Legislative Women’s Caucus Announces 2024 Priority Bill Package

SACRAMENTO – The California Legislative Women’s Caucus (LWC), a bipartisan caucus made up of California’s 50 women Senators and Assemblymembers, today announced its 2024 priority bill package — 15 bills authored exclusively by women legislators and selected by a vote of the full caucus membership.

This year’s bills address critical issues facing women and children such as women’s economic security, hospital maternity ward closures, quality early care and education for California’s children age 0 to 4, reproductive healthcare, and issues related to sexual assault.

This is the tenth year that women members of the legislature have come together to prioritize bills centered on the six pillars that inform the Caucus’s work, those pillars are: Poverty, Childcare and Education Equity, Gender Violence and Public Safety, Healthcare and Health Equity, Vulnerable Communities and Workplace and Economic Equity.

“Women, girls, and women headed households continue to face barriers to opportunity and equity. The bills the Women’s Caucus has prioritized uplift the everyday needs of women to protect their children from sexual assault, secure quality childcare, and expand economic opportunities. These bills also offer a lifeline to help the many California women and families who can barely afford diapers, period products, and reproductive healthcare,” said LWC Chair Senator Nancy Skinner. “We look forward to working with our legislative colleagues to advance the growth and prosperity of California, which depends so greatly on the wellbeing and contributions of women and families,” said LWC Chair Senator Nancy Skinner, D-Berkeley.

“The hardworking members of the Women’s Caucus continue to lead vital efforts in the Legislature to improve the daily lives of women, children and families in California. We understand the State’s budget situation and the difficult decisions that will need to be made this year, but our Caucus will continue to move forward a bold agenda that ensures cuts do not fall on the backs of women and working families,” said LWC Vice Chair Assemblymember Cecilia Aguiar-Curry, D-Winters.

Below are the 15 LWC priority bills for 2024, arranged by the LWC’s priority pillars.

Addressing Poverty
AB 2446 (Ortega): Medi-Cal Covered Diapers
SB 953 (Menjivar): Period Equity Now

Childcare & Education Equity
AB 1913 (Addis): Child Abuse Prevention Act
AB 1930 (Reyes): Child Development Associate Teacher
AB 2476 (Bonta): Childcare Payment Upfront

Gender Violence & Public Safety
AB 2295 (Addis): Child Sexual Assault Justice Act
SB 1386 (Caballero): CA Civil Rape Shield Preservation Act

Health Care & Health Equity
AB 1895 (Weber): Maternity Ward Closures
AB 2104 (Soria): CA Community College Bachelor's Degree in Nursing Pilot
AB 2339 (Aguiar-Curry): Extending Telehealth for Reproductive Healthcare to Medi-Cal Patients

Vulnerable Communities
AB 2137 (Quirk-Silva): Homeless & Foster Youth AB 2319 (Wilson): Reducing Black Maternal Mortality Though Implicit Bias Training
AB 2740 (Waldron): Dignity for Incarcerated Women

Workplace & Economic Equity
AB 2901 (Aguiar-Curry): The Pregnancy Leave for Educators Act
SB 782 (Limón): Gubernatorial Boards & Commissions

The California Legislative Women’s Caucus (LWC) is a 54-member bipartisan body of women elected leaders from the California Assembly, Senate, and constitutional offices.

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