June 17, 2026 · Labor · 23,071 words · 24 speakers · 30 segments
Thank you. Thank you. Senate Labor and Public Employment and Retirement Committee will commence. We are starting as a subcommittee this morning. Many of our members are in four different committees, so we're going to do the best that we can here today. We have 18 items, file items on our agenda, and we are ready to start with Mr. Lee. File item number 1, AB 1729. Any witnesses in support of this bill, please have a seat at the front table.
you each have two minutes when we are ready for your testimony you may begin all right well thank you madam chair i am here to present ab 1729 to update the telework policy for state agencies this policy has not been amended or updated in over 30 years and does not reflect the technological opportunities, or workplace realities of 2026. According to the state auto report last year, if state workers telework three or more days weekly, the state could reduce office space by roughly 30% and save upwards of $225 million annually. Telework and hybrid schedules are the norm in many state departments, and return to the office requires planning. And according to the Sacramento Bee's reporting, more than 70 state offices could not accommodate state workers ahead of Newsom's RTO order for July 2025. The RTO order did not acknowledge the realities about office space, office leases, office equipment, or parking. The RTO order did not acknowledge employees that had been hired as remote workers and may not be able to reallocate. And that is still true of 2026. Telework led to accumulative savings of nearly 393,000 metric tons of CO2 emissions across 121 state departments between 2021 and 2023. And how do we know this? because the state auditor report found that over two of state departments reported that productivity was improved or unchanged when employees were teleworking three or more days per week And approximately three of local governments offer hybrid schedules And even looking at Indeed website today the following companies many of them my constituents work for still offer remote jobs like Amazon, Aetna, Cisco, Salesforce, Humana, UnitedHealth Group, Wells Fargo. Remote and hybrid workplaces are becoming standard for the wide range of jobs. So this bill updates state telework policy to require state departments to have written, thought-out telework policy. And when a department wants to implement a return to the office plan, the department simply needs to identify the operational needs to spend the amount of time and money to do so to properly prepare. And from 2020 to 2024, the state proudly displayed a dashboard of the savings and benefits of telework. This bill will bring that dashboard back so the public can see whether telework is working for the state. Now, I will say is that I agree with Governor Newsom when he first created this innovative policy during the era of the pandemic. And we have hired thousands and thousands of workers across the state in this innovative system. I also agree with Governor Newsom when he said that state workers are the backbone of the state infrastructure. When we are fighting against so many threats happening to our state and for our working class families, we need our state workers to have a real work-life balance, to have high morale, and have a true, decent, affordable quality of living. And all we can do that, and we can do all that by just continuing the status quo. So I agree that he said they are the backbone of a state government, and we ought to back up our state workers so that we can enable all the ambitious things we want to do for our state employees, for our state residents. With me here today in support is Talene Gazarian, the president of CASE, and Karina Grove representing CAPS UAW.
Thank you. You each have two minutes.
Hello. Madam Chair, good morning. My name is Talene Gazarian, and I am the president of CASE, which is the California Attorneys, Administrative Law Judges, and Hearing Officers in State Employment. We represent about 5,200 state employees. I am here today in support of AB 1729, which our union is proud to co-sponsor. AB 1729 is a reasonable bill. It does not require full-time remote work. It simply requires that telework decisions be based on evidence, transparency, and the actual needs of the work that's being performed. A one-size-fits-all mandate does not make sense where state employees perform vastly different work with vastly different operational needs. So in my own position as an attorney with the Department of Healthcare Services, I collaborate regularly with agency leadership and the governor's office on complex and sensitive issues including responding day and night to the relentless federal attacks to Medi-Cal and reproductive freedom. For six years, we have demonstrated that we can collaborate across programs, departments, and geographic regions effectively using modern technology while still coming together in person when it serves a meaningful operational need. Telework made state government more efficient. It reduced commuting and travel by allowing statewide meetings, hearings, and trainings to move online. At the same time, housing and living costs were soaring, and telework helped make continued public service financially feasible. It also helped the state keep experienced employees and attract talented professionals from across California despite the growing pay gap with the private sector. And for those reasons, I respectfully ask for your aye vote.
Thank you. Good morning, Madam Chair and committee members. My name is Karina Grove. I am a state worker at the State Water Resources Control Board. I am also a proud member and the financial secretary for CAPS UAW Local 1115 the union of approximately 6 state of California employed scientists in over 50 departments Our union enthusiastically co AB 1729 The state auditor determined that reducing office space through expanded telework could save approximately $225 million annually, primarily through decreased leasing, operations, and maintenance expenses. These savings are achievable when employees can telework three or more days per week without compromising productivity or service delivery. A blanket return to office mandate imposes unnecessary financial strain on state employees during a time of elevated fuel, vehicle, child care, and housing costs. Over the last six years, telework has repeatedly demonstrated its effectiveness in supporting productivity, collaboration, and inclusivity, while reducing emissions, traffic congestion, and risks associated with commuter travel. In my position at the Water Board, I help ensure protection of wetlands by regulating discharges to waters of the state. I have written CEQA documents for permits that protect wetlands, and I'm currently working on an online application system that aims to reduce staff time in processing these permits. While some scientists require in-person work, like lab work, my work and that of many of my colleagues is in regulation, where we analyze data, write reports, issue permits, and consult with stakeholders across the state. work we've been doing successfully for the last six years on a telework basis. This legislation offers a fiscal responsible, environmentally sound, and an equitable approach that benefits California's workforce and taxpayers alike. For these reasons, I urge you to vote aye on this measure. Thank you for your time and consideration.
Thank you very much. Are there any Me Too's in support of this bill? Please state your name and affiliation.
Madam Chair, good morning. Ted Toppin for the Professional Engineers in California Government and the Association of California State Supervisors, proud sponsors of the bill. Urge your support. Thank you.
Hello. Good morning. Anika Walls, proud president of SCIU Local 1000, representing 100,000 state employees in strong support of AB 1729 and urge an aye vote. Thank you.
Madam Chair, Matt brought here for case in support. Thank you.
Hello, Stephen Boyd. I'm an automation analyst for the Employment Development Department, encouraging your support on the bill. Thank you.
Hi, Stephen Gonzalez. I'm an analyst with High Speed Rail, and I strongly urge your support on this bill. Thank you.
Good morning. My name is Leif Jones. I work for the Department of Housing and Community Development. I am here in support of AB 1729, and I respectfully urge a yes vote. Thank you.
Good morning. My name is David J. Egan. I'm with the Department of Housing and Community Development, a proud member of SEIU Local 1000. I urge your support for AB 1729. Thank you.
Hi, I'm Kim Tinker Jaya. I'm a member of CAPS UAW, and I urge you to support this bill. Thank you.
Hello, I'm Trinity Smith. I'm with the Department of Public Health. I work with the Department of Public Health. I'm a member of SEIU Local 1000, and I support AB 1729 and respectfully urge a yes vote.
Hello, my name is Rada Yassin. I'm an attorney with the Agricultural Labor Relations Board and a member of the case union, and I very, very enthusiastically urge your support. Thank you.
Hello my name is Flavio Bautista with the Agricultural Labor Relations Board and I urge your support
Hi, my name is Hannah Hendrickson. I'm an office technician with the California Department of Aging and I support this bill.
My name is Oliver Hendrickson and I support this bill.
Good morning. My name is Skyler Waldek-Meyers. I work as an analyst for the Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation. I'm here in support of AB 1729 and I urge your support for it as well. Thank you.
Hi, my name is Melissa Hoagie and I'm an analyst at Housing and Community Development and also a constituent. I am a proud member of SCIU Local 1000 and I am here in support of AB 1729 and I respectfully request an aye vote. Thank you.
Thank you.
Hi, my name is Selena Benitez. I'm a budget analyst with the California Department of Aging. I'm here to support AB 1729 and I strongly urge an aye vote. Thank you.
Hi, my name is Ellie Macaluso-Moore. I work for the Employment Development Department and I support AB 1729 and I graciously ask you for an aye vote.
