At press time, two CTA-sponsored bills were still waiting for the governor's signature:
- AB 2506 (Steinberg), which would require the State Teachers' Retirement System to set up a website to explain 403 (b) tax-sheltered investing to its members.
- SB 1983 (Soto), which would provide funds to increase STRS member services and raise the cap on the amount retired teachers could earn from public education entities before seeing their pension payments reduced.
Gov. Gray Davis has signed the following CTA-approved and CTA-supported bills into law:
- AB 1746 (Liu), which prohibits community college districts from charging fees or tuition for California residents who are surviving spouses or children of persons killed in the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.
- AB 1900 (Nakano), which designates April as Labor History Week and provides $150,000 to districts to purchase materials for labor education.
- AB 2785 (Chan), which increases grants from the School Community Policing Partnership Grant Program to $15,000, deletes matching fund requirements, and authorizes grant funds to be used for programs relevant to a school's safety plan (including programs to develop tolerance and prevent bullying).
- AB 2950 (Strom-Martin), which extends the authorization for six University of California subject matter projects until June 30, 2007, moves the repeal date to Jan. 1, 2008, and eliminates the repeal dates for the California Professional Development Institutes.
- SB 1253 (Figueroa), which allows a school district governing board or its designee to regulate the use of electronic signaling devices, such as cellular telephones and pagers, as long as the use of such devices does not interfere with school instruction or activities.
- SB 1264 (Alpert), which mandates that a student's monetary award for academic achievement shall not count in computing the family's eligibility for public assistance; also allows dependent children attending school full-time to continue receiving aid until age 19, bringing state law into line with federal law.
- SB 1632 (Perata), which requires every school site to allow pupils to use sunscreen during the school day without a physician's note or prescription and authorizes school sites to set a policy related to the use of sunscreen.
- SB 1709 (Poochigian), which requires charter school audits to be sent to county offices.
The governor has vetoed the following CTA-supported bills:
- SB 1498 (Vincent), would have permanently declared June 19 as Juneteenth, Emancipation Day in California, to celebrate freedom from the vestiges of racial discrimination and the abolition of slavery and to reflect the significant role that African Americans have played.
The governor has signed the following CTA-opposed bills:
- AB 902 (Alquist), which authorizes a credit for each year beginning on or after January 1, 2001, in an amount equal to 50 percent of the amount paid or incurred during the taxable year for qualified expenses in connection with lending qualified employees to public schools for the purpose of teaching mathematics or science. In so doing, it would reduce the state's revenues and the Proposition 98 guarantee.
- AB 1342 (Alquist), which allows the California State University and the University of California to develop a pre-candidacy program to prepare eligible candidates for National Board of Professional Teaching Standards certification.
Len Feldman
