(Sacramento, September 14) – Assemblywoman Nell Soto (D-Ontario) today announced that eleven of her bills had passed the Legislature in 2007. She urged Governor Schwarzenegger to sign all of them in letters she sent Friday. Since first being elected to the legislature in 1999, two Governors have enacted ninety-two of Nell Soto’s bills. Eight more bills signed would bring the total to an even 100. Soto was the first woman elected to the State Legislature from the Inland Empire.

“Taken together, these bills are a snapshot of the steps we need to take to make California a better place,” Soto said. “My priorities are to help kids, give a break to the little guy, and promote goodwill. These bills have those themes in common.”

The eleven bills are:

AB 57 Highways: Safe Routes to School construction program.
This bill makes permanent California’s Safe Routes to School construction program. Soto first started the program in 1999 with AB 1475. Since then, Caltrans has offered a statewide competitive grant-making process to improve the safety of the physical environment for children traveling to and from schools. Through 2006, there were 2,843 applications submitted, and 570 grants awarded during the first six years of the state program. The extension of the program will allow more safety projects around schools.

AB 277 Foster care: foster family home licensing.
This bill helps foster families have successful outcomes by increasing the requirements for foster caregiver training programs and information provided to foster parents and relative caregivers.

AB 314 CalWORKs: welfare-to-work activities.
Studies indicate that the completion of a formal education can lead low-income families out of poverty and towards self-sufficiency. This bill allows CalWORKs parents in vocational training and education to count study time as core hours toward satisfaction of their weekly welfare-to-work participation requirement. Sponsored by the Western Center for Law and Poverty (WCLP), this bill will "help more families meet the work participation requirements" and thereby improve the state's work participation rate.

AB 446 Mobilehomes.
The bill was a priority for the Golden State Manufactured-home Owner’s League. It provides that a park management’s notice to a homeowner, to make certain repairs or improvements to the home or otherwise remove it from the park on resale, is void and unenforceable if the repair or improvement required by management does not comply with specified provisions of the Mobilehome Residency Law, a preexisting law to protect homeowners and tenants.

AB 764 Education technology: the California Technology Assistance Project (CTAP); Statewide Educational Technology Services (SETS)
AB 764 extends and improves California education technology programs, CTAP and SETS. CTAP trained over 42,000 educators last year in how to use computers in the classroom. California Superintendent of Public Instruction O’Connell said, “California ranks in the bottom 10 percent of states in terms of funding for educational technology and its effective use in schools, which is why this legislation is sorely needed.”

AB 959 Blind Vendor Revolving Loan Fund
This bill provides some assistance to blind vendor's to reduce the vendor's interest rates for commercial loans for obtaining inventory and equipment for their vending facilities. Sponsored by California Federation of the Blind.

AB 1281 Charter schools: special education
This bill ensures that students with disabilities are appropriately served by charter schools and that charter schools are providing all the education services required by each child’s individualized education plan (IEP). Sponsored by the California School Boards Association (CSBA).

AB 1397 Long-term health care facilities.
This bill helps improve long term care in California by providing more transparency to funding for programs to improve the quality of life for residents.

AB 1432 State teachers' retirement. CALSTRS
This bill allows California teachers to apply service time for teaching at public schools overseas to their retirement benefits.

AB 1453 Foster care: residentially based services.
Under this bill, the California Department of Social Services will convene a workgroup of public and private stakeholders that will develop a plan for transforming the current system of group care for foster children or youth, and for children with serious emotional disorders into a system of residentially based services. Sponsored by California Alliance of Child and Family Services.

AB 1477 Wildlife Control Operators
This bill establishes continuing education requirements for licensed trappers, requires that non-target animals ensnared in traps be immediately released or, if injured, taken to a shelter or veterinarian, requires reasonable efforts to notify owners of domestic animals, such as dogs or cats, injured or killed in a trap, and requires the Department of Fish and Game to approve a form trappers would be required to provide to clients informing them of non-lethal options for animal control and other information.