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AB-1458 Political Reform Act of 1974: Secretary of State: online filing and disclosure system.(2017-2018)

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Date Published: 04/18/2017 09:00 PM
AB1458:v98#DOCUMENT

Amended  IN  Assembly  April 18, 2017

CALIFORNIA LEGISLATURE— 2017–2018 REGULAR SESSION

Assembly Bill
No. 1458


Introduced by Assembly Member Friedman

February 17, 2017


An act to add Section 84616 to the Government Code, relating to the Political Reform Act of 1974.


LEGISLATIVE COUNSEL'S DIGEST


AB 1458, as amended, Friedman. Political Reform Act of 1974: Secretary of State: online filing and disclosure system.
The Political Reform Act of 1974 generally requires elected officials, candidates for elective office, and committees formed primarily to support or oppose a candidate for public office or a ballot measure, along with other entities, to file periodic campaign statements. The act requires that these campaign statements contain prescribed information related to campaign contributions and expenditures of the filing entities. Existing law, the Online Disclosure Act, requires the Secretary of State, in consultation with the Fair Political Practices Commission, to develop online and electronic filing processes for use by these persons and entities. That act also requires the Secretary of State to make prescribed information from those filings available on the Internet in a user-friendly, easily understandable format that provides the greatest public access, as specified.
This bill would require a candidate for elective state office to include and conspicuously display on the homepage of any his or her campaign Internet Web site of the candidate a hyperlink to the Secretary of State’s Cal-Access Internet Web site page that displays the candidate’s campaign finance information. This requirement would not apply to social media.
A willful violation of the Political Reform Act’s provisions is punishable as a misdemeanor. By expanding the scope of a crime, the bill would impose a state-mandated local program.
The California Constitution requires the state to reimburse local agencies and school districts for certain costs mandated by the state. Statutory provisions establish procedures for making that reimbursement.
This bill would provide that no reimbursement is required by this act for a specified reason.
The Political Reform Act of 1974, an initiative measure, provides that the Legislature may amend the act to further the act’s purposes upon a 2/3 vote of each house of the Legislature and compliance with specified procedural requirements.
This bill would declare that it furthers the purposes of the act.
Vote: 2/3   Appropriation: NO   Fiscal Committee: YES   Local Program: YES  

The people of the State of California do enact as follows:


SECTION 1.

 Section 84616 is added to the Government Code, to read:

84616.
 (a) A candidate for elective state office shall include and conspicuously display on the homepage of any his or her campaign Internet Web site of the candidate a hyperlink to the Secretary of State’s Cal-Access Internet Web site page that displays the candidate’s campaign finance information. information pursuant to Section 84602.
(b) Subdivision (a) does not apply to social media.

SEC. 2.

 No reimbursement is required by this act pursuant to Section 6 of Article XIII B of the California Constitution because the only costs that may be incurred by a local agency or school district will be incurred because this act creates a new crime or infraction, eliminates a crime or infraction, or changes the penalty for a crime or infraction, within the meaning of Section 17556 of the Government Code, or changes the definition of a crime within the meaning of Section 6 of Article XIII B of the California Constitution.

SEC. 3.

 The Legislature finds and declares that this bill furthers the purposes of the Political Reform Act of 1974 within the meaning of subdivision (a) of Section 81012 of the Government Code.