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Briefing
California P&C Legislative Summary: 2025 Start of Session
The 2025-2026 legislative cycle began on January 6. There have been significant changes in the legislature with the addition of 29 new members. In this session, there is a limit to the number of bills that members can introduce during the two-year cycle. As of the February 21 deadline, approximately 2,300 bills have been introduced. The focus has been on affordability, potential federal government cuts, and natural disaster response.
Several bills have been labeled as "spot bills" and are likely to change during the committee sessions. As the committee sessions begin, the last day for each house to pass their bills is currently set for September 12. The last day the Governor must sign or veto bills passed by the legislature is currently set for October 12.
Below are some of the bills that have been introduced during this session. If you have any questions or would like more information on any of the legislation described in this briefing, please contact your Keenan Risk Management Analyst.
AB 579 – Yaeli’s Law
This bill would amend the California Child Abuse and Neglect Reporting Act (CANRA) and defines that using a child’s name, referring to a child by a pronoun consistent with the child’s sex recorded at birth, treating a child consistent with their sex as recorded at birth, or refusing to consent to provide gender affirming mental or health care, does not constitute neglect, severe neglect, or general neglect.
AB 970 – Child Abuse and Neglect Reporting
This bill authorizes the County of Los Angeles to establish a pilot program starting on January 1, 2026, through October 31, 2028, to test a new model for mandatory reporting of child abuse or neglect. The program would require mandated reporter training that may be made available to all mandated reporters in the county, and require an internet based, or other type of decision tool, for those who have completed the training and make a recommendation on whether or not to report. The bill shields a mandated reporter who satisfied their reporting duty pursuant to the program from civil or criminal penalty.
AB 972 – Postsecondary Education: Discrimination: Sex
This bill adds sex as a list of specified characteristics prohibiting discrimination in a program or activity conducted by a postsecondary educational institution.
AB 1098 – Postsecondary Education: Undergraduate and Graduate Students: Pregnancy or Pregnancy-Related Issues
This bill explicitly prohibits a postsecondary educational institution from discriminating against a student based on the student’s current, potential, or past pregnancy or pregnancy-related conditions. The institution is required upon being informed of a student’s pregnancy or pregnancy related condition to give the student the institution’s Title IX coordinator’s contact information, require reasonable accommodations, and provide the student access to a private and secure room for lactation. The student is to be reinstated to the same academic status held before their voluntary leave of absence began.
AB 79 – Public Social Services: Higher Education
AB 79 requires the Department of Social Services to develop a training to be available for basic needs directors, staff or a campus basic needs center, other designated professional staff and eligibility workers, regarding best practices, updates, challenges, or other topics related to programs and services offered by the department that may be available to students attending public higher education campuses.
AB 772 – Suspensions and Expulsions: Off-Campus Acts: Model Policy
This bill requires the Department of Education, on or before June 30, 2026, to develop, post on its website and distribute to each Local Education Agency (LEA), a model policy on how to address certain acts of bullying, cyberbullying, harassment, sexual harassment, or intimidation occurring outside of school hours and outside of campus. Each LEA is to adopt the policy on or before July 1, 2027, and the policy is to be provided to each of its credentialed employees, students, and parents.
AB 857 – School Employees: Cultural Competency Training
This bill requires the State Department of Education to develop an online cultural competency training delivery platform and curriculum for school employees to support students of color, on or before July 1, 2027. Starting with the 27-28 school year, all school employees are to complete the training. “Cultural competency” is defined as the active engagement in an ongoing process of self-reflection that informs deeper understanding and respect of cultural differences where an increase in cultural competency can lead to behaviors, programs, policies, practices, and services that are more culturally appropriate.
AB 1123 – Education Finance: Penalty Exceptions: Professional Development Days
Notwithstanding other law, starting with the 26-27 school year, LEAs are required to authorize the use of up to five days of instruction for purposes of professional development for all school staff without incurring any otherwise applicable financial penalties due to that missed instructional time. This bill sunsets on July 1, 2031.
