AMENDED IN ASSEMBLY APRIL 16, 2026

AMENDED IN ASSEMBLY MARCH 19, 2026

CALIFORNIA LEGISLATURE— 2025–2026 REGULAR SESSION

97

Introduced by Assembly Member Caloza

February 20, 2026

An act to add Section 9603 to the Unemployment Insurance Code, relating to employment.

Vote: majority   Appropriation: no   Fiscal committee: yes   Local program: no

LEGISLATIVE COUNSEL’S DIGEST

Existing law requires the Employment Development Department, among other duties, to establish, in conjunction with other state entities, a systemwide policy of actively promoting the training of women in nontraditional occupations. Existing law defines “nontraditional occupations” as any job classification in which not more than 25% of the employees are women, according to the statistics of the United States Department of Labor.

This bill would require the department to collect specified data on women in the construction industry, construction workers, including, among other data, the training and educational capacity to produce trained, certified, and licensed women in construction. construction workers. This bill would also require the department to work with the Department of Industrial Relations’ Division of Apprenticeship Standards to determine this capacity within state-registered construction preapprenticeship and apprenticeship programs and to determine the number of construction preapprentices and apprentices in any given year who are women. The bill would require the department, on or before July 1, 2027, and every 3 years thereafter, to report this data to the Legislature and post the report on its internet website.

The people of the State of California do enact as follows:

SECTION 1.

Section 9603 is added to the Unemployment Insurance Code, to read:

9603.

(a) The department shall collect all of the following data:

(1) The current supply of women in construction, construction workers who are women, by specialty.

(2) The geographical distribution of women as construction workers, workers who are women, by specialty.

(3) The diversity of women in construction, construction workers who are women, by specialty, including, but not limited to, data on race, ethnicity, and languages spoken.

(4) The current and forecasted demand for women in construction, construction workers, by specialty.

(5) The training and educational capacity to produce trained, certified, and licensed women in construction, construction workers, by specialty and geographical distribution, including, but not limited to, the number of educational slots, state-registered preapprenticeship and apprenticeship slots, the number of enrollments, the attrition rate, and wait time to enter a program of study. program. The department shall work with the Department of Industrial Relations’ Division of Apprenticeship Standards to determine this capacity within state-registered construction preapprenticeship and apprenticeship programs as well as to determine the number of construction preapprentices and apprentices in any given year who are women.

(b) On or before July 1, 2027, and every three years thereafter, the department shall transmit a report of the data collected pursuant to this section to the Legislature. The department shall transmit the report in compliance with Section 9795 of the Government Code.

(c) The department shall post a report transmitted pursuant to subdivision (b) on its internet website.