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Government Relations

High-Impact Advocacy Across the State

Racial disparities that leave low-income people of color behind should concern us all. The Government Relations team aims to shift public policy priorities and investments toward programs that benefit all Californians—not just the privileged few.

Educational Equity 

  • AB 49 (Muratsuchi):  School sites: immigration enforcement. 
    Protects students by prohibiting any agency conducting immigration enforcement from entering schools without valid identification, a warrant signed by a judge, and approval from a school administrator. It would also mandate that administrators limit access to facilities where pupils are not present. As the federal administration continues to target the immigrant community, these protections become more necessary. This bill ensures students have equal access to safe, inclusive, and supportive classrooms where they can learn and thrive. 
  • AB 495 (Rodriguez): Family Preparedness Plan Act of 2025.   
    Protects children in immigrant and mixed-status families if their parents/caregivers are deported. It ensures updated emergency contact information and family safety plans that can lessen the stress on children when families suffer such a traumatic separation. It also ensures the legal recognition of caregiving arrangements (i.e. Caregiver’s Authorization Affidavits, Guardianship Nominations, and Short-Term Guardianships) to provide a supportive and stable environment. Legally recognized options ensure children have continuity of support in these situations, including access to health care and supportive schools. 
  • AB 865 (Gonzalez): Dual language immersion programs: instructional materials and grants.  
    Establishes the Dual Language Immersion Education Instructional Materials Grant Program and appropriates $5 million to provide Local Education Agencies (LEAs) with one-time grants of $100,000 so they can provide instructional materials in a diversity of languages for quality dual language immersion programs. The bill enables more schools to respond to parent demand for multilingual programs that foster biliteracy and overall academic achievement, as well as affirm children’s home languages and cultures. AB 865 is critical to state efforts to foster welcoming and safe spaces that support California’s diverse student population to thrive. 
  • SB 48 (Gonzalez, L) Immigration enforcement: school sites: prohibitions on access, sharing information, and law enforcement collaboration. 
    Strengthens California’s ability to provide all students with safe and supportive learning environments, regardless of their immigration status, by preventing unlawful access by immigration authorities to enter or search schools and question students while at school. It provides clear steps in the face of unprecedented deportation threats for LEAs and school administrators to engage with immigration authorities and requires the Department of Justice to release more comprehensive model policies for schools.  

Political Voice

  • AB 868 (Carillo) Primary elections: county officers: top two candidates.  
    Requires that all county elections proceed to the general election, even if one of the candidates receives a majority of the votes in the primary. Primary elections typically have significantly lower and less diverse voter turnouts compared to general elections. The primary electorate traditionally includes fewer young people and communities of color, so candidates work to appeal to a smaller electorate of older, predominantly white voters. Mandatory general elections for all candidates will ensure that the highest and most representative turnout of California's full electorate elects every candidate for public office.  
  • SB 42 (Umberg) Political Reform Act of 1974: public campaign financing: California Fair Elections Act of 2026.  
    Revises the Political Reform Act of 1974 to allow public officials and candidates to accept/spend public money to seek elective office in jurisdictions in which this is now prohibited. Passage would refer the issue to voters through a ballot measure in the November 2026 general election. Currently, wealthy people, corporations, and special interests use their financial resources to finance electoral campaigns, allowing only well-financed candidates to compete in elections. Because wealth is concentrated in Whiter and older communities, this system shuts out candidates from communities of color and low-income communities, denying them a similar voice in elections, policy creation, and decision-making. Giving all jurisdictions in California the ability to adopt campaign public finance models can help balance the political influence between low-income BIPOC Californians and traditional wealthy donors.

