BILL ANALYSIS �
SB 1377
Page 1
Date of Hearing: August 8, 2012
ASSEMBLY COMMITTEE ON APPROPRIATIONS
Felipe Fuentes, Chair
SB 1377 (Corbett) - As Amended: August 6, 2012
Policy Committee: JudiciaryVote:10
- 0
Human Services 6 - 0
Urgency: No State Mandated Local Program:
No Reimbursable:
SUMMARY
This bill clarifies the information available to the
state-designated protection and advocacy (P & A) agency.
Primarily, this bill provides that the authority of the P&A
agency includes access to the following unredacted records: a
citation report, licensing report, survey report, plan of
correction, or statement of deficiency prepared by a department
responsible for issuing a license or certificate to a program or
facility serving an individual with a disability, and provides
that the information obtained in those records is subject to
confidentiality requirements.
FISCAL EFFECT
Costs associated with this legislation should be minor and
absorbable within existing resources.
COMMENTS
Purpose . The intent of this bill is to clarify a P & A agency's
right to review reports of abuse and neglect of individuals with
developmental and mental health disabilities without having to
make a separate assertion of probable cause in each case.
The author explains the need for such clarification by noting
that federally mandated P & A agencies such as Disability Rights
California (DRC) are charged with protecting and advocating for
the rights of persons with disabilities. In order to fulfill
this function, federal law grants P & A agencies the
right to access reports prepared by state agencies that
SB 1377
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investigate reports of abuse, neglect, injury or death of
persons with disabilities and perform certification or licensing
reviews.
The author asserts that in the past, the Department of Public
Health (DPH) provided such reports to DRC in complete and
unredacted form. However, in 2009 the DPH changed this policy
for two special populations of vulnerable individuals with
disabilities-people with developmental disabilities and people
with mental health disabilities. Citing state privacy laws
governing the records of persons with developmental disabilities
(W&I Code Sec. 4514) and mental health disabilities (W&I Code
Sec. 5328), DPH began forwarding to DRC redacted records with
all relevant information about cases involving individuals with
either a developmental disability or mental health disability
blacked out. Under DPH policy, upon receipt of the redacted
report DRC must submit an individual written request to receive
an unredacted record for the case. For cases involving people
with all other disabilities, DRC continued to receive reports
from DPH in the usual unredacted form.
This bill clarifies that P & A agencies are authorized to
receive all reports involving the abuse and neglect of
vulnerable individuals in an unredacted form.
Analysis Prepared by : Julie Salley-Gray / APPR. / (916)
319-2081