Board of Supervisors Committee - Regular Meeting

Good afternoon and welcome to the Alameda County Board of Supervisors Personnel Administration and Legislation Committee meeting for Monday, July the 20th, 2026. May I have a roll call, please?

Supervisor Tan?

Present.

Supervisor Fortunato-Bass? We have a quorum.

Thank you. Let's start with the federal legislative update.

Good afternoon. Got Emily DeSilva and Curtis Erdman here with the federal update. This week is going to be a pretty big week, particularly for the House. Right now, the House is scheduled to leave for the August recess at the end of this week. So they will be gone for five weeks and return on August 31st. The Senate is currently scheduled to be in session through August 7th. So they're here at least right now, for two more weeks. We wouldn't be surprised if somehow this gets shortened, but we'll see. As a result, as I mentioned, this is going to be an important week for House Republicans in terms of passing critical legislation. On the House side, the House Rules Committee actually started meeting at 2 p.m. today to write a single rule covering four bills that they want to take up on the floor this week. One is the National Defense Authorization Act, NDAA, a clean CR, a continuing resolution to December 4th, and then a third reconciliation or what they're calling 3.0 for a budget resolution, which unlocks reconciliation and then a stock trading ban. The committee should pass the rule later today. However, I think full House adoption Tuesday could be difficult. The rule covers the four bills. So if the rule goes down and we've seen this happen, you know, several different weeks kind of throughout this year, the House schedule could be in flux for the remainder of the week. So, you know, the big vote will be tomorrow. The pressure point is the budget resolution. And I know we talked a little bit about this last week. It includes roughly $95 billion or authorizes $95 billion with no offsets. And so fiscal hawks are objecting to this. President Trump already put out on Truth Social a post calling on House Republicans to vote yes on the rule. framing it explicitly as the path to the Save America Act rather than for defense funding. Once the House passes the rule, the individual bills are likely to pass, particularly NDAA. That should pass. It's a House Republican product written without Senate input, but the Senate is taking up its own NDAA bill specifically. It's carried by armed services, Republicans, Republican leadership and defense hawks. Most Democrats will vote no, but it should pass on a party line vote. This is one of those bills, and I know we've talked about that passes Congress no matter what by the end of the year. And so we expect that to get out off the House floor with relative ease. Then next is the clean continuing resolution. And last week it was decided that the House would take up a CR through December 4th. this is their attempt to avoid any sort of potential shutdown as it gets closer to September 30th. Of course, the new fiscal year starts on October 1. And as we've talked about, the FY27 appropriations bills are nowhere near ready to go. Even the Freedom Caucus chair has said he supports a clean continuing resolution, which matters because it's usually the Freedom Caucus that would object. Democrats are still undecided, but there could be some Democrats that vote for it, particularly because it is a clean continuing resolution and doesn't have any policy provisions in it. I think the budget resolution is the real question mark. And again, you know, if they're able to get the rule through and President Trump is able to convince enough members. It should clear the House. I think the trickier issue will be the Senate. And we've already heard Majority Leader Thune say he just doesn't know that they have the votes in the Senate for this to pass. It includes $73 billion for military and intelligence. This is mainly for the war in Iran. This is because they know they can't get a supplemental appropriations bill done, so they're doing it through budget reconciliation efforts. There's $12 billion included for aid to farmers. And then there's $10 billion in state grants for election security. And this is kind of the provisions to get the Save America Act in reconciliation. Again, this is simply the budget resolution. If it passes, the House would then head home. And then when they come back in September, they would give guidance to the various committees with instructions to put together the reconciliation package. And again, this is simply the House side, the Senate. We think it would be very difficult to get through. As far as what the Senate plans to take up this week, it's the nomination of Jay Clayton for Director of National Intelligence. The Senate Intelligence Committee votes tomorrow, and his nomination is expected to pass out of committee on party lines. But we do not think he will be confirmed this week because Democrats have said they will not agree to fast track his nomination. So the earliest procedural vote on the floor is Thursday. And that's questionable. So likely he could be confirmed next week, assuming the Senate stays in. Again, as far as the continuing resolution, the House plans to pass a clean CR to December 4th. But Senate Republicans are also working with the White House. on anomalies for a post-September 30th funding package. So basically their own CR. So that's a clear signal that the Senate intends to reject the House clean approach. So even if the House passes the CR this week, there's no guarantee that the Senate would take up that CR. They'll probably take up maybe something that they create on their own. And so the House will likely leave for five weeks with the FY27 funding piece unresolved. So meaning even when they come back in September, it could still be crunch time because they're going to need to figure out a path forward to avoid a shutdown. And then just real quick on Senate appropriations, they are holding a hearing this tomorrow on the White House supplemental appropriations request for the war. So Secretary of War Hegseth, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Dan Cain, and then Ag Secretary Brooke Rollins will all testify. And this is likely where there will be quite a bit of talk of like what the actual funding dollars are, what's needed for the war funding. And of course, that's running parallel to what the House is trying to do through reconciliation efforts. Also on Senate Approps, and I think we talked about this last week, we do not expect the committee to mark up any of their appropriations bills. We think they will simply post them as drafts on the committee website before the August recess. This actually is something similar to what then-Chairman Pat Leahy, a Democrat, did in 2023 when they couldn't get the bills out of committee. They simply posted them so that they could kind of begin negotiations. Of course, they don't have the same standing if they were able to pass it out of committee and then on the floor, but they can at least begin negotiations with the House. And then finally, I know you all have seen this, but an update on public charge. Again, the final rule for public charge was published in the Federal Register today. It came out, I believe, last Thursday, but was published today, July 20th, and so is effective in September, September 18th. I know that we have talked about this, and you all, the county, submitted comments back in November when it was a notice of proposed rule. The final rule is certain to draw lawsuits, likely with requests to block the final rule before it goes into effect in September. Again, I know this is not new news, but, you know, the similar Trump public charge regulation was implemented in 2019 and was subject to litigation. You know, I think the big concern, and we've talked about this, that while that rules technical application was limited to a small number of lawfully present immigrants applying for green cards, its chilling effect was far broader. And I think that's one of the big concerns that we have talked about now is just the chilling effect that this could have on folks who would apply for benefits. So just wanted to note that. I think that's all we have for today, so happy to answer any questions that you may have.

