ACSA joined education partners and safety advocates Sept. 8 at a news conference in support of Senate Bill 848 (Pérez), which would strengthen student safety by implementing prevention measures against school employee sexual misconduct.

SB 848 was up for a critical vote on the Assembly floor in the final days of the California legislative session, which ended Sept. 12. The bill had not been voted on as of EdCal’s print deadline.

ACSA Legislative Advocate Dorothy Johnson stood with bill author Sen. Sasha Renée Pérez and co-author Assemblymember Josh Hoover; Jeff Vaca of the Riverside County Office of Education; Sara Pietrowski of the California Association of School Business Officials, Lois Gormley of Schools Excess Liability Fund and other supporters to emphasize the importance of protecting student welfare, beginning with the hiring process.

Johnson said ACSA and the Riverside County Office of Education have worked for years to establish a database of classified employees that would allow administrators to access information on applicants, such as prior sexual assault investigations.

“Our school employers, despite our best efforts to conduct thorough background checks, sometimes lack important information if applicants do not disclose their full employment history or prior investigations of egregious conduct,” Johnson said.

The lack of such a database — which already exists for teaching positions — has allowed some employees to “slip through the cracks” and move from one district to the next.

“All school employees need to be held accountable for egregious acts against students,” Johnson said. “SB 848 offers that path forward and puts student safety first.”

Pérez said a recent report by the Fiscal Crisis and Management Assistance Team confirmed “breakdowns in oversight and accountability that allowed abuse to persist unchecked.”

“California still lacks a comprehensive, standardized approach to preventing abuse in K-12 schools,” Pérez said. “We must do better. Protecting our kids is the most basic promise we make.”