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Bill

AB 2796

Criminal history information: background checks.

2025-2026 Regular Session

Expands fingerprint-based criminal history checks across many professions and agencies, adding more entities and ongoing arrest notifications for licenses and employment.

From committee: Do pass. To Consent Calendar. (Ayes 15. Noes 0.) (June 24).
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Bill Summary · AB 2796

Overview

AB 2796, introduced by the Public Safety Committee and amended May 27, 2026, would expand and reorganize California’s framework for criminal history background checks across multiple state agencies, professions, and settings. The bill aims to increase access to state and national criminal history information for certain employers and licensing authorities, while clarifying procedures for fingerprint-based background checks, arrest notifications, and related reporting. It also adds or shifts responsibility to the State Department of Public Health (DPH) in certain background-check contexts and broadens the universe of entities subject to background checks, often imposing a state-mandated local program footprint.

Main purpose and intent

  • Strengthen safeguards by requiring more entities to perform fingerprint-based state and national criminal history checks.
  • Update which state agencies or designees handle background-check processes (notably adding the State Department of Public Health as an alternative designee to DHCS in certain provisions).
  • Ensure that individuals seeking certain licenses, certifications, or employment with access to vulnerable populations (e.g., minors, patients) undergo thorough background screening and remain subject to ongoing arrest notifications.

Key provisions and changes

  • Expanded background-check requirements across numerous codes, including:
    • Business and Professions Code: for professional licensure and certification processes (e.g., private sector credentialing and professional fiduciaries).
    • Corporations Code: commands related to fingerprint-based checks for appointing humane officers (animal care context).
    • Education Code: broad updates requiring fingerprint-based checks for employees of private and heritage schools, private school contractors, and related personnel with pupil contact; includes ongoing follow-up requirements for arrest notifications.
    • Family Code: updates related to adoption agency background checks.
    • Financial Codes (Banking and Escrow): fingerprint checks for certain banking officials and escrow agents.
    • Health and Welfare: coordination with health-related licensing and facility licensing entities, expanding access to criminal history information.
  • National and state checks: time to submit fingerprint images and to obtain state and federal background-check responses; ongoing arrest notification requirements (subsequent arrest notifications) for applicants and licensees.
  • Firearms-related checks: for eligibility determinations, requiring fingerprint submissions to determine state and federal prohibitions on firearm possession; department retention of fingerprint impressions for arrest notification.
  • Public health and private schools: shifts authority for background-check processing to the State Department of Public Health as an alternative to the Department of Health Care Services (for certain high-risk provider screenings).
  • Expanded list of roles requiring checks in care facilities and schools, including administrators, supervisors, managers, directors, and individuals with substantial financial interest, as well as adults in supervisory roles over clients.
  • Privacy and data handling: reiteration of confidentiality, secure storage, and destruction timelines for criminal history information, with cost-recovery and potential fees to cover background-check processing.
  • Reimbursement note: the bill states that no reimbursement is required for local agencies or school districts, clarifying funding posture.

Who is affected

  • Licensing boards, regulatory agencies, and employers that hire individuals in positions with direct contact with minors, patients, or vulnerable populations.
  • Private schools, heritage schools, and child-care related facilities and contractors.
  • Banks, escrow agents, and financial services entities.
  • Humane societies and related animal-care organizations appointing humane officers.
  • State and local agencies that administer background-check processes, including DHCS and DPH as applicable designees.
  • Individuals applying for licenses, certifications, employment, or volunteer roles that involve contact with vulnerable groups.

Procedural and timeline aspects

  • Immediate effect: described as an urgency statute, taking effect immediately upon enactment.
  • fingerprint submission timelines: requirements specify how quickly fingerprints and related information must be submitted and how results are processed.
  • Ongoing notification: recipients must handle subsequent arrest notifications and update employers or agencies accordingly.
  • Federal authorization condition: if the FBI authorizes federal checks for certain licensing or employment purposes, affected entities must require and resubmit fingerprints for those purposes.
  • Local program impact: expansion of background-check access constitutes a state-mandated local program.

Note: The bill text provides detailed, section-specific amendments across multiple codes. This summary highlights the central thrust and substantive impact, without replicating every procedural nuance.

Compiled from official sources — confirm details with the bill’s official record.

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