Political Landscape:

A bill that would require California-based companies to certify that they do not “wrongfully hold” assets that belonged to victims of genocide advanced to the state Assembly’s Judiciary Committee on Tuesday.

AB 961, submitted by Assemblyman Paul Krekorian, would also prohibit companies from contracting with the state if they can’t prove their compliance. The so-called Justice for Genocide Victims bill unanimously passed the Business and Professions Committee on Tuesday during the main week of genocide remembrance events throughout the world.

Krekorian, in a statement released after the vote, cited a range of massacres — from the Armenian Genocide that started in 1915, to the ongoing conflict in Darfur — in calling for a continued legislative crackdown on “homicidal tyrannies.”

“This legislation will send an important message by ensuring that California will not do business with companies that have enriched themselves at the expense of genocide victims,” he said.

The bill is scheduled to go to the Judiciary Committee for review next week.

School district bill clears Senate hurdle

Legislation that would make permanent a 17-year-old law allowing parents to send their children to schools outside their home district unanimously passed the Senate on Monday.

The bill, jointly written by Sen. Bob Huff, whose district includes portions of La Crescenta, would make the District of Choice program permanent before it is scheduled to sunset on July 1. Under the current rules, parents can send their children to outside districts participating in the program without first getting permission from their home district.

Typically, families must receive permission to transfer their students to outside districts since federal and state funding allotments are based in large part on school attendance, but the current law was established to allow districts to participate in the transfer program if they chose.

Huff has pushed the law as “a tool that rewards schools doing a great job, and motivates other schools to do a better job with our limited education dollars.”

The Assembly Education Committee is due to take up the bill in coming weeks.

Dreier supports a Reagan statue in D.C.

The U.S. House of Representatives on Wednesday unanimously passed a resolution to bring a statue of former President Ronald Reagan to the nation’s capital this summer.