AB 1247 – Classified Employees: School Districts and Community College Districts: Contracting Out: Training Requirements
This bill requires that any contractor performing a classified employee's job must ensure that the contract includes provisions for meeting applicable nondiscrimination standards. Additionally, it guarantees that contributions to any bona fide fringe benefit programs, such as health care or retirement benefits, are equivalent to those that would be made if the contractor were a direct hire. The bill also requires school districts and community college districts to compensate classified employees at their regular rate of pay for time necessary to complete any mandated training. Furthermore, those trainings, whether conducted online or in person, would require questions asked to be answered by a natural person in real time during the training.
AB 65 – School and Community College Employees: Paid Disability and Parental Leave
AB 65 requires a governing board of a school district and governing board of a community college district to provide up to 14 weeks of leave of absence (LOA) with specified pay benefits due to pregnancy, miscarriage, childbirth, termination of pregnancy, or recovery from these conditions. This leave cannot be deducted from any other LOAs available to the employee pursuant to state or federal regulations or laws.
AB 259 – Open Meetings: Local Agencies: Teleconferences
This bill allows the use of alternative teleconferencing for meetings where at least a quorum of members participates in person from a publicly accessible location identified on the agenda. It also permits members to request remote participation due to emergency circumstances, with these provisions applying indefinitely instead of expiring on January 1, 2026.
SB 707 – Open Meetings: Meeting and Teleconference Requirements
SB 707 would require until January 1, 2030, a city council or a county board of supervisors and a local agency to comply with additional meeting requirements, including that all open and public meetings include an opportunity for members of the public to attend via a two-way telephonic option or a two-way audiovisual platform and that good faith efforts are made to encourage resident participation. It would also require that the agenda be provided in English and in all other languages spoken jointly by 20% or more the population in the county in which the local agency is located, among other changes.
AB 340 – Employer-Employee Relations: Confidential Communications
This bill prohibits a local public agency employer, a state employer, a public-school employer, a higher education employer, or the district from questioning an employee or employee representatives regarding communication made in confidence between an employee and an employee representative in connection within the scope of the employee’s organization’s representation.
AB 374 – K-14 Classified Employees: Payment of Wages: Itemized Statements
This bill mandates that public-school employers, including CCDs, provide classified school employees with an accurate written statement at the time of each paycheck. This statement must include specified information such as gross wages earned, all deductions, and all applicable hourly rates in effect during the pay period. Additionally, employers must record these deductions and retain them on file for at least three years. Current and former classified employees have the right to inspect or receive a copy of these records.
AB 1067 – Public Employees’ Retirement: Felony Convictions
This bill requires a public employer that is investigating a public employee for misconduct arising out of the employee’s official duties to continue the investigation even if the employee retires while under investigation. The public employer is to refer the matter to law enforcement, if appropriate. If a felony conviction arises, the employee would forfeit all accrued rights and benefits in any public retirement system.
AB 1233 – Noncertificated Employees: Applicants: Previous Employment
This bill requires a person applying for a noncertificated position at a LEA to provide a complete list of every LEA they have previously been an employee of.
AB 1109 – Evidentiary Privileges: Union Agent-Represented Worker Privilege
AB 1109 establishes a privilege that allows a union agent and a represented employee to refuse to disclose any confidential communication between them while the agent is acting in their representative capacity.
SB 29 – Civil Actions: Decedent’s Cause of Action
This bill removes limitation on the amount of recovery for damages for pain, suffering, or disfigurement by a decedent’s personal representative or successor. All loss and damages the decedent sustained or incurred before death would be recoverable by the successor or representative, including pain, suffering, or disfigurement and punitive damages.
SB 494 – Classified School and Community College Employees: Disciplinary Hearings: Appeals: Contracted Administrative Law Judges
This bill requires the governing board of a school district or community college district to adopt rules of procedure for disciplinary proceeds authorizing the employee to request a hearing within a minimum of 30 days after service of notice of the specific charges to the employee.
