BILL ANALYSIS �
SB 1075
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Date of Hearing: June 26, 2012
ASSEMBLY COMMITTEE ON JUDICIARY
Mike Feuer, Chair
SB 1075 (Committee on Rules) - As Introduced: February 14,
2012
PROPOSED CONSENT
SENATE VOTE : 39-0
SUBJECT : UNIFORM ELECTRONIC LEGAL MATERIAL ACT
KEY ISSUE : SHOULD CALIFORNIA ADOPT THE UNIFORM ELECTRONIC LEGAL
MATERIAL ACT TO ESTABLISH STANDARDS TO ENSURE AUTHENTICATION AND
PRESERVATION OF THE STATE CONSTITUTON, STATUTES, AND CODES WHEN
SUCH LEGAL MATERIAL IS MADE AVAILABLE ONLINE IN ELECTRONIC FORM?
FISCAL EFFECT : As currently in print this bill is keyed fiscal.
SYNOPSIS
With modern advances in information technology, all states now
publish their laws, statutes, rules and other legal material
online. According to the author, however, while electronic
publication of legal material has facilitated greater public
access, it raises novel concerns about the authenticity and
preservation of this official information when in electronic
format. This non-controversial bill would adopt in this state
the Uniform Electronic Legal Material Act (UELMA), model
legislation drafted and recommended for passage by the Uniform
Law Commission. This bill would designate the Legislative
Counsel Bureau (LCB) as the official publisher of electronic
legal material in California, and would require LCB to develop
means for the authentication, preservation, and accessibility of
such material. UELMA provides an outcomes-based approach, which
identifies standards and goals, but not specific procedures that
states that adopt UELMA must use to manage their electronic
legal material. This bill passed the Senate without any "No"
votes and is double-referred to the Assembly Rules Committee.
SUMMARY : Adopts the Uniform Electronic Legal Material Act to
ensure the authenticity of California legal material made
available to the public online. Specifically, this bill :
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1)Defines "legal material" to mean the California Constitution,
Codes, and statutes of this state.
2)Designates the Legislative Counsel Bureau (LCB) as the
official publisher for electronic legal material in this
state.
3)Provides that where the LCB publishes legal material only in
an electronic record, the electronic record must be designated
as official, and the legal material in the record must be
authenticated, preserved, and made reasonably available for
public use on a permanent basis.
4)Provides that where the LCB publishes legal material in an
electronic record and also in a record other than electronic
form, the electronic record may only be designated as official
if the publisher authenticates, preserves, and makes the legal
material reasonably available for public use on a permanent
basis.
5)Requires the LCB to authenticate the legal material in any
electronic record that is designated as official, by providing
a method for a user to determine that the record received by
the user from LCB is unaltered from the official record
published by LCB.
6)Provides that if legal material is preserved in electronic
form, the LCB must ensure the integrity of the electronic
record, provide for backup and disaster recovery of that
record, and ensure the continuing usability of the legal
material.
7)Specifies a number of considerations that LCB, in its capacity
as official publisher, must take into account in implementing
UELMA, including the standard and practices of other
jurisdictions, and the use of methods and technologies used by
other official publishers in states that have adopted UELMA.
8)Becomes operative on July 1, 2015.
EXISTING LAW :
1)Requires the LCB to make specified categories of legislative
information available to the public in electronic form,
including, among other things, the California Codes, the
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California Constitution, and all statutes enacted on or after
January 1, 1993. (Government Code Section 10248(a),
paragraphs (8)-(10). All further references are to this code
unless otherwise stated.)
2)Requires the LCB to operate and maintain an information system
in order to make legislative information, as specified,
available to the public by means of access by way of the
largest nonproprietary, nonprofit cooperative public computer
network, as well as by other means and in other formats so as
to provide the greatest feasible access to the general public
in this state. (Section 10248(b).)
3)Provides that any electronic public access through the above
computer network shall be in addition to other electronic or
print distribution of the information. (Section 10248(f).)
