NOTICE IS HEREBY GIVEN that the Director of the Department of Corrections (CDC), pursuant to rulemaking authority granted by Penal Code (PC) Section 5058, in order to implement, interpret and make specific PC Section 5054, proposes to amend Article 7 (Sections 3170 through 3179) in the California Code of Regulations (CCR), Title 15, Division 3 relating to Visiting. 

PUBLIC HEARING:

Date and Time:March 8, 2002,9:00 a.m. – 5:00 p.m.

Place:Department of Water Resources Auditorium 
1416 Ninth Street 
Sacramento, CA95814 

Purpose:To receive comments about this action.

PUBLIC COMMENT PERIOD:

The public comment period will close March 8, 2002 at 5:00 p.m.Any person may submit public comments in writing (by mail, by fax or by e-mail) regarding the proposed changes.To be considered by the Department, comments must be submitted to the Department of Corrections, Regulation and Policy Management Branch, P.O. Box 942883, Sacramento, CA 94283-0001; by fax at (916)322-3842; or by e-mail at [email protected] before the close of the comment period.

CONTACT PERSON:

Please direct any inquiries regarding this action to:

Rick Grenz, Chief,
Regulation and Policy Management Branch
Department of Corrections
P.O. Box 942883, Sacramento, CA 94283-0001
Telephone (916) 322-9702

In the event the contact person is unavailable, inquires should be directed to the following back-up person: 
Peggy McHenry, Chief,
Regulation Management Unit
Telephone (916) 322-9702

Questions regarding the substance of the proposed regulatory action should be directed to:
Terry Brayer

Institutions Division, Institution Services Unit
Telephone (916) 323-4242.

LOCAL MANDATES:

This action imposes no mandates on local agencies or school districts, or a mandate which requires reimbursement pursuant to Government Code Section 17561.

FISCAL IMPACT STATEMENT:

·Cost or savings to any state agency:None

·Other non-discretionary cost or savings imposed on 
local agencies:None

·Cost or savings in federal funding to the state:None

EFFECT ON HOUSING COSTS:

The Department has made an initial determination that the proposed action will have no significant effect on housing costs. 

COST IMPACTS ON REPRESENTATIVE PRIVATE PERSONS OR BUSINESSES:

The Department is not aware of any cost impacts that a representative private person or business would necessarily incur in reasonable compliance with the proposed action.

SIGNIFICANT STATEWIDE ADVERSE ECONOMIC IMPACT ON BUSINESS:

The Department has initially determined that the proposed regulations will not have a significant statewide adverse economic impact directly affecting businesses, including the ability of California businesses to compete with businesses in other states.

EFFECT ON SMALL BUSINESSES:

The Department has determined that the proposed regulations may not affect small businesses.It is determined that this action has no significant adverse economic impact on small business, because they are not affected by the internal management of state prisons.

ASSESSMENTS OF EFFECTS ON JOB AND/OR BUSINESS CREATION, ELIMINATION OR EXPANSION:

The Department has determined that the proposed regulation will have no affect on the creation of new or the elimination of existing jobs or businesses within California, or affect the expansion of businesses currently doing business in California.

CONSIDERATION OF ALTERNATIVES:

The Department must determine that no reasonable alternative considered by the Department, or that has otherwise been identified and brought to the attention of the Department, would be more effective in carrying out the purpose for which the action is proposed or would be as effective and less burdensome to affected private persons than the proposed regulatory action.

AVAILABILITY OF PROPOSED TEXT AND Initial Statement of Reasons:

The Department has prepared and will make available the text and the Initial Statement of Reasons (ISOR) of the proposed regulations. The rulemaking file for this regulatory action, which contains those items and all information on which the proposal is based (i.e., rulemaking file) is available to the public upon request directed to the Department's contact person.The proposed text, ISOR, and Notice of Proposed Action will also be made available on the Department’s website http://www.cdc.state.ca.us/. 

AVAILABILITY OF THE FINAL STATEMENT OF REASONS:

Following its preparation, a copy of the final statement of reasons may be obtained from the Department’s contact person. 

AVAILABILITY OF CHANGES TO PROPOSED TEXT:

After considering all timely and relevant comments received, the Department may adopt the proposed regulations substantially as described in this notice.If the Department makes modifications which are sufficiently related to the originally proposed text, it will make the modified text (with the changes clearly indicated) available to the public for at least 15 days before the Department adopts the regulations as revised.Requests for copies of any modified regulation text should be directed to the contact person indicated in this notice.The Department will accept written comments on the modified regulations for 15 days after the date on which they are made available.

Informative Digest/Policy Statement Overview:

Penal Code Section 5054 vests with the Director the supervision, management and control of the prisons, and the responsibility for the care, custody, treatment, training, discipline, and employment of inmates. 

Penal Code Section 5058 authorizes the Director to prescribe and amend regulations for the administration of prisons.

This action will adopt revisions to Title 15, Subchapter 2, Division 3, Article 7 of the California Code of Regulations (CCR) governing the processes, approvals, and requirements authorizing inmates to receive visits from their family, friends, and legal representatives at California Department of Corrections (CDC) institutions and facilities.The primary objective of this action is to standardize visiting procedures system-wide, provide more specificity and define terms in areas where needed, remove procedural material in the existing regulations more appropriately placed in the departmental operations manual, and incorporate updated references to the Penal Code.

These regulations repeal the entire Article of the CCR governing visiting (Sections 3170 through 3179) and readopt a new reorganized Article that has been rewritten for clarity and easier reference by staff, inmates, and visitors.While many specific regulatory provisions are retained in virtually unchanged form, a complete repeal and amended re-adoption of the regulations was selected to facilitate public review and understanding of the visiting process in total from beginning to end.This approach also includes recognition that the extensive reorganization of the material and numerous clarifying edits would be very difficult to follow if the changes were made retaining the original text.

While a complete rewrite of the current visiting regulations also presents some challenges, our goal is to clarify current policy and standardize procedures system-wide while presenting the regulations in sequential order to facilitate maximum visiting process understanding and compliance by all users.In this regard, several previously referenced regulatory sections are incorporated directly into the visiting section and the regulations within the visiting section are now organized in sections that group all similar process provisions (i.e. application, approval/disapproval, visitor processing) in one place for easy reference.

CDC’s commitment to the value of visiting for establishing and maintaining meaningful family and community relationships is retained in the initial paragraph of the new regulations, as well as the desire to be as accommodating as possible while operating a safe, secure, and orderly inmate visiting program. These regulations incorporate identified program needs and the security that will be required for each program - inmates with Administrative Segregation and Security Housing Unit status will be most restricted while those involved in work and academic programs, with no disciplinary infractions, are least restricted. In adopting these regulations, CDC seeks to standardize many processes that were formerly subject to local interpretation, while retaining some appropriate flexibility of benefit to individual institutions and facilities and their visitors.