SACRAMENTO, Calif. — The suspense file hearing was held in the legislature Thursday.

It is a twice-yearly hearing where hundreds of bills are decided on by the powerful Appropriations Committees in both houses. Bills that have a fiscal impact of $50,000 on the state’s General Fund or $150,000 on a special fund are placed on the Suspense File.

At the suspense file hearing, the Appropriations chair will read out if a bill is passed or is held in suspense, which means it is essentially killed for the year. Unlike most committee hearings, there is no public comment heard.

In the first suspense hearing, bills are decided on in the Appropriations Committee from their house of origin. This year, 668 bills were on the suspense file in the Assembly and 341 bills were on suspense in the Senate. 

Thirty-five percent of the bills on the suspense file in the Assembly were held, which was a higher amount than is typically seen. Chris Micheli, an adjunct professor at the McGeorge School of Law, said a reason for the uptick is the current state budget deficit.

“It really puts a damper on legislators’ ability to carry bills that have a significant fiscal impact,” Micheli said.

In the Senate, approximately 25% of the bills were held on suspense, which Micheli says is a more typical percentage of held bills compared to previous hearings.

One bill that did not survive the suspense hearing was Democratic Senator Steven Bradford’s Senate Bill 1007, which would have provided housing grants for descendants of enslaved people.

“We know reparations is about land and again that’s how we build generational wealth, so we still have to work to provide that opportunity for folks who’ve never owned property in this country,” Bradford said.

Three of Bradford’s reparations-related bills passed through Appropriations, including legislation to establish a new state agency that will be tasked with overseeing reparations for descendants of slaves in the state.

“We didn’t expect 100%, but three that got out are critically important for setting up the framework for reparations going forward,” Bradford added.

As the state faces a budget deficit of $45 billion, Republican Assemblymember Josh Hoover says lawmakers are going to have to make tough decisions for what to fund.

“It all comes down to priorities,” Hoover said.

Bills passed through Appropriations now go to a floor vote to be sent to the other house. In August, the same Suspense File process repeats after bills swap houses and go through a few policy committees. 

Notable bills passed:

• AB 2316 (Garbriel): Bans public schools from selling food products with certain additives and dyes
• SB 1043 (Grove): Requires the Department of Social Services to disclose when the use of restraints and isolation rooms are used in short-term residential therapeutic programs
• SB 1414 (Grove): Increases the penalty for purchasing a child for sex from a misdemeanor to a felony
• AB 2716 (Bryan): Bans low-production oil and gas wells from being within 3,200 feet of sensitive areas

Notable bills held:

• AB 2751 (Haney): Would have given employees the right-to-disconnect from non-emergency work calls and texts
• SB 1012 (Wiener): Would have provided regulated access to certain psychedelic substances
• AB 2210 (Petrie-Norris): Would have required Ignition-Interlock devices (i.e., a breathalyzer) be placed in cars of people convicted of a DUI
• AB 1999 (Irwin): Would have overturned a state law that requires the California Public Utilities Commission to implement an income based fixed charge for utilities for three of the biggest investor-owned utility companies