Thank you, especially for the last-minute update as well. Supervisor Fortunato to ask questions or comments.

All I can say is elections matter. This is, yeah, it's really frustrating that that much money would go towards war versus meeting people's everyday basic needs across our country. I'm glad you mentioned public charge. I was very interested in hearing about that. So at this point, it sounds like the main recourse, given that we've already waited on the rulemaking process is you know, who's going to litigate this and potentially try to overturn it. Is that correct?

I think that's right. And I think we're waiting on further guidance, too, from agencies. But, I mean, I think that's exactly right, Supervisor. Okay. That's all.

Thank you. Just to follow up on a couple of things, as Supervisor Prachandana has mentioned, Elections have consequences. So you mentioned that there's funding that is going to be for election security similar to what's in what you said, the SAVE Act. And I just came back from a conference in Los Angeles. Free and fair elections has been a real concern for the upcoming November elections. Do you... see that taking shape for this midterm election?

It's, I don't think this is, you know, Save America cannot pass the Senate, right? Like the votes just are not there. And so this idea of including provisions in reconciliation was an idea that folks had, like, let's try and do it through reconciliation. But it can't, The Senate parliamentarian would not rule that the Save America Act, as it's currently written, would pass muster in a reconciliation bill. So now House Republicans are trying to include funding that would be grants for states if they adhere to certain aspects of the Save America Act. I don't think that reconciliation in general is going to pass the Senate. It may pass the house, but I just, again, the way it's currently written and we have a ways to go, but the way that Senate leadership has talked about it and just individual Senate Republicans who are objecting to like no offsets included for the supplemental funding for the war, they want to see offsets. I just don't think the votes are there for the overall package.

Okay, that's reassuring. I had a real quick briefing this morning with the exec director of the Alameda Alliance for Health, and he did mention the public charge definition changing, but it wasn't clear to me how what was, I thought, settled in 2019 It's coming back. I mean, are we re-litigating the same issue eventually?

It's a little different from 2019, but basically, and Curtis, I may get you to jump in, but in 2022, when the Biden administration came in, they basically came in with their own policy public charge rule. And so it superseded the 2019 one from the Trump era. And so this is basically, for lack of a better word, rescinding the 2022 Biden era rule and coming back to what the Trump administration would do. And I think what's different now is that the new rule would allow officers to look at a larger picture again, and it does not name any specific programs and allows officials to use their own judgment. And so I remember talking about this back in November. So it doesn't, again, list any specific programs and leaves it up to like individual officers to make the decisions, which is different than 2019.

Okay. That's helpful. But again, like you said, it's going to create that chilling effect, especially as people are trying to get their permanent residency, they'll be scrutinized very heavily on the, you know, the level of public assistance and services that they use. That's right. That's right.

