CFFN members, representing the diversity of food & farming issues facing the state from hunger and nutrition to farmer livelihood and food chain worker protections, collectively identify policies important for the state’s food and farming system. Five value-aligned pieces of legislation were then chosen by our grassroots leader’s Steering Council as priority legislation for the whole Network to focus more deeply on.
We ask Legislators to consider these pieces of legislation to ensure California’s policies contribute to the creation of an inclusive, equitable, and ecologically regenerative food and farming system that has recognized and repaired injustices to Black, Indigenous and people of color (BIPOC) workers, producers and communities, and which generates healthy, affordable, accessible, nutritious and culturally appropriate food and other agricultural products.
2025 Priority Food + Farm Legislation
Agroecological Farming
AB 524 (Wilson) Farmland Access and Conservation for Thriving Communities Act
Creates the first statewide program in California dedicated to agricultural land security, administered by the Department of Conservation in consultation with the Agricultural Land Equity Task Force. The program provides technical assistance, infrastructure, and financial resources to purchase and secure land with long-term leases for land transfer to beginning & underserved farmers and Tribal communities. This bill is designed to capture $30 million in the Prop 4 Climate Bond directed towards this issue. (Sponsor: Community Alliance with Family Farmers; as a representative of the Land Equity Collective – a BIPOC-led collective focused on developing transformational systems-level policy solutions to ensure equitable access to CA agricultural land)
Healthy Food Access
SB 411 (Pérez) Stop Child Hunger Act
Addresses the gap in access to school meals by ensuring California maximizes federal SUN Bucks and streamlines both families’ access and schools’ administrative processes through the implementation of a single statewide web application. Includes a budget ask (TBD amount), to create the online statewide application. (Co-Sponsors: California Association of Food Banks, GRACE/End Child Poverty CA, Service Employees International Union (SEIU))
SB 225 – (McNerney) Summer Caregiver Meals
Ensures parents and caregivers can have a meal with their child when they visit a summer meal site by requiring the State Department of Education to reimburse summer meal program operators for caregiver meals. Includes a $6M budget ask to pilot this at summer meal sites located at public libraries. (Sponsors: California Association of Food Banks)
AB 1049 (Rodriguez) California Food Assistance Program – Sponsor Deeming
Removes sponsor deeming from the eligibility determination process for the California Food Assistance Program (CFAP), streamlining enrollment into food benefits and reducing chilling effect for sponsored immigrants as part of the Food4All campaign. (Co-Sponsors: Nourish CA and CA Immigrant Policy Center)
Farmworker and Food Chain Worker Advancement
AB 694 (McKinnor) Strengthening CA’s Health and Safety Enforcement Workforce
Requires CalOSHA to contract with UCLA and UCB to convene an Advisory Committee of experts and produce a report to make recommendations to increase and diversify CalOSHA’s enforcement positions through a workforce development pipeline program. This bill has an accompanying budget ask of $1.25 million. (Co-sponsors: California Farmworker Coalition, SoCalCOSH, CA Labor for Climate Jobs)
Regional Food Ecosystems
This year, the Regional Food Ecosystems Working Group is leading in identifying bills that strengthen regional food ecosystems. More information to come soon.
Support for Additional Food and Farming Bills
AB 79 (Arambula) Public Social Services: Higher Education
AB 446 (Ward) Surveillance Pricing Protection Act
AB 936 (Lee) CalFresh Fruit and Vegetable EBT Program
AB 937 (Connolly) Improvements to Organic Transition Program
AB 1211 (Sharp-Collins) CalFresh Benefit Maintenance
SB 279 (McNerney) Scaling up CA Composting
CFFN’s positions on legislation do not necessarily represent the positions of all of our members.
