Assembly Speaker Robert Rivas claims he has a new way to hold state government accountable: A series of legislative hearings to examine how well state laws are working.
But which laws? State lawmakers who volunteered to participate in the initiative handpicked 13 laws enacted in the last decade, often laws they wrote themselves. Rivas did not give specific criteria for the selection, stating only it was based on lawmakers’ voluntary participation.
Details about the program remain scant: It is unclear how many laws were submitted for consideration, how many hearings and hours of work the project will lead to, or whether and how lawmakers expect to act upon findings from the process.
And any legislative reform necessary to strengthen those laws will likely have to wait until at least next January, when a new legislative session begins, Rivas told reporters at a press briefing Tuesday.
Rivas said the new program, dubbed the Outcomes Review Oversight Project, would help lawmakers reassess laws they authored or championed and, if necessary, improve them.
Fourteen Assembly members will evaluate laws ranging from one in 2015 that empowered the state labor commissioner to crack down on wage theft to one last year that required mortgage forbearance for Los Angeles wildfire victims, according to a press release from Rivas’ office.
The lawmakers will hold committee hearings and community meetings and announce “findings, actions and solutions” in the fall.
“Meaningful oversight certainly means asking hard questions … about how effective those laws have been, but then being willing to follow the answers wherever they may lead,” Rivas said.
But isn’t fixing ineffective laws already the job of state lawmakers, who amend dozens of laws each year to address concerns they, their constituents or special interest groups have?
Rivas acknowledged it Tuesday, but said the hearings would allow lawmakers to dive deeper into certain laws and create “a new culture here that emphasizes accountability.”
Assembly Elections Committee Chair Gail Pellerin, a Santa Cruz Democrat, said the effort recognizes that “passing a law is not the finish line. The real measure of success is whether that law is working in the real world for the people it was meant to serve.”
Pellerin will lead the review of a 2024 law she authored that aimed to ensure foster children remain homed while foster family agencies scrambled to get insured. The law required the California Department of Social Services to report last year the options to keep those agencies insured, but Pellerin said Tuesday there appears to be “no progress” on the report. A department spokesperson did not immediately return CalMatters’ inquiry for comment.
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This story was originally published by CalMatters and distributed through a partnership with The Associated Press.
