ABC OF CALIF PRIORITY BILL LIST 

ABC of California is the statewide organization for the five
ABC chapters in California.

Priority Bill Status List As Of 

MAY 26, 2011

 

BILL/AUTHOR

SUBJECT

Position

DESCRIPTION

STATUS

AB 20 (Halderman)

Construction Defects

SUPPORT

AB 20 ensures that homeowners get all facts before entering into a construction defect lawsuit against their homebuilder.

Assembly Judiciary

3/15/2011

FAILED PASSAGE

AB 21 (Nestande)

State Budget Reform

SUPPORT

AB 21 prohibits a governor from including in the budget proposal estimates of revenues that would be generated from laws not then in effect

Assembly Budget

NO DATE SET FOR HEARING

AB 83 (Jeffries)

CEQA Exemptions: Recycled Water

SUPPORT

ABC California supports AB 83 that will reduce lawsuits by providing a common sense exemption from CEQA for the replacement of recycled water lines under existing streets, highways or right of ways.

Assembly Natural Resources

FAILED PASSAGE

4/11/2011

AB 127 (Logue)

Regulatory Reform

SUPPORT

AB 127 conforms the effective dates of state issued regulations to the effective date of new statutes – i.e., January 1 of the year following adoption.

Assembly Business and Professions

2 YEAR BILL

AB 197 (Monning)

New Liquidated Damage Liability: Minimum Wage Claims

OPPOSE

ABC California is working with large employer coalition to oppose AB 197 that seeks to impose unreasonable new liability for liquidated damages in wage claims.

Senate Labor & Industrial Relations

NO DATE SET FOR HEARING

AB 206 (Harkey)

CEQA Reform: Fireworks Displays

SUPPORT

ABC California believes that AB 206 will reduce CEQA based lawsuits by providing a common sense exemption for municipal fireworks display from the California Coastal Act and CEQA.

Assembly Natural Resources

FAILED PASSAGE

4/25/2011

AB 273 (Valadao)

Regulatory Reform

SUPPORT

ABC California believes AB 273 will help reduce the regulatory burden on business by strengthening the requirements for assessing the true economic impact of proposed regulations.

Assembly Appropriations

SUSPENSE

Suspense Hearing: 5/27/2011

AB 311 (Cook)

Consultation Unit: Labor Commissioner

SPONSOR

SUPPORT

ABC California-sponsored AB 311 establishes a needed employer consultation unit in the state Labor Commissioner’s office to aid employer compliance with complex state wage and hour laws.

Assembly Labor & Employment

2 YEAR BILL

AB 314 (Gorell)

Court Facilities: Construction

SUPPORT

ABC of California supports AB 314 that requires that contracts pertaining to the acquisition and construction of the court facilities to be subject to the competitive bidding provisions of the Public Contract Code.

Assembly Business & Professions

2 YEAR BILL

AB 356 (Hill)

Public Works: Local Hire Policies

SUPPORT

AB 356 which would exempt any public works project that is funded, in whole or in part, entirely or partially funded with state funds from a policy imposed by a local agency that mandates that any portion or percentage of project work hours be performed by local resident.

Assembly Floor

THIRD READING

5/26/2011

AB 400 (Ma)

Mandated Sick Leave

OPPOSE

ABC California opposes AB 400 that unreasonably expands all public and private sector employer costs and liability through a new paid sick leave mandate covering all employees regardless of full or part-time or seasonal employment status

Assembly Appropriations

SUSPENSE

SUSPENSE HEARING: 5/27/2011

AB 425 (Nestande)

Regulatory Reform

SUPPORT

ABC California supports AB 425 that requires state agencies to review their regulations and repeal or report to the Legislature those regulations identified as duplicative, archaic, or inconsistent with statute or other regulations or inhibit economic growth in the state. ABC California is signatory on the business coalition support letter.

Assembly Appropriations

SUSPENSE

SUSPENSE HEARING: 5/27/2011

AB 429 (Knight)

Regulatory Reform

SUPPORT

ABC California supports AB 429, - a part of the business regulatory reform coalition bill package. AB 429 requires an agency, for any regulation that it has identified as having a gross cost of $15 million or more, an increased cost of 5% or more over the cost of an existing regulation, or both, to submit the rule making record for that regulation to the Legislature when submitting the regulation to for approval.

Assembly Business & Professions

FAILED PASSAGE

3/31/2011

AB 436 (Solorio)

New Prevailing Wage Mandate: Renewable Energy Projects for Schools

OPPOSE

ABC California believes AB 436 is an unreasonable new prevailing wage mandate on private works of improvement that significantly increases costs of building or maintaining renewable energy generation capacity and make renewable energy projects less affordable for schools and the taxpayer.