Good morning. Good morning. My name is Claudia Perez, and I'm an outreach analyst for the Employment Development Department, and I strongly urge your support for this bill. Thank you. Good morning. My name is April Hughes. I'm an office technician and a steward for the department under the State Treasurer's Office. I highly support or highly suggest an aye vote for this. Good morning. My name is Katie Fox. I'm an analyst, too, for the Air Resources Board, and I encourage you to support this bill. My name is Robert Bradshaw. I'm a senior data analyst with the Department of Justice, and I urge your support on AB 1729. Thank you. Don Antonowich, Department of Pesticide Regulation, where we spent seven years and millions of dollars to go paperless, and we're there. I can do my work evaluating pesticides from the space station, if necessary, and I urge your vote yes. On 1729. Asia Murphy, quantitative ecologist with the Department of Fish and Wildlife, and I urge you guys to vote yes on this bill. Good morning. Robert Rossi. I'm a senior environmental scientist with the Department of Toxic Substances Control, a CAPS UAW member, and I traveled 200 miles today to urge you to vote aye on this bill. Thank you. Hi, I'm Rafika LaRosa with CAPS UAW. I'm a senior scientist with the Department of Fish and Wildlife, and I'm here in support of AB 1729. Thanks. Hi, I'm Karen Odkins. I'm with CAPS UAW, and I am a senior scientist at CDFW, and I urge you to support. Yes. Good morning. My name is Vanessa Lowe. I'm with CAPS UAW, and I'm a senior environmental scientist with CFW, and I urge you to support this bill. Thank you. Good morning. I'm Lori Steffi. I'm an environmental scientist at the Department of Toxic Substances Control, also a CAPS member and a constituent of Alex Lee. Thank you for this bill. Thank you. My name is Julia Rose Pacheco. I work as a tax technician for the Franchise Tax Board. I'm here in support of this bill, and I kindly implore you all to support this bill as well. Hello. My name is Olga Ledergerber. And I work as an analyst at Employment Development Department, and I urge you to support this bill because commuting 32 hours a week unpaid commute doesn't make any sense for the job that can be done remotely. Thank you. Good morning. My name is Danica Dupatti, and I'm a compliance monitoring analyst with the Employment Development Department, and I highly encourage you to support this bill. Thank you. Good morning. My name is Jaspreet Kaur. I'm a research data specialist with the Department of Social Services and a member of SEIU Local 1000. And I'm here in support of AB 1729 and respectfully urge you to support the bill. Thank you. Good morning. I'm Charlene Villanueva with the Department of Social Services as an analyst, too. And I am also an SEIU member, and I kindly ask that you support this bill. Thank you. Good morning. My name is Paimon Alamy, senior engineer with the State Water Resources Control Board and also a proud PEC member. I'm here to support AB 1729 and I urge you to vote yes. Thank you. Good morning. I'm Michael Baker. I'm a senior scientist and subject matter expert at Cal Fire. I'm also a proud member of the California Association of Professional Scientists, an affiliate of the UAW Local 1115. My fellow scientists at CAL FIRE and I urge you to support this bill. Thank you. Hello, my name is Felipe Laluz. I'm a senior environmental scientist with the California Department of Fish and Wildlife and I respectfully request that you help us achieve our mission and support AB 1729. Thank you. Good morning. Marcus Prasad. I work at California Department of Public Health as an accountant. I live over 60 miles away in Sutter County, and right now it's unaffordable to drive to my work site four days a week, so I urge you to support this bill. Thank you. Hi, everyone. I'm Nia Nguyen, and I'm a proud member of SEIU Local 1000. And I really encourage you all to support this bill and encourage you all to vote yes on it. You know, just think about the 90,000 extra cars, vehicles on the road, and how much less stress you would be trying to get to work every morning. So I encourage you to vote yes on this bill, and I support it wholeheartedly. Thank you. Hi, my name is Patty Blashaw. I work for California Department of Tax and Fee Administration. I urge you to support this bill. Thank you. Hello, I'm Benjamin Lester, and I work as a tax technician for the Franchise Tax Board, and I urge you to support 1729 because I live, like, almost 30 minutes to an hour away, and it's just not feasible. You know what I mean? Like, gas is so expensive with Donald Trump's war in the Middle East, you know. The whole world's gas prices have gone up, and it doesn't make sense for us to spend so much money just so that we can be near businesses. Thank you. We want to make sure we get to everyone's comment. Thank you for that. Just your name and affiliation and position. Thank you. Susanna Gandy with the California Department of Public Health a health physicist proud member of CAPS UAW asking you guys to join us in support of this bill Hi I Trent Rosenquist I an associate health physicist at the California Department of Public Health and I urge you to support this bill Hi, Katrina Campas. I'm an analyst with the Department of Conservation and an SEIU member, and I urge you to support the bill. Thank you. Good morning. My name is Natalia Salva. I work for the Department of Conservation as well as IT specialist, and I'm here to support AB 1729, and I ask you to support us in this and urge you. Thank you so much. Good morning. My name is Valentina Kalanuk, and I work for the Department of Conservation as well, and I'm respectfully asking you to support AB 1729. Thank you. Good morning. My name is Elena Nekam and I'm IT project manager for Department of Conservation. I would like to ask you and beg you please support this bill. Thank you. Good morning. My name is George Iwaki. I am a procurement analyst for Department of Conservation and I'm here in support of AB 1729 and I respectfully request a yes vote for this important bill. Thank you. Good morning. Brendan Brown, a store with CAPS UAW and a risk assessor for the Department of Pesticide Regulation, and I urge you to support the bill. Hi, Brendan Darcy, research scientist and epidemiologist with the Department of Pesticide Regulation and member of CAPS UAW. I urge you to support this bill. Thank you. Hi, my name is Kirsta Purley. I'm an attorney with the Department of Housing and Community Development. member of case and I urge you to support the bill thank you good morning my name is John DeRosa I'm also an attorney with the Department of Housing and Community Development and a case union member strongly urge your support of this bill thank you good morning I'm Michael Young I also work for a housing community development I'm attorney and I urge and hope that you guys will support this bill Thank you. I'm Eric Payne. I'm a scientist with CalRecycle, part of CAPSUR-AW, and I urge you to support this bill. Thank you. Good morning, Madam Chair. My name is Nick Cruz. I work at the Department of Health Care Services, and I'm a proud member of SAU Local 1000. I'm in strong support of this bill, and I respectfully urge an aye vote. Thank you. Hello, Lorraine Frias, Department of Health Care Services. I urge a yes on this bill and to please, please, please consider the health inequities that return to work is causing in our offices. Thank you so much. Good morning. My name is Luke Bernthal. I'm an attorney with the Victim Compensation Board and a case union member, and I respectfully urge an aye vote on this bill. Thank you. Hi, my name is Amber Villegas. I'm a structural design technician at the Department of Transportation and I urge you to vote yes on this bill. Good morning. My name is Trevor Pratt. I'm an administrative law judge with the Public Utilities Commission and I'm asking for your support on this bill. Thank you. Good morning. My name is Kyle Shimke and I'm an environmental scientist with the Department of Toxic Substances Control and a proud member of CAPCAW. I strongly encourage you to support AB 1729. Thank you. Steven Nijjar, I work for ITB at EDD. I support this AB 1729. I respectfully urge your vote for this one. Thank you Good morning I Guggen Nijjar I work for California Air Resource Board I Analyst 2 and I urge you guys to support this bill Good morning, my name is Tally Kingsnorth. I'm an attorney for the California Department of Public Health and here with CASE. I urge you to support this bill. Thank you. Good morning, my name is Kirsten Arnold. I'm an attorney for the Department of Managed Health Care. I'm here with CASE and I encourage you to support this bill. Thank you. Good morning. My name is Lauren O'Gadis. I'm an attorney three with the Department of Financial Protection and Innovation, and I strongly urge your support for this bill. Thank you. Good morning, Madam Chair. Edgar Guerra with SEIU California, proud co-sponsor. Thank you. Good morning. I'm Peter Chow. I'm an attorney three with the California Public Utilities Commission with the case union. I urge you to vote yes on this bill. Thank you. Michael Saposnikov, Deputy Attorney General, also a member of CASE. Please support the bill. Thank you. Good morning. My name is Jerry Brunsfield. I'm an IT specialist with the California Department of Public Health. I support this bill and ask you also to support it. Thank you. Good morning. I'm Patricia Kelly. I'm an attorney for with the Department of Industrial Relations, Relations, Division of Labor Standards Enforcement, also known as the Labor Commissioner's Office, and we urge you to vote yes on the bill. Thank you. Good morning. My name is Alicia Johnson. I'm an attorney for with the California Department of Public Health. I'm a member of CASE, and I strongly urge you to vote aye on this bill. Thank you. Hello, my name is Corey Dutra. I'm an attorney for at the California Department of social services. In July, it'll be 20 years. I respectfully request you to vote aye today. Thank you. Hello, I'm Serena Rose. I'm with the DIR with the WCAB, and I've come all the way from I'd like to support the bill. I come all the way from Los Angeles. Good morning. My name is Madison Boynton. I'm an environmental scientist at the State Water Resources Control Board and proud member of CAPS UAW-1115 and I urge you to support this bill. Thank you for your time. Good morning I'm Peter Haupt I'm an environmental scientist with the State Water Board. I urge you to support this bill. Good morning I'm Jill Zimmerman I'm an attorney with the Department of Toxic Substances Control and I support this bill I hope you will as well. Good Good morning. My name is Ivan Wagoner. I'm an attorney with the Department of Housing and Community Development, and I respectfully urge you to vote aye on AB 1729. Hello, my name is Chris Stermer. I work for the California Department of Fish and Wildlife, and I urge you to support this bill. Thank you. Good morning. I'm Amy Olson. I'm a senior scientist with Fish and Wildlife and a proud member of CAPS UAW. And I strongly urge you to support this bill. Thank you. Hi, my name is Christine Lucky Akamine. I am a legislative analyst with the Employment Development Department, and I strongly urge you to support this bill. Thank you. Hi, I'm Chelsea Lunsford. I'm with the Employment Development Department as a Legislative Analyst, and I strongly support this bill. Good morning I Katrina Smith a Senior Scientist with the California Department of Fish and Wildlife and a proud member of CAPS UAW and I ask for your support in this bill Hello, my name is Stephen Vann. I work for the California Energy Commission in decarbonization and affordable housing, and I urge everyone to support Assembly Bill 1729. Thank you. Good morning. My name is Cheng Bo Zhang. I'm a staff of tax colleges in the Department of Pest Set Regulation. I urge you to support this bill. Thank you. Hi, my name is Benjamin Tuggy. I work on clean transportation at the California Energy Commission. CAPC UAW member. I support AB 1729. Thank you. Hi there. My name is Forrest Hanson. I'm an environmental scientist and project biologist with the California Department of Water Resources. I live here in Sacramento and I urge you to vote yes on AB 1729. Thank you. Hello. My name is Tina Riley and I'm a maternal mortality research scientist staff with CDPH and I urge you to support this bill. I also support CAPS UAW as a steward. My name is Marisol Pasquier. I am an injury epidemiologist with the Department of Public Health and a proud member of CAPC-AW, and I urge all of you to support this bill. Hi, my name is Carolyn Zambrano. I'm an adolescent health research scientist at the California Department of Public Health, and I ask you to support this bill. Thank you. Hello, my name is Alexander Yeh. I'm an environmental scientist at the Department of Pesticide Regulation, and I strongly urge you to support this bill. Hi, my name is Anne Hilborn. I'm with the Department of Fish and Wildlife and Environmental