorical programs and gave
school districts the flexibility to use the funds for any
educational purposes. The local control funding formula (LCFF),
enacted in 2013, eliminated most categorical programs and
integrated categorical program funds, including those for school
safety programs, into school districts' base grants. These
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previous school violence prevention programs remain in statute
but are no longer specifically funded.
Proposed Law:
AB 63 would require CDE to apply to DMV to sponsor a school
violence prevention license plate program pursuant to the
requirements of the specialized license plate program in
existing law. The bill would require additional fees derived
from the plate program to be deposited into the School Violence
Prevention Fund, established by this bill. Revenues would be
allocated to CDE, upon appropriation by the Legislature, to
carry out one or more purposes of existing specified school
violence prevention programs. Funds would be available to both
charter and non-charter public schools.
The bill also authorizes the Superintendent of Public
Instruction (SPI) to consult with the Board of State and
Community Corrections, the Department of Social Services, and
the Department of Public Health on school violence prevention
and intervention to carry out the purposes of specified existing
programs.
Related
Legislation: SB 544 (DeSaulnier), which was similar to this
bill, failed passage in the Assembly Education Committee in
2014.
Over the past five years, 13 bills have been introduced
directing a state agency to sponsor a specialized license plate
for a variety of causes, and eight of these bills were enacted.
Most recently, the following four bills were signed into law in
2014: AB 49 (Buchanan), Ch. 351/2014, for breast cancer
awareness; AB 1096 (Nestande), Ch. 353/2014, for Salton Sea
restoration; AB 2321 (Gomez) Ch. 358/2014, for domestic violence
prevention and sexual assault awareness; and AB 2450 (Logue),
Ch. 359/2014, for kidney disease awareness.
There are three other specialized license plates pending in this
Committee: AB 192 (Allen) would require the State Coastal
Conservancy to apply to the DMV to sponsor a coastal conservancy
awareness license plate program, and make specified changes to
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the Pet Lover's specialized plate program; AB 270 (Nazarian)
would require the Department of Public Health to apply to DMV to
sponsor a diabetes awareness specialized plate program; AB 932
(Daly) would require the Department of Parks and Recreation to
apply to DMV to sponsor a professional sports franchise license
plate program, as specified.
Staff
Comments: As noted above, any state agency may sponsor a specialized
license plate program and apply to DMV to issue the plates upon
collection of 7,500 pre-paid applications without legislative
action. Rather than allow CDE to sponsor a plate at its
discretion, this bill would require the department to apply to
DMV to sponsor a school violence prevention plate program.
As a sponsoring entity, existing law requires CDE to design a
plate, apply to DMV to sponsor a plate program, and collect
7,500 pre-paid applications within 12 months. If the requisite
number of applications has not been reached within a year, CDE
has the option of either returning all fees and deposits to
applicants, or notifying DMV that it intends to continue
collection efforts to obtain the minimum 7,500 applications
within the subsequent 12 months. If CDE elects to continue
collection efforts, it must contact applicants who submitted
applications and fees to determine whether they would prefer to
continue the application or have their deposits and fees
refunded. Staff notes that only two of the 12 specialized plate
programs signed into law since 2000 have successfully met the
minimum threshold of 7,500 pre-paid applications.
Staff estimates that CDE would incur initial costs of
approximately $25,000 in 2015-16 to design the school violence
prevention license plate and apply to DMV to sponsor the plate,
and additional costs of up to $50,000 in 2016-17 to collect
applications and fees. If 7,500 applications have not been
received within 12 months of applying to DMV, CDE may incur
similar costs in 2017-18 if it chooses to apply for an
extension. There could be additional costs to the extent CDE
implements a marketing strategy to attract applicants, although
that is not an explicit requirement in the bill or current law.
Staff notes that there is no requirement that CDE incur costs
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beyond the initial 12 month period if less than 7,500
applications have been collected. If the program is fully
implemented, CDE indicates it would incur annual costs of
approximately $119,000 to administer the program. This amount
is likely to exceed the specified maximum of 25 percent of plate
funds that may be used for administrative costs. Costs in
excess of these amounts would be a General Fund expense.
All DMV costs are contingent upon receipt of 7,500 pre-paid
applications, as specified above. If the requisite number of
applications are not received within the specified timeframes,
the school violence prevention plate program would not be
implemented and there would be no further costs or revenues
derived from the bill.
If the license plate program is implemented, it would generate
at least $300,000 in annual revenues for school violence
prevention programs (assuming the minimum 7,500 plate holders
paid a $40 renewal fee). After deducting CDE's allowable
administrative costs, there would be very little funding
available for grants to schools.
Existing law requires specified additional funds related to
personalizing a specialized license plate must be deposited into
the California Environmental License Plate Fund. This bill
requires DMV to deposit all fees collected from the sale of the
school violence prevention plates into the School Violence
Prevention Fund, after deducting administrative costs. This
would appear to result in the diversion of any revenues
associated with personalization from the Environmental License
Plate Fund to the new fund for expenditure by CDE.
Staff notes that the Senate Transportation and Housing Committee
authored, and the Senate approved, SR 28 last year to declare a
moratorium on legislation to increase the number of specialized
plate types that DMV may issue until the Legislature can assess
the full and long-term impacts of the ongoing increase in
license plate types. The resolution requested DMV to establish
a task force to study plate proliferation and make
recommendations to the Legislature and Governor by July 1, 2015.
That report is still pending, and the proposed moratorium has
apparently not prevented new plate proposals from moving forward
in the current Session.
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