Assembly Appropriations

SUSPENSE

SUSPENSE HEARING: 5/27/2011

AB 530 (Smyth)

Regulatory Reform

SUPPORT

This bill requires agencies to include in regulations packets submitted to the Office of Administrative Law (OAL), an economic impact statement (EIS) with the initial statement for reasons for adopting, amending, or repealing a regulation

Assembly Appropriations

SUSPENSE

SUSPENSE HEARING: 5/27/2011

AB 535 (Morrell)

Regulatory Reform

SUPPORT

ABC California supports AB 535 as part of the business regulatory reform coalition bill package. Among other provisions, AB 535 requires a state agency to review and report on regulations that it adopts or amends on and after January 1, 2012, 5 years after adoption.

Assembly Appropriations

SUSPENSE

SUSPENSE HEARING: 5/27/2011

AB 586 (Garrick)

Regulatory Reform

SUPPORT

AB 586 requires a standing committee of the Legislature with jurisdiction over a state agency proposing to adopt a regulation with a gross cost in excess of $10,000,000 to hold an informational hearing regarding the proposed regulation. ABC California supports AB 586 as part of the business regulatory reform coalition bill package

Assembly Business & Professions

2-YEAR BILL

AB 598 (Grove)

CEQA Reform

SPONSOR

SUPPORT

ABC California sponsored AB 598 would restrict lawsuits challenging CEQA project permits to those initiated by the Attorney General.

Assembly Natural Resources

2-YEAR BILL

AB 632 (Wagner)

Regulatory

Reform

SUPPORT

ABC California supports AB 632 that is part of the business regulatory reform bill package. AB 632 requires that the notice of proposed action also be submitted to the Legislature if it includes particular information relating to economic and cost impacts of the regulation on businesses and private persons. ABC California is signatory on the coalition support letter.

Assembly Business & Professions

FAILED PASSAGE

3/31/2011

AB 780 (Calderon)

Fixed Price Contracts

SUPPORT

ABC California supports AB 780 that would exclude from sales and use tax increases the gross receipts from certain sales and uses of tangible personal property that are subject to a fixed price pursuant to a contract entered into prior to the operative date of the tax increase.

Assembly Appropriations

SUSPENSE

SUSPENSE HEARING: 5/27/2011

AB 830 (Olsen)

Flexible Work Weeks

SUPPORT

ABC California supports AB 830 that permits individual employees to seek and obtain a flexible work schedule.

Assembly Labor & Employment

FAILED PASSAGE

4/27/2011

AB 860 (Jones)

Campaign Reform

SUPPORT if Amended

ABC California supports AB 860 that seeks to reform California’s political contribution process to increase transparency and accountability if amended to remove corporations from coverage by the bill.

Assembly Elections & Redistricting

2 YEAR BILL

AB 890 (Olsen)

CEQA Exemption: Minor Roadway Improvements

SUPPORT

ABC California believes that AB 890 provides a reasonable exception to CEQA for minor roadway improvements to repair, maintain, of make safety changes to existing roadways and streets.

Assembly Natural Resources

FAILED PASSAGE

5/2/2011

AB 894 (V. Manny Perez)

Economic Development: Loans

NEUTRAL

Originally, ABC opposed AB 894 due to special preference given economic development loans applications submitted jointly by unions and management. AB 984 subsequently amended to address ABC concerns.

Assembly Appropriations

SUSPENSE

SUSPENSE HEARING: 5/27/2011

AB 931 (Dickinson)

CEQA Reform: Infill Housing

SUPPORT

ABC California supports AB 931 which would increase from 15% to 25% the amount of floor space for a primarily residential urban infill development that is exempt from CEQA under certain conditions

Passed Assembly

TO SENATE

5/19/2011

AB 963 (Valadao)

CEQA Reform: Safe Drinking Water

SUPPORT

ABC California supports AB 963 that exempts from CEQA a project undertaken to allow for the substitution of a source of surface water for a source of groundwater deemed to be contaminated if that source of contaminated groundwater is serving an economically disadvantaged community of less than 3,000 residents.

