BILL ANALYSIS
SB 441
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Date of Hearing: July 15, 2009
ASSEMBLY COMMITTEE ON APPROPRIATIONS
Kevin De Leon, Chair
SB 441 (Ducheny) - As Amended: June 25, 2009
Policy Committee: Public
SafetyVote: 7-0
Urgency: No State Mandated Local Program:
No Reimbursable:
SUMMARY
This bill:
1)Replaces the Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation's
(CDCR) Corrections Standards Authority (CSA) with a new,
independent entity, the Board of Community Corrections (BCC),
effective July 1, 2010.
The BCC would maintain much of the mission of the CSA -
including developing and monitoring standards for local youth
and adult correctional facilities, reviewing architectural
plans for local detention facilities, establishing recruitment
and training standards for local corrections personnel,
administering funds for the construction or renovation of
local detention facilities, and administering state-funded
local corrections programs - but one of CSA's central charges,
which is developing, approving and monitoring standards for
the selection and training of state correctional officers,
would be shifted to a resurrected Commission on Peace Officer
Standards and Training (CPOST).
Also, the CSA/BCC membership would be reduced from 19 to 17,
with the chair shifting from the secretary of the CDCR to a
governor's appointment. Three of four CDCR officials would be
dropped from the membership, replaced by one Superior Court
judge appointed by the Judicial Council. The balance of the
existing appointments, all gubernatorial, remain.
2)Re-establishes the Commission on Peace Officer Standards and
Training (CPOST) to reclaim responsibility for developing and
monitoring training for correctional peace officers from the
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Corrections Standards Authority (CSA), which assumed this
responsibility following the reorganization of the Department
of Corrections and Rehabilitation (CDCR) in 2005.
SB 441 does not change current law related to training, other
than reconstituting CPOST and substituting CPOST for CSA in
the sections of law related to correctional officer training.
The executive board of CPOST would be composed of seven voting
members: three appointed by and representing the management of
CDCR, three appointed by and representing the membership of
the CA Correctional Peace Officers Association (CCPOA), and
one representing higher education, with a background in
corrections or employee training, as selected by the two
controlling interests following a rochambeau-like
determination.
FISCAL EFFECT
1)BCC . The cost of replacing the CSA with an independent BCC
would appear to be minor, to the extent funding for the
administration of the CSA is simply redirected to the BCC. To
the extent, however, that a considerable portion of CSA's
administrative funding could not be transferred from CDCR, as
it is currently absorbed by CDCR due to the ability of CDCR to
achieve significant economy-of-scale administrative savings,
new annual GF costs would likely be in the low hundreds of
thousands of dollars for accounting, personnel, testing,
recruiting, budget, contract, legal, office space and other
administrative functions currently provided by CDCR.
Also, unanticipated costs, such as attorney fees could exceed
several million dollars. For example, according to CDCR,
settlement costs in excess of $1 million incurred from Waters
v. Tilton, which involved the CSA, were absorbed by CDCR.
2)CPOST . To the extent sufficient funds are shifted from CDCR to
support CPOST, the net cost could be minor. To the extent
economies of scale are lost, however, by creating a new entity
with a more singular mission from a large entity with a
broader mission, costs will likely increase by at least
several hundred thousand dollars for staffing, travel and per
diem, and office space.
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CDCR estimates a cost of about $300,000 to support staffing,
costs that are currently absorbed by CDCR.
Increased costs are likely, particularly if the proposed
budget addresses the concerns of the Office of the Inspector
General (OIG), which in 2005 recommended increased funding and
a dedicated executive director position. Prior to being
abolished, the CPOST budget was reduced from about $2.3
million in 2001 to about $1.3 million in 2005, while the
amount currently budgeted for state corrections standards and
training for 2009-10 is $860,000.
COMMENTS
1)Rationale .
a) BCC/CSA . In 2005, when the Youth and Adult Correctional
Agency was reorganized into the CDCR, the Board of
Corrections (BOC) was transformed into the CSA. CPOST was
eliminated and consolidated under CSA. The author contends
CSA was more effective in its prior incarnation as BOC and
CPOST.
According to the author, "Local stakeholders were better
represented under the old BOC. This bill would again
increase their participation and provide for a better
state-local balance. In addition, CPOST would be
reconstituted and its functions would remain under CDCR?.
"This bill would reorganize the current CSA to provide a
much needed independent state entity to enhance
coordination between state and local law enforcement crime
prevention efforts, and to create a stronger partnership
between parole and probation.
b) CPOST . The author contends that since responsibility for
developing and monitoring training shifted from CPOST to
CSA in 2005, quality and standards have deteriorated. The
author suggests that since training is but one of many
responsibilities of CSA, it would be more effective to
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return this responsibility to CPOST, whose focus is solely
on training issues.
CPOST was created in 1994 (SB 1902, Peace) and abolished in
2005 when training responsibility was transferred to CSA,
which itself was restructured from the former BOC. In 2004,
the Corrections Independent Review Panel (IRP) under the
direction of Gov. Deukmekjian, recommended CPOST be
eliminated and its function and funding be consolidated
within the CSA.
2)The CSA is a 19-member board with a $55 million budget with
broad responsibilities over state and local corrections,
including developing and monitoring standards for local youth
and adult correctional facilities; reviewing architectural
plans for local detention facilities; establishing recruitment
and training standards for local corrections personnel;
administering funds for the construction or renovation of
local detention facilities; and administering state-funded
local corrections programs.
3)OIG reports broadly criticized CPOST and CSA . In 2005 OIG
stated that, since its inception, CPOST made only minimal
progress in developing correctional peace officer training
standards. The review found that the commission developed
training standards for only 7 of the 27 correctional peace
officer classifications for which it is responsible and that
it had yet to approve any of the standards that have been
developed. The review also found that the apprenticeship
program lacks key components essential to such a program and
is threatened with decertification for non-compliance with
state and federal standards.
The OIG also stated that CPOST's independence "had been
undermined by the influence of both the Youth and Adult
Correctional Agency and the California Correctional Peace
Officers Association, and that the commission's membership
structure was causing institutional paralysis because of
consistent voting deadlocks between management and
rank-and-file, caused obviously by the even split between
management and rank-and-file representatives."
In a 2006 follow-up report, the OIG criticized CSA's response
to deficiencies identified by the OIG in 2005: "Most of the
recommendations from a 2005 special review of the former CPOST
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have not been implemented. The CSA has made limited progress
toward developing selection and training standards for
correctional peace officers, and (CDCR's) Office of Training
and Professional Development has not yet implemented
recommendations pertaining to the correctional peace officer
apprenticeship program."
The OIG did note that the configuration of CSA's 19-member
board "appears to have resolved the structural problems that
invited voting deadlocks" with CPOST.
4)Support. The bill is supported by local probation departments
and sheriff departments, who prefer an independent entity to a
state-administered CSA.
5)Opposition. The Department of Finance opposes the bill on the
basis of cost.
6)OIG criticisms are not resolved simply by switching
responsibilities back to CPOST . Among the recommendations
offered by the OIG:
a) Provide the resources necessary to develop and monitor
training standards.
b) Resolve the voting stalemate by revising the "perpetual
stalemate."
c) Recruit and appoint an independent executive director to
provide leadership.
d) All of these recommendations would require increased
expenditures.
7)Prior Legislation .
a) AB 890 (Aghazarian), 2007, also reconstituted CPOST. AB
890 was held in Senate Appropriations.
b) SB 737 (Romero) Chapter 10, Statutes of 2005, created
the reorganized CDCR.
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Analysis Prepared by : Geoff Long / APPR. / (916) 319-2081