Well, it’s the season of legislative accomplishments. I can’t possibly point out all of them as the sheer volume would be rather oppressive for a blog format. But I do want to point out a couple of bills here and there. Specifically, SB 275 and SB 2, both from Senator Gil Cedillo.
SB 275 creates civil penalties for dumping the homeless against their will. Initially, as drafted by Cedillo and LA City Atty Rocky Delgadillo, the bill was supposed to have a criminal charge associated. However, the criminal charges were stripped under pressure from the hospital lobby. However, the bill will prohibit a hospital from transporting a patient to a location other than their residence without written consent and make such offenses subject to civil penalties of $150,000 on second offense and $300,000 on a third offense. These penalties are large enough to attract attorneys to file on behalf of the dumping victims. I do not yet know if an attorney’s fees provision is included, but that would certainly also be helpful.
SB 2, the Fair Share Zoning bill would require cities and counties to include an inventory of sites suitable for emergency shelters, supportive housing, transitional housing and residential rental developments in the housing element of their general plan. SB 2 includes provisions allowing these facilities as permitted use rather than conditional use or other discretionary permits.