Assembly Appropriations

SUSPENSE

SUSPENSE HEARING: 5/27/2011

AB 987 (Grove)

Public Works: Omnibus Reform

SPONSOR

SUPPORT

ABC California sponsored AB 987 restores an honest definition of a “public work” by clarifying when construction is actually being done on a public work and by repealing provisions of law added during the administration of Governor Gray Davis that distorted the definition of “public work.” It increases a project cost threshold for prevailing wage that was set in 1931 and remains in place today. It gives local governments the right to establish their own prevailing wage policies for local projects.

Assembly Labor & Employment

2 YEAR BILL

AB 988 (Grove)

Public Works: Omnibus Reforms

SPONSOR SUPPORT

ABC California sponsored AB 988 would reform the calculation of state-mandated construction wage rates by giving the California Division of Labor Statistics and Research a means to calculate and determine more accurate state-mandated construction wage rates within various regions of the state. It also restores the personal privacy of construction workers by ending the ability of union-affiliated private organizations to obtain addresses of individual employees from payroll records possessed by the government.

Assembly Labor & Employment

2 YEAR BILL

AB 1179 (Mansoor)

Paycheck Protection

SUPPORT

ABC California supports AB 1179 that would establish paycheck protection that requires workers to give permission to unions to use their dues money for political purposes.

Assembly Labor & Employment

2 YEAR BILL

AB 1185 (Torres)

CEQA Exemption: Retail Facilities

SUPPORT

ABC California supports AB 1185 that exempts from CEQA until January 1, 2015 a project that consists of the alteration of a vacant retail structure that existed prior to January 1, 2008, is not more than 60,000 square feet in area, and meets certain requirements.

Assembly Natural Resources

2-YEAR BILL

AB 1326 (Furutani)

Oil and Gas: Severance Tax

OPPOSE

ABC California OPPOSES AB 1326 that would impose a 12.5% tax on oil and gas extracted from the ground in California to fund higher education programs. Businesses would be prohibited from passing the cost of the through to consumers by way of higher prices for oil, natural gas, gasoline, diesel, or other oil or gas consumable byproducts, such as propane and heating oil.

Assembly Revenue & Taxation

SUSPENSE

HELD on SUSPENSE FILE

ABX1 3

Regulatory Reform: 5 Year Review

SUPPORT

Provides that all regulations go through regular review on a 5 year basis.

Assembly Rules

AB X1 4 (Logue)

Regulatory Reform: Effective Dates

SUPPORT

ABX1 3 conforms the effective dates of state issued regulations to the effective date of new statutes – i.e., January 1 of the year following adoption.

Assembly Rules

AB X1 6 (Logue)

Regulatory Reform: Economic Impact

SUPPORT

ABX1 6 updates and refines process for adopting regulations in California to ensure that real economic impact analysis is performed prior to adopting regulations.

Assembly Rules

ACA 1 (Jefferies)

Legislature: Meetings: Expanded Public Notice

SUPPORT

ABC California supports ACA 1 that encourages open government by requiring that legislative meetings be noticed at least 72 hours prior, among other provisions. The measure would generally prohibit consideration of any matter not included in the agenda.

Assembly Rules

ACA 2 (Jeffries)

Legislature: Floor Session

SUPPORT

ABC California supports ACA 2 that requires legislative sessions to be held between 9 a.m. and 9 p.m. unless there is an emergency.

Assembly Rules

ACA 8 (Olsen)

State Budget

SUPPORT

ABC California supports ACA 8 that requires the Governor to recommend, in addition to additional revenues, any spending reductions to be made to balance expenditures with estimated revenues in the ensuing fiscal year.

Assembly Budget

No Hearing date

SB 11 (Anderson)

Registered Warrants

SUPPORT

Would prohibit a state entity from assessing a fine, interest, or penalty, based on a debt owed to the state by an individual who or entity that is a payee named in a registered warrant, from the date the state issued the registered warrant until at least 30 days after the date the registered warrant is payable by the state.

Senate Appropriations

SUSPENSE

HELD IN COMMITTEE

5/26/2011

SB 18 (Blakeslee)

Political Reform

SUPPORT

ABC California supports SB 18 that prohibits legislators from receiving gifts of any significance from lobbyists and other interest groups.

Senate Appropriations

SUSPENSE

HELD IN COMMITTEE

5/26/2011

SB 56 (Corbett)

Apprenticeship Programs: New Mandates

OPPOSE

SB 56 would significantly limit apprenticeship opportunities in California by imposing onerous requirements on program applicants at tremendous cost to the Division of Apprenticeship Standards (DAS).

Assembly Labor & Employment

NO HEARING DATE SET

SB 104 (Steinberg)

Card Check

OPPOSE

SB 104 institutes card check – the Employee Free Choice Act (EFCA) -- for agricultural workers. ABC of California is part of a large business coalition opposing this bill due to the bad precedent such legislation sets.