AB 596 – Occupational Safety: Face Coverings
AB 596 would prohibit employers from preventing an employee from wearing a face covering, including a respirator, unless, wearing one creates a safety hazard.
AB 1163 – Employees: Workplace Violence Prevention Plans: Topics and Trainings
This bill requires a Workplace Violence Prevention Plan (WVPP) covering LEA employees, on or before July 1, 2026, to cover additional education-related topics that include physical and verbal de-escalation techniques and strategies or support to help students safety return to the learning environment after committing a violent incident, and to be in person and allow for questions to be asked and answered by a natural person in real time. The required training is to occur before a new employee begins and as soon as practicable for existing employees, and annually thereafter.
AB 1331 – Workplace Surveillance
This bill limits the use of workplace surveillance tools by prohibiting an employer from monitoring or surveilling workers in private, off-duty areas, and surveillance tools to be disabled during off duty hours. A civil penalty of $500 per employee for each violation would be authorized.
AB 1371 – Occupational Safety and Health: Employee Refusal to Perform Hazardous Tasks
This bill revises CalOSHA provisions that allows an employee, acting in good faith, to refuse to perform a task assigned by an employer if it would violate prescribed safety standards or if the employee has a reasonable apprehension that the task would result in an injury or illness. The employee’s refusal is contingent on the employee or another employee, if reasonably practical, having communicated or attempted to notify the employer of the safety or health risk and the employer failing to provide a response that is reasonably calculated to allay the employee’s concern.
AB 228 – Pupil Health: Epinephrine Delivery Systems
AB 228 replaces all references to epinephrine auto-injectors or auto-injectable epinephrine to epinephrine delivery systems and requires schools districts, county office of education, and charter schools to provide at least one type of FDA approved epinephrine delivery system.
AB 19 – Education Expenses: Education Savings Accounts
This bill states the intent of the Legislature to enact the Education Choice and Parental Empowerment Act of 2025 to send children to better performing schools by providing them with education savings accounts.
AB 281 – Comprehensive Sexual Health Education and Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV) Prevention Education
This bill requires a school district to allow a parent to inspect any written or audiovisual educational material used in comprehensive sexual health education and HIV prevention education. The parent would be allowed to make copies of any written educational material that will be distributed to students, if the material is not copyrighted or the material is to be presented by an outside consultant or guest speaker. The school can charge up to $0.10 per page if the parent elects to make copies.
AB 600 – Pupil Instruction: Transgender Concepts: Opt Out
AB 600 allows a parent to request a student to be excused from any part of the school’s instruction in health if it conflicts with their religious training and beliefs. The school district is required to make an alternative educational activity available to students whose parents have opted them out of the instruction. Any individuals whose rights pursuant to the bill have been violated can have a private right of action against the LEA engaged in the violation for damages, including attorney fees and court cost.
AB 677 – Pupil Records: Directory Information
This bill authorizes the disclosure of directory information of a student identified as a homeless child or youth to facilitate an eye or oral health assessment unless the parent afforded with parental rights does not consent to the physical examination.
SCA 1 – Educational Expenses: School Choice Flex Accounts and Special Education Flex Accounts
This constitutional amendment would authorize the distribution of funds pursuant to an agreement between the state and a parent, or legal guardian, of an eligible child for tuition and education related expenses associated with attending a private school serving students in K-12, irrespective of religious affiliation, and provide tax or other public benefits to private schools serving students in grades K-12, irrespective of religious affiliation.
AB 250 – Sexual Assault: Statute of Limitations
This bill extends the eligibility period for revival claims for claims that would be barred prior to January 1, 2026. It requires the revived claim against an entity where the plaintiff alleges sexual assault and one or more entities or persons are legally responsible for damages arising out of the sexual assault, and the entity or entities engaged in a cover up. This bill would not revive a claim brought against a public entity.
SB 68 – Major Food Allergens
This bill adds sesame to the list of major food allergens, starting on July 1, 2026. It requires a food facility to include on all of its menus written notification of the major food allergens contained as an ingredient in each menu item.
