BILL ANALYSIS Ó
SENATE COMMITTEE ON APPROPRIATIONS
Senator Ricardo Lara, Chair
2015 - 2016 Regular Session
AB 222 (Achadjian) - Vehicle records: confidential home address
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|Version: March 23, 2015 |Policy Vote: PUB. S. 7 - 0 |
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|Urgency: No |Mandate: No |
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|Hearing Date: June 22, 2015 |Consultant: Jolie Onodera |
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This bill meets the criteria for referral to the Suspense File.
Bill
Summary: AB 222 would add specified employees of the Department
of State Hospitals (DSH) and the Department of Corrections and
Rehabilitation (CDCR), and the spouses and children of these
persons, to the list of persons who may request an additional
level of confidentiality from the Department of Motor Vehicles
(DMV).
Fiscal
Impact:
To the extent approximately 4,700 psychiatric technicians,
nurse practitioners, health services specialists, and medical
directors at DSH and CDCR, and their family members could
apply in the first year and/or annually thereafter, accounting
for changes to vehicle ownership, the DMV would incur
additional staffing costs to process these applications as the
system is administered manually, including a significant
portion requiring follow-up inquiries. First-year costs are
estimated at about $187,000 and ongoing costs of $44,000
AB 222 (Achadjian) Page 1 of
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(Special Fund*).
Potential reduction in state and local tolls, parking fees,
and fines to the extent that current law makes it difficult
for local parking and toll agencies to collect tolls and fines
from additional persons protected by the enhanced
confidentiality statutes.
*Motor Vehicle Account
Background: Under existing law the residential address of certain public
employees and their families are confidential. (Vehicle Code
(VC) §§ 1808.4 and 1808.6.)
Existing law states that all residential addresses in any record
of the DMV are confidential and shall not be disclosed to any
person, except a court, law enforcement agency, or other
governmental agency, or as otherwise authorized. (VC § 1808.21.)
Existing law provides that the release of such confidential
information is a misdemeanor, punishable by a fine of up to
$5,000 and/or by up to one year in county jail. (VC § 1808.45.)
According to the Senate Committee on Public Safety analysis of
this measure:
Vehicle Code section 1808.4 was added by statute in 1977
to provide confidentiality of home addresses to specified
public employees and their families. In 1989, Vehicle Code
section 1808.21 was added to make all residence addresses
contained within the DMV files confidential. Vehicle Code
section 1808.21(a) states the following:
The residence address in any record of the department is
confidential and cannot
be disclosed to any person except a court, law enforcement
agency, or other governmental agency, or as authorized in
Sections 1808.22 or 1808.23.
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This section was further amended in 1994 to allow
individuals under specific circumstances to request that
their entire records be suppressed. Any individual who is
the subject of stalking or who is experiencing a threat of
death or great bodily injury to his or her person may
request their entire record to be suppressed under this
section.
Upon suppression of a record, each request for information
about that record has to be authorized by the subject of
the record or verified as legitimate by other
investigative means by the DMV before the information is
released.
A record is suppressed for a one-year period. At the end
of the one year period, the suppression is continued for a
period determined by the department and if the person
submits verification acceptable to the department that he
or she continues to have reasonable cause to believe that
he or she is the subject of stalking or that there exists
a threat of death or great bodily injury to his or her
person.
DMV has long maintained that all residence addresses are
suppressed and only persons authorized by statute can
access this information.
Proposed Law:
This bill would add the following persons to those who may
request an additional level of confidentiality from the DMV:
Employees of the CDCR and the DSH specified in
Government Code (GC) § 20407, which lists the following
classifications of state safety members in forensic
facilities: pre-licensed psychiatric technicians,
psychiatric technicians, senior psychiatric technicians,
nurse practitioners, health services specialists, and
medical program directors.
The spouse or child of a person listed above, regardless
of the spouse's or child's place of residence.
Related
Legislation: SB 372 (Galgiani) 2015 would have added code
enforcement officers, parking control officers, and non-sworn
AB 222 (Achadjian) Page 3 of
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investigators with the Department of Insurance to the list of
persons eligible to enroll in the DMV Confidential Records
Program. This bill was held on the Suspense File of this
Committee.
AB 2687 (Bocanegra) Chapter 273/2014 allows Licensing Program
Analysts from the Department of Social Services to enroll in the
DMV Confidential Records Program.
SB 767 (Lieu) 2014 would have added code enforcement officers to
those eligible to enroll in the DMV Confidential Records
Program. This bill failed passage in the Assembly Committee on
Transportation.
Over the past 10 years, a number of bills proposing to expand
the statutory confidentiality list, including for code
enforcement officers, have either failed in committee or have
been vetoed.
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