Scientist. I'm a steward with CAPS UAW, and I urge you to support this bill. Thank you. Hello, my name is Hannah Johnson. I'm a proud CAPS UAW member. I work at preventing the transmission of infectious diseases for the California Department of Public Health, and I strongly encourage you all to support this bill. Thank you. Hi, everybody. My name is Kara Drake and I'm a research scientist with California Department of Public Health and I strongly urge you to support this bill for all of us. Thank you. Hello, my name is Megan Melnick. I'm a senior environmental scientist at DTSC and a member of CAPS UAW 1115. I'm here in support of AB 1729 and I urge your support with an aye vote. Thank you. Hi, my name is Laura Patterson. I'm the statewide amphibian reptile conservation coordinator for the Department of Fish and Wildlife and a proud CAPS UAW local 1115 member. I urge you to vote aye on this bill. Hi, Jason Van Court, research scientist supervisor, Department of Healthcare Services. RTO is killing morale. I have half my staff working at home, half coming to... I drove two hours this morning. Please support this bill. Hi, Ashida Mohandas, an attorney at Office of Administrative Law and member of CASE. My job consists of reading regulatory packages, writing memos, and attending Teams meetings, which I do the same as at home and in the office. Please support this bill. Thank you. Jason Folina, attorney for the Office of Administrative Law, and I support this bill, and I urge you to as well. Thank you. Good morning, Madam Chair, members. Janice O'Malley with AFSCME California, and we are proud co-sponsors. Thank you. Good morning, Stephen Malin. I'm an attorney with the Office Administrative law, I urge you to support this bill and I do as well. Thank you. Samantha Tedder with the Department of Corrections Office of Business Service. I'm a steward for the building and on behalf of the 100 plus employees, we urge you to support this bill, please. Good morning, committee. My name is Crystal Coles. I work for the Department of Housing and Community Development and I'm a proud board of directors member with SEIU Local 1000. I strongly urge you guys to support this bill. Thank you. Good morning. My name is David Jimenez, Vice President for SEAU Local 1000, proud state worker for the Department of Social Services, and I ask for your support on this bill. Thank you. Good morning. My name is Matt Goger. I'm the Vice President of CASE. I'm also an Administrative Law Judge with the ALRB, and I support this bill. Thank you. Good morning, everyone. My name is Mehdi Chaudhry. I am a transportation planner with CalTrans, and and I can tell you that my VMT has increased significantly, even with the hybrid schedule. This bill is a step in the right direction, and I urge you to support it. Thank you. Good morning, Madam Chair. Tiffany White with SEIU California in support. Thank you. Morning, Chair members. Elmer Lozada with the California Federation of Labor Unions in support. Good morning, Chair members. Mario Guerrero with the California Faculty Association in support. Okay. Wow. Do we have any more Me Too's? Okay. Seeing none, we will move to opposition. Are there opposition witnesses here to testify? Seeing none, any opposition Me Too's? Okay. Seeing none, we will come to our members, Dias, members, questions, comments. I have no questions. Do we have a quorum? I just came in. Okay. I was going to offer a motion. Well, when the time is right, we will take note of that. We'll press repeat. I just want to say to all of the witnesses who gave testimony, to all of the workers who came out, it is always impressive to see the cross-section of the people who do the business of the people for the state of California. And I really want to thank the author for bringing this bill forward. Where the state goes in this very complex discussion about how we will do work in the future and where we will do that work and how do we do it in a way that saves our environment? How do we do that in a way that also saves our commercial corridors? How do we do this in a way to give workers dignity and some control over their time and how they approach their working conditions? It's a very, very valuable discussion today, and that's why I support this bill. I understand the concerns and pressures that the administration, the governor, has raised. I've heard also from local leaders in Los Angeles about this question as well. We do recognize that our urban and commercial corridors are going through some pretty hard times, just like working people are going through pretty hard times. And given all of the hostility from this administration in Washington, we know the cost of living, whether it's gas, whether it's food, whether it's, you know, the cost of electricity and utilities. all of these things weigh in on how workers are best able to support themselves and their families while doing the work in the business of the state It is and has to be especially frustrating for workers our state workers to pay more to come into town to work in buildings to provide a service and the level of productivity that they have been able to do while at home through Zoom. and through other technologies. It's also a real demand on your time, unpaid time, to be commuting in and out of your neighborhoods into our urban corridors to commercial spaces where we know time is money. Time is the most valuable thing that we have. And so I say all of this to say that I support this bill. I think this bill is very important. I think that where this conversation lands is going to be important, not just for public sector, but for private sector as well. I think this is a step in the right direction. I think having flexibility is critical and key, and this bill does exactly that. We can do better by our state workers, and that is letting their voices be heard in this determination of how California will do its business moving forward. And for all these reasons, I will support the bill when we have a full quorum. We are in between a number of committees today. We will take this bill up, and I will give you the opportunity to close, Assemblymember. Well, first, I want to thank the senator and the member for your support of this bill. I think this is an incredibly important bill for not just our state capacity but our state employee morale. I also want to thank all of our state employees and workers who have traveled near and far to come testify for this bill and each hearing that we're having for these things. I know some people come very, very far, and I really want to thank them because it's not often that we have the joy and the privilege to actually see the people who day in, day out carry out the big ambitions we have to the state. I know now we're in the budget season, so we just see many of your departments as line items in a giant budget, but it's really, truly amazing privilege to see the people who work so hard and give up so much to actually make our state the most competitive, the most welcoming state in the union, and if not the world. and I find a lot of joy in that, being able to meet so many of you, even many of you live in my district too, which is an amazing commute you'd have to do because I know it. But, you know, this kind of boils down to one thing is really reflecting the modern reality of the workplace. As legislators, I know we have often complained many meetings could have been an email, right? So we don't need to always be there, constantly always there in person. But when we are in person, it's those meetings and those collaborations are more meaningful. The reality is so many people work so many jobs that can be done remotely and it gets cut down on commute time, carbon pollution, and more time to afford for their families and for their loved ones. And I think as we grapple with the affordability crisis, we want to make sure that our downtowns and urban cores are not places where workers have to be but where workers want to be. And that's incumbent on us and local and every policymaker to make them vibrant downtowns that families want to go to on the weekends, people want to go during nightlife, and people also, of course, want to go on their lunch break. So I think it's not fair to shackle our office workers to be the entire bedrock for our downtowns. and I think from talking to a lot of state workers they're probably not the best demographic to have disposal income to spend on very high risky things constantly but I think it is really important to revitalize their downtown as a way that inclusive and welcoming to everyone and really thinking about affordability again how many people have moved either to be back home to their family in more expensive areas or more affordable areas that are further away from metro areas and that is a reality And I think the governor did a really good thing six years ago when he created this innovative work style and all we're asking with this bill is to preserve that and let every department figure out for themselves what is the right mix of telework, because we're not saying everyone has to telework and no one ever comes out of the office. We're saying what is the right mix, what is the right mix of flexibility, And again, I want to thank the chair for your support and all the workers who have come out here. And at the appropriate time, I'll ask for your strong eye support. Thank you. Thank you. Okay, I think we were just trying to clear everyone out from that last file item. Looks like we are ready to move on to our file item number two. I see Assemblymember Jackson is here. If you have witnesses, they are welcome to sit at the front table. Thank you for that. Okay, Assemblymember, you may begin. In brief, the bill would direct California's Labor Workforce Development Agency to work with the County of Riverside to make electric vehicle manufacturing jobs and education more accessible and one of the fastest growing regions in the state. Respectfully ask for your aye vote. I told you. And we don't have support witnesses. Any support me too's name and affiliation please. Thank you Madam Chair Jean Hurst here today on behalf of the Riverside County Board of Supervisors in support. Thank you. Okay we will move I don't see any other me too's we'll move to opposition witnesses. Are there any opposition witnesses here today? Seeing none. Any opposition? Me too. Speakers. Okay. We do not have a quorum yet. And we will certainly be taking this up once we get our fellow members here. Any comments from the dice? No, I'll be happy to move it if you want to note that when the time comes. Respectfully ask for an aye vote. Appreciate your time and getting us back on time. Okay we are looking for authors in Senate Labor Public Employment and Retirement Assemblymember Fong Ortega Valencia Calusa Berman Gibson Connelly Schiavo Pellerin Petrie Norris come on down We're ready. All authors, please report to Senate Labor, Public Employment and Retirement. Thank you. Thank you. Okay, wonderful. We are ready to move to file item number three, AB805. I see Assemblymember Fong is with us. Whenever you're ready, Assemblymember, if you have witnesses, they're welcome to sit at the table at this time. And please begin. Good morning, Madam Chair and Senators. I will be taking the amendments listed in the analysis. Thank you so much to the committee staff for their assistance with this bill. Apprenticeships are a proven pathway to good-paying careers because they combine classroom learning with paid, hands-on work experience. In 2022, SB191 established youth apprenticeship as a state priority and directed the Division of Apprenticeship Standards, also known as DOS, to convene a working group to develop recommendations for expanding youth apprenticeships. Senator Durazo was instrumental in advancing that effort in the development of the California Youth Apprenticeship Model Report. Assembly Bill 805 implements a key recommendation from that report by establishing the Career Apprenticeship Bridge Program. This bill connects high school career technical education with registered apprenticeships, allowing students to earn paid work experience and college credit while still in high school. Assembly Bill 805 lays the foundation for DOS, schools, employers, and regional partners to build and expand youth apprenticeship programs statewide. Here to speak and support are Edgar Castillo with Unite LA and Sally Ching with the Alliance for Boys and Men of Color. Thank you. Thank you. And you each have two minutes. Hello, can you hear me? Hello? Okay. Thank you. Good morning, Chair and members of the committee. My name is Eric Castillo. I'm the Senior Manager for Workforce Development of Policy and Systems at United LA, and I'm proud to speak today in support of AB805. As a co-sponsor, along with the California Opportunity Youth Network, the Alliance of Boys and Men of Color, and Youth Will. In November of last year, the California Youth Apprenticeship Committee convened by the Division of Apprenticeship Standards released its report, the California Youth Apprenticeship Model, which includes