A new California law creates an array of measures to educate school staff, beef up reporting requirements and stop teachers credibly accused of abuse from getting jobs at other districts.

The law, Senate Bill 848, goes into effect Jan. 1 and schools must have protocols in place by July. The law applies to all schools, including private schools.

“I’m proud to see this bill move forward. It’s been really personal for me,” state Sen. Sasha Renée Pérez (D-Alhambra), the bill’s author, said after it passed. “For survivors, this is an important step toward justice.”

Avalanche of lawsuits

The law stems from a previous California law that made it easier for victims to sue school districts and counties. Under Assembly Bill 218, which went into effect in 2020, victims can file suit until age 40 or even older if they didn’t remember being abused until later in life. That has led to an avalanche of lawsuits and much greater public awareness of the scope of the problem.

So far, victims have filed more than a thousand lawsuits against school districts and counties, with some resulting in enormous payouts. A jury in Riverside County in 2023 handed Moreno Valley Unified a $135-million verdict over abuse allegations, and Los Angeles Unified faces more than $500 million in claims.

Overall, California schools face nearly $3 billion in sex abuse claims from former students, according to the Fiscal Crisis and Management Assistance Team, a state agency that helps school districts with financial matters. Some of the incidents occurred decades ago, as early as the 1940s, and some of the payouts have been so large that they’ve led districts to financial insolvency.

School accountability

While the new law doesn’t address the lawsuits, it does institute measures intended to stop future abuse and hold schools more accountable. It requires schools to write comprehensive policies on appropriate behavior, and train students, teachers, coaches and other school staff on recognizing and reporting misconduct. It also broadens the number of staff who are required to report abuse allegations.

Perhaps the most noteworthy requirement is creating a database of teachers credibly accused of abuse. The database, to be administered by the California Commission on Teacher Credentialing, will be available to schools during their hiring processes. The aim is to stop teachers who have abused students from quitting and getting rehired elsewhere, only to abuse more students. Teachers who have been cleared of wrongdoing will be removed from the database.

Pérez said she was inspired to author the new law after reading about generations of abuse at Rosemead High School, which is in her district. She also told CalMatters that she was the victim of a teacher’s unwanted attention when she was in high school.

“There are now dollars and cents being assigned to these cases,” she said in September. “It’s really opened up this conversation about what can we do to better prevent this abuse from happening.”

Jones writes for CalMatters.

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Senate Bill 848, sponsored by state Sen. Sasha Renée Pérez, a Democrat from Alhambra, stems from a slew of recent lawsuits over sexual abuse in California schools, as well as a news report on decades of sexual abuse by at least a dozen teachers at a high school in her district.

“I’m proud to see this bill move forward. It’s been really personal for me,” said Pérez, who recently told CalMatters that she was the victim of a teacher’s inappropriate interest while she was in high school. “For survivors, this is an important step toward justice.”

The law goes into effect Jan. 1, and applies to all K-12 schools in California, including private schools. 

Among other things, the law requires schools to train teachers, coaches and other school staff on how to prevent and report sexual misconduct; broadens the number of staff who are required to report abuse allegations; and requires schools to write comprehensive policies on appropriate behavior. 

But the database is perhaps the most significant change. Administered by the California Commission on Teacher Credentialing, the database is intended to stop teachers facing credible accusations of abuse from quitting and getting rehired at another school, potentially abusing more children. The database will be available to schools as part of their employee screening process, and would be updated if allegations against a teacher prove to be unfounded.

Although sexual abuse has long occurred in schools, the extent of the problem came to light in 2020 after the passage of AB 218, which made it easier for victims to sue school districts and other government agencies over sexual abuse. The law opened a floodgate of lawsuits that have so far cost California schools more than $3 billion and brought some districts to the brink of insolvency. 

Another bill’s failure

The large payouts inspired another bill this year, which would have provided some relief for school districts faced with lawsuits over decades-old abuse claims while still allowing victims to be compensated. Senate bill SB 577, sponsored by State Sen. John Laird, a Democrat from Santa Cruz, stalled in the Assembly. 

The bill didn’t cap settlements or attorney fees, but it called for a statute of limitations on older incidents and would have made it easier for school districts to issue bonds to pay settlements, which in California have mostly ranged from $5 million to $10 million.

“I am disappointed that SB 577 will not be advancing this year,” Laird said in an email. “I had hoped to protect survivors’ access to justice while finding some fiscal relief to local governments. Despite these months of hard work, it was just impossible to balance these interests to get to a successful outcome this year.”

Laird said he hopes to resurrect the bill next year.

Financial hardships for districts

School districts were devastated by SB 577’s failure. Some had canceled preschool programs and field trips, frozen salaries or laid off staff and taken other steps to pay legal settlements. The expenses come at a difficult time for schools, as pandemic relief grants have recently expired and enrollment continues to decline in many parts of the state. 

Montecito Union School District, a 350-student district near Santa Barbara, last month settled an abuse lawsuit for $7.5 million — nearly half its annual budget — for alleged sexual abuse by a former staff member between 1972 and 1978. 

Nearby Carpinteria Unified has also been affected.

“We are very frustrated that legislators failed to assist California school districts who have been forced to defend themselves against decades-old claims, spending millions of dollars that impact current students and families,” said Diana Rigby, superintendent of Carpinteria Unified. “Our district has been severely impacted by the financial burden of defending four lawsuits from the 1970s.”

Advocates for SB 577 said that trial attorneys were behind the bill’s failure. Attorneys earn up to 30% to 40% on legal settlements, and have been advertising around California in search of people who were abused in schools. 

In the final days of the legislative session, ads circulated on social media featuring a photo of Assembly Speaker Robert Rivas with the words, “Stop the Predator Protection Law” and “Stand with child victims.” The ads were paid for by the law firm Manly, Stewart & Finaldi, a national firm with offices in Irvine and Riverside, which specializes in sex abuse claims.

John Manly, a partner in the firm, said he bought the ads to pressure Rivas to reject the bill.

“If I have to spend every last dime to protect a child from being abused, I will do that,” Manly said. “I’ve spent my career doing this, and I’m not going to stop.”

Manly, the lead attorney in the lawsuit against former Olympic team doctor Larry Nassar, said he’d fight any legislation that curbs abuse lawsuits. He also said Pérez’s bill doesn’t go far enough: it should include felony charges for mandated reporters who fail to report suspected abuse, and it should require school districts to publish the names of staff who’ve been “credibly accused” of sexual misconduct.  

He expects the fight to continue next year and beyond.

Consumer Attorneys of California, a lobbying group, was neutral on Laird’s bill.

“Although CAOC had no official position on the bill, we thought it struck the right balance between protecting survivors’ rights and addressing issues relating to public entities,” said Jonathan Underland, spokesperson for Consumer Attorneys of California. “We were disappointed to see that it did not cross the finish line.”

Eventually, state political leaders will have to take action on abuse lawsuits because too many schools and government agencies are facing insolvency, endangering programs that millions of people rely on, said Ben Adler, public affairs director for the California State Association of Counties.

“God bless Senator Laird for taking this on. It was a thankless task,” Adler said. “Moving forward, there has to be a way to ensure justice for survivors without bankrupting schools and counties, which provide a social safety net. The governor and the Legislature will have to get everyone in a room to figure this thing out.”

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