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By Greg deGiere, Civil Rights Advocate, The of California
Californians, and particularly adults and children with disabilities, are a step closer to greater protection from hate crimes and other crime and violence with the passage of three major bills in their first tests in the Legislature.
The Assembly Public Safety Committee unanimously passed these bills in the last two weeks:
- AB 751 by Assemblymember Pilar Schiavo, which would require almost all local police and sheriff’s departments to adopt comprehensive policies guiding officers to provide much better protection to seniors and to adults and children with disabilities. The Arc/UCP and the California Alliance for Retired Americans are the bill’s sponsors.
- AB 449 by Assemblymember Phil Ting that, likewise, would require all state and local law enforcement agencies adopt policies guiding officers to prevent, report and responds to hate crimes. This is especially important to the disability community because anti-disability hate crimes are the invisible hate crimes, rarely even reported. We lead an impressive list of sponsors and supporters of this bill.
- AB 1064 by Assemblymember Evan Low, which would make it easier to report – and convict the perpetrators of –- hate crimes. Of particular importance to our community, the bill notes “callousness” and “a perception of the vulnerability of the victim due to the victim being perceived as being weak, worthless, or fair game because of an actual or perceived characteristic of the victim” as examples of a perpetrator’s bias that that turns a crime into a hate crime. We were instrumental in drafting and organizing support to this bill.
The bills and analyses are available by following the links above. While we can expect perhaps tougher tests of the bills ahead in the legislative process, the initial unanimous passage of these initial bills puts us in a stronger position to meet the challenges ahead.