A Big Week for California Assembly Bills Addressing End-of-Life Issues

This past week I was on San Francisco’s Fox TV strongly offering my view on Bill AB 691 (SevenPonds Founder Suzette Sherman)

It’s been a big week for end-of-life legislative action in the state of California. Given the state’s size, hence importance, many eyes watch as two assembly bills currently work their way through the process.

Will Governor Jerry Brown sign the aid-in-dying bill?
(Credit:enoghproject.org)

The first is the aid-in-dying bill. This past week, after a heated debate among Democrats and Republicans, the aid-in-dying bill is finally headed to the California Governor’s desk. This was not the first time the bill was up for a California vote, but the first time it arrives at Jerry Brown’s desk.

Now all eyes wait to see if he will sign the bill. If so, California will be the 5^th state to legalize what was formerly called physician-assisted suicide but is now termed “aid in dying.” The word “suicide” was eliminated since it is not appropriate to the process. Should Jerry Brown sign the bill (TBD) California will join in along with four other states: Oregon, Washington, Vermont and Montana, where aid-in-dying is now legalized.

Second is the California AB 691, an assembly bill that will be voted on at the end of this week. This is the first bill proposed in California that addresses digital assets. A according to The Digital Beyond a few other states have already enacted laws relating to digital assets. What are digital assets? They are emails, photos, financials or any digital information you place or enter on a website. The bill will allow any tech company to keep this information if you have not set up provisions ahead of time. The law will dictate that you must provide legal consent to any person(s) you wish to have your digital assets either through the website (providing the website has a section allowing you to do so) or through your estate planning. Otherwise the tech company will legally own anything you have placed on their site.

Tech lobby groups have formed
(Credit: silicon angle.com)

The bill will make all of this information private. According to the San Jose Mercury News, it is backed by Facebook, Yahoo, AOL and also supported by a lobby group that represents Microsoft, Google and Apple. The bottom line is these companies are tired of family members coming to them to obtain the digital assets of someone who died.

As I recently reported on Fox TV, this bill is set up in the interest of the tech companies. They can easily set up legal provisions on their websites. For those users who are signing up on a new site for the first time, the tech companies can provide a fill-out section to a user. This gives consent to an heir(s) or for those who have an existing account to program-in prompt boxes, forcing users to immediately make a legal decision to further use the account. Sites typically force subscribers to sign an “agreement form,” so including a consent line item naming those you wish to allow access (or to not allow) to your digital assets after your death is easy.

Currently both Facebook and Google do allow you to set up which heirs will have access to your digital assets, but the rub is you must be proactive in setting it up. Once you are dead, it’s too late. Most people do not act on making the necessary provisions before their death.