COMMENTS : With modern advances in information technology, all
states now publish their laws, statutes, rules and other legal
material online. According to the author, however, while
electronic publication of legal material has facilitated greater
public access, it raises novel concerns about the authenticity
and preservation of this official information when in electronic
format. For example, how can users accessing the text of a
statute online be assured that it is an unaltered, accurate copy
of the true language of the law? This non-controversial bill
would adopt in this state the Uniform Electronic Legal Material
Act (UELMA), model legislation drafted by the National
Conference of Commissioners on Uniform State Laws (i.e. "Uniform
Law Commission") that provides for the authentication,
preservation, and accessibility of official state legal material
in electronic form.
Background: The Legislative Counsel Bureau (LCB) is required to
make the California Codes, statutes, Constitution, and other
specified legal information available to the public in
electronic form. While this information is available at the
Legislative Counsel Bureau-maintained website
(www.leginfo.ca.gov), there is currently no "official" online
version of the statutes or codes, and no single state entity
serves as the digital clearinghouse for electronic records. The
Secretary of State is the custodian of all acts and resolutions
passed by the Legislature, but it does not maintain an official
electronic version of California's laws.
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According to the Council of State Governments, while all 50
states now maintain online versions of their codes, only seven
states provide access to "official" versions online. ( Public
Access to Official State Statutory Material Online , p.2.) In
2011, the Uniform Law Commission recommended that the states
adopt UELMA, and since then the Act has been introduced in six
states, including California.
UELMA promotes flexibility to achieve standards for
authentication, preservation, and accessibility. UELMA provides
an outcomes-based approach, which identifies standards and
goals, but not specific procedures that states that adopt the
Act must use to manage their electronic legal material. In
short, this approach allows states to remain flexible when
fashioning solutions to the particular technological and
practical challenges it faces in implementing the Act. Because
there is no uniformity of technology standards among states,
outcome-based requirements provide a reasonable solution to the
challenge of managing official publications in electronic form
and allow for the likely possibility that publication
technologies will change over time and require further
adaptation. Finally, an outcomes-based approach is also
consistent with other uniform acts that have been widely adopted
by the states. (See, e.g., the Uniform Electronic Transactions
Act (1999) (adopted by 47 states) and the Uniform Real Property
Electronic Recording Act (2004) (enacted in 27 states).)
This bill would designate the LCB as the official publisher in
California. The bill would then require LCB to authenticate the
electronic records of official material-and more specifically,
"to provide a method for a user to determine that the record
received by the user from the publisher is unaltered from the
official record published by the publisher." Authenticity of
official legal material in electronic form is a concern because
all online information is transitory and vulnerable to hacking
and mischief. Currently, California's online database of
electronic legal material (http://www.leginfo.gov) instructs
users to verify the authenticity of information elsewhere.
Using the standards articulated by the drafters of UELMA, this
bill would give LCB discretion to select appropriate methods of
authentication to achieve the desired outcome, which ultimately
could lead to the ability to provide the electronic legal
material's official and authenticated status through its
website.
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Under this bill, LCB would also have discretion to designate
what electronic legal material is official and must therefore be
preserved, and the system by which to preserve it. If legal
material is preserved in print form, reliable procedures are
well-established and therefore not specified in the Act. If
legal material is preserved electronically, however, this bill
would require LCB to provide backup and disaster recovery of the
electronic records, ensure the continuing usability of the
material in those records, and ensure that the material is
reasonably available for use by the public on a permanent basis.
The bill does not restrict the method by which California
achieves these goals, but specifies that it be informed by best
practices of other jurisdictions. According to the Uniform Law
Commission, current best practices call for (a) the existence of
multiple electronic copies that are geographically and
administratively separated; (b) backup copies of electronic
records to be made periodically; and (c) backups to contain the
original material plus subsequent changes to the material.
(UELMA report (July 2011), p. 16.)
Finally, this bill would not require that legal material be
preserved only in electronic form. According to the author,
"there is no consideration in implementing S.B. 1075 to
eliminate the print copies of the California Constitution, the
Statutes of the State of California, or the California Codes."
REGISTERED SUPPORT / OPPOSITION :
Support
California Taxpayers Association (CalTax)
Council of California County Law Librarians
Northern California Association of Law Libraries
San Diego Area Law Libraries
Southern California Association of Law Libraries
Opposition
None on file
Analysis Prepared by : Anthony Lew / JUD. / (916) 319-2334
SB 1075
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