(a) (1) Except as provided in Section 45125.01, the governing board of any school district shall require each person to be employed in a position not requiring certification qualifications, except a secondary school pupil employed in a temporary or part-time position by the governing board of the school district having jurisdiction over the school attended by the pupil, to have two fingerprint cards bearing the legible rolled and flat impressions of the person’s fingerprints together with a personal description of the applicant prepared by a local public law enforcement agency having jurisdiction in the area of the school district, which agency shall transmit the cards, together with the fee required by subdivision (f), to the Department of Justice; except that any district, or districts with a common board, may process the fingerprint cards if the district so elects.

(2) As used in this section, “local public law enforcement agency” includes any school district and as used in Section 45126 requires the Department of Justice to provide to any school district, upon application, information pertaining only to applicants for employment by the district, including applicants who are employees of another district.

(b) (1) Upon receiving the fingerprint cards, the Department of Justice shall ascertain whether the applicant has been arrested or convicted of any crime insofar as that fact can be ascertained from information available to the department and forward the information to the employing agency submitting the applicant’s fingerprints no more than 15 working days after receiving the fingerprint cards. The Department of Justice shall not forward records of criminal proceedings that did not result in a conviction but shall forward information on arrests pending adjudication.

(2) Upon implementation of an electronic fingerprinting system with terminals located statewide and managed by the Department of Justice, the Department of Justice shall ascertain the information required pursuant to this subdivision within three working days. If the Department of Justice cannot ascertain the information required pursuant to this subdivision within three working days, the department shall notify the school district that it cannot so ascertain the required information. This notification shall be delivered by telephone or electronic mail to the school district. If a school district is notified by the Department of Justice that it cannot ascertain the required information about a person, the school district may not employ that person until the Department of Justice ascertains that information.

(3) In the case of a person to be employed in a position not requiring certification qualifications who is described in subparagraph (A) or (B), the school district shall request the Department of Justice to forward one copy of the fingerprint cards to the Federal Bureau of Investigation for the purpose of obtaining any record of previous convictions of the applicant.

(A) The person has not resided in the State of California for at least one year immediately preceding the person’s application for employment.

(B) The person has resided for more than one year, but less than seven years, in the State of California and the Department of Justice has ascertained that the person was convicted of a sex offense where the victim was a minor or a drug offense where an element of the offense is either the distribution to, or the use of a controlled substance by, a minor.

(c) The governing board of a school district shall not employ a person until the Department of Justice completes its check of the state criminal history file as set forth in this section and Sections 45125.5 and 45126, except that this subdivision does not apply to secondary school pupils who are to be employed in a temporary or part-time position by the governing board of the school district having jurisdiction over the school they attend.

(d) The governing board of each district shall maintain a list indicating the number of current employees, except secondary school pupils employed in a temporary or part-time position by the governing board of the school district having jurisdiction over the school they attend, who have not completed the requirements of this section. The Department of Justice shall process these cards within 30 working days of their receipt and any cards in its possession on the date of the amendment of this section by Assembly Bill 1610 of the 1997–98 Regular Session within 30 working days of that date. School districts that have previously submitted identification cards for current employees to either the Department of Justice or the Federal Bureau of Investigation shall not be required to further implement the provisions of this section as it applies to those employees.

(e) A plea or verdict of guilty or a finding of guilt by a court in a trial without a jury or forfeiture of bail is deemed to be a conviction within the meaning of this section, irrespective of a subsequent order under the provisions of Section 1203.4 of the Penal Code allowing the withdrawal of the plea of guilty and entering of a plea of not guilty, or setting aside the verdict of guilty, or dismissing the accusations or information.

(f) (1) The school district shall provide the means whereby the fingerprint cards may be completed and may charge a fee determined by the Department of Justice to be sufficient to reimburse the department for the costs incurred in processing the application. The amount of the fee shall be forwarded to the Department of Justice with the required copies of applicant’s fingerprint cards. The governing board may collect a reasonable fee payable to the local public law enforcement agency taking the fingerprints and completing the data on the fingerprint cards. In no event shall the fee exceed the actual costs incurred by the agency.

(2) The additional fees shall be transmitted to the city or county treasury. If an applicant is subsequently hired by the board within 30 days of the application, the fee may be reimbursed to the applicant. Funds not reimbursed to applicants shall be credited to the general fund of the district. If the fingerprint cards forwarded to the Department of Justice are those of a person already in the employ of the governing board, the district shall pay the fee required by this section, which fee shall be a proper charge against the general fund of the district, and no fee shall be charged the employee.

(g) This section applies to substitute and temporary employees regardless of length of employment.

(h) Subdivision (c) of this section shall not apply to a person to be employed if a school district determines that an emergency or an exceptional situation exists, and that a delay in filling the position in which the person would be employed would endanger pupil health or safety.

(i) Where reasonable access to the statewide, electronic fingerprinting network is available, the Department of Justice may mandate electronic submission of the fingerprints and related information required by this section.

(j) A school district shall request subsequent arrest service from the Department of Justice as provided under Section 11105.2 of the Penal Code.

(k) All information obtained from the Department of Justice is confidential. Each agency handling Department of Justice information shall ensure the following:

(1) No recipient may disclose its contents or provide copies of information.

(2) Information received shall be stored in a locked file separate from other files, and shall only be accessible to the custodian of records.

(3) Information received shall be destroyed upon the hiring determination in accordance with subdivision (a) of Section 708 of Title 11 of the California Code of Regulations.

(4) Compliance with destruction, storage, dissemination, auditing, backgrounding, and training requirements as set forth in Sections 700 through 708, inclusive, of Title 11 of the California Code of Regulations and Section 11077 of the Penal Code governing the use and security of criminal offender record information is the responsibility of the entity receiving the information from the Department of Justice.

(l) Notwithstanding any other provision of law, the Department of Justice shall process pursuant to this section all requests from a school district, an employer, or a human resource agency for criminal history information on a volunteer to be used in a school.

(Amended by Stats. 1999, Ch. 78, Sec. 31. Effective July 7, 1999.)