Legislation
We work on bills that affect the communities our members come from. One of them is now law in California, and a second one is being written.
SB 338: mobile health hubs for farmworkers
SB 338 sets up a state program to bring health care to farmworkers where they work, in vehicles fitted out for video visits with a doctor. The Governor signed it on 3 October 2025.
The law is called the Virtual Health Hub for Rural Communities Pilot Program, and it is now Chapter 311, Statutes of 2025. Senator Josh Becker, who represents California’s 13th Senate District, is its author, and Senator Rubio is a coauthor.
The law tells the State Department of Public Health to award grants to partnerships of two separate community-based organizations to build and run virtual health hubs. A virtual health hub is “a vehicle or portable facility that is equipped with, at a minimum, computers, Wi-Fi, cubicles for virtual visits, and exam rooms for telemedicine.” The idea is to bring health care, mental health services and education to farmworkers in rural places where a clinic is far away and a day off work is expensive.
The department picks the two rural communities that get a hub, “based on farmworker population and access to health care.” The statute does not fix a town or a county. It also sets conditions before any of this can start: no General Fund money is used, the Virtual Health Hub Fund reaches the balance the law requires, and the department posts a notice. If the fund has not reached that balance by 31 December 2030, the program ends.
Every recorded vote on the bill was unanimous. The Senate passed it 38 to 0 on 29 May 2025, the Assembly 80 to 0 on 9 September, and the Senate agreed to the Assembly’s amendments 40 to 0 the next day. The text itself was final on 3 July 2025.
Where the idea came from
Senator Becker runs a “There Ought to Be a Law” competition in his district every year, and residents send in ideas for bills. On 11 March 2025 his office announced that the 2025 winner was Aisha Baro, executive director of Life Science Cares Bay Area, and that “her winning bill idea has been introduced as SB 338.”
Ms. Baro said in that announcement that she was inspired by the Farmworker Health Equity Express in her home community of Half Moon Bay, and thought the program should be expanded statewide to help rural communities. She is listed on our Board of Advisors.
The service it is modeled on
The bill says what it is copying. Its findings name the Farmworker Health Equity Express Bus program, which launched in 2022 and visits farms in and around Half Moon Bay, and say the Legislature intends to model the pilot on it. The bus came out of a partnership between Ayudando Latinos A Soñar (ALAS) and Life Science Cares Bay Area, with grants and donations from the Gilead Foundation, Genentech and AbbVie. The findings also cite a San Mateo County Health survey in which farmworkers gave lack of transportation, and fear that taking time off work would cost them their jobs, as common reasons for not getting care.
The Office of Senator Josh Becker described the service in its announcement of 11 March 2025: “This program serves approximately 120 people per week by rotating among farms in the afternoons and evenings when workers are most available.” Read the announcement.
The Farmworker Health Equity Express is run by ALAS in partnership with Life Science Cares Bay Area. Our members have spent a day on it at a mushroom farm near Half Moon Bay and held a fundraiser for a new bus in December 2025, and you can read about both on our events page.
What our founder did
Our founder, David Liu, began an internship in the Office of State Senator Josh Becker in September 2025, while the bill was in its final stage. His work there was research and advocacy support through the bill’s last stage: the Assembly floor vote, the Senate’s agreement to the Assembly amendments, and the wait for a signature.
A bill that has passed both houses is not law until the Governor signs it. He wrote to the Governor asking him to sign it, and made the case for it to people in the district. That is a part of lawmaking a high school student can take part in, and it is the part we teach our chapters to do.
The work now is implementation. The program starts only once the funding conditions in the law are met and the department posts its notice. We are following that, and making the case that a service like the one in Half Moon Bay should reach the farms further south, Salinas among them.
A second bill
Our founder is the sole author of a second bill, on tax credits and state support for small businesses owned by neurodiverse adults. He is working it through with Senator Becker’s staff and with Legislative Counsel, the office that puts a proposal into legal language.
It has not been introduced and has no bill number yet, and it will not get one while the legislature is out of session. When it has a number, we will post it here with a link to the text.
Read the law
Here are the originals.
- SB 338 as chaptered, Health and Safety Code Division 118.5, the text the Governor signed.
- The bill’s history, with every amendment, committee vote and floor vote.
- The announcement of the 2025 There Ought to Be a Law winner, Office of Senator Josh Becker, 11 March 2025.
- The office of Senator Josh Becker, who authored the bill.
- Ayudando Latinos A Soñar (ALAS) at alasdreams.com, which runs the Farmworker Health Equity Express.