Gravel2Gavel Construction & Real Estate Law Blog
The California Contractor State License Board (CSLB) recently issued notice of its upcoming Legislative Committee Meeting. The agenda for the meeting indicates that a legislative update will include review of pending Assembly Bills 1702, 2165 and 2396, and Senate Bill 1467. The meeting will be held at the CSLB’s headquarters located at 9821 Business Park Drive, Sacramento, CA 95827, in the John C. Hall Hearing Room. The teleconference location for the meeting will be at 265 Hegenberger Rd., Suite 200 Oakland, CA 94621. (The meeting may be canceled without notice. For verification of the meeting, call (916) 255-4000 or visit the CSLB’s website. Webcasts of the CSLB’s earlier Legislative Committee Meetings are available on its website.]
The California State Legislature website provides the public with access to the full text of the current legislative bills. Below are summaries from Assembly Bills 1702, 2165 and 2396, and Senate Bill 1467:
Assembly Bill 1702 (Maienschein) – “This bill would provide that an individual who has satisfied any of the requirements needed to obtain a license while incarcerated, who applies for that license upon release from incarceration, and who is otherwise eligible for the license shall not be subject to a delay in processing the application or a denial of the license solely based on the prior incarceration, except when the incarceration was for a crime substantially related to the qualifications, functions, or duties of the business or profession.”
Assembly Bill 2165 (Patterson) – “This bill would require each board to complete within 45 days the application review process with respect to each person who has filed with the board an application for issuance of a license, and to issue, within that 45 days, a license to an applicant who successfully satisfied all licensure requirements. The bill also requires each board to offer each examination the board provides for the applicant’s passage of which is required for licensure, a minimum of 6 times per year.”
Assembly Bill 2396 (Bonta) – “This bill would prohibit a board from denying a license based solely on a conviction that has been dismissed [as contemplated by select provisions of existing law].” As explained in the bill, existing law “prohibits a board from denying a license on the ground that the applicant has committed a crime if the applicant shows that he or she obtained a certificate of rehabilitation in the case of a felony, or that he or she has met all applicable requirements of the criteria of rehabilitation developed by the board, as specified, in the case of a misdemeanor.” It also “permits a defendant to withdraw his or her plea of guilty or plea of nolo contendere and enter a plea of not guilty in any case in which a defendant has fulfilled the conditions of probation for the entire period of probation, or has been discharged prior to the termination of the period of probation, or has been convicted of a misdemeanor and not granted probation and has fully complied with and performed the sentence of the court, or has been sentenced to a county jail for a felony, or in any other case in which a court, in its discretion and the interests of justice, determines that a defendant should be granted this or other specified relief and requires the defendant to be released from all penalties and disabilities resulting from the offense of which he or she has been convicted.”
Senate Bill 1467 (Lieu (Chair), Berryhill, Block, Corbett, Galgiani, Hernandez, Hill, Padilla, Wyland, and Yee) – Under the Contractors’ State License Law, the CSLB licenses and regulates contractors. Under existing law, there is within the board a separate enforcement division that is required to rigorously enforce the Contractors’ State License Law. As the bill explains, “[e]xisting law specifies that persons employed as enforcement representatives in this division, and designated by the Director of Consumer Affairs, are not peace officers and are not entitled to safety member retirement benefits. This bill would make technical, nonsubstantive changes to these provisions.”
Additional Resource: California Contractors State License Board