BILL ANALYSIS Ó
SENATE COMMITTEE ON APPROPRIATIONS
Senator Ricardo Lara, Chair
2015 - 2016 Regular Session
AB 532 (McCarty) - State agencies: collection of data: race or
ethnic origin
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|Version: May 20, 2015 |Policy Vote: G.O. 10 - 2 |
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|Urgency: No |Mandate: No |
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|Hearing Date: August 17, 2015 |Consultant: Mark McKenzie |
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This bill meets the criteria for referral to the Suspense File.
Bill
Summary: AB 532 would require state entities that collect
demographic information on ethnicity and race to provide forms
that offer respondents the option of identifying as multiracial
and to select one or more ethnic or racial designations, by
January 1, 2022.
Fiscal
Impact:
Unknown, but significant overall costs to comply with the bill's
mandates. Many state entities report minor and absorbable costs
to comply by 2022, and many others are unaffected by the bill
because they don't collect demographic data. The following
AB 532 (McCarty) Page 1 of
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entities that provided information would have significant costs:
The Employment Development Department (EDD) estimates costs of
up to $6.5 million (General Fund) to reprogram the
Unemployment Insurance program's Single Client Database and
the Workforce Services CalJOBS systems. EDD identified over
600 programs that would need updates, and the CalJOBS system
would need to be updated through vendor contracts. Some of
these costs could be mitigated to the extent they are made in
conjunction with other updates between now and 2022, although
none are planned at this time.
The Department of Human Resources and the State Personnel
Board (CalHR) estimates costs in the range of $250,000
(General Fund), primarily associated with programming duties
to update systems.
The Administrative Office of the Courts (Judicial Council)
indicates that several of the mandated duties of the courts
require the collection of demographic data. Some of these
procedures either currently allow for multiple racial or
ethnic designations, or could be updated in the normal course
of business by 2022. Courts also collect race data on
criminal defendants through case management systems, most of
which offer the option to identify as "multiracial" or
"other," but not to select more than one designation. Costs
to update 58 separate case management systems are unknown, but
likely significant. (Trial Court Trust Fund)
Background: Existing state law requires state agencies, boards, or
commissions that directly or by contract collect demographic
data as to the ancestry or ethnic origin of Californians to use
separate collection categories for each major Asian and Pacific
Islander group, as specified.
Existing federal regulations require federal agencies to ensure
respondents have the option of selecting one or more ethnic or
racial designations on federal government forms requesting such
information. [Standards for Maintaining, Collecting, and
Presenting Federal Data on Race and Ethnicity (62 FR
58782-58790)]
There is no current requirement in state law for agencies to
provide respondents with an option to identify as multiracial or
AB 532 (McCarty) Page 2 of
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to indicate more than one racial or ethnic designation.
Proposed Law:
AB 532 would require any state agency, board, or commission
that collects demographic data on ethnic origin, ethnicity, or
race to provide forms that offer respondents the option of
identifying as multiracial and selecting one or more ethnic or
racial designations. The bill would require data on race or
ethnicity that is reported to other state agencies, boards, or
commissions to be tabulated and reported with all of the
following:
The number or percentage of respondents who identify with each
ethnic or racial designation alone and not in combination with
other racial or ethnic designations.
The number or percentage of respondents who identify with each
ethnic or racial designation, whether alone or in combination
with other racial or ethnic designations.
The number or percentage of respondents who identify with
multiple ethnic or racial designations.
The data must be reported and tabulated in compliance with
specified federal rules in cases of state or federally
mandated actions related to an ethnic or racial community, or
in assessing disparate impact or discriminatory patterns.
Each affected state agency, board, and commission must comply as
early as reasonably feasible, and no later than January 1, 2022.
State entities that collect demographic data from a local
agency would be authorized to continue to collect and report
that data in the form that the data is submitted.
Related
Legislation: Both SB 26 (Simitian), which was held on the
Assembly Appropriations Suspense File in 2007, and SB 1615
(Simitian), which was held on this Committee's Suspense File in
2006, contained provisions that were nearly identical to this
bill. A key distinction between this bill and previous versions
is that this bill requires agencies to provide the option of
identifying as multiracial and selecting one or more ethnic or
racial designations, while the previous versions did not require
forms to include the added field of multiracial but did require
AB 532 (McCarty) Page 3 of
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the selection of one or more designation.
Staff
Comments: There are over 200 state departments, boards,
commissions and agencies in state government. Many departments
and agencies do not collect racial or ethnic data, and would
therefore be unaffected by this bill. Some others currently
offer the option to collect more than one racial or ethnic
designation on forms that collect demographic information, and
would also be unaffected by the bill, while others are able to
comply by 2022, as specified in the bill. Several entities
reported significant costs, as noted above, and some others that
are likely to collect demographic information, such as the
Department of Public Health and the Department of Social
Services, were unable to provide information for purposes of
this analysis. Overall state costs are unknown, but likely in
the millions of dollars over several fiscal years.
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