California Legislature to Adjourn September 10

The California Legislature is in the final weeks of its current session before it adjourns on September 10. CLFP is actively engaged in opposing two high-priority bills that would adversely impact the food processing industry.

New Warehouse Requirements
AB 701 threatens warehouse employers with costly litigation by creating a duplicative and likely inconsistent regulation from Cal/OSHA regarding appropriate performance levels in warehouses. It also creates rebuttable presumption of retaliation that can be triggered multiple times which will interfere with legitimate discipline, as well as creating a new Private Attorneys General Act (PAGA) claim related to warehouse work speed.

Specifically, the bill establishes these standards in the Labor Code, which allows employees to file complaints under the Private Attorneys General Act of 2004 (PAGA). It authorizes current or former employees to bring an action for injunctive relief, limited to suspension of the quota and any adverse action resulting from its enforcement. The bill does not limit authority of the AG, district attorneys or city attorneys to prosecute upon their own complaint or those of employees or limit local ordinances that provide equal or greater protection to employees. 

New Aggressive Climate Change Goals
AB 1395 would create a brand-new climate target of reducing greenhouse gases 90% below 1990 levels by 2045. The state’s current target of 40% reduction below 1990 levels by 2030 was established by the Legislature in 2016 and regulations implementing that law just took effect in 2021. This is an extraordinarily aggressive goal that would require largescale transformation of California’s entire economy. This policy is the equivalent of eliminating California’s industrial, residential, commercial, transportation, electrical, and manufacturing sectors – effectively shutting down the entire state economy.

CLFP and other organizations opposed to AB 1395 have argued that any post-2030 target should not precede the work just getting started via the California Air Resources Board Scoping Plan that will begin to outline the additional steps necessary to meet our current emissions reductions targets and evaluate post-2030 reduction scenarios. This work will help inform the state’s progress on our current 2030 goals and outline some narrowly defined potential pathways to achieve the broader goal of carbon neutrality. This bill can wait for those results.

As members of the legislature know well, establishing and extending climate targets requires involved, complex and negotiated policymaking. Unfortunately, there have been nomeaningful conversations with stakeholders about extending either the date or the targets of the current SB 32 goal. Significant work must be done to assess and understand the impacts of this type of policy before the legislature votes.