68120. (a) Notwithstanding any other law, no mandatory systemwide fees or tuition or mandatory campus-based fees of any kind shall be required or collected by the Regents of the University of California, the Board of Directors of the college named in Section 92200, the Trustees of the California State University, the Board of Governors of the California Community Colleges, or any campus of the University of California, the California State University, or the California Community Colleges from any surviving spouse or surviving child of a deceased person who met all of the following requirements:
(1) The deceased person was a resident of this state.
(2) The deceased person was employed by a public agency or was a contractor, or an employee of a contractor, performing services for a public agency, or was a firefighter employed by the federal government whose duty assignment involved the performance of firefighting services in this state.
(3) The deceased person’s principal duties consisted of active law enforcement service or active fire suppression and prevention. This section does not apply to a person whose principal duties were clerical, even if the person was subject to occasional call or was occasionally called upon to perform duties within the scope of active law enforcement or active fire suppression and prevention.
(4) The deceased person was killed in the performance of active law enforcement or active fire suppression and prevention duties, died as a result of an accident or an injury caused by external violence or physical force incurred in the performance of the person’s active law enforcement or active fire suppression and prevention duties, or died as a result of an industrial injury or illness arising out of and in the course of active law enforcement or fire suppression and prevention duties.
(b) Notwithstanding subdivision (a), a person who qualifies for the waiver of mandatory systemwide fees and tuition and mandatory campus-based fees under this section as a surviving child of a contractor, or of an employee of a contractor, who performed services for a public agency shall, in addition to the requirements set forth in subdivision (a), meet both of the following requirements:
(1) Enrollment as an undergraduate student at a campus of the University of California or the California State University or as a student at a community college campus.
(2) Documentation that the student’s annual income, including the value of any support received from a parent, does not exceed the maximum household income and asset level for an applicant for a Cal Grant B award, as set forth in Section 69432.7.
(c) As used in this section:
(1) “Contractor” or “employee of a contractor” does not include a security guard or security officer, as defined in Section 7582.1 of the Business and Professions Code.
(2) “Public agency” means the state or any city, county, city and county, district, or other local authority or public body of or within the state.
(3) “Spouse” has the same meaning as defined in Section 22171.
(4) “Surviving child” means either of the following:
(A) A surviving natural or adopted child of the deceased person.
(B) A surviving stepchild who meets both of the following requirements:
(i) The stepchild was living or domiciled with the deceased person at the time of the deceased person’s death.
(ii) The stepchild was claimed on the tax form most recently filed by the deceased person before that person’s death, or the stepchild received 50 percent or more of the stepchild’s support from that deceased person in the tax year immediately preceding the death of the deceased person, or both.
(Amended by Stats. 2022, Ch. 478, Sec. 15. (AB 1936) Effective January 1, 2023.)