BILL ANALYSIS
Appropriations Committee Fiscal Summary
1669 (Chu)
Hearing Date: 8/18/03 Amended: 7/2/03
Consultant: Karen French Policy Vote: B&P 4-1,
PS 6-0
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BILL SUMMARY: AB 1669 increases the education and
training requirements for individuals performing mental
health screening of peace officers applicants.
Fiscal Impact (in thousands)
Major Provisions 2003-04 2004-05
2005-06 Fund
Various state agencies:
CHP, CDC --------Unknown, potentially
significant------- Various
Local mandate --------Unknown, potentially
major------------- General
STAFF COMMENTS: This bill meets the criteria for referral
to the Suspense File.
Existing law requires a peace officer applicant's emotional
and mental condition to be evaluated by a licensed
physician or by a licensed psychologist who has a doctoral
degree in psychology and at least five years of
postgraduate experience in the disgnosis and treatment of
emotional disorders. This bill requires the physician also
to be psychiatrist with five full time years of experience
in the diagnosis and treatment of emotional and mental
disorders, three years of which must be accrued after
completion of the psychiatric residency program. This bill
requires psychologists who perform such evaluations to be
licensed by the California Board of Psychology and at least
three of the five years of experience to be postdoctorate.
Under current law, the same physician who evaluates
physical condition also could evaluate emotional and mental
condition. The requirement for a psychiatrist imposes a
minimum of ten years additional education and training
beyond that of a physician. Costs to hire psychiatrists
frequently are twice that to hire a physician, assuming
psychiatrists are available to perform these services.
These costs would be mandated on local government under
provisions of the bill, and would be major. Staff notes the
current year budget has suspended or suspended payment on
most local mandates. The state owes billions of dollars on
existing mandates. Law enforcement related mandate claims
are one of the fastest growing areas of mandated costs.
This bill is one of three measures before this committee
today, which are the work product of the Speaker's
Commission on Police Conduct. The others are AB 991
(Negrete McCleod ) providing training guidelines for SWAT
teams and AB 1331 (Wesson) providing whistleblower
protection for law enforcement officers.