BILL ANALYSIS
AB 1532
Page 1
Date of Hearing: January 12, 2010
Counsel: Nicole J. Hanson
ASSEMBLY COMMITTEE ON PUBLIC SAFETY
Tom Ammiano, Chair
AB 1532 (Lieu) - As Amended: January 4, 2010
SUMMARY : Enumerates a separate Penal Code section for the
existing definition of a "code enforcement officer."
EXISTING LAW defines a "code enforcement officer" as any person
who is not peace officer and who is employed by any governmental
subdivision, public or quasi-public corporation, public agency,
public service corporation, any town, city, county, or municipal
corporation, whether incorporated or chartered, that has
enforcement authority for health, safety, and welfare
requirements, and whose duties include enforcement of any
statute, rules, regulations, or standards, and who is authorized
to issue citations, or file formal complaints. A "code
enforcement officer" also includes any person who is employed by
the Department of Housing and Community Development who has
enforcement authority for health, safety, and welfare
requirements pursuant to the Employee Housing Act; the State
Housing Law; the Mobilehomes-Manufactured Housing Act; the
Mobilehome Parks Act; and the Special Occupancy Parks Act.
[Penal Code Sections 241(d)(9)(A) and (B), and 243(f)(11)(A) and
(B).]
FISCAL EFFECT : Unknown
COMMENTS :
1)Author's Statement : According to the author, "There are a
number of pieces of federal legislation that contemplate
giving federal grants for local code enforcement functions.
Virtually every jurisdiction performs code enforcement
functions; however, many jurisdictions lack a definition of
code enforcement functions. As a consequence, those
jurisdictions are disadvantaged in the effort to obtain
federal funding for code enforcement purposes. AB 1532
establishes a free-standing definition for code enforcement
officers that can be used by any local jurisdiction in their
AB 1532
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application for code enforcement funding."
2)Background : According to information provided by the author,
"California lacks a free-standing definition for code
enforcement officers that a local jurisdiction could reference
in applications for code enforcement funding. AB 1532
establishes this free-standing definition and is verbatim from
current law (Penal Code Sec. 241 and 243). This bill is not
intended to expand the powers of code enforcement officers,
but just merely provide a definition so that California
jurisdictions may compete on an even playing field in securing
federal dollars."
3)Code Enforcement Officers : Code enforcement officers enforce
the regulations and standards of state and local governments.
Unlike police officers, however, code enforcement officers are
not "peace officers" under California law and are not
empowered to effectuate arrests or to carry weapons during the
course of duty. (Penal Code Section 830 to 832.6.)
Code enforcement officers are responsible for investigating
violations and requiring compliance with the law. Correcting
deficient conditions is often inconvenient and costly. Orders
to correct deficient conditions are often taken personally and
produce anger, resentment, and hostility in the affected
parties. These intense negative feelings aroused by code
enforcement officers may be rooted in human nature, which
includes biological, cultural, and social determinants to
stake out and defend our personal environments. [See Baron &
Byrne, Social Psychology: Understanding Human Interaction (5th
ed. 1987) pp. 440-442, 450-452 (discussing the innate
predilections humans have when it comes to the spaces they
inhabit).] Personal territory, as in a home or business, is
significant for humans as that is where people carry on
long-term essential activities. (Id. at 440 & 451.) It is
the desire for privacy and control that causes a person to
become distressed and attempt to assume dominance over
uninvited intrusions into his or her primary space. (Ibid.)
This predilection to control and defend one's space can
manifest itself in aggression and violence. (Ibid.) Thus, an
enforcement officer is an adversarial position from the start
and on a potential collision course with the inhabitants of
the "invaded" territories. Attacks on code enforcement
officers have included the use of firearms, explosives, all
manners of bludgeons, knives, motor vehicles, beatings and
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even human bites on the officer's person. [See California
Association of Code Enforcement & California Environmental
Health Association, 2001 Survey Results 8 (2002) [hereinafter
Survey Results] (reporting the testimonials of code
enforcement officers about dangerous experiences in the
field).] A 2001 California Association of Code Enforcement
survey of association members reported that over 63% of those
who responded to the survey had been assaulted or threatened.
(Ibid.)
Confronting unlawful, aggressive individuals in the course of
enforcing the law has long been the responsibility peace
officers. Yet, code enforcement officers consistently
encounter felons, gang members, unstable homeless individuals,
irate tenants and potentially violent property owners. In
addition, code enforcement officers investigate violations,
issue citations, prepare criminal cases, arrange arrests for
failures to appear, and obtain court orders.
4)Argument in Support : According to The California Association
of Code Enforcement Officers, "Code enforcement is a process
whereby local governments use various techniques to gain
compliance with duly-adopted regulations such as land use and
zoning ordinances, health & safety codes, sign standards,
substandard housing, property maintenance and uniform building
and fire codes. In recent years, federal and state
regulations governing air and water quality and the transport
of storage of hazardous wastes, and requirements for
implementing the Americans with Disabilities Act have come
into play. Local governments are now obliged to include
enforcement of these rules and regulations in the array of
responsibilities they assume for protecting the publish
health, safety, and welfare.
"Contemporary code enforcement involves local enforcement
officials in the job of ensuring compliance with policies,
codes, rules, regulations, and permits in a proper, timely
fashion within the limits of the law. Consequently,
enforcement officials must be fully acquainted with the
adoption process and the thinking behind the regulations they
enforce as well as the legal limits placed on them.
Conversely, those who write the laws must understand the
problems particular to enforcement and administration as the
codes and regulations are implemented.
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"Your bill, AB 1532, provides a much needed definition of code
enforcement. Although, code enforcement has been used by
local governments for decades, many entities do not have a
codified definition of code enforcement. This oversight has
placed local agencies at a disadvantage in seeking federal
money that is available for code enforcement through
competitive grant processes. Currently, funds for code
enforcement can be made available from Byrne JAG Grant
funding, Regional Information Sharing Systems (RISS) funding,
federal COPS funding, Byrne Discretionary funding, Byrne
Competitive Grants, Community Development Block Grants (CDBG)
. . . .
"We believe that the lack of a codified definition of code
enforcement makes the obtaining of important federal code
enforcement funding more daunting. AB 1532 will rectify this
situation and enable jurisdictions in California to compete on
an even playing field with jurisdictions around the county for
needed code enforcement funding."
5)Prior Legislation : SB 919 (Ortiz), Chapter 274, Statutes of
2003, increased the penalty for a simple assault or battery
upon a code enforcement officer from a term not to exceed six
months to a term not to exceed 12 months in the county jail.
REGISTERED SUPPORT / OPPOSITION :
Support
California Association of Code Enforcement Officers
Opposition
None
Analysis Prepared by : Nicole J. Hanson / PUB. S. / (916)
319-3744