Existing law prescribes various protections for employees and generally charges the Labor Commissioner with the enforcement of labor laws. Existing law establishes the powers and responsibilities of the Division of Occupational Safety and Health and the Division of Labor Standards and Enforcement, which are within the Department of Industrial Relations. This bill would enact the Fast Food Accountability and Standards Recovery Act or FAST Recovery Act. The bill would establish, until January 1, 2029, the Fast Food Council (council) within the Department of Industrial Relations, to be composed of 10 members to be appointed by the Governor, the Speaker of the Assembly, and the Senate Rules Committee, and would prescribe its powers. The purpose of the council would be to establish sectorwide minimum standards on wages, working hours, and other working conditions related to the health, safety, and welfare of, and supplying the necessary cost of proper living to, fast food restaurant workers, as well as effecting interagency coordination and prompt agency responses in this regard. The bill would define the characteristics of a fast food restaurant, including that the establishment be part of a set of fast food restaurants consisting of 100 or more establishments nationally that share a common brand, or that are characterized by standardized options for decor, marketing, packaging, products, and services. This bill would require the council to promulgate minimum fast food restaurant employment standards, including standards on wages, working conditions, and training, and to issue, amend, and repeal any other rules and regulations, as necessary to carry out its duties, subject to a petition signed by 10,000 fast food restaurant employees approving the creation of the council, as specified. Under the bill, if a conflict exists between council's standards, rules, or regulations and those issued by another state agency, the standards, rules, or regulations issued by the council would apply to fast food restaurant workers and fast food restaurant franchisees and franchisors, and the conflicting rules or regulations of the other state agency would not have force or effect with respect to these parties. The bill would except from this application proposed standards within the jurisdiction of the Occupational Safety and Health Standards Board and would prescribe a process for the council to petition the board to adopt, amend, or repeal a standard. This bill would require the council to submit a report to the Legislature, as specified, for a standard, or repeal or amendment of a standard, to become effective, and would specify that a standard, repeal, or amendment shall not take effect before October 15 of the same year. The bill would also require the council to provide information as requested by the appropriate committees of the Legislature on labor to facilitate a review of the council's performance and standards, as specified. This bill would require the council to conduct a full review of the adequacy of minimum fast food restaurant health, safety, and employment standards at least once every 3 years. The bill would require the council, following that review, to issue, amend, or repeal, or make recommendations to issue, amend, or repeal, any fast food employment, health or safety standard applicable to fast food restaurants, as appropriate. The bill would require the council to hold meetings or hearings no less than every 6 months that would be open to the public, as specified, and would authorize the council to coordinate with and authorize local agencies to hold such meetings. The bill would authorize a county, or a city with a population greater than 200,000, to establish a Local Fast Food Council, and would prescribe its powers and requirements for its composition. The bill would authorize a Local Fast Food Council to provide recommendations to the council. This bill would require standards for minimum wages, maximum hours of work, and other working conditions fixed by the council to be the minimum standards for fast food restaurant employees, absent a valid collective bargaining agreement, as specified, and would require that they be enforced by the commissioner, as specified, and the Division of Labor Standards Enforcement. By expanding the application of crimes associated with those enforcement procedures, this bill would impose a state-mandated local program. The bill would require the Labor Commissioner and the commissioner's deputies to take assignments of violations of standards issued by the council upon the filing of a claim in writing by an employee or an employee's authorized representative. This bill would prohibit a fast food restaurant operator from discharging or in any manner discriminating or retaliating against any fast food restaurant employee for specified reasons and would create a cause of action and right to reinstatement for employees in this connection, as well as a presumption of unlawful discrimination and retaliation in certain circumstances. The California Constitution requires the state to reimburse local agencies and school districts for certain costs mandated by the state. Statutory provisions establish procedures for making that reimbursement. This bill would provide that no reimbursement is required by this act for a specified reason.
