The University of California Office of the President invites comments on proposed revisions to the Presidential Policy of Sexual Violence and Sexual Harassment. The proposed revisions are to: (i) comply with a new state law, Senate Bill (SB) 493, and (ii) better account for Prohibited Conduct in the clinical setting.

Senate Bill 493. UC must comply with SB 493 by January 1, 2022. The law was motivated largely by concerns, which UC shares, about potential adverse effects of the U.S. Department of Education's 2020 amendments to the federal Title IX regulations. UC policies and implementing frameworks already codify most of SB 493's requirements. Some other requirements are met in practice but not currently written in policy. Implementing revisions to the SVSH Policy are therefore limited.

Clinical Setting-Related Changes. The University  has dedicated significant effort and resources to the critical work of preventing, detecting and responding to Prohibited Conduct arising from the context of patient care. To further that work, certain proposed policy revisions are to better account for the clinical context. These revisions were reviewed last year by the President's Working Group on SVSH in the Clinical Setting.

For details and specifics about the policy revision, please see more information at the UCR Policies website and review the Systemwide Cover Letter for the revised SVSH Policy, the proposed revision to the SVSH Policy (Clean), and the proposed revision to the SVSH Policy (Redline). 

If you have any questions, please contact the UCR Policy Office at policy@ucr.edu. Please submit your comments to Suzanne Taylor, Systemwide Title IX Director at suzanne.taylor@ucop.edu no later than November 24, 2021.