Reimagining Safety and Justice

  • AB 247 (Bryan): Fair pay for incarcerated firefighters.  
    Increases hourly pay for incarcerated firefighters to $19 while assigned to an active fire incident and requires annual rate updates.  During emergencies, incarcerated firefighters make approximately $30 total for a full 24-hour shift. Non-incarcerated firefighters doing the same or similar work with CalFIRE receive a monthly base pay of $3,672-$4,643 (or $121-$152 daily). AB 247 is a modest step toward ensuring that incarcerated people saving lives on the front line of emergencies are valued and sufficiently compensated. 
  • AB 1036 (Shultz): Ensuring greater access to evidence for incarcerated people.  
    Modernizes California’s post-conviction discovery laws by improving incarcerated people’s access to evidence. Currently, a person convicted of a serious or violent felony resulting in a sentence of 15 years or more, may petition the court for access to evidence to support their post-conviction motion for release (i.e., habeas corpus). However, the person must demonstrate that they already attempted to obtain the evidence from trial counsel and were unsuccessful. This process is often so burdensome and inequitable that many incarcerated people are unable to obtain evidence to prove their innocence. AB 1036 will help reduce those barriers and prevent innocent people from remaining imprisoned. 
  • AB 1231 (Elhawary): Expanding access to pretrial diversion to improve community safety and end mass incarceration.  
    Gives judges discretion to divert people charged with non-violent, low-level felonies to programs that advance community safety. People who participate in diversion programs instead of incarceration cut their rate of reoffending in half, and improve their rates of employment. Diversion addresses needs through behavioral and healthcare services, substance use treatment, and vocational training. 

Office of Strategic Initiatives/Research & Data Analysis

  • AB 91 (Harabedian): AB-91 State and local agencies: demographic data.  
    Requires the appropriate state and local agencies to collect, categorize, and tabulate demographic data for Californians of Middle Eastern and North African (MENA) descent, also known as Southwest Asian and North African (SWANA). Historically, this group is categorized as White, even though they largely experience the world as people of color. The nuanced experiences of these communities get lost with this practice. Existing in the data allows MENA communities the opportunity to press for resources to address their specific needs.   
  • AB 1157 (Kalra) Tenancy: just cause termination: rent increases.  
    Addresses California's escalating housing crisis by further limiting allowable annual rent increases, providing some relief to millions of renters struggling with exorbitant rent hikes and the looming threat of homelessness. Many low-income Californians of color spend a significant portion of their income on rent. By increasing limits on rent increases, this bill will make it easier for these renters to afford their rent and cover their other basic needs. 
  • AB 1186 (Patel): Data collection: race and ethnicity: minimum categories. 
    Enables state agencies such as the Department of Finance’s Demographic Research Unit to disaggregate data in alignment with new federal standards for collecting race and ethnicity data. It provides California with an important benchmark for the 2030 Census to help verify critical data so communities can receive fair representation and resources. Disaggregation across state agencies is key to gathering truly representative data that leads to understanding inequities and creating solutions for greater equity. 

News & Blog Posts

MEET THE TEAM

A TIMELINE OF OUR VICTORIES

Catalyst California’s government relations work has helped achieved the following:

2023
October
Helped secure the passage of AB 764 (Bryan) which prohibits the consideration of incumbency protection in the redistricting process, adds clarity regarding the proper prioritization of redistricting criteria, and ensures jurisdictions do their due diligence to comply with the federal Voting Rights Act.
2023
October
Helped secure the passage of AB 1127 (Reyes), which extends the project performance and reporting period for the Bilingual Teacher Professional Development Program (BTPDP) from 2024 to 2029, and requires the California Department of Education (CDE), when administering the BTPDP, to meet quarterly with grant recipients to share promising practices and resources.
2023
October
Helped secure the passage of AB 393 (Rivas, L) which requires the Director of Social Services to develop procedures for general or migrant childcare and development contractors to identify and report data on dual language learners enrolled in a general childcare and development program or migrant childcare and development program.
2023
September
Helped secure the passage of AB 421 (Bryan), which requires a disclosure notifying the public that the petition circulator is receiving money for soliciting signatures, or that the person is a volunteer or employee of a nonprofit organization.
2023
June
Secured $10 million in one-time funding for the Diversity Education Leaders Pipeline Initiative (DELPI), which will increase diversity among school leaders and promote a culturally responsive learning environment to better reflect the students, teachers, and communities our state serves.
2023
April
State Assembly Speaker Anthony Rendon Appoints Catalyst California's John Kim and Dr. John Dobard to Racial Equity Commission and Racial and Identity Profiling Advisory Board

Today, Catalyst California is delighted to announce that John Kim, President & CEO, and Dr. John Dobard, Vice President of Policy and Programs, have been appointed to the Racial Equity Commission and Racial and Identity Profiling Advisory (RIPA) Board, respectively, by California State Assembly Speaker Anthony Rendon. The appointments come at a crucial time as California reckons with racial disparities that have only been exacerbated in the wake of the lingering COVID-19 pandemic and racial uprisings. 

2022
September
Governor Gavin Newsom issued Executive Order N-16-22, establishing the state’s first Racial Equity Commission. Senator Richard Pan, M.D. developed the Commission with Catalyst California and other racial equity organizations that sponsored SB 17 (2021). Through the Governor’s executive order, the Commission will produce a Racial Equity Framework consisting of resources and tools to promote racial equity and address structural racism. 
2022
September
Governor Gavin Newsom signed our sponsored bill, AB 2832, authored by Assemblymember Robert Rivas (D-Salinas). The bill created a new tool to identify the areas of highest need of increased early care and education (ECE) and whole child resources due to racial and economic inequities. AB 2382 was included in Education Trust-West’s “The Equity 8 – California’s Key Legislative Proposal 2022.”
2021
October
Governor Newsom signed our sponsored bill, AB 1363, authored by Assemblymember Luz Rivas (D-San Fernando Valley). This data will help guide instruction and practice, build on DLLs’ linguistic skills and needs, and support early childhood educators and quality Early Learning.
2020
November
Helped secure passage of AB 1196 (Gipson), a powerful policing reform bill The bill creates a uniform statewide policy to eliminate the use of chokeholds and carotid artery restraints statewide by law enforcement.
2020
November
Helped secure passage of ACA 6 (McCarty), restoring voting rights to formerly incarcerated people
2020
June
Helped secure passage of bill that authorizes the Secretary of State to establish an advisory committee that would make recommendations and establish guidelines for removing barriers to Native American voter participation
2019
August
Helped secure passage of the Police Accountability and Community Protection Act
2018
August
Secured $850 million in Early Childhood Education investments
2018
June
Helped secure passage of SB1421, The Right To Know Act

Gives the public the right to see certain records relating to police misconduct and serious uses of force.

2018
June
Secured $90 Million for 2020 Census for outreach to hard-to-count communities
2017
June
Securing over $800 million dollars for state-funded early care and education programs since the Great Recession.
2017
June
Securing funding for Census 2020 outreach and planning.
2017
June
Securing $200m allocation in the budget to establish the College Readiness Block Grant.

The grant provides California high school students, particularly those who are low income, English learners, or foster youth, additional supports and creates a stronger pipeline between high schools and the University of California and other postsecondary educational institutions.

2015
July
Securing full health care coverage to undocumented children under the age of 19 within Medi-Cal.
2015
June
Negotiated a change in funding formula for the California State Preschool Program (CSPP) grants.

As a result, the new allocation formula provides much-needed access to high-quality preschool slots to areas where high number of children do not have access to state subsidized preschool.

2013
June
Creating the Local Control Funding Formula that guarantees more funding for low-income students, English learners, and Foster Youth.
2010
September
Establishing Transitional Kindergarten, which gives California a two-year public school kindergarten experience that will ensure that our youngest children will be prepared to succeed in school.
2011
July
Establishing the California DREAM Act

Allows children who were brought into the US under the age of 16 without proper visas/immigration documentation meet in-state tuition and GPA requirements to have access to financial aid benefits at public universities and colleges.

2008
September
Providing $90 million in facility lease money reimbursement to charter schools serving low-income students and $400 million in facility eligibility to the state’s overcrowded classrooms.
2008
September
Ensuring that the state streamline funding for early childhood education and care so that more resources can be spent on services to children.