Our weekly California Legislature “hot list” provides you with a preview of the bills that are up (as well as other important legislative action) the following week.
Budget Deadline Looms Large
Midnight on June 15 is the constitutional deadline for the Legislature to pass a 2017-18 budget and send it to the Governor for his signature. There will be a flurry of activity this week as both chambers will hold lengthy floor sessions to pass the budget – as well as dozens of budget “trailer bills” – by the midnight deadline. Specific budget proposals and trailer bill language is still in flux, but see our previous post about some of the potential budget items of interest to California employers.
Senate Judiciary Committee – June 13, 2017 (Tuesday) – 1:30 p.m. – Room 112
AB 260 (Santiago) – Human Trafficking: Hotels and Motels – Requires hotels, motels, bed and breakfasts inns, and other similar lodging establishments (other than personal residences) to post an existing notice relating to slavery and human trafficking. This bill is similar to SB 225 (Stern), which has also been introduced this year. See our previous blog post about this bill.
AB 1556 (Stone) – Employment Discrimination – This bills amends provision of the Fair Employment and Housing Act (FEHA) and the California Family Rights Act to make them gender-neutral by deleting gender-specific personal pronouns. In addition, this bill amends provisions of FEHA related to pregnancy disability discrimination and leave to delete the terms “female person” and “female employee” and replace them with gender neutral terms. This bill is sponsored by Equality California, who states the following as rationale for the bill: “These changes ensure that transgender, nonbinary, and gender non-conforming people are reflected in these protections and know that they can rely on them to meet their health needs if they become pregnant or have related medical conditions during the course of their employment.”
Senate Education Committee – June 14, 2017 (Wednesday) – 9:00 a.m. – Room 4202
AB 500 (Gomez) – Employee Codes of Conduct – Requires a school that maintains a section on employee interactions with pupils in its employee code of conduct to provide a copy to parents and guardians of pupils and post in on the school’s website.
Senate Labor Committee – June 14, 2017 (Wednesday) – 9:30 a.m. – Room 2040
AB 168 (Eggman) – Salary History Information – Prohibits an employer from seeking salary history information about an applicant for employment. This bill also requires an employer, upon reasonable request, to provide the pay scale for a position to an applicant for employment. Previous legislative efforts in this regard have not been successful.
AB 1425 (Kalra) – Apprentices – Requires contractors to provide specified contract information to the apprenticeship committee for each applicable craft or trade in the area of the public works project within 10 days of the execution of a contact (or not later than the first day work begins). This bill also provides that a contractor or subcontractor that knowingly commits four or more apprenticeship violations in a three-year period shall be ineligible to bid on a public works contract for one year.