SENATE Floor

CONCURRENCE

5/26/2011

SB 111 (Yee)

Civil Rights: Language Restrictions

OPPOSE

ABC California is working with the Chamber’s coalition in opposition to SB 111 that would make it a violation under the Unruh Civil Rights Act for a business establishment to require, limit, or prohibit the use of any language, unless such requirement, limit or prohibition is a business necessity.

Assembly Judiciary

HEARING: 6/7/2011

SB 118 (Yee)

Public Contracts: Energy Services: Best Value

WATCH

ABC California originally supported SB 118 that requires a public agency to use competitive bidding to enter into an energy service contract. Recent amendments to still possibly permit awarding contracts to favorite bidders changed the position to "watch". (This bill addresses how a few school districts awarded large no-bid contracts to Chevron Energy Solutions.)

Senate Appropriations

SUSPENSE

HELD IN COMMITTEE

SB 120 (Anderson)

Registered Warrants

SUPPORT

Requires a state agency to accept a registered warrant issued by the Controller as a payment. ABC of California supported this bill last year.

Senate Floor

THIRD READING

5/31/2011

SB 241 (Cannella)

CEQA: Litigation Pilot Project:

SUPPORT

ABC California supports SB 241 that would enact the CEQA Litigation Protection Pilot Program of 2011 and require the Business, Transportation and Housing Agency to select projects to exempt from judicial review in specified regions for each calendar year between 2012 and 2016.

Senate Environmental Quality

FAILED PASSAGE 2/17/2011

SB 362 (Berryhill)

Apprenticeships

SPONSOR

SUPPORT

ABC California-sponsored SB 362 would repeal a provision signed into law in 1999 by former Governor Gray Davis that allows apprenticeship programs to maintain regional monopolies on vocational training for certain construction trades, as a result limiting training opportunities for Californians seeking career technical education through state-approved apprenticeship programs.

Senate Labor & Industrial Relations

2-YEAR BILL

SB 367 (Dutton)

Alternate Work Schedules: Small Business Employees

SUPPORT

ABC California supports SB 367 that permits an individual nonexempt employee employed by an employer with 25 or fewer employees to request an employee-selected flexible work schedule providing for workdays up to 10 hours per day within a 40-hour workweek, and would allow the employer to implement this schedule without any obligation to pay overtime compensation.

Senate Labor & Industrial Relations

FAILED PASSAGE

2/24/2011

SB 378 (Dutton)

Overtime: Extended Alternate Schedules

SUPPORT

SB 378 provides that an alternative workweek schedule may include a regularly scheduled alternative workweek that authorizes work by for more than 10 hours a day, as long as the employees are paid at the appropriate overtime rate as required by law.

Senate Labor & Industrial Relations

2 YEAR BILL

SB 389 (Dutton)

Meal and Rest Periods

SUPPORT

ABC California supports SB 389 that would revise the laws concerning meal periods to specify that the requirements apply only to employees subject to the meal period provisions of an order of the Industrial Welfare Commission, among other provisions.

Senate Labor & Industrial Relations

2 YEAR BILL

SB 400 (Dutton)

Regulatory Reform

SUPPORT

ABC California supports SB 400 that would reform the way regulations are adopted in California under the Administrative Procedures Act. SB 400 also requires the Office of Administrative Law (OAL) to reject any regulations that do not comply with the economic analysis requirements.

Senate Environmental Quality

FAILED PASSAGE 5/2/2011

SB 401 (Fuller)

Regulatory Reform

SUPPORT

ABC California supports SB 401 which would require that every regulation proposed by an agency after 1/1/2012 to include a provision repealing the regulation in 5 years. The bill would prohibit the office from approving a proposed regulation unless it contains repeal provisions.

Senate Environmental Quality

FAILED PASSAGE 5/2/2011

SB 438 (Cannella)

Prevailing Wage: Off-Site Fabrication

SUPPORT

ABC California supports SB 438 that eliminates prevailing wage coverage for most off-site fabrication by clarifying that workers in a yard, shop, or plant off the site of construction shall only be deemed to be employed upon public works if that yard, shop, or plant is specifically established for that public work project.