And I think, I mean, I'm sure just like in 2019, I'm sure there will be a big kind of public like education effort, right. Underway to, to, let people know kind of this big rules change and what it could mean for them.

Okay. Thank you for that clarification. Do we have any public comments in our federal legislative update?

There are no public comments.

Thank you, Emily. So we do have a request from both our social service and our Alameda County Health Department to oppose an interim final rule from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services that on its face sounds like it's encouraging community engagement requirements for individuals receiving Medicare and Medicaid, but the way it's structured, it essentially would make coverage loss even higher for individuals and significantly tighten the criteria for the medically frail in terms of receiving medical coverage. So do we have concurrence on opposing this interim final rule?

Yes, and I am happy to make a motion to advance this to the full board.

I will second that motion. Do we have any public comment on this item?

There are no public comments.

Okay. We have roll call vote.

Supervisor Fournette-Bass?

Aye.

Supervisor Tan?

Aye. Motion passes. Thank you. Let's move to the state legislative update from Poland Strategies.

Okay.

Can you hear me?

Yes, we can hear you.

Okay. Thank you so much. Good afternoon. Vanessa Flores here with Full Moon Strategies to deliver the state legislative report. As the California State Legislature closed out its second week of summer recess last week, Governor Newsom was busy signing most of the remaining budget trailer bills into law. Of the eight trailer bills the governor signed last week, Senate Bill 172 provides permanent funding for California's Farm to School program. This program connects schools with California farmers to expand access to fresh meals and local ingredients. Lawmakers said the program has invested $86 million in 327 projects since 2021, benefiting 49% of public school students, with about 80% of grant recipients being Title I schools. Senate Bill 168 establishes a new light-duty zero-admission electric vehicle incentive program for first-time buyers of zero-admission electronic vehicles. The rebate will allow first-time EV buyers to receive an instant rebate of $3,500 for a new vehicle with an MSRP up to $50,000 and $1,750 for a used electric vehicle sold up to $25,000. The state is dedicating $135.5 million to this program and requires automakers to match dollar for dollar. Senate Bill 180 encourages business development in the state by extending the California Competes program through taxable years before January 1st of 2035. The program capped annually at $100 million encourages businesses to locate or expand in California by offering credits that offset future state income taxes. It had previously been scheduled to sunset on January 1st of 2030. Another bill that was signed last week was Assembly Bill 179, the Housing Development Finance Committee Bond and Tax Credit Reservation, aims to cut red tape and accelerate affordable housing construction in California. Assembly Bill 179 implements aspects of the governor's reorganization plan of 2025, which eliminates the business, consumer services, and housing agency effective on July 1st of 2026, and creates the new housing and homeless agency in California. It also makes targeted changes to housing programs, funding allocations, performance tracking, and administrative structures. On another note, what was mentioned earlier by Emily, she did a great job expanding on that, so I'm not going to go into the detail, but just wanted to also add that there was a joint statement released from the California Health and Human Services Agency on the new federal public charge rule. And a part of their statement, they also released that they're concerned that the federal rule will create confusion and discourage eligible families from seeking critical resources. So they will be posting more on their website on what that means for Californians as they get more information. And they also provide a list of nonprofit organizations qualified to exist individuals and that are available on the California Department on Social Services website. And with that, that includes our report.

Thank you. Thanks for the update on especially the trailer bills. Supervisor Cortana-Bass, any questions or comments?

Just one question. I am curious to hear if there's progress on the public hospital allocation of $250 million and any draft guidance on how that will be distributed.

That is a great question. I can follow up with you after this email. I believe maybe Amy Costa will have more information on that.

Thank you. Thank you again. I know that the governor came last week to our area to highlight the streamlining of efforts with housing on DETROIT BILL 179. I THINK THAT'S SOMETHING HE SEES AS ALSO BEING VERY FOUNDATIONAL IN TERMS OF HELPING TO MOVE FORWARD WITH THE HOUSING BOND THIS FALL AS WELL. SO THANK YOU FOR THAT UPDATE. I DON'T HAVE ANY FURTHER QUESTIONS OR COMMENTS. DO WE HAVE ANY PUBLIC COMMENT ON OUR STATE LEGISLATIVE UPDATE?

NEW SPEAKER NO PUBLIC COMMENTS.

Thank you Vanessa. Do we have any public comment on items that are not on today's agenda?

There are no public comments.

Thank you. This meeting stands adjourned.