Belt-Tightening California Lawmakers Kill Hundreds of Bills in Fiscal Committees

The Senate and Assembly appropriations committees sidelined 275 bills Aug. 15 during suspense file hearings—where bills with significant fiscal impacts are considered without testimony. Suspense file hearings take place twice a year, and bills that impact the state’s general fund by $50,000 or any fund by $150,000 are typically placed in the file to await votes by the fiscal committees. In the most recent hearing, the Assembly committee held 95 of 315 bills, and the Senate side held 180 of 515 under consideration. Known as where bills go to die in silence, the suspense file was used to hold up about one-third of the proposals in the most recent meeting, about equal to the 32 percent held in May and about 8 percent higher than the historical average....