Sponsored bills
The California Global Warming Solutions Act of 2006 requires the State Air Resources Board to adopt regulations to require the reporting and verification of statewide greenhouse gas emissions and to monitor and enforce compliance with the act. The act requires the state board to make available, and update at least annually, on its internet website the emissions of greenhouse gases, criteria pollutants, and toxic air contaminants for each facility that reports to the state board, as provided. This bill would require the state board, on or before January 1, 2024, to develop and adopt regulations requiring United States partnerships, corporations, limited liability companies, and other business entities with total annual revenues in excess of $1,000,000,000 and that do business in California, defined as "reporting entities," to publicly disclose to the emissions registry, as defined, and verify, starting in 2025 on a date to be determined by the state board, and annually thereafter, their greenhouse gas emissions, categorized as scope 1, 2, and 3 emissions, as defined, from the prior calendar year, as provided. The bill would require the state board, on or before January 1, 2029, to review, and update as necessary, these deadlines to evaluate trends in scope 3 emissions reporting and to consider changes to the deadlines, as provided. The bill would require reporting entities to disclose their greenhouse gas emissions in a manner that is easily understandable and accessible to residents of the state. The bill would require reporting entities to ensure that their public disclosures have been independently verified by the emissions registry or a third-party auditor, approved by the state board, with expertise in greenhouse gas emissions accounting. The bill would require the state board, in developing these regulations, to consult with the Attorney General, other government stakeholders, stakeholders representing consumer and environmental justice interests, and reporting entities that have demonstrated leadership in full-scope greenhouse gas emissions accounting and public disclosure and greenhouse gas emissions reductions. The bill would also require the state board to establish auditor qualifications and a process for approval of auditors that ensures sufficient auditor capacity, as well as timely reporting implementation, as required. The bill would further require the state board to contract with an emissions registry to develop a reporting and registry program to receive and make publicly available the required disclosures. This bill would require the state board, on or before July 1, 2026, to contract with the University of California, the California State University, a national laboratory, or another equivalent academic institution to prepare a report on the public disclosures made by reporting entities to the emissions registry. The bill would require, in preparing the report, consideration to be given to, at a minimum, greenhouse emissions from reporting entities in the context of state greenhouse gas emissions reduction and climate goals. The bill would require the state board to provide the report to the emissions registry to post on a digital platform that would be required to be created by the emissions registry, and publicly accessible, to house the state board's report and the reporting entities' public disclosures. The bill would require the emissions registry to provide the state board's report to the relevant policy committees of the Legislature. This bill would authorize the Attorney General to bring a civil action against a reporting entity, in the name of the people of the State of California, seeking civil penalties for violations of these provisions. This bill would make implementation of these provisions contingent upon an appropriation by the Legislature in the annual Budget Act or another statute for its purposes.
The California Global Warming Solutions Act of 2006 designates the State Air Resources Board as the state agency charged with monitoring and regulating sources of emissions of greenhouse gases. Under the act, the state board is required to approve a statewide greenhouse gas emissions limit equivalent to the statewide greenhouse gas emissions level in 1990 to be achieved by 2020 and to ensure that statewide greenhouse gas emissions are reduced to at least 40% below the 1990 level by no later than December 31, 2030. Under the act, a violation of a rule, regulation, order, emission limitation, emission reduction measure, or other measure adopted by the state board under the act is a crime. This bill instead would require the state board to ensure that statewide greenhouse gas emissions are reduced to at least 55% below the 1990 level by no later than December 31, 2030. By expanding the scope of a crime, this bill would impose a state-mandated local program. The California Constitution requires the state to reimburse local agencies and school districts for certain costs mandated by the state. Statutory provisions establish procedures for making that reimbursement. This bill would provide that no reimbursement is required by this act for a specified reason.