recommendations to expand youth apprenticeship programs focused on strengthening the state's workforce and closing the skills gap. AB 805 implements a key recommendation from the final report, the creation of the Career Apprenticeship Bridge Program. The committee spent more than a year bringing together education, workforce, labor, employer, and youth leaders to design a youth apprenticeship system, and the CAB program emerged as a central strategy for connecting high school students to college-level apprenticeships and career pathways. Importantly, it is the intent of this bill that outreach, recruitment, retention, and support efforts prioritize youth and young adults who face barriers to educational attainment or employment. ensuring these opportunities are accessible to those who can benefit most. AB 805 also recognizes the successful implementation requires strong local partnerships. The bill directs us to help work with county and regional intermediaries, coordinating and expanding career apprenticeship bridge programs across California. By creating stronger pathways between education and apprenticeship while improving coordination among partners, AB 805 will help more young people access high quality, earn and learn opportunities to meet California's workforce needs. We respectfully ask for your support today. Thank you. Good morning, Chair and members. My name is Sally Ching. I'm the Policy Director with the Alliance for Boys and Men of Color, which is a statewide network of more than 200 organizations working to improve outcomes for boys and men of color, their families, and communities across California. We are proud co-sponsors of AB805 alongside Assemblymember Fong, Unite LA, the California Opportunity Youth Network, and Youth Will. For ABMOC, youth apprenticeship is about more than workforce development. It's about ensuring that young people, particularly those who have been historically facing barriers and opportunities and who have been disconnected, have access to real pathways to quality employment mentorship and the opportunity to live self lives Across California we continue to see a troubling disconnect Employers in critical industries are searching for talent, while young people are struggling to access the networks, experiences, and opportunities that lead to good jobs. Apprenticeship has long been one of the most effective ways to bridge that gap, by allowing people to earn while they learn, build skills, and enter careers without taking on significant debt. AB 805 helped strengthen that pathway by creating the Career Apprenticeship Bridge Program and providing students with earlier exposure to apprenticeship opportunities and career-connected learning. Just as importantly, the bill recognizes that successful youth apprenticeship systems require strong partnerships among schools, employers, labor, community organizations, and regional intermediaries working together to support young people's success. As a member of the California Youth Apprenticeship Committee, ABMOC was proud to participate in the collaborative process that informs this legislation. The committee brought together labor, employers, educators, workforce leaders, community organizations, and youth representatives to develop recommendations for a stronger statewide youth apprenticeship system. AB805 reflects an important step towards implementing that vision. For working families across California, access to high-quality career pathways can be a life-changing experience. This bill helps create stronger connections between education, apprenticeship, and employment while investing in the next generation of California's workforce. We respectfully ask for your aye vote. Thank you. Thank you. Just on time. Appreciate that. Are there any Me Too's in support of this bill? Please step forward and state your name and affiliation. Good morning. Ruth Sosa on behalf of PowerCA Action in support. Nicole Morales on behalf of Children Now in strong support. Pooja Lal on behalf of NextGen California in support. Sophia Quach on behalf of the Bay Area Council in support. Good morning. LeAngela Reid on behalf of CARA, the California Association of Career and College Readiness Organizations in strong support. Michael Henning on behalf of the California Alliance of Child and Family Services in support. We will now move to opposition. Are there any opposition key witnesses? If so, please come to the table. Seeing none, any opposition Me Too's in the audience? Seeing none, we will come to the dais members. Any comments, questions? Well, Assemblymember, we don't have a quorum yet. We are acting as a subcommittee. When the time is right, we will bring this back to the members for a vote. In the meantime, would you like to close? Thank you so much, Madam Chair and Senators. I really appreciate all the comments from our lead witnesses as well. I would certainly ask for an aye vote when appropriate. Thank you. Thank you. Okay, we are going to go back to file order, and that is file item number five and six. We will take up together, and that's Assemblymember Ortega. Any witnesses you have are welcome to sit at the table for file item number five. Hi Good morning Thank you Madam Chair and Senators for the opportunity to present AB 1576 today AB 1576 makes necessary reforms to the subsequent injury benefit trust fund This bill makes a series of thoughtful changes that will reduce litigation costs, reduce medical legal costs and reduce the number of 100% disability cases. The cumulative impact will reduce employer assessments by 20 to 25 percent while maintaining the lessened financial risk to employers who give previously disabled workers a second chance. My witness today is former Assemblymember Alberto Tirico with the California Applicants Attorneys Association. Mr. Tirico, you have two minutes. Good morning, Madam Chair. Thank you. I want to thank the author for her work on this important topic. I think the bill is a reflection and an understanding that there is a serious problem with the SIBTF. I will note that the problem has many roots, but a couple of them are severe staffing shortages in the agency. That's acknowledged by the administration because they've requested more staff in their budget, and I think the legislature has granted those requests. And it also stems largely from a decision in the case called TODD, T-O-D-D, which significantly expanded the eligibility of workers to apply for the SIBTF program. This bill takes many of the RAND recommendations and applies them to significantly reduce not only the cost, as mentioned by Assemblymember Ortega, but also the number of cases that can be processed. One of the biggest challenges and one of the biggest objections that we have to the administration's proposal is that they want to apply the changes they're looking for retroactively. They want to apply them to all of the 25,000 to 35,000 cases that are open. Many of those cases have been litigated over many, many years. In our research, we have never found an instance where workers' comp benefits were either increased or decreased retroactively. Those were always prospective. So the notion that these benefits would be cut after years of litigation and after years of workers going through the process seems completely unfair. We also note that the Todd decision is not a court decision. It's a decision brought by the Workers' Compensation Appeals Board, which is entirely made up of gubernatorial appointees. It was a unanimous decision. We are ready to try to resolve this problem. We think the approach in this bill is much better than what the administration has proposed, but we do recognize there is an issue, and we hope to find a resolution either through this bill or through the budget process. But because of the magnitude of this situation, we think a bill is a much more appropriate venue. Thank you. Respectfully ask for an vote. Thank you. Are there any other Me Too's in support of this bill? Please state your name and affiliation at the mic. Thank you, Madam Chair and Senators. Evan Corder on behalf of the California Coalition of Injured Workers in support. Thank you. Any others? Okay, we will move to opposition. There's opposition key witnesses. Please come and take a seat at the table. Thank you Madam Chair and members My name is Jason Schmelzer I here today on behalf of the California Coalition on Workers Compensation and Public Risk Innovation Solutions and Management or PRISM We are respectfully opposed to AB 1576 by Assemblymember Ortega, but I do want to take a moment to thank the Assemblymember for her efforts. We disagree on the bill, but she was the first person in the legislature to raise the issue and attempt to do something about it, so I just want to acknowledge that here at the beginning. We may disagree with the Assemblymember and her sponsors about the details of her proposal. We are quite thankful that the legislature as a whole and the Newsom administration have stepped up to fix what is clearly broken. The analysis does a great job of walking through the history of the subsequent injuries benefit trust fund and the importance of the fund to the workers who need it, those that it was intended for. What we have today is an entirely unintended litigation free-for-all that has led to bad results all around. For the injured workers who should access the fund, it means longer wait times to get their claims processed and a delay in their benefits. For the state that bears the administrative burden, it means an ever-increasing workload that is quite difficult and expensive to manage. And for the private and public sector employers that fund the SIBTF, it means massive and mounting liability. Again, we want to thank the legislature for working through the problem. If we're looking for a comprehensive solution that resolves all of the issues with the SIBTF, we don't feel AB 1576 is the right choice. Governor Newsom's proposed trailer bill, on the other hand, addresses all of the issues outlined in the RAND and LAO reports, and we would prefer that as an outcome. I have Michael Pisani here today. Michael is the claims manager from the school's insurance authority, and we'll walk through the sort of substantive differences between the two proposals. You may proceed. Good afternoon, Madam Chair and members. I'm here today on behalf of Schools Insurance Authority as a member of CCWC in opposition to AB 1576. School districts across California are facing significant financial pressures. In addition to rising costs associated with AB 218 and subsequent legislation, districts are now confronting rapidly increasing SIBTF assessments. These pressures are directly diverting resources away from classrooms, student services, and staffing. These are fixed costs that must be paid, and schools can regrettably only spend each dollar once. Every additional dollar spent on the SIBTF is a dollar that can't be spent on students. The recent amendments to AB 1576 moved the bill significantly backwards. They removed the improvements that had previously been incorporated by the author and largely returned the bill to the framework that was vetoed by the governor last year. More importantly, AB 1576 does not address the core concerns identified by the RAND study and the Legislative Analyst's Office. RAND and the LAO identified primary drivers behind the explosive growth in the SIBTF costs and recommended structural reforms to restore the program to its intended purpose. The administration's trailer bill directly addresses those recommendations. AB 1576 does not. The result is a system that now faces approximately $30 billion in existing liability that continues to add $2 to $3 billion every year. Those costs only fall on public entities throughout California, including schools, cities and counties, and the state itself. There are important technical differences between AB 1576 and the trailer bill, and I'd be happy to answer any questions about that. However, at a high level, the choice before the legislature is whether to pursue comprehensive reforms recommended by land, supported by the legislative analyst's office, and advanced by the administration, or to continue with the proposal that does not address the underlying causes of this fiscal crisis. My grandma always told me difficult work doesn't get easier by waiting. That's exactly what we're facing here. If we don't address this problem today, we'll continue to pay for it tomorrow at a much greater cost. For these reasons, we respectfully oppose AB 1576 and support the trailer bill. Thank you. Thank you. Are there any other opposition Me Too's in the audience? Please step to the mic and state your name and affiliation. Mark Seckman of the American Property Capital Insurance Association also opposed. Clifton Wilson on behalf of the Board of Supervisors for Fresno and Kern both in opposition. Thank you. Good morning. Eric Lohr on behalf of the California State Association of Counties in respectful opposition. Thank you. Andy Liebenbaum County of Los Angeles. We align our opposition to PRISM. Thank you very much. Chair Senator