Bill Text: CA AB943 | 2023-2024 | Regular Session | Chaptered

California Assembly Bill 943

Bill Title: Corrections: population data.

Spectrum: Partisan Bill (Democrat 1-0)

Status: (Passed) 2023-10-08 - Chaptered by Secretary of State - Chapter 459, Statutes of 2023. [AB943 Detail]

Download: California-2023-AB943-Chaptered.html

Assembly Bill No. 943

CHAPTER 459

An act to add Section 2068 to the Penal Code, relating to corrections.

[ Approved by Governor October 08, 2023. Filed with Secretary of State October 08, 2023. ]

LEGISLATIVE COUNSEL'S DIGEST

AB 943, Kalra. Corrections: population data.

Existing law establishes the state prisons under the jurisdiction of the Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation. Existing law requires the Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation to provide operation and fiscal information to the Joint Legislative Budget Committee, including, among other things, data regarding the total expenditures and average daily population for each adult institution.

This bill would require the department to prepare and publish monthly demographic data, based on voluntary self-identification information from people admitted, in custody, and released and paroled, disaggregated by race and ethnicity, as specified. The bill would require, beginning January 1, 2025, the department to make the data publicly available on the department’s internet website via the Offender Data Points dashboard.

Vote: MAJORITY Appropriation: NO Fiscal Committee: YES Local Program: NO

The people of the State of California do enact as follows:

SECTION 1.

The Legislature finds and declares all of the following:

(a) While the Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation currently publishes monthly data of its population in its custody, people admitted, released and paroled, many ethnicity types, including Asians, Pacific Islanders, and Indigenous people are categorized as “other” in its monthly population reports.

(b) The state of California has invested in various programs to provide rehabilitative services to incarcerated individuals. For example, the Budget Act of 2019 established the California Reentry and Enrichment (CARE) Grant program that provides nonprofit organizations to design and provide transformative programs in California prisons. The goal of the program is to help individuals understand the causes and consequences of their behavior and address and treat symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder.

(c) However, because it is unknown to the public how many Asians, Pacific Islanders, and Indigenous people are currently in the California prison system, their experiences and urgency of needs are left out in these programs.

(d) From 2019 to 2021, inclusive, Asian Prisoner Support Committee, a California organization that provides direct support to Asian and Pacific Islander prisoners conducted a statewide survey in our prisons in an attempt to paint a fuller portrait of our prison system population and better serve those in the prison system and their reentry plans.

(e) The survey shows that a majority of more than 500 respondents indicated war as being the main cause for displacement from their country of origin. When people resettle in the United States, they often experience economic hardship and violence. Many of these respondents react to these forms of trauma by joining a gang to find community.

(f) Southeast Asian adults have the highest rate of post-traumatic stress disorder compared with the general population due to war trauma, poverty, and other challenges after they or their families fled from various wars in the 1970s to 1980s, inclusive.

(g) Disaggregated data provides better insight on racial and ethnic disparities in the justice system. For example, while Native Hawaiian and Other Pacific Islander make up 0.5 percent of the San Francisco County population, the San Francisco Juvenile Probation Department 2010 report showed that Samoan youth make up 5 percent of all youth booked in its juvenile hall that year.

(h) In order to better serve Asians, Pacific Islanders, and Indigenous people, closing service gaps and ensure incarcerated and formerly incarcerated people receive culturally competent and sensitive in-prison and reentry programs, collection of the number of Indigenous people, and additional Asian, Native Hawaiian, and Pacific Islander ethnic groups is critical for enhancing understanding of the needs and experiences of these different communities.

SEC. 2.

Section 2068 is added to the Penal Code, to read:

2068.

(a) The department shall collect voluntary self-identification information pertaining to race or ethnic origin of people admitted, in custody, and released and paroled, which shall include, but not be limited to, American Indian/Alaskan Native, Bangladeshi, Black, Cambodian, Chinese, Colombian, Cuban, Fijian, Filipino, Guamanian or Chamorro, Guatemalan, Native Hawaiian, Other Hispanic Not Listed, Hmong, Indian, Indonesian, Jamaican, Japanese, Korean, Laotian, Malaysian, Mexican, Nicaraguan, Other, Other Asian Not Listed, Other Pacific Islander Not Listed, Pakistani, Puerto Rican, Salvadorian, Samoan, Sri Lankan, Taiwanese, Thai, Tongan, Unknown, Vietnamese, and White. Based on that voluntary self-identification information, the department shall prepare and publish monthly demographic data pertaining to the race or ethnic origin of people admitted, in custody, and released and paroled, disaggregated by the same race and ethnicity categories used by the department for the purpose of voluntary self-identification information.

(b) Starting January 1, 2025, the data, except for personally identifying information, which shall be deemed confidential, shall be publicly available on the department’s internet website via the Offender Data Points dashboard.

(c) If the population number of any race or ethnicity category is under 50, the department shall only reference, in the published data, those numbers as “fewer than 50” in order to protect personally identifying information.