1. Home
  2. Regulations
  3. 2023 Legislative Updates

2023 Legislative Updates

The following is a list of bills the Board of Registered Nursing took a position on during the first year of the 2023-2024 Legislative Session, that were ultimately passed by the Legislature and signed into law by Governor Newsom.

For a list of every bill the Board took a position on this year and the outcome of each bill, please visit the following: 2023 Board Positions

Because most bills contain multiple provisions, please refer to the bills themselves for complete details. The bills can also be accessed through the California Legislative Information website.

Assembly Bills

  • AB 269 (Berman) Public health: COVID-19 testing and dispensing sites
    The bill authorizes a person to perform an analysis of samples to test the virus that causes COVID-19, in a clinical laboratory or a city, county, or city and county public health laboratory if they meet certain requirements. The bill also authorizes an entity contracted with and approved by the California Department of Public Health to operate a designated COVID-19 testing and dispensing site to acquire, dispense, and store COVID-19 oral therapeutics at or from a designated site, until January 1, 2024.
  • AB 633 (Patterson) Nursing: licensure: retired licenses
    The bill requires the Board of Registered Nursing to establish a retired license category for registered nurses (RN) who meet certain criteria. The bill prohibits a retired RN from engaging in any activity that requires an active RN or advanced practice RN license but authorizes them to provide nursing services to the public, free of charge in any public health program created by federal, state, or local law or administered by a federal, state, county, or local government entity under adequate supervision.
  • AB 883 (Mathis) Business licenses: United States Department of Defense SkillBridge program
    The bill requires a licensing program within the Department of Consumer Affairs, after July 1, 2024, to expedite the initial licensure process for an applicant who provides evidence that they are an active-duty member of a regular component of the US Armed Forces and enrolled in the Department of Defense SkillBridge program.
  • AB 1007 (Ortega) Occupational safety and health standards: plume
    The bill requires the Division of Occupational Safety and Health to, by December 1, 2026, submit to the Occupational Safety and Health Standards Board a proposed regulation requiring a health facility to evacuate or remove plume using plume-scavenging systems in all settings that employ techniques that involve the creation of plume. It also requires the Occupational Safety and Health Standards Board to consider the proposed regulation for adoption by June 1, 2027.
  • AB 1283 (Chen) Pupil health: emergency stock albuterol inhalers
    The bill authorizes a local educational agency, county offices of education, and charter schools to make emergency stock albuterol inhalers available at school sites and allows school nurses or trained personnel who have volunteered to administer them. The bill also requires the Superintendent of Public Instruction to establish minimum standards of training for the administration of stock albuterol inhalers and to review those standards at least every 5 years.
  • AB 1651 (Sanchez) Pupil health: emergency medical care: epinephrine auto-injectors
    The bill requires a local education agency, county office of education, and charter schools to store epinephrine auto-injectors and written materials on how to use them in an accessible location upon the need for emergency use. The bill also extends the definition of “volunteer” and “trained personnel” to state that holders of an Activity Supervisor Clearance Certificate can administer an emergency epinephrine auto-injector.
  • AB 1707 (Pacheco) Health professionals and facilities: adverse actions based on another state’s law
    The bill protects licensed health care professionals, clinics, and health facilities from being denied a license or subjected to discipline on the basis of a civil judgment, criminal conviction, or disciplinary action imposed by another state based solely on the application of a law that interferes with a person's right to receive sensitive services that would be lawful in California.
  • AB 1722 (Dahle) Pupil health: credentialed school nurses, registered nurses, and licensed vocational nurses
    The bill authorizes, until January 1, 2029, a local educational agency to employ a licensed vocational nurse who is supervised by a credentialed school nurse employed by a different local education agency.

Senate Bills

  • SB 234 (Portantino) Opioid antagonists: stadiums, concert venues, and amusement parks
    The bill requires stadiums, concert venues, and amusement parks to maintain unexpired doses of an opioid antagonist on its premises and ensure that at least two employees are aware of the location. The bill also provides indemnification.
  • SB 345 (Skinner) Health care services: legally protected health care activities
    The bill establishes various safeguards against the enforcement of other states’ laws that prohibit, criminalize, sanction, authorize civil liability against, or otherwise interfere with a person, healthcare provider, or other entity in California that offers reproductive health care services or gender-affirming health care services.
  • SB 372 (Menjivar) Department of Consumer Affairs: licensee and registrant records: name and gender changes
    The bill requires a board under the Department of Consumer Affairs to replace references to a licensee's former name or gender on their license and on the online license verification system, upon request, when the licensee's name has been changed due to a court-ordered change in gender or under circumstances that resulted in participation in state's address confidentiality program.
  • SB 544 (Laird) Bagley-Keene Open Meeting Act: teleconferencing
    The bill revises and repeals, until January 1, 2026, certain requirements under the Bagley-Keene Open Meeting Act. Among other changes, the bill requires a quorum of members of the state body to be physically present in the same location for a meeting of the full state body. Any additional members of the state body, in excess of a quorum, may attend and participate in the meeting from a remote location that does not need to be accessible to the public. Certain exceptions to the physical quorum requirement apply for members with disabilities and for meetings of subcommittees or advisory committees.
  • SB 667 (Dodd) Healing arts: pregnancy and childbirth
    The bill, among other changes, clarifies a certified nurse midwife’s (CNM) authority to treat and provide care for common gynecologic conditions, permits a CNM to admit or discharge a patient if a CNM has privileges at a general acute care hospital, clarifies that a CNM is a practitioner for purposes of certifying disability, and includes a CNM as a laboratory director for purposes of performing specified laboratory tests.
  • SB 887 (Committee on Business, Professions and Economic Development) Consumer Affairs
    The bill makes numerous technical and clarifying provisions related to programs within the Department of Consumer Affairs.