Dean Grafiel with Capital Advocacy here on behalf of the California Hospital Association opposed to AB 1576. Thank you. Good morning. Andrea Lynch on behalf of the California Chamber of Commerce and Respectable Opposition. Sarah Decay on behalf of the Rural County Representatives of California in opposition. Matthew Easley on behalf of the Associated General Contractors of California and as well as the San Diego Chapter in opposition. Thank you. Okay. That looks like the end of our Me Too's. Members, member, no comment? Okay. We are in a subcommittee. Obviously, we're waiting for our quorum to get established, and we will take this bill up shortly. Would you like to close, Assemblymember? Yes. Thank you, Madam Chair and member, for the opportunity to present today. I also want to thank the opposition for their remarks and acknowledging the fact that I have taken on such a big issue, and in a couple of years have been working on this issue because it is comprehensive, it is massive, and it should be transparent. What the opposition felt to mention is that they're currently trying to move this through the trailer bill process, which does not allow for us to have these kinds of conversations and input. And that's why you have this bill before you today. And when the time comes, I respectfully ask for your aye vote. Thank you very much. and we will be taking it up shortly. Thank you. And now we're going to move to your next bill, Assemblymember, file item number six. Thank you. Thank you. again Madam Chair and members for allowing me to present AB 1582 today. For decades the University of California has contracted out service worker jobs and replaced them with cheaper labor. In 2020 AFSCME 3299 and UC signed a contract establishing a general prohibition on contracting out of workers at UC. Under the agreement should UC decide to outsource jobs and a disagreement arises, the outsourcing contract must be reviewed in an expedited arbitration. Despite this agreement, UC has disregarded any arbitrator decision they do not like. AB 1582 makes it an unfair labor practice for a higher education employer to circumvent or disregard an arbitrator's decision or refuse to schedule arbitrations in a timely manner. The bill also requires relief for a violation of these provisions to include the charging party's attorney's fees and costs. My witnesses today in support are Andrew Martinez with Ask Me Local 3299 and Kate Hallward Ask Me 3299 Counsel to help answer any questions Thank you and you each have two minutes Good morning My name is Andrew Martinez I work at UCLA as a senior custodian On behalf of ASME 3299, the frontline service workers at the University of California, we support the bill. For decades, UC has contracted out our jobs and replaced us with lower paid people who didn't get decent benefits. Today, our collective bargaining agreements have an arbitration process to settle disputes related to contracting out our jobs. UC is ignoring this agreed-upon process and ignoring the agreed-upon arbitrator's decisions. So even if we win at arbitration, UC doesn't allow for an arbitrator's decision and instead makes us do it all over again and again at our own expense and years of delay. So even if we win at arbitration, I'm sorry, at UCLA it took us four years, three arbitrations, and a court ruling. This was for cafeteria workers who were contracted out by a UC and shouldn't have been. Workers will never get back what was lost over those four years. This bill won't reopen any underlying dispute, and it won't change what happened. We are asking that future arbitration decisions mean something. Thank you for your consideration. Good morning, Chair and member. My name is Kate Hallward. I'm counsel to ask me $32.99, and I'm here for any technical questions that you may have. Thank you. I see we have some Me Too's in support of this bill. Please step to the mic. Each state your name and affiliation. Good morning. My name is Jasmine Cohen. I am a certified occupational therapy assistant and member of $32.99, and I support this bill. Good morning. I'm Veronica Rendon, pharmacy technician, also a member of AFSCME 3299, and I support this bill. Good morning. My name is Norma Alvarez, and I'm a pharmacy technician, and I'm also part of AFSCME 3299, and I support this bill. Good morning. My name is Brenda Mendoza, member of ASME 3299, and I'm a hospital unit service coordinator, and I support this bill. My name is Story Johnson, and I'm an LVN, and I'm a member of ASME 3299, and I support this bill. Good morning. My name is Deborah Gutierrez, and I'm a patient service coordinator, also a member of 3299, and I support this bill. Good morning. My name is Janisha Hosley. I'm a medical assistant. I am also a member of ASME 3299, and I am in support of this bill. Good morning. My name is Erica Ritonang, and I am a mental health worker and also a member of ASME 3299. I stand in support of IAB 1582. Thank you. Hi, my name is Francine Cruz. I'm a senior custodian. I'm a member of ASME 3299, and I am in support. Good morning. My name is Sarojini Devi, and my job title is Senior Custodian, and I'm a member of AFSCME 3299. I stand in support of AB 1582. Thank you. Good morning I Dallas I a PSR and member of ASME 3299 I support this bill Good morning My name is Tamara I am in support of 1582 for AFSCME 3299 Good morning. My name is Dawn Rivera. I'm a patient service representative and with AFSCME 3299 and I support this bill. Good morning. My name is Angelina Velasquez. I'm a food service worker and a member of 3299 and I support this bill. Matt Broad for Teamsters California in support. Thank you. Janice O'Malley AFSCME California in strong support. Thank you. Good morning Doug Subbers on behalf of the California State University Employees Union in support. Thanks. Jason Henderson on behalf of the Faculty Association of California Community Colleges in support. Thank you. Elmer Lazardi on behalf of the California Federation of Labor Unions in support. Mario Guerrero on behalf of the California Faculty Association in support. Thank you. Randy Perry on behalf of PORAC in support. Katherine Beer Houston, United Steelworkers District 12 in support. Okay, that concludes our support witnesses. Do we have opposition witnesses here today? Key witnesses, you may have a seat at the table. Thank you. Support witnesses. And you both have two minutes. Okay. Good morning, Madam Chair and members of the committee. My name is Melissa Mattella, Associate Vice President for Systemwide Employee and Labor Relations for the University of California. The university must continue to oppose AB 1582 for three fundamental reasons. First, the UC and AFSCME have recently negotiated a collective bargaining agreement and settlement agreements related to Article 5. The union should not be able to use the legislative process to get concessions from the university that it was not able to obtain at the table, nor should it be able to unilaterally rewrite the party's collective bargaining agreements. Second, this bill is not necessary. The party's agreements have negotiated an agreement agreed upon remedies for arbitrator decisions, including contract termination. Third, the bill punishes patients and students by creating a blunt and unnecessary ban on critical services at a time when they are needed most across our system. Going through each point in more detail, in 2020, UC and ASME did carefully negotiate a comprehensive contracting out framework found in Article 5. That agreement explicitly balances a shared commitment to our internal workforce with narrow and common sense vital exceptions, including for emergencies, temporary staffing shortages, and operational continuity. It also requires UC to pay wage and benefit parity to all of these outside workers. Just last month, after two and a half years of negotiations, the parties successfully reached an agreement for these critical workers. Notably, during those two and a half years, 1582's provisions did not come up in negotiations, nor did they come up in the several recent settlement agreements the parties negotiated regarding remediation processes for Article 5. Second, Article AB 1582 is not required. Article 5, again, already contains robust agreed-upon remedies for violations, and I wanted to say explicitly arbitrators can cancel contracts, and under our settlement agreements, we have agreed to contract provisions that require termination and then also have a remediation framework should the UC not provide wage and benefit parity to these workers. Third and most importantly this does prevent us from providing patient and student services at a time when they needed most across the system This would mean that one violation of the more than 50 compliance obligations in Article 5 and the related obligations could cut services at a time when they needed most And with that, I'll turn it over to Christine. Thank you. Good afternoon, Chair and member of the committee. My name is Christine Williams, and I am the Chief Nursing Executive at UC Davis Health. I am here to voice the university's opposition to Assembly Bill 1582 due to the severe direct risks it poses to patient care and hospital operations. As a Level 1 Adult and Pediatric Trauma Center and Primary Safety Net provider, UC Davis Health operates a fluid 24-hour environment. To maintain safe patient care, we rely on the narrow critical exceptions present in Regents Policy 5402 and Article 5 of our labor agreements. These terms explicitly allow us to contract for temporary services, including during acute staffing shortages, public health emergencies, and unforeseen patient surges. AB 1582 threatens to cripple this operational lifeline. Because the bill would apply a localized penalty, a contracting dispute or minor infraction at a hospital department could trigger a blanket prohibition on same or similar contracted services at the entire UC Davis Health facility here in Sacramento. If UC Davis Health is locked into a systematic ban and prohibited from utilizing specialized contract staffing or emergency support during a shortage, the consequences will be real and immediate. It will create severe operational body necks, dangerously increased ED wait times, and force us to divert or deny critical patients who need us the most. Three examples of vulnerable patient populations reliant on us are neonatal transplant and burn specialty care services, to name just a few. These patients rely on specialized, flexible, and rapidly deployable care teams to respond to unpredictable and often life-threatening patient needs. In neonatal care, acuity and volume shift abruptly. Having the right care teams are needed to prevent adverse outcomes in these very vulnerable, critically small infants. Similarly, transplant services operate within narrow clinical windows, timing is imperative, and the inability to mobilize appropriate teams will impact organ viability and patient survival. Burn care requires intensive, resource-heavy interventions. The inability to scale staffing could compromise both patient outcomes and staff safety in highly demanding care settings. Your two minutes is up. Please wrap your statement now. For the sake of our patients, we respectfully request your no vote on AB 1582. Thank you. Are there any opposition Me Too's out there? Please state your name and affiliation. Good morning. Andrea Lynch on behalf of the California Chamber of Commerce and respectful opposition. Jean Hurst here today on behalf of the California Association of Public Hospitals and Health Systems and respectful opposition. Sophia Kwach on behalf of the Bay Area Council and respectful opposition. Eric Baku at the California State University and respectful opposition. That looks like it concludes our opposition. Me too. Any statements, comments? We are, again, still in our subcommittee form, and we'll take this up later when members come. And I want to appreciate the author for bringing this bill forward. It's incredibly important that we do all that we can to protect the arbitration process. and to support workers through that effort. I know this is a dual referred to judiciary next, and so I will make sure that we... Bring this up when when our quorum is in place and with that you may close When it's appropriate I would like to ask for an I vote. Thank you very much Thank you. Okay, we are going to establish a quorum, and then we will move to Assemblymember Calusa, who's been waiting patiently. Senator Small Cuevas? Present. Small Cuevas? Present. Senator Strickland? Here. Strickland? Here. Senator Cortese? Here. Cortese? Here. Cluedozo? Laird? Okay. We have a quorum. So we will move to Assemblymember Calusa. Please come forward. If you have witnesses, they are welcome to sit at the front table. You may proceed. Good morning. Thank you, Chair and Senators of the Committee for this opportunity to present AB 1630. Thank you as well to the Committee consultants and staff for all your hard work on this bill. AB 1630 authorizes union representatives to invite members of the bargaining unit to observe, meet, and confer sessions. It's a thoughtful and balanced measure that strengthens transparency, trust, and engagement in the collective bargaining process while maintaining the integrity of negotiations and respecting the realities faced by public employers. For many workers, collective bargaining can feel out of reach, something that happens behind closed doors with outcomes that deeply affect their livelihoods, yet without clear visibility into how some of those decisions are made. Allowing more members of the bargaining unit to observe negotiations remotely builds meaningful trust in union leadership and strength and solidarity across the bargaining unit. And ultimately, this will foster more informed and engaged workplaces. We believe that in the bargaining process, and it can be improved when more union members have the opportunities to engage. And for this bill specifically, we know that some members of the bargaining unit have really demanding schedules that do not allow for them to be there in person, like our medical residents and our internists. And so allowing them the flexibility to observe remotely is critically important to their participation. With me to testify in support is Sandra Barrero with SEIU California. Thank you, and you have two minutes. Thank you, Madam Chair and members. Sandra Barrero on behalf of SEIU California. We are the sponsors of this bill. Between 50 and 70 percent of medical residents experience depression and burnout. It's largely due to the demands of their schedules and also being placed in areas where they have no existing social support network The union is a social support network It provides a sense of belonging and also control over one working conditions However, medical residents still can't access meaningful union participation due to the demands of their schedule. This bill would make union participation more accessible by providing remote observers a way to observe without participating in local bargaining sessions. They can participate whenever their schedule allows from their phone. And, of course, hosts can disable audio and cameras to make sure that there are no disruptions. CIR negotiates with universities in other states that provide observers with remote access. and they found that it has actually reduced the number of bargaining sessions needed to reach an agreement. In California, CIR has been negotiating with the UC for almost a year, and they're very motivated to reach an agreement as soon as possible. This bill is a simple way to recognize the sacrifices that medical residents make to work. They work 24-hour shifts without sleep, and we should acknowledge that their schedules prevent them from being able to meaningfully engage. I respectfully request your aye vote. Thank you. Thank you. Do we have any me-tos in support of this bill? Please come to the mic and state your name and affiliation. Matt Broad for Teamsters California in support. Mario Guerrero with the California Faculty Association in support. Thank you. Thank you, Madam Chair. Doug Zubers on behalf of the California State University Employees Union in support. Elmer Lazardi on behalf of the California Federation of Labor Units in support. Mitch Steiger with CFT, a union of educators and classified professionals, also in support. Thank you. We will move to opposition. Are there any opposition witnesses? Please come to the table. Support witnesses, you may have a seat. And you each have two minutes. Good morning Chair and members. Eric Bakke on behalf of the California State University here in respectful opposition to this bill. Let me begin by saying we appreciate the conversations we've had with the bill's sponsors and their willingness to engage on our concerns. While the CSU supports the goal of transparency and access in collective bargaining, we believe this issue is best addressed through the collective bargaining process itself, consistent with HERA and the longstanding PERB decisions. AB 1630 would remove from the bargaining table a subject that PERB has expressly determined must be negotiated between the parties. Current law already allows employers and unions to mutually agree on whether observers may attend bargaining sessions and under what conditions. Additionally, we have concerns that the bill introduces significant ambiguity by allowing one or more observers to attend at the exclusive representative's discretion without establishing any parameters around attendance. Those details matter. Questions regarding the number of observers, logistics, confidentiality, and the conduct of bargaining sessions are best resolved by the parties through negotiated ground rules. Left undefined and subject to one party's discretion, the bill risks complicating bargaining sessions and undermining the candid dialogue that is often necessary to reach agreements. We believe the existing process provides the flexibility needed to address the differing needs of bargaining units while preserving productive labor relations For these reasons we respectfully request a no vote on AB 1630 Good afternoon, Madam Chair and committee members. Missy Mattela, Associate Vice President for Systemwide Employee and Labor Relations at the University of California. The university similarly supports the goal of transparency in this bill, but we respectfully oppose AB 1630 because we believe in the productive two-party bargaining system that has worked well for the last several decades and that gives the parties the ability to define the rules that work well for their negotiations. From a practical labor relations perspective, UC has successfully closed six contracts over the last nine months. We have been able to do that through productive and candid conversations between our bargaining teams. These bargaining teams have been large enough to fully represent the university and the union's interests while also ensuring that the parties maintain a focused environment for these important conversations between the union and the institutions. As PERB recognized in the Petaluma decision, bargaining depends on this type of atmosphere. This bill would fundamentally shift away from this proven model to a legislatively mandated model that invites observers into the process without the consent or negotiation of the parties, and at which, at this point, seems more focused on the rights of the observers than the rights of the parties to the negotiation. This is especially true given the bill's amendments that indicate that an observer is not a passive participant. Implementing this bill would also create a significant logistical and technical burden. The universities would need to secure authenticated platforms capable of hosting thousands of potentially observers across our entire system. Many of our unions are more than 30,000 members, which would create significant problems. We believe that maintaining the flexibility to determine observation protocols through the collective bargaining process best serves both all parties involved. It allows us to keep our negotiations efficient, collaborative, and tailored to the unique needs of the unit, a process that has worked well for the university for decades. Thank you. Thank you very much. We are going to go to opposition Me Too's. Are there any opposition Me Too's in the room? Please state your name and affiliation. Hello, Sophia Quach on behalf of the Bay Area Council and respectful opposition. Okay, that looks like we're concluding. Bring it to the dais members. Questions, comments? I'm in support of the bill and happy to make a motion that we have a quorum. Wonderful. So we have a motion. Thank you. We'll leave that and give our member an opportunity to close. Thank you, Chair. Thanks to the sponsors of the bill, SEIU California and SEIU CIR specifically. I appreciate the opposition for coming forward, sharing your opinion, but have to, you know, really disagree with the framing of this bill. We're essentially allowing for our medical residents and internists to get a Zoom link who are already part of the bargaining unit. And so this is, you know, should not be controversial. We're trying to give them the flexibility that they need so that they can actually participate remotely. And they are, again, already part of the bargaining unit. And so I hope that you see in the CSU come on board in a good faith effort since you have rejected all efforts to allow for this remote participation currently. and that's why this bill is before us today. And so I look forward to future conversations and I respectfully ask for your aye vote. Thank you so much And we will take this bill up Oh well we can we take it up We have a quorum We have a motion from Senator Cortese And assistant please call the roll Motion is due pass to the Senate Committee on Appropriations. Senator Smaller Cuevas? Aye. Smaller Cuevas, aye. Senator Strickland? No. Strickland, no. Senator Cortese? Aye. Cortese, aye. Senator Durazo? Senator Laird? We have a vote of two to one. This bill is on call. Thank you. We are going to move to the consent calendar. Can I get a motion? Thank you. Senator Strickland, assistant, please call the roll. On the consent calendar, we have file item 4, AB 1245, file item 9, AB 1980, file item 14, AB 2417, and file item 18, AB 2780. Senator Smollett-Cuevas? Aye. Smollett-Cuevas, aye. Senator Strickland? Aye. Strickland, aye. Senator Cortese? Aye. Cortese, aye. Senator Durazo? Senator Laird? We have a vote of 3-0 on the consent calendar. It is on call. Looks like we are waiting for authors now. Madam Chair, do we want to go back and pick up the non-quorums that we had? I think there were several of them. Absolutely. So we're going to make the request for motions. I know you did several earlier, Senator Cortese. So we're going to go file item number 1, AB 1729. So moved. We have a motion. from Senator Cortese. Please call the roll. The motion is due pass to the Senate Committee on Governmental Organization. Senator Small Cuevas? Aye. Small Cuevas, aye. Senator Strickland? No. Strickland, no. Senator Cortese? Aye. Cortese, aye. Senator Durazo? Senator Laird? Okay, we have a vote of two to one on that bill. It's on call. We will move to file item number 2, AB 72. Move. Got a motion from Senator Cortese. Please call the roll. The motion is due pass to the Senate Committee on Appropriations. Senator Smaller Cuevas? Aye. Smaller Cuevas, aye. Senator Strickland? No. Strickland, no. Senator Cortese? Aye. Cortese, aye. Senator Durazo? Senator Laird? That bill has a vote of 2 to 1, and it is on call. We will move on to file item number 3, AB805, Assemblymember Fong. Move, move, move. We got a motion from Senator Strickland. Please call the roll. The motion is due pass as amended to the Senate Committee on Appropriations. Senator Small Cuevas? Aye. Small Cuevas, aye. Senator Strickland? Aye. Strickland, aye. Senator Cortese? Aye. Cortese, aye. Senator Durazo? Senator Laird? Okay, that bill has a vote of 3-0. It is on call. Moving on to file item number 5, AB 1576. We need a motion? Moved. We have a motion from Senator Cortese. Please call the roll. The motion is due pass to the Senate Committee on Appropriations. Senator Small Cuevas? Aye. Small Cuevas, aye. Senator Strickland? No. Strickland, no. Senator Cortese? Aye. Cortese, aye. Senator Durazo? Senator Laird? Okay, that bill has a vote of 2-1. It is on call. We will move on to file item number 6, AB 1582 Ortega. Need a motion? Moved. Thank you, Senator Cortese. Please call the roll. The motion is due pass to the Senate Committee on Judiciary. Senator Smallwood. Aye. Senator Strickland? No. Strickland, no. Senator Cortese? Aye. Cortese, aye. Senator Durazo? Senator Laird? Okay, we have a vote of 2 to 1, and that bill is on call. We are going to move on to file item number 8. Oh, we did that. We just voted on that. Okay, so we are, I think, done with our previous bills, and we are waiting on Assemblymember Valencia. Oh, Assemblymember Pellerin, right on time. Early. Wonderful. So we are going to move to file item number 16, and that's AB 2650. And any witnesses, please come and have a seat at the table. Let's see who I have. Yes. Good to see you. Okay. I was hurrying and trying to block anyone else from coming in the door. And you were successful. Begin when you're ready. Good morning, Madam Chair and members. Retirement savings, while important for everyone to have, many do not plan for it until it's too late. Planning for retirement in today's economy has become increasingly more difficult to attain. As of 2020, over one-fourth of non-retired adults and two-thirds of millennials do not have any form of retirement savings. Cal Savers was created by this body in 2016 to tackle California's retirement savings crisis. Since its launch in 2019, California has seen private employer plans grow by 15 percent, with Cal Savers adding more than 630,000 accounts to supplement that coverage. However, multiple problems are facing the CalSAVERS program, which have affected implementation and require updating. AB 2650, the Save for All Workers Act, makes several technical updates to modernize the