[Source: Orange County Register] There’s growing recognition among California’s small businesses, nonprofits, and legislators that the state’s Private Attorneys General Act (PAGA), which deputizes employees and trial lawyers to enforce state labor law, must be reformed to curtail widespread abusive lawsuits. Over the last 15 years, more than 35,000 PAGA notices have been sent to Read More…
Category: California News
Coronavirus support available for workers, employers
[Source: CalChamber] On Thursday, March 5, California’s Employment Development Department (EDD) clarified employer and employee coverage related to the coronavirus disease 2019, also known as COVID-19. The additional support comes one day after Governor Gavin Newsom declared a state of emergency as part of California’s response to the coronavirus. Covered employees who’ve been exposed to Read More…
Proposition 13 would spend $15 billion on California schools
[Source: Associated Press] Lake Elementary School, just a half-hour drive northeast of San Francisco, is a relic from 1957. Much of the school’s scuffed flooring is old linoleum that contains asbestos, as does the insulation around the school’s hulking old steel furnace where grey duct tape is wrapped around rusting pipes. “The heating system is Read More…
Why Texans don‘t want any more Californians
[Source: The Atlantic] Across a frightened nation divided by politics and culture, a fragile harmony is ascendant, as Americans in small towns and large cities alike cry out in trembling unison: Hey, where did all these Californians come from? Talk of a “California Exodus” is sweeping the country—and so are anxieties about its effects on Read More…
Ready or not here it comes—State groundwater regulation
[Source: CalChamber] January 31, 2020 marks the first time in California’s history that groundwater will be regulated. Twenty-one critically over-drafted groundwater basins must submit detailed plans showing how they will reach sustainability by 2040. The plans must include ways to monitor groundwater on a day-to-day basis, short-term, seasonal, and year long. Sustainability generally means eliminating Read More…
Solar power required for all new California homes starting Jan. 1
[Source: The Mercury News] Landmark building rules will be first-in-the nation solar requirement. California already generates more electricity from solar power than any other state. But now a dramatic expansion is about to begin as new building codes take effect Jan. 1 requiring all newly constructed homes statewide to be powered by the sun. The Read More…
California weighs controversial rule to tackle truck tailpipe pollution
[Source: CalMatters] California’s clean air enforcers want major truck manufacturers to sell zero-emission vehicles in the state — but the agency’s proposal faces criticism from environmentalists and truck makers alike. Noemí Bueno’s daughter was barely 14 months old when she started struggling to breathe. Bueno, a San Bernardino resident who works as a crossing guard Read More…
The false premises and promises of the push for split roll
[Source: Orange County Register/Carolyn Cavecche] I guess desperate times call for desperate measures. But I am keeping my fingers crossed that California voters, already living in the highest taxed state in the nation, will see through the political antics of the desperate. In 2018, some of California’s largest labor organizations and civil rights groups filed Read More…
Small businesses and communities rely on Prop. 13
[Source: Orange County Register/John Kabateck] A study by the National Federation of Independent Business (NFIB) found only 22 percent of U.S. small-business owners own the property on which they operate. The majority lease or rent their property. Furthermore, many small-business owners have what is called a triple net lease, which means in addition to the Read More…