AB 68 – School Safety: Armed School Resource Officers
This bill requires schools district to hire or contract with at least one-armed school resource officer (SRO) authorized to carry a loaded firearm in accordance with the following:
On and after 1/1/26 for schools with grades 9 to 12; on and after 1/1/27 for schools with grades 6 to 8, but no lower than grade 6, on and after 1/1/28 for schools K to 5.
AB 90 – Public Postsecondary Education: Overnight Student Parking
AB 90 requires the governing board of each CCD and the Chancellor of the CSU to establish a program to allow overnight parking by eligible students as part of the annual campus safety plan on or before September 1, 2026. The plan of action is to include the issuance of an overnight parking permit, campus security monitoring agreement, bathroom and shower designation and agreement with custodial staff for maintenance, designation of least one parking lot and 50 parking spots, overnight parking rules, procedures for registering and verifying identity of eligible students, daily time of use or hours of operation, permit use for a period of two weeks (along with renewal procedures), and a cost estimate. A campus in compliance with the requirements are not civilly liable for a campus employee’s good faith act or omission that fails to prevent an injury of a participating student that occurs in, or in close proximity to, and during the hours of operation. Immunity does not apply to gross negligence, intentional misconduct, or violations of other laws. The board is to vote to establish the program consistent with the plan of action and conduct an annual vote as part of the campus safety plan adoption, until an overnight parking program is established at each campus.
AB 453 – Pupil Safety: Comprehensive School Safety Plans
This bill requires the Superintendent of Public Instruction to convene a stateside stakeholder workgroup to review existing comprehensive school safety plans and make recommendations on the development and approval process and the required elements of a comprehensive school safety plan on or before July 1, 2026. On or before July 1, 2027, a report is to be submitted on the recommendations. The bill also authorizes the department of education to enter exclusive or nonexclusive contracts with nongovernmental entities to implement said provisions.
AB 598 – School Safety: School Mapping Data Grant Program
Upon legislature appropriation, this bill establishes the School Mapping Data Grant Program under the OES to provide one-time grants to participating school districts to enter into contracts with qualified vendors providing school mapping data to assist public safety agencies during on campus emergencies at school.
AB 832 – School Energy Efficiency Stimulus Program: Indoor Air Quality
This bill requires the State Department of Education to develop indoor air quality standards, guidelines, and recommendations for school districts, county offices of education and charter schools.
AB 998 – Household Hazardous Waste: Vape Pens
Current law requires hazardous waste be transported to a hazardous waste facility by a specified entity. This bill defines that a vape pen confiscated by a school as contraband is presumed to have been generated by a household and does not lose its status as household hazardous waste. The bill imposes a requirement on schools to transport such hazardous waste to an appropriate hazardous waste facility, ensuring proper handling and disposal in accordance with existing regulations.
AB 1005 – Drowning Prevention: Public Schools: Informational Materials: Swimming Lesson Vouchers
Starting with the 26-27 school year, public schools are authorized to provide informational material from drowning or injury prevention organizations (DIP organizations) to parents no later than the first week of May. The DIP organizations are restricted to correspond only with a school administrator to work with the school and the informational material provided must contain information of at least one expert organization as defined.
AB 1454 – School Facilities: Heating, Ventilation, and Air-Conditioning Systems
This bill requires each LEA to submit an annual inventory of their HVAC systems to the State Department of Education, including, but not limited to, a description of any modifications made, pursuant to existing provisions.
SB 289 – Postsecondary Education: Statewide Title IX Oversight Office (Spot Bill)
This bill expresses legislative intent to enact future legislation to establish a statewide Title IX oversight office. The office will serve as a point of contact for students who are dissatisfied with campus-based policies or investigative procedures.
SB 848 – Sex Equity in Education: Title IX (Spot Bill)
This bill expresses legislative intent to enact future legislation relating to Title IX.
