As school districts and county offices of education across California prepared to open their schools in a virtual distance learning format, electronic recording of remote instruction sessions became a topic of interest in labor negotiations.

With two separate recently passed laws, the California Legislature has altered the procedures surrounding school district disposition of surplus property. Senate Bill 98 (SB 98), an education omnibus budget trailer bill signed into law on June 29, 2020, allows for more flexible use of the proceeds of a sale of surplus property.

In a recent ruling, a California Appellate Court determined that a taxpayer’s reverse validation action alleging conflicts of interest in lease-leaseback agreements became moot upon completion of the project.

On August 11, 2020, California's Fourth District Court of Appeal upheld the dismissal of Patricia Crawford (Crawford), a certificated guidance counselor for the Jurupa Unified School District (District), on the grounds that her comments on a colleague's Facebook post concerning students were immoral and demonstrated she was unfit for service.

In City & County of San Francisco v. All Persons Interested in the Matter of Proposition C (2020) 51 Cal.App.5th 703, California's First District Court of Appeal held that special taxes proposed by voter initiative require only a simple majority vote to pass, notwithstanding the provisions of Proposition 13 and Proposition 218, which would otherwise require a two-thirds approva

On May 7, 2020, California Governor Newsom signed Executive Order N-63-20 (EO N-63-20) as part of his broad response to COVID-19. EO N-63-20, among many things, extends multiple statutory and regulatory timelines.

On June 30, 2020, the United States Supreme Court held that Montana's exclusion of religious schools from a state scholarship program discriminated against religious schools and the families whose children attend or hope to attend them, and violated the Free Exercise Clause of the United States Constitution.

The California Attorney General, in a recent opinion, has concluded that members of legislative bodies may not receive health and welfare benefits not widely offered to the agencies' employees and officers and that mistakes made in determining benefit plans offered to legislative body members can yield serious consequences.

A recent court ruling reaffirms the expansiveness of administrative records required to be retained under the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA).