This year’s Q4D Policy Platform was built upon four pillars: release people from prison, restore full civil and human rights to system-impacted people, reunify families and communities, and relieve people from untenable conditions inside and out.
Bills marked with a * are cosponsored by LSPC & AOUON.
Release
AB 1647*: The Juvenile Potential Protection Act (JPPA) (Bryan): AB 1647 aims to reduce transfers of youth to the adult system, and ensure that young people have an opportunity to speak at their transfer hearings without those statements being used against them later in related proceedings.
AB 2122*: End Bench Warrants for Infractions (Kalra): This bill prohibits the issuance of a warrant of arrest from a judge (a “Bench Warrant”), when the underlying crime is an infraction, such as failure to appear, failure to pay bail, or a fine imposed for the violation of a state or local traffic law.
SB 1009: Community First, Detention Last Act (Becker): This bill establishes a clear evidentiary standard for pre-adjudication detention, clarifying the basis on which youth may be detained in juvenile hall, providing youth with a meaningful opportunity for courts to reconsider the necessity of continued detention in juvenile hall, and strengthening the legal requirements governing custodial placement decisions at disposition.
Restore
AB 2095*: Fair Chance Improvement Act (Lee): This bill aims to improve the California Fair Chance Act (FCA), which went into effect in 2018, expanding employment opportunities for millions of Californians, by closing loopholes that still allow employers to still unfairly deny qualified candidates.
AB 2483: Wildland Firefighters: Formerly Incarcerated Firefighter Certification and Employment Program (Elhawary): This bill would implement a process to issue official certifications for all trainings completed by incarcerated hand crews in the Conservation Camp Program. The bill would also create a permanent pathway to good jobs and gainful employment for formerly incarcerated hand crews who wish to pursue careers in firefighting upon release.
Budget Request: Jails to Jobs (McKinnor): This budget request would invest $40 million as a one-time investment in the State’s FY2026-27 budget to launch “Jails to Jobs” (J2J), a three-year, multi-county pilot program integrating workforce development for Californians into pretrial proceedings.
Reunify
AB 1201: The ReUNITY Act (Jackson): California’s family policing system disproportionately harms low-income families + communities of color through “automatic bypass” laws that order permanent placements when parents have experienced chronic substance abuse or prior terminations of parental rights, denying parents access to reunification services without evaluating their current circumstances. The ReUNITY Act replaces automatic exclusions based on violent felony convictions with trauma-informed, evidence-based evaluations in specific cases, thus ensuring more equitable outcomes for families.
AB 1645: The HUGS Act (Gonzalez & Bryan): The HUGS Act ensures that normal, appropriate physical contact—such as hugging, holding hands, and comforting children—is clearly allowed in prison visiting rooms by defining and limiting what can be considered “excessive contact.”
AB 1646*: The HUG Act (Bryan): This bill ensures young people confined in a juvenile hall or facility are able to have physical contact during in-person visits, ensuring that parents can hug and hold hands with their children when visiting. AB 2434: Visitor Protections and Safety Act (Bonta): The Visitor Protections and Safety Act will protect visitors from arbitrary and discriminatory visit denials in CDCR prison visiting rooms. The bill would establish clear, enforceable standards limiting when a visit can be denied, requiring written documentation any time a visitor is turned away, and establishing guardrails for searches. AB 2434 strengthens existing CDCR search regulations for prison visitation. Such regulations include searches that are non-contact; same-gender; private; and witnessed by a second same-gender staff member.
SB 498*: Keep Families Connected 2.0 (Becker): This bill would provide free phone calls lasting longer than 15 minutes and free texts for people in California prisons to strengthen bonds between incarcerated people and their loved ones.
Relieve
AB 1537: No Side Jobs for ICE (Rodriguez): This bill would enact a ban in California on local and state law enforcement officers from engaging in secondary employment with ICE, CBP, or other entities engaged in the arrest or detention of immigrants, including private security companies which contract with ICE.
AB 1932*: C.R.I.S.E.S. Act 2.0 (Elhawary): AB 1932 reauthorizes the Community Response Initiative to Strengthen Emergency Systems (CRISES) program, originally established by AB 118 (Kamlager, 2021). The program funds community-based alternatives to law enforcement as first responders in crisis situations that are not related to fire department or emergency medical service (EMS) response.
AB 2428*: End Poverty Fees (Rodriguez): This bill would eliminate poverty fees statewide. In California, “poverty fees” include fees for bounced checks, fees to enter into payment plans, and fees to participate in community service, which are charges that burden the people least able to pay, with little benefit to public safety or government revenue.
AB 2499*: Adrienne’s Act: Climate Justice in Prison (Gipson): AB 2499, formerly put forth as AB 1424 (2025), would expand worker rights to include incarcerated people, adding protections from dangerous work conditions due to extreme weather by setting indoor temperature standards, improving emergency plans, and strengthening safety measures.
SB 1095: Expose Data Deportation Centers + Fusion Centers (Perez): SB 1095 would limit the sharing of information between fusion centers and federal immigration enforcement agencies. This bill would help prevent state and local law enforcement data from being used in immigration enforcement.
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