BILL ANALYSIS �
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|SENATE RULES COMMITTEE | AB 1612|
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THIRD READING
Bill No: AB 1612
Author: Donnelly (R), et al.
Amended: 5/23/14 in Assembly
Vote: 21
SENATE GOVERNMENTAL ORGANIZATION COMMITTEE : 10-0, 6/24/14
AYES: Correa, Berryhill, Cannella, De Le�n, Galgiani,
Hernandez, Lieu, Padilla, Torres, Vidak
NO VOTE RECORDED: Vacancy
SENATE APPROPRIATIONS COMMITTEE : Senate Rule 28.8
ASSEMBLY FLOOR : 74-0, 5/29/14 - See last page for vote
SUBJECT : State government: regulations: online access
SOURCE : Author
DIGEST : This bill prohibits the Office of Administrative Law
(OAL) from charging any fee to individuals with disabilities to
enable access to the California Code of Regulations (CCR), and
from charging for any accessibility option advertised to end
users of its Internet Web site under the "accessibility" link,
as specified.
ANALYSIS : Existing law requires the OAL to provide on its
Internet Web site, free of charge, the full text of the CCR,
including an index of links to the full text of each regulation,
or pending regulation, filed with the Secretary of State. OAL
may contract with another state agency or a private entity in
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AB 1612
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order to provide this service.
This bill prohibits OAL from charging any fee to individuals
with disabilities to enable access to the CCR, and from charging
for any accessibility option advertised to end users of its
Internet Web site under the "accessibility" link, as specified.
Background
Currently, OAL has no information technology staff and contracts
with West Publishing Corporation to provide the statutorily
required public access. Compensation for the service provided
by the private entity comes from the ability of this entity to
charge individuals, businesses and others for additional
services (including enhanced search functions and notifications
of changes or additions in regulations) based upon the copyright
of the CCR that is held by the State of California.
According to the author's office, the quality of online access
is unacceptably poor. For example:
OAL allows users only five minutes of access at a time.
More than 2,000 separate clicks are required to generate a
Table of Contents.
The site charges persons with disabilities for access.
OAL intentionally blocks search engines from accessing and
indexing the text.
The site blocks third-party language translation services
(e.g. Google Translate).
OAL only allows access to one section of text at a time.
Each individual section can only be loaded, copied, or printed
one-by-one.
Each Division, Chapter, Subchapter, and Article must be
manually expanded one-by-one before users can access the text
of regulations.
The full text is not available for download.
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Permission is required from OAL before a member of the public
can use, share, distribute, reproduce, disseminate, publish,
transfer, or store the text of a regulation.
FISCAL EFFECT : Appropriation: No Fiscal Com.: Yes
Local: No
SUPPORT : (Verified 7/31/14)
California Council of the Blind
National Federation of Independent Business
ARGUMENTS IN SUPPORT : According to the author's office, this
bill prohibits OAL from charging users with disabilities a fee
for access to the free online regulations. Currently on OAL's
site, the accessibility tab is linked to a private company that
states that accessible versions of the site are available, but
they will cost the user a substantial amount of money. This
bill will ensure that the state's laws are open and accessible
to all Californians.
ASSEMBLY FLOOR : 74-0, 5/29/14
AYES: Achadjian, Allen, Ammiano, Bigelow, Bloom, Bocanegra,
Bonilla, Bonta, Bradford, Brown, Buchanan, Ian Calderon,
Campos, Chau, Ch�vez, Chesbro, Conway, Cooley, Dahle, Daly,
Donnelly, Fong, Fox, Frazier, Beth Gaines, Garcia, Gatto,
Gomez, Gonzalez, Gordon, Gorell, Gray, Grove, Hagman, Hall,
Harkey, Roger Hern�ndez, Holden, Jones, Jones-Sawyer, Levine,
Linder, Logue, Lowenthal, Maienschein, Mansoor, Medina,
Melendez, Mullin, Muratsuchi, Nazarian, Nestande, Olsen, Pan,
Patterson, Perea, John A. P�rez, V. Manuel P�rez, Quirk,
Quirk-Silva, Rendon, Ridley-Thomas, Salas, Skinner, Stone,
Ting, Wagner, Waldron, Weber, Wieckowski, Wilk, Williams,
Yamada, Atkins
NO VOTE RECORDED: Alejo, Dababneh, Dickinson, Eggman,
Rodriguez, Vacancy
MW:kd 8/7/14 Senate Floor Analyses
SUPPORT/OPPOSITION: SEE ABOVE
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