The California Global Warming Solutions Act of 2006 designates the State Air Resources Board as the state agency charged with monitoring and regulating sources of emissions of greenhouse gases. The state board is required to approve a statewide greenhouse gas emissions limit equivalent to the statewide greenhouse gas emissions level in 1990 to be achieved by 2020 and to ensure that statewide greenhouse gas emissions are reduced to at least 40% below the 1990 level by 2030. The act requires the state board to prepare and approve a scoping plan for achieving the maximum technologically feasible and cost-effective reductions in greenhouse gas emissions and to update the scoping plan at least once every 5 years. This bill, the California Climate Crisis Act, would declare the policy of the state both to achieve net zero greenhouse gas emissions as soon as possible, but no later than 2045, and achieve and maintain net negative greenhouse gas emissions thereafter, and to ensure that by 2045, statewide anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions are reduced to at least 90% below the 1990 levels. The bill would require the state board to work with relevant state agencies to ensure that updates to the scoping plan identify and recommend measures to achieve these policy goals and to identify a variety of policies and strategies that support carbon dioxide removal solutions, carbon capture and storage technologies, and nature-based climate solutions in California, as specified. The bill would require the state board to work with relevant agencies to establish criteria for the use of carbon dioxide removal technologies and carbon capture and storage technologies for purposes of achieving these policy goals. The bill would require the state board to identify interim 5-year greenhouse gas emission reduction goals that begin on January 1, 2025, and submit an annual report, as specified. The bill would impose other requirements on state agencies, as specified.
Existing law establishes the Department of Housing and Community Development in the Business, Consumer Services, and Housing Agency and makes the department responsible for administering various housing programs throughout the state, including, among others, the Multifamily Housing Program, the Housing for a Healthy California Program, and the California Emergency Solutions Grants Program. Upon appropriation by the Legislature for this express purpose, this bill would require the department to create the Reentry Housing and Workforce Development Program, and would require the department to take specified actions to provide grants to applicants, as defined, for innovative or evidence-based housing, housing-based services, and employment interventions to allow people with recent histories of incarceration to exit homelessness and remain stably housed. The bill would require the department to establish a process, in collaboration with the Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation and with counties in which recipients are operating, for referral of participants, in accordance with certain guidelines and procedures. The bill would require the department to score applicants to the program competitively according to specified criteria. The bill would require recipients of funds from the program to use those funds for, among other things, long-term rental assistance in permanent housing, incentives to landlords, and innovative or evidence-based services to assist participants in accessing permanent supportive housing. The bill would require the department to distribute funds allocated by executing contracts with awarded entities for a term of 5 years, subject to automatic renewal. The bill would require a recipient of the program to submit an annual report to the department. The bill would require the department to hire an independent evaluator to assess outcomes from the program and would require the department to submit the analysis of that assessment to specified committees of the Legislature.
Existing law, the Sustainable Groundwater Management Act, requires all groundwater basins designated as high- or medium-priority basins by the Department of Water Resources that are designated as basins subject to critical conditions of overdraft to be managed under a groundwater sustainability plan or coordinated groundwater sustainability plans by January 31, 2020, and requires all other groundwater basins designated as high- or medium-priority basins to be managed under a groundwater sustainability plan or coordinated groundwater sustainability plans by January 31, 2022, except as specified. Existing law authorizes any local agency or combination of local agencies overlying a groundwater basin to decide to become a groundwater sustainability agency for that basin and imposes specified duties upon that agency or combination of agencies, as provided. Existing law authorizes a groundwater sustainability agency to request of the county, and requires a county to consider, that the county forward permit requests for the construction of new groundwater wells, the enlarging of existing groundwater wells, and the reactivation of abandoned groundwater wells to the agency before permit approval. Existing law also authorizes the State Water Resources Control Board to designate a high- or medium-priority basin as a probationary basin under certain conditions for specified purposes. Existing law requires the State Water Resources Control Board to adopt a model water well, cathodic protection well, and monitoring well drilling and abandonment ordinance implementing certain standards for water well construction, maintenance, and