Senate Labor & Industrial Relations

2 YEAR BILL

SB 469 (Vargas)

Land Use

OPPOSE

ABC California opposes SB 469, that attempts to forbids all local governments and charter cities from approving retail facilities larger than 90,000 square feet, and with 10 percent of sales for food and related non-taxable items, without an extensive economic impact report paid for by the permit applicant

Senate Floor

THIRD READING

5/31/2011

SB 569 (Kehoe)

Electrical Work: New Limits

OPPOSE

Designated as worst bill of the year by ABC California. IBEW-sponsored SB 569 strictly limits all work however minor that is involved in an electrical job must be performed by certified electricians.

Senate Transportation and Housing

2 YEAR BILL

SB 581 (Liu)

Electric Work

OPPOSE UNLESS AMENDED

ABC California OPPOSES unless Amended SB 581 that specifies the kinds of nonelectrical tasks that may be validly performed by employees of a licensed electrical contractor, who are not certified as electricians under state law or exempt. This bill needs to be amended to strike the phrase "outside a building structure."

Senate Labor and Industrial Relations

2 YEAR BILL

SB 620 (Correa)

CEQA Exemption: Retails Facilities

SUPPORT

ABC California supports SB 620 that would exempt from CEQA until January 1, 2015, a project that consists of the alteration of a vacant retail structure that existed prior to January 1, 2009 and is not more than 120,000 square feet in area.

Senate Environmental Quality

2 YEAR BILL

SB 653 (Steinberg)

Local Government: New Taxing Authority

OPPOSE

ABC California opposes SB 653 which would authorize the board of supervisors of any county or city and county, school districts and community colleges by ordinance or resolution, to propose to the voters a tax, including, but not limited to, a local personal income tax, a local corporate income tax, and a local sales and use tax and be able to make the tax retroactive.

Senate Floor

THIRD READING

5/31/2011

SB 683 (Correa)

CEQA: Objection Limits

SUPPORT

ABC California supports SB 683 that would prohibit CEQA objections unless the oral or written presentation or objection occurs during the public comment period provided under CEQA or prior to the close of the public hearing on the project before the filing, rather than issuance, of the notice of determination.

Senate Environmental Quality

2 YEAR BILL

SB 725 (Berryhill)

Public Works: Omnibus Reform

SPONSOR

SUPPORT

ABC California-sponsored SB 725 would establish a more reasonable definition of public works for state-mandated construction wage rates, thus limiting coverage of those mandates to truly public projects. This bill also increases a project cost threshold for prevailing wage, set in 1931 and still in place today, from $1,000 to $100,000. It also gives local governments the right to establish their own prevailing wage policies for local projects.

Senate Labor & Industrial Relations

2 YEAR BILL

SB 727 (Berryhill)

State Mandated Construction Wage Rates: Reform

Sponsor

SUPPORT

ABC California-sponsored SB 727 would repeal numerous expansions and distortions of prevailing wage law enacted by former Governor Gray Davis that force California companies to pay inflated and inaccurate wage rates to construction and manufacturing employees. It would allow all California local governments to enjoy the right now exercised by charter cities to set their own local prevailing wage policies for locally-funded projects. It would save money for taxpayers on government construction and encourage private owners to pursue commercial and industrial developments, thus spurring economic growth and job creation.

Senate Labor & Industrial Relations

2 YEAR BILL

SB 829 (DeSaulnier)

Cal/OSHA Penalties: New Liabilities

OPPOSE

ABC California OPPOSES SB 829 that contains almost two dozen provisions that put businesses at a greater disadvantage in Cal-OSHA citation appeals. ABC is working with a large coalition of employer organizations in opposition to SB 829.

Senate Floor

THIRD READING

5/31/2011

SB 883 (Correa)

Employers: Good Faith Defense

SUPPORT

ABC California is working with the California Chamber and a large coalition of employer organization in support of AB 883 that would provide employers with an affirmative defense when relying in good faith upon, and in conformity with, the opinions received from the division of Labor Standards Enforcement (DLSE).

Senate Labor & Industrial Relations

2 YEAR BILL

SB 886 (Corbett)

Sprinkler Fitter: Certification Mandate

OPPOSE

ABC California opposes SB 886 that establishes a state certification program overseen by the State Fire Marshal for fire sprinkler fitters. The bill restricts the kind of work that can be done by sprinkler fitters who have not obtained certification, among many other provisions.

Senate Business & Professions

2-Year Bill

SCA 6 (Emmerson)

Legislative Sessions: Biennial Sessions

SUPPORT

ABC California supports SCA 6 that reforms the budget process to institute budget sessions and general sessions in alternating years, require budgets to be for two fiscal years, and make other changes.

Senate Governance & Finance

NO HEARING DATE SET


Sponsors