A bill requiring California teachers to receive LGBTQ cultural competency training is again in fiscal trouble in light of the state’s growing budget deficit. Meanwhile, the expected completion date of the online trainings has been delayed by a year.
Shortly after being sworn in last December, gay freshman Assemblyman Rick Chavez Zbur (D-West Hollywood) introduced House Bill 5, the Safe and Supportive Schools Act. It would require teachers and credentialed staff serving seventh- through twelfth grade public school students to take an online LGBTQ cultural competency training course when it begins in two years.
The California Department of Education is working with the Los Angeles County Office of Education to develop the training. Over the course of six one-hour courses, they are expected to cover how school employees can support LGBTQ+ students facing bullying, harassment, discrimination or lack of acceptance in at home or at school.
Late last year, the state agency told the Bay Area Reporter it intended to debut the online training in conjunction with Pride Month in June 2024. But it has since asked for an extension until June 30, 2025 “due to delays in establishing the necessary contracts,” according to legislative analysis made on Zbur’s bill before it was heard in committee in April.
State Superintendent of Public Instruction Tony Thurmond had worked with former gay Democratic Rep. Todd Gloria, now mayor of San Diego, in 2019 to pass AB 493, also known as the Safe and Supportive Schools Act, which asked for the creation of the training. The state agency announced in March that Los Angeles education officials were working with the lead partner agency, the Equality California Institute, and an advisory committee made up of 20 nonprofits, including the Trevor Project and the Human Rights Campaign Foundation, to develop the training course.
The project is called PRISM: Providing Relevant, Inclusive Support That Matters for LGBTQ+ Students.
“Many LGBTQ+ students, for too long, have not reported issues of harassment and violence. This is unacceptable; it is vital that we create equal opportunities for quality public education in an environment that accepts all students for who they are,” has affirmed Thurmond earlier this year.
Funding is an obstacle
Tax issues have long overshadowed the legislative effort to create LGBTQ training sessions for teachers. The first bill calling for the training, which Thurmond had drafted in 2018 when he served in the Assembly, was vetoed by then-Gov. Jerry Brown because of its cost.
When Governor Gavin Newsom succeeded Brown in office the following year, he signed the law back into law, but without including any funding to pay for it. In 2021, Newsom allocated $2.3 million to create the online course.
Because AB 493 did not include a mandate for teachers and school staff to take the training, Zbur wrote AB 5 to make sure the previous bill “doesn’t sit on the shelf” in somewhere in Sacramento, he told BAR last year.
As the former executive director of the state LGBTQ advocacy organization Equality California, Zbur had pushed for the passage of previous bills authored by Gloria and Thurmond. His AB 5 passed the Assembly Education Committee on a 6-0 vote in late April and now awaits a vote in the Assembly Credentials Committee.
But the length of the required training sessions and how often they must be done have changed since Zbur introduced it last year. Originally, AB 5 had required four hours of LGBTQ cultural competency training by middle and high school teachers and certified staff every three years.
Last month, in response to comments about the length of that training, Zbur agreed to change the bill to mandate one hour of annual training for covered school employees.
“It’s pretty close to what we wanted,” Zbur recently told BAR. “The curriculum being prepared by the state education department has training modules in one-hour modules, so that worked out well for us.”
The bill would set the training requirements at the start of the 2025-26 school year. They would be stopped at the end of the 2029-30 school year.
The analysis of the bill as originally written by Zbur had noted that the Office of Legislative Counsel introduced the bill “as a possible state-mandated local program,” meaning it could cost implementation. But it did not specify what the bill’s fiscal impact might end up being.
With California projected to face a budget deficit by 2023, Newsom vetoed a number of bills last year because of their costs, including one focused on LGBTQ health services. Earlier this year, the state estimated the budget shortfall at $22.5 billion, and the figure is expected to be higher when Newsom presents his revised budget proposal for fiscal year 2023-24 this month .
The state’s worsening financial outlook has dimmed the prospects for passing AB 5 this year, Zbur acknowledged. However, he expressed his confidence that it would pass the Legislature in a recent interview with the BAR
“The big question is whether we’re going to get it through appropriations,” Zbur said. “People assume it’s going to happen. I think there’s strong support in both the Assembly and the Senate.”
If both chambers pass it by late summer, it remains to be seen whether the bill will survive Newsom’s veto pen once it reaches his desk.
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