abandonment and requires each county, city, or water agency, where appropriate, not later than January 15, 1990, to adopt a water well, cathodic protection well, and monitoring well drilling and abandonment ordinance that meets or exceeds certain standards. Under existing law, if a county, city, or water agency, where appropriate, fails to adopt an ordinance establishing water well, cathodic protection well, and monitoring well drilling and abandonment standards, the model ordinance adopted by the state board is required to take effect on February 15, 1990, and is required to be enforced by the county or city and have the same force and effect as if adopted as a county or city ordinance. This bill would instead require a county to forward permit requests for the construction of new groundwater wells, the enlarging of existing groundwater wells, and the reactivation of abandoned groundwater wells to the groundwater sustainability agency before permit approval. The bill would prohibit a county, city, or any other water well permitting agency from approving a permit for a new groundwater well or for an alteration to an existing well in a basin subject to the act and classified as medium- or high-priority unless specified conditions are met, including that it obtains a written verification, from the groundwater sustainability agency that manages the basin or area of the basin where the well is proposed to be located, determining that, among other things, the extraction by the proposed well is consistent with any sustainable groundwater management program established in any applicable groundwater sustainability plan adopted by that groundwater sustainability agency or an alternate plan approved or under review by the Department of Water Resources. The bill would also require, as condition of approving a permit for a new groundwater well or for an alteration to an existing well in an above-described basin, a county, city, or any other water well permitting agency to, among other things, post the well permit application on its internet website for at least 30 days before approving a permit for a new groundwater well or for an alteration to an existing well. By imposing additional requirements on county, city, or any other water well permitting agency, the bill would impose a state-mandated local program. This bill would provide various exemptions from the above-described provisions, including exempting a permit for any well that provides less than 2 acre-feet of water annually for domestic use or any well used by a public water supply system or state small water system. The California Constitution requires the state to reimburse local agencies and school districts for certain costs mandated by the state. Statutory provisions establish procedures for making that reimbursement. This bill would provide that no reimbursement is required by this act for a specified reason.
The Personal Income Tax Law authorizes various credits against the taxes imposed by that law, including a credit for qualified renters in the amount of $120 for spouses filing joint returns, heads of household, and surviving spouses if adjusted gross income is $50,000, as adjusted, or less, and in the amount of $60 for other individuals if adjusted gross income is $25,000, as adjusted, or less. This bill would require the Franchise Tax Board to prepare a written report by April 1, 2023, on the number of taxpayers claiming the credit, and the average credit amount on returns claiming the credit.
Existing law prohibits settlement agreements from containing provisions that prevent the disclosure of factual information related to specified claims or causes of action, such as information relating to an act of sexual harassment or an act that may be prosecuted as a felony sex offense. This bill would prohibit a provision within an agreement between the parties in an action the factual foundation for which establishes a cause of action for civil damages regarding a defective product or environmental hazard that poses a danger to public health or safety, as defined, that purports to restrict the disclosure of factual information related to the action. The bill would provide that those provisions are void as a matter of law and as against public policy and unenforceable, except as specified. The bill would provide that the disclosure of discoverable factual information relating to those actions must not be restricted by stipulation or by order of a court or arbitral tribunal, except for specified categories of information such as medical information, personal identifying information, the amount of the settlement, current proprietary customer lists, trade secrets, or citizenship or immigration status. The bill would allow a person for whom it is reasonably foreseeable that the person would be affected by a provision, agreement, or order, to challenge the provision, agreement, or order, as specified. The bill would allow a party, including an intervenor that has become a party, or a person whose attendance in the action or production of documents or other tangible things is required by subpoena, subpoena duces tecum, or other means, to file a motion for nondisclosure under these provisions. The bill would require a party requiring attendance in the action or production of documents of a person who is not a party to the action to provide a notice of the availability of a motion for nondisclosure of a proprietary customer list or trade secret to the person who is not a party to the action. The bill would provide that an attorney's failure to comply with these provisions may be grounds for professional discipline.