law, bringing the program closer to sustainability and maintaining employer compliance over time. Furthermore, it allows CalSAVERS to assist participants in claiming government retirement benefits by cutting red tape, which can result in an increase of $136 million a year. The bill also clarifies that domestic employees are included in the program, ensuring that they have access to the same retirement as their boss. With me to testify in support is CalSAVER's Executive Director, David... Take hearts. Take hearts. Thank you. Take hearts. Wonderful. Thank you so much. You have two minutes. Thank you very much, Madam Chair, members of the committee and Assemblymember. I'm David Teckhardt. I'm the exec director for CalSavers. CalSavers is California's state-run retirement savings program for workers whose employers do not offer a retirement plan like a 401K, which gives millions of Californians the opportunity to have a simple, portable, and low-cost way to save for their retirement. Today, CalSavers is already operating at scale. We have about 77,000 businesses that are actually running the program. We have now approached now 700,000 individual savers in the program, so it's growing and it's working right now. We have $2 billion in assets under management. The bill before you today is a technical but important cleanup bill that helps the program to operate just more efficiently, more effectively, while clarifying details that were not really fully addressed in the original framework many years ago. Among the key elements are the following. It would help ensure that the program can create the correct account types so that eligible participants can receive federal Savers Match funds smoothly and without unnecessary friction That the big one Free money easily into the accounts from the federal government It would raise the cap on annual contribution increases for participants from 8% to 10%, getting us in line with industry best practices and helping Savers actually accumulate enough money to eventually retire. It clarifies that penalties for continued employer noncompliance are indeed ongoing, not just a one-time slap on the wrist. And lastly, it confirms that household employers, basically with wage-paid workers in their homes, are indeed covered and mandated, consistent with the program's original intent. The bill also includes smaller technical fixes, including dates and administrative clarifications to make the program easier to administer and for folks to understand exactly what their obligations are. In short, the bill just strengthens CalSAVERS so that we can continue to close the retirement savings access gap for working Californians. Thank you. Happy to take any questions or turn to Assemblymember. Thank you. Thank you. Any Me Too's in support of this bill, please come to the mic and state your name and affiliation. Peter Hansel here on behalf of AARP California in strong support. Thank you. Okay, we will move to opposition. Is there an opposition witness or witnesses here? Seeing none. Any opposition me-toos? Seeing none. We will bring it to the members. Questions, comments? Okay, we have a motion from Senator Cortese. And I want to just say thank you to the author for this bill, and I want to also thank Treasurer Fiona Ma for sponsoring this bill. In an ideal world, Social Security would cover it all, but we don't live in that world. And some of us don't have pensions, speaking as a member of the California State Legislature. And so these programs are, yes, incredibly important. We need to do better. Cal Savers is a really good start. It's already creating so many retirement accounts. I'm glad to hear the progress in terms of the assets. This bill smartly gives Cal Savers clear authority and guidance to set up the special IRAs for workers to capture federal Savers match contributions, which is critically important. And I recognize the need for this bill to enhance penalties to deal with those outlaw employers, those employers who don't do the right thing. But I do have concerns, particularly about our economically and culturally vulnerable small employers who oftentimes don't get access to information, don't know how to do the right thing, and in some instances need technical assistance to understand how they do that. I'm supporting the bill today, of course, but I hope the author will work on this question about how do we inform those employers who have just one employee to make sure that our minority and very small businesses, those that need culturally appropriate outreach in terms of language, in terms of one-on-one support, that they get it to be able to do the right thing and ensure that every worker is able to participate in this program. And so with that, we have a motion from Senator Cortese, but I will invite you to close. I respectfully ask for your aye vote. Thank you. Assistant, please call the roll. The motion is due pass to the Senate Committee on Revenue and Taxation. Senator Small DeCuevas Aye Small pique was aye Senator Strickland Senator Cortese Aye Cortese aye Strickland no Strickland no Senator Durazo Senator Laird We have a vote of two to one on that bill. It is on call. Thank you very much. Thank you. I see Assemblymember Gibson is in the House, so we will move back up to file item number 12. If you have witnesses, they may have a seat at the front table. Begin when you're ready. Thank you very much, Madam Chair and members. Thank you for allowing me to present Assembly Bill 2054. Assembly Bill 2054 ensures equitable access to paid family leave for eligible relatives for military service members. In California, we recognize that when a service member is called to duty, their entire family is called to service alongside them. State law provides unemployment insurance benefits to military families to help them manage real-life impact of employment. Things like arranging child care, handling financial and legal matters, and preparing for long periods of separation from their families. This support exists because we understand that military service creates sudden and significant disruptions at the homes. However, the current status, the current statute does not reflect the full range of modern service, military service. Today, service members may be deployed overseas, activated here at home in response to natural disasters or emergencies, or assigned to extensive training in preparation for future deployment. Despite similar in sacrifice or disruptions, not all of these assignments are treated equally under existing law. As a result, families can face confusion, inconsistencies, or inabilities that they face within here at home or through their deployment. That means a service member's responding to a wildfire or flood or other emergencies here in California may be protecting our communities while worrying about their families here at home. Assembly Bill 2054 addresses these gaps by updating and clarifying the definition of coverage active duties to reflect a reality of modern-day military service here at home. Here with me to provide testimony to Assembly Bill 2054 and provide technicals, any technical questions you may have, will be Veronica, please pronounce your last name. Well please yes is the United States Navy personnel who will be here to testify in support of Assembly Bill 2054 and we happy to have her here Thank you very much Thank you You have two minutes Good morning, Chair, Senators. My name is Veronica Padillo. I'm here representing Navy Region Southwest on behalf of the military services in California, as well as the Defense State Liaison Office, who is a sponsor of this bill and unfortunately couldn't be here today. Our service members face unique challenges that go beyond foreign deployments. Today's military duty frequently includes domestic mobilizations and extended large-scale training exercises right here in the United States. Additionally, there are other circumstances or examples such as the COVID pandemic where several medical military personnel mobilized throughout the country in support of many of the major hospitals to serve as backfill services. And they were there for several months. What was supposed to be a few weeks turned into a very long mobilization. During these periods of service, military spouses and family members often need to take time away from their work to handle qualifying extengencies. This includes certain necessities like securing child care or making critical legal and financial arrangements. AB 2054 enhances the state's unemployment insurance program. And as the Assemblymember mentioned, this critical update ensures the program reflects the actual realities of modern-day military service and functions as originally intended. The well-being and readiness of our service members are directly linked to the stability of their families. We deeply appreciate California's significant efforts to support our service members and their communities. AB 2054 is a common-sense measure that strengthens that commitment. We respectfully request your support on this bill. Thank you. Thank you. And as a daughter of a Navy veteran, go Navy. Any Me Too's in support of this bill, please step to the mic and state your name and affiliation. Ned McKinley with Marine Corps Installations West in support. Okay, we will move to opposition. Are there any opposition witnesses with us today? Seeing none, we will move to opposition Me Too's. Any opposition Me Too's? Okay. To the DICE members. Move the bill. Move the bill. Okay. We have a motion from Senator Strickland. Would you like to close, Assemblymember? Yes. I want to thank our witness, one, for her service to this country, and then also her testifying on behalf of the men and women who will benefit from this measure. We believe that those who not only protect us abroad but also in case of a natural disaster or any kind of emergency here at home who are called to duty should be treated equally as they do taken abroad because their family, again, when they're called to duty, the family is also called to duty and should not suffer behind even if they're deployed here at home. We witnessed the Eden and the Palisades fire where we had military being deployed and they should also be taken care of. And that's one of the reasons why this bill is so important for those men and women, but most of all, those families who also are, in fact, need to be taken care of based on this particular bill. We believe this measure is needed. It speaks to the day and time that we're living in right now. I respectfully ask for an aye vote. This is a common sense measure. And respectfully, I'd ask for a strong aye vote. Thank you very much. Thank you, Assemblymember. We have a motion from Senator Strickland. Let's call the roll. The motion is due pass to the Senate Committee on Military and Veteran. Fares. Senator Smolt-Huevas. Aye. Smolt-Huevas, aye. Senator Strickland. Aye. Strickland, aye. Senator Cortese. Aye. Cortese, aye. Senator Durazo. Senator Laird. We have a vote of 3-0. The bill is on call. We'll take it up when the members return. Thank you, Assemblymember. Thank you. Okay, we are looking for authors in the Senate Labor, Public Employment, and Retirement Committee. Come on down, room 2200. We're ready for you. That is Assemblymember Valencia, Berman, Connolly, Schribo, Petrie Norris. Please join us, room 2200. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you Thank you Thank you. Thank you. Thank you Thank you. Thank you. Thank you Thank you. Thank you. Thank you Thank you. Thank you. Thank you Okay, we have an author in our midst. Wonderful. We are going to move to file item number 13. That's AB 2157. December member Conley, please join us. If you have a witness, they are welcome to have a seat at the table. Thank you, Chair and members. Good morning. Great to be here. Proud to present AB 2157, which will make the Displaced Oil and Gas Workers Fund pilot program, commonly known as DOGWF, permanent in California statute. Currently, DogWoof is the only state program of its kind that helps address the needs of displaced workers in the oil and gas sector by supporting them in training and transitioning into jobs that match their skills, expertise, and offer comparable wages. As the global economy shifts away from oil and gas production, both extraction and refining, Operational closures have displaced thousands of workers throughout the state. In 2020 and 2021, the Marathon refinery closure in Martinez and the Phillips 66 refinery closure in Santa Maria displaced over 600 full-time workers. In October of 2024, the Phillips 66 refinery in Carson announced its plan to close by the fourth quarter of 2025, with approximately 900 employees and contractors expected to lose their jobs. Additionally, Valero refineries in both Benicia and Wilmington have announced their closures this year. It's important to recognize that displacement in the oil and gas sector is particularly difficult for workers. Almost a third of employees are age 50 or older, and most have spent decades in the industry receiving their training on the job. Traditional retraining pathways, such as multi-year apprenticeship programs in the industrial sector, may not be realistic or appropriate for these workers. Most importantly, it may also not be what workers want. This is why the DogWoof program is so important. It has created the opportunity for workers to engage in diverse pathways to new employment in multiple sectors of the economy. Currently, the DogWoof program is set to expire on July 1 of next year, even though displaced workers will need support long after 2027. AB 2157 addresses this issue by eliminating the sunset date for the Dog Wolf program and making it permanent. With me to testify in support of AB 2157 is Norman Rogers second vice president United Steelworkers Local 675 and Nick Plurkowski President of United Steelworkers Local 5 Thank you, Assemblymember. You both have two minutes. All right. Good morning, everybody. Nick Plurkowski, President of United Steelworkers Local 5, and I just wanted to give a little background on the Displaced Oil and Gas Worker Fund. like mentioned when Marathon shut down in 2020 workers were caught off guard not sure what to do we actually have a study that was published by Dr. Virginia Parks on fossil fuel layoff and it shows the very difficult options that people are put into and the loss of the full wage most people still didn't find a job after a year. So very, very difficult times there. And we represent the proprietary workers in these refineries. So the skill is basically becoming a specialist on these trade secret units that run in there. And so when a worker steps outside the gate, their training, their certifications and everything basically just don't exist. So, you know, historically these have been careers. People spend decades specializing in the units that they run, and they don't transfer from one refinery to another. And when laid off, to go to another refinery would be to start over. And for a lot of people, that's not a great option, especially now with more and more refinery closures. So this bill was kicked off to help, and all the refineries that have been closing just goes to show you the need for this program. So we would like it to continue and get rid of the sunset so that we can finish what we started with this. And I'll pass it off to Norm. Thank you. Good morning. Yeah, to follow up with what Nick's been saying, the heavy work's actually already been done because AB-191 was passed in June of 2022. So the vetting and all that's taken place, but that's when the sunset date came in, making this a pilot program. But we knew then that it was problematic because in 2020, the doing away with internal combustion engines, no new internal combustion engines to be sold in the state of California by 2035, we're already starting to close the curtain and we know that contraction is going to continue to take place with oil refining. So we were happy we got it. We knew it was not going to meet fully what we needed because the need is going to be there beyond 2027. We've had to we've received funds and what we've done is create the California oil worker readiness program and that's through the USW for our folks. Ideally it had been to be a preemptive before people lost their jobs but when Phillips closed it became more of an emergency. But that's to get folks into training and we have our folks working as navigators to guide folks through the program to get them signed up, to get them into the program, to get them the classes they need. All that's taken time to get things where we we need them to be. Now with the sunset coming of next year, somebody that loses their job today, we're already through spring semester, we're almost too late for somebody to sign up in the summer semester, that just leaves fall, and then come March, June of next year, July, that's the end of the program. The need goes well beyond that. And even one of our navigators who's been helping other people, when her refinery closed, she's been helping other people, but now she doesn't have the time to actually take advantage of the program herself. But it's been working. We've had a gentleman that's moved into cybersecurity, and even though that's moved him into an entry-level job, he has that base knowledge now to help him matriculate more quickly with the company he's hired onto. And there's other folks taking drone classes, water treatment classes, crane operation. Folks are moving through. Your two minutes is up. Okay, so we're just finished by please asking for your eye vote. Thank you. Thank you. any me too's in support of this bill please step forward and state your name and affiliation. Clifton Wilson on behalf of the Kern County Board of Supervisors just want to say thank you for the comments to the witness and thank you for the bill to the author. Will Breger from Climate Action California. We recognize that health jobs are healthy and electric vehicles healthy so this is part of the package. Thank you. We support. Catherine Vieira, Houston, on behalf of United Still Workers District 12, the Climate Center, and California Labor for Climate Jobs in support. Grishina Mohabir, California Environmental Voters in support. Thank you. Janice O'Malley, ASME, California in support. Jim Lindberg, Friends Committee on Legislation of California in support. Thank you. Do we have any opposition witnesses with us? Okay, any opposition? Me too. Folks, okay, seeing none, we'll come to the dais. And we have lost our member for a motion. I want to just thank the author for bringing this bill forward, and I really appreciate the testimony of the witnesses today. This is a very difficult space to be in, transitions, right? It's a very difficult space to be in, and the steelworkers know very well how this transition works, and to have an offensive plan as well as a defensive plan, making sure that we can protect these jobs that workers have organized in in the oil and gas field to make them career union jobs, that we have to work together to figure out ways to have a just transition and protect the workers no matter what sector they're in. And I really wanted to appreciate seeing the environmental community here we want to make sure that that coalition is in place, not just for the DOGWOF, which I didn't know was the acronym, but a fund to retrain workers, but also to make sure that we do all that we can to maintain those careers for as long as we can, because we know our state is going to need a number of sources of energy to beat the needs of our communities in the future. So with that, I will give you the opportunity. Oh, you will do a courtesy motion. Okay, wonderful. So we do have a courtesy motion from Senator Strickland, and I will give you the opportunity to close. And thank you so much for that consideration respectfully ask for an aye vote Wonderful Thank you We have a motion from Senator Strickland Please call the roll The motion is due pass to the Senate Committee on Appropriations Senator Small Cuevas? Aye. Small Cuevas, aye. Senator Strickland? No. Strickland, no. Senator Cortese? Senator Durazo? Senator Laird? We have a vote of one to one on this bill. It's on call. Thank you. Thank you. Senator Berman. Oh, I'm promoting, I'm putting you in my house already. I'm sorry about that. Assembly Member Berman, our good chair of Assembly BMP, thank you for being here. We are going to move to your file item number 10, AB 1838. Your witnesses can have a seat at the table. and you please proceed when ready. Thank you, Chair Smallwood-Cuevas and Senator Strickland, Vice Chair Strickland. Vice Chair Strickland, I want to make sure that I get the honorifics appropriate. Is that a thing? I think that's a word. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. It's perfect. AB 1838 would ensure that local agencies can better assess if contractors should be awarded a public works project bid. Existing law requires most public works construction contracts to be awarded to the lowest responsible bidder. Any history of wage and hour violations directly reflects contractor responsibility and is critical information for local agencies to determine who should be trusted with taxpayer dollars. This bill would require a contractor submitting a bid for a public works construction project to disclose any history of wage and hour violations within the previous five years. The bill was recently amended to ensure that contractors don't have to submit duplicative documents, and that there is a notice and appeals process. AB 1838 would help ensure taxpayer dollars are well spent, promote fair labor practices, and increase transparency for local agencies awarding public contracts. And I respectfully ask for an aye vote. And I'm joined today by Keith Dunn with the District Council of Ironworkers. Thank you. And you have two minutes. Thank you, Madam Chair and Mr. Vice Chair. Keith Dunn here on behalf of the District Council of Ironworkers as well as other co-sponsors, the operating engineers, as well as the State Building Construction Trades Council. As was stated, under existing law, most public work construction contracts are required to be awarded to the lowest responsible bidder. And existing law further defines that a responsible bidder is a bidder who has demonstrated the attributes of trustworthiness as well as quality, fitness, capacity, and experience to satisfactorily perform that public work. While existing law is clear on what constitutes a responsible bidder, awarding agencies are often not privy to certain information that could be critical to determining if a contractor is securing taxpayer dollars for a public construction project is actually responsible. One of the main tools that awarding bodies currently use to determine if a contractor is responsible is through verifying their license and public works registrations. as these items can allow an awarding agency to determine whether a contractor has workers' compensation insurance or has been debarred from bidding on public works. While this information is critical, awarding agencies are often not aware of a contractor's history of labor violations, which directly reflect whether a contractor can be considered responsible moving forward on new contracts. Out of recognition of the hour, I'm going to cut short the rest of my testimony and just say I'm here to answer any questions. We think this is a good, responsible bill, and we'd ask for your support. Thank you very much. Are there Me Too folks out there in support of the bill Please come to the mic and state your name and affiliation Thank you Madam Chair Sandra Barrero on behalf of SEIU California in support Jessica Haight with AFSCME California in support. Madam Chair and members, Martin Vindial on behalf of the California State Association of Electrical Workers, the California State Pipe Trades Council, and the Western States Council of Sheet Metal Workers in support. Thank you. Thank you. Okay, we will move to opposition. Is there an opposition witness? Please have a seat at the table. Mr. Fuentes, you have two minutes. Thank you, Madam Chair and member of the committee. Felipe Fuentes here on behalf of the Associated General Contractors of California. And let me begin by saying that AGC supports labor law compliance and accountability. Contractors that violate labor law should be held accountable. However, even as amended, this bill creates a new disclosure mandate that is burdensome, duplicative, and likely to reduce competition for local public works projects. While we appreciate that the author has narrowed the bill by exempting projects covered by project labor agreements and projects where contractors are already required to be qualified, however, significant concerns remain. First, the bill still requires contractors bidding on local public works projects to compile and disclose five years of wage and hour violations and provide supporting documentation regarding the resolution of those matters. For many contractors, particularly small and mid-sized firms, this creates a substantial administrative burden before they can even submit a bid. Second, while the amendments clarify that only final judgments, orders, or administrative determinations must be disclosed, the bill still creates a one-size-fits-all disclosure requirement that does not distinguish between serious violations and isolated issues that were fully resolved years ago. Contractors that have corrected past issues and remained compliant may still face additional scrutiny and reputational harm despite addressing those matters. Third, the bill authorizes bid disqualification for incomplete disclosures and requires every local agency to establish its own appeal process. That means dozens, if not hundreds, of different local agencies could develop different standards, procedures, and interpretations, creating uncertainty and inconsistency through the California public contracting system. And finally, California already has robust contractor accountability tools, including public works registration, labor compliance monitoring, DIR enforcement, pre-qualification programs, and debarment authority for serious violators. AB 1838 