AB 1336 – Farmworkers: Benefits
If an employer as defined in LC 3300 and in the agricultural industry fails to comply with the heat illness prevention standards, any resulting heat-related injury to the employee shall be presumed to arise out of and in the course of employment. The presumption is disputable and may be controverted by other evidence. The bill also creates the Farmworker Climate Change Heat Injury and Death Fund.
AB 1398 – Workers’ Compensation
This bill requires all interested parties to disclose their financial interest to a third-party payer or other entity to whom a claim for payment is presented for services furnished pursuant to a referral.
AB 1498 – Workers’ Compensation: Medical Treatment
This bill requires the Administrative Director to create an Medical Provider Network (MPN) of physicians who are willing and able to treat in the San Joaquin Valley region (including counties of Fresno, Kern, Kings, Madera, Merced, San Joaquin, Stanislaus, and Tulare) on or before January 1, 2027. The employee would first be required to seek treatment within their employers MPN, unless the employer or insurance network is unable to treat the employee within 30-days of the requires for medical treatment.
SB 230 – Workers’ Compensation: Firefighters
This bill amends firefighters’ cancer injury presumption to include firefighting members of a fire department that provides fire protection to a commercial airport regulated by the FAA.
SB 447 – Workers’ Compensation: Death Benefits
This bill extends the age for minors to continue receiving health benefits from a deceased firefighter or peace officer from 21 to 26 years old.
SB 536 – Workers’ Compensation Insurance Fraud Reporting
This bill requires an insurer or licensed rating organization to notify the Employment Development Department (EDD), in addition to the local District Attorney’s office and Fraud division of the Department of Insurance, of suspected premium fraud. The bill also requires, upon written request, the EDD to release detailed payroll information, including payroll summary totals, allowing the requester to compare the records with the information they are otherwise entitled to receive from employers in workers’ compensation claims or pursuant to policies.
SB 555 – Workers’ Compensation: Average Annual Earnings
Starting on January 1, 2026, this bill would require that the annual earnings for purposes of Temporary Disability (TD) and Permanent Disability (PD) be adjusted by an amount equal to the Cost-of-Living Adjustment (COLA) for social security benefits.
SB 632 – Workers’ Compensation: Hospital Employees
This bill creates presumption for hospital employees who provide direct patient care that injury includes infectious disease, musculoskeletal injuries, PTSD, respiratory diseases, and COVID-19. Applies the presumption to post termination claims.
SB 668 – Workers’ Compensation: Medical Legal Expenses: Fee Schedule
This bill authorizes the medical director to adjust the fee schedule every two years based on an evaluation of certain medical practice costs, including increases in the conversion factor and the per-page cost of reviewing records.
AB 89 – Interscholastic Sports: Gender Equity
This bill requires the California Interscholastic Federation (CIF) to amend its constitution, bylaws, and policies to prohibit a pupil whose sex was assigned male at birth from participating on a girl’s interscholastic sports team.
AB 310 – Nevaeh Youth Sports Safety Act
This bill requires that by January 1, 2027, a youth sports organization is to ensure that its coaches are certified to perform cardiopulmonary resuscitation and to operate an Automated External Defibrillator (AED). The youth sports organization is to have a written emergency response plan that includes the location and procedures to be followed during a sudden cardiac event. The organization is to properly maintain and test its AED as specified.
AB 708 – California Youth Football Act: Safety Equipment
This bill requires a youth tackle football league, youth sports organization that conducts a tackle football program, or coach to allow youth participants to use safety equipment, including soft-shelled add-ons on football helmets and only conduct no more than two full contact practices per week during the preseason and regular season, and no full contact practice during the off season.
AB 844 – Educational Equity: Sex-Segregated School and Athletic Programs and Activities: Use of Facilities
AB 844 requires a student’s participation in sex-segregated school programs and activities, including athletic teams and competitions, and use of facilities be based on the student’s sex at birth.
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Keenan is not a law firm and no opinion, suggestion, or recommendation of the firm or its employees shall constitute legal advice. Clients are advised to consult with their own attorney for a determination of their legal rights, responsibilities, and liabilities, including the interpretation of any statute or regulation, or its application to the clients’ business activities.
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