Existing law requires a person who owns, leases, controls, operates, or maintains a building or structure in, upon, or adjoining a mountainous area, forest-covered lands, shrub-covered lands, grass-covered lands, or land that is covered with flammable material to maintain defensible space of 100 feet from each side. Existing law requires the Director of Forestry and Fire Protection to establish a statewide program to allow qualified entities, including counties and other political subdivisions of the state, to support and augment the Department of Forestry and Fire Protection in its defensible space and home hardening assessment and education efforts. Existing law requires the director to establish a common reporting platform that allows defensible space and home hardening assessment data, collected by the qualified entities, to be reported to the department. This bill would require any local governmental entity that is qualified to conduct these defensible space assessments in very high and high fire hazard severity zones, as specified, and that reports that information to the department, to report that information using the common reporting platform. The bill would require the department, on December 31, 2023, and annually thereafter, to report to the Legislature all defensible space data collected through the common reporting platform, as provided. Existing law requires the department to establish a local assistance grant program for fire prevention and home hardening education activities and provides that local agencies, among others, are eligible for these grants. This bill would require the department, when reviewing applications for the local assistance grant program, to give priority to any local governmental entity qualified to perform defensible space assessments in very high and high fire hazard severity zones, as specified, for using the common reporting platform to report that information.
The Personal Income Tax Law and the Corporation Tax Law allow various credits against the taxes imposed by those laws, including a motion picture credit for taxable years beginning on or after January 1, 2020, to be allocated by the California Film Commission on or after July 1, 2020, and before July 1, 2025, in an amount equal to 20% or 25% of qualified expenditures for the production of a qualified motion picture in this state, with additional credit amounts allowed, including for amounts equal to specified qualified expenditures and qualified wages relating to original photography outside the Los Angeles zone, as specified. Existing law limits the aggregate amount of credits that may be allocated to specified amounts per fiscal year, and sets forth allocation percentages for various productions under the motion picture credit. This bill, for credit allocations made on or after July 1, 2023, would revise the definition of qualified motion picture for purposes of the credit to require an applicant to provide a diversity workplan that includes goals that are broadly reflective of California's population, as specified, and would require the commission to approve or reject each diversity workplan, to the extent allowed by federal and state law. The bill would prohibit the commission from certifying the tax credit for an applicant required to provide a diversity workplan until the commission receives the applicant's final diversity report, and would authorize the commission to increase the applicant's credit percentage if the commission determines that the applicant has met or made a good faith effort to meet the diversity goals in its diversity workplan. This bill, if legislation relating to the 2023 Budget Act and making changes to the application criteria for the motion picture credit is enacted, would extend the period during which the commission allocates the above-described motion picture credits through July 1, 2030. The bill would also extend the application of the limit on the aggregate amount of credits that may be allocated through the 2029–30 fiscal year and would make conforming changes. Existing law also allows a credit for taxable years beginning on or after January 1, 2022, and before January 1, 2032, in an amount equal to 20% or 25%, or as modified, of qualified expenditures paid or incurred during the taxable year by a qualified motion picture produced in this state at a certified studio construction project. This bill would instead allow the credit for qualified expenditures paid or incurred by a qualified taxpayer in all taxable years during the production of a qualified motion picture produced in this state at a certified studio construction project. Existing law requires any bill authorizing a new tax expenditure to contain, among other things, specific goals, purposes, and objectives the tax expenditure will achieve, detailed performance indicators, and data collection requirements. This bill would provide findings to comply with the additional information requirement for any bill authorizing a new tax expenditure. This bill would include a change in state statute that would result in a taxpayer paying a higher tax within the meaning of Section 3 of Article XIIIA of the California Constitution, and thus would require for passage the approval of 2/3 of the membership of each house of the Legislature. This bill would take effect immediately as a tax levy.