BILL ANALYSIS
Senate Appropriations Committee Fiscal Summary
Senator Christine Kehoe, Chair
441 (Ducheny)
Hearing Date: 05/18/2009 Amended: 04/02/2009
Consultant: Jacqueline Wong-HernandezPolicy Vote: Public Safety
7-0
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BILL SUMMARY: SB 441 removes the Corrections Standard
Authority (CSA) from under the management of the Department of
Corrections and Rehabilitation (CDCR), effective July 1, 2010.
This bill specifies that researching "best practices in the
field of crime prevention" is part of the duties of CSA. This
bill also requires CSA to conduct two specific studies and to
report its findings and recommendations to the Legislature and
the Governor:
1) Methods to improve coordination and effectiveness between
state parole and local
law enforcement. This study must be completed by July 1,
2010.
2) The effect of concurrent parole and probation sentences on
state and local
governments and the levels of coordination between the
state and counties in
these cases.
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Fiscal Impact (in thousands)
Major Provisions 2009-10 2010-11 2011-12 Fund
CSA transition costs Unknown, potentially
significant costs General
Study #1 $600
General
Study #2 up to $600
General
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STAFF COMMENTS: This bill meets the criteria for referral to
the Suspense File.
Until 2005, CSA was the stand-alone Board of Corrections, and
was not under authority of CDCR. The Department of Corrections
became CDCR in 2005, when CSA and the Department of Juvenile
Justice (DJJ) became part of the department. This bill would
restore CSA as a stand-alone entity. Removing CSA from CDCR will
likely incur one-time transition costs, but the extent of those
costs is not clear.
CSA is physically located separately from CDCR, so there will be
no costs associated with moving or additional office space.
Currently, CDCR provides administrative support to CSA in
budgeting, recruiting, and various personnel services. CDCR has
estimated that losing these services would cost CSA $500,000 to
$1,000,000 annually. Because CDCR's administrative budget is
based on workload, however, its budget should be decreased by
virtually the exact amount CSA's would need to be increased for
those additional tasks CDCR currently provides. Another option
to limit disruption, would be for CSA to enter into an
inter-agency agreement with CDCR to continue to receive the
services it currently does from CDCR. Further mitigating the
costs, is CSA's history as a stand-alone department. Until 2005,
it functioned as its own department.
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SB 441 (Ducheny)
This bill specifies that research best practices in the field of
crime prevention is part of the duties of CSA. Since CSA's
existing duties include both studying "the entire subject of
crime" and "possible methods of prevention of crime", this
phrasing does not appear to create a new duty or expand current
duties.
This bill requires a study of methods to improve coordination
and effectiveness between state parole and local law
enforcement, to be completed by July 1, 2010. CSA believes this
timeline would be very difficult to adhere to, and estimates the
cost of such a study to be $600,000. Expenses from the study
include both PYs and travel costs.
The second study required by the bill is likely to cost less
than $600,000 because there is no deadline for the report, so
the workload can be distributed over a longer period of time.
Because the bill contains only general concept language, it is
unclear how extensive these studies will be. Public
Safety-related studies range in cost from $30,000 to $600,000
depending on t he department conducting the study and the
extensiveness of the study.