In With the New

The California Legislature passed 805 new laws last year: Here are highlights from our local reps.

naction defined Washington last year, but legislators in Sacramento were busily proposing and enacting hundreds of new laws, crossing partisan lines as co-authors, and lobbying for Gov. Jerry Brown's signature, which seems to have no relation to party lines. California lawmakers have ducked some third-rail issues like gun control, but they've acted on plenty of controversial things too, like immigrants' rights and fracking.

Here's a small sampling of the bills our local lawmakers authored or co-authored last year, and what they mean for you as they take effect.

SB 255 | Criminalizing Revenge Pom

State Sen. Anthony Cannella, R-Ceres

Even scrolling through the homepage of websites like MyEx.com (tagline "Get Revenge") feels like a violation of the people whose photos have been posted there. And that's without clicking through to the naked photos.

It's long been a crime to photograph or videotape people nude without their consent, but this law makes it illegal to disseminate such images even if they were taken willingly-on the condition of privacy. "People share intimate photos, and then those photos are later used as a weapon," Cannella says. He only learned about the devastating problem of widely disseminated revenge porn when a constituent came to talk to him about it. "I'm too old," he explains. "We had Polaroids."

Winners: Anyone who's ever trusted anyone else enough to let them take a nude photo; prosecutors, though the Monterey County DA hasn't received any complaints yet-perhaps because it wasn't a crime.

Losers: The people who manipulate their exes by sending out intimate content

AB 10 | Minimum Wage Increase

Assemblyman Luis Alejo, D-Watsonville

Zuccotti Park in lower Manhattan was scrubbed clean and elegantly lit with white Christmas lights last month, with nothing left to signal that Occupy Wall Street had once been there. But class divisions have stayed on the minds of many Americans, and Alejo's. "It goes to the core of people's ideas of fairness," he says. "Workers are working hard, but they still live in poverty."

While the new minimum wage might - help people pay rent, it's still not necessarily enough to cover costs like car repairs or medical care. A living wage calculator created by MIT calculates a living wage for one adult with one child in Monterey County is $21.34.

The new law ups the existing minimum wage from $8/hour to $9 on July 1, then to $10 in 2016.

Winners: The workforce.

Losers: Depends on who you talk to. Business advocacy groups like the Chamber of Commerce eventually took a neutral position on the bill, but Alejo says it took some negotiating.

AB 216! High School Requirements for Foster Kids

Assemblymen Mark Stone, D-Scotts Valley, and Brian Malenschein, R-San Diego

As if being in foster care isn't enough of a strain, foster youth on average transfer schools three times during what should be four years of high school. This bill clarifies graduation requirements for foster youth, allowing students to graduate if they meet state standards but not a specific school district's, therefore earning high school diplomas on time and entering the workforce without getting bogged down in years of redundant classes.

Stone also authored AB 346, giving the state authority to inspect and license shelters for runaway and homeless youth, and AB 643, allowing child welfare agencies to coordinate more and share information.

"The theme here is to give foster kids more control over their own destiny," Stone says. "To wrest control away from the bureaucracy and give a little bit to foster kids."

Thanks to an urgency provision, AB 216 took effect on Sept. 23, in time to make a difference for the 2013-14 school year.

Winners: High school students; teachers; foster youth; foster parents.

Losers: Bureaucrats who don't like change.

SB 232 | Veterans Cemetery Endowment Fund

State Sen. Bill Monning, D-Carmel

While the battle over measures M and K raged on, Monning was quietly jockeying for Gov. Jerry Brown's support for the Fort Ord veterans cemetery. SB 232 was a game changer, even though its adjustments to the endowment fond were mostly technical, allowing interest to be applied toward non-reimbursable costs. The law also came with a $1 million pledge from the state, which boosted fundraising efforts almost immediately thereafter.

Winners: Veterans, Fort Ord open space advocates.

Losers: Brian Boudreau, developer of proposed Monterey Downs; this takes away his leverage.

SB 4 | Fracking Regulations

State Sen. Fran Pavley, D-Agoura Hills;

State Sen. Bill Monning, D-Carmel, as co-author

Ask regulators if anyone is fracking the Monterey Shale formation in South Monterey County, and you can't get a straight answer. That's because no one knows, since oil and gas companies haven't been required to disclose such information. That's all about to change with the implementation of SB 4, the only one of 11 fracking-related bills in 2013 to get to the governor's desk. State regulators are traveling the state to receive public input on proposed fracking and well stimulation rules with a stop in SalinasJan. 8 (see story, p. 9), where they're parsing details of monitoring and reporting. "I think it will really slow down the industry," Monning says. "It was a rough year to be a ffacker."

Winners: The public (from a disclosure and public health standpoint); the water supply; agriculture; landowners in oiland gas-rich areas.

Losers: The oil and gas industries.

AB 60 | Safe and Responsible Drivers Act

Assemblyman Luis Alejo, D-Watsonville

The change is simple, but lifechanging to the more than 1 million Californians this law will most immediately impact: The DMV won't require proof of residency status anymore, making it possible for undocumented immigrants to get driver's licenses.

Worth noting: AB 60 doesn't just give out licenses, but it gives people the opportunity to take and pass the test like everyone else. "It's going to make our roads and highways safer," Alejo says.

The law isn't required to take effect until 2015, unless the DMV acts sooner.

Winners: Everyone on the road, licensed or unlicensed; auto insurance companies.

Losers: None. A license is no longer enough to get across the border into the U.S. anyway-you have to go through the hassle of getting a passport. #*