Budget 2022-2023
The Legislative Women’s Caucus’ budget priorities for the 2022-23 budget year are $1.9 billion for child care, $127 million for expanding and improving access to reproductive services, $31.4 million to support workforce opportunities for women, and $5 million to support the grants program of the California Commission on the Status of Women and Girls.
Workplace Equity
SB 1162 (Limon)
Requires employers to provide a salary range on all job postings, and to make promotional opportunities available to current employees. Additionally, this bill requires employers with 100 or more employees to publicly report pay data broken down by race, ethnicity, and sex for both direct employees and employees hired through a third-party staffing agency.
SB 1325 (Gonzalez)
Establishes the California Techquity Innovation Fund, to be administered by the Governor’s Office of Business and Economic Development (GoBiz), with the mission of funding grants or investments that advance equity in tech entrepreneurship in California, and support underserved, equity-forward entrepreneurs, and business owners.
Access to Child Care/Family-Friendly Policies
SB 976 (Leyva)
Establishes universal preschool in California. Specifically, this bill ensures that parents have the option to send their children to a public elementary school provider or a community-based provider to benefit from universal transitional kindergarten.
Protecting Vulnerable Communities
AB 988 (Bauer-Kahan)
Creates a new easy-to-remember three-digit phone line, 988, as the new 911 for suicidal and immediate mental health crises. With 988, callers will be connected with around-the-clock intervention, including mobile crisis teams staffed by trained mental health professionals and trained peers instead of law enforcement.
SB 1017 (Eggman)
Ensures survivors of domestic and interpersonal violence who are tenants, maintain their current housing and avoid eviction. This legislation increases safety by providing stability as survivors heal. The bill creates eviction protections consistent with early lease termination laws that protect abuse survivors and immediate family members.
AB 2717 (Waldron)
Expands the community treatment program for incarcerated parents to include prenatal counseling, visitation support, and overnight visits upon approval.
Addressing Poverty
AB 2052 (Quirk-Silva)
Extends CalWORKs benefits to high school students from 19 years to 20 years old, which is on par with other available services and benefits.
Gender Equity
AB 1287 (Bauer-Kahan)
Eliminates the gender-based price differences applied to identical products, commonly known as the “Pink Tax.”
AB 1467 (Cervantes)
Establishes that sexual assault counselors are independent of the campus Title IX office. It also allows sexual assault counselors to maintain confidentiality when interacting with survivors of sexual assault. This bill will also help ensure that when California State University (CSU) executive orders relating to discrimination, harassment, and retaliation are reviewed, they are done so in collaboration with appropriate officers and employees.
Health & Safety
AB 32 (Aguiar-Curry)
Requires the State Department of Health Care Services (DHCS) to extend the telehealth flexibilities in place during the COVID-19 Pandemic. Additionally, AB 32 ensures patients will continue to have access to care by maintaining parity in reimbursement for telehealth services for Medi-Cal managed care plans.
AB 2024 (Friedman)
Ensures that additional diagnostic screening tests remain affordable to patients by limiting any cost-sharing requirement to the same amount required for an initial mammogram.
AB 2185 (Weber)
Increases access to medical evidentiary examinations for survivors of domestic violence assault. This measure also ensures survivors of domestic violence are connected to local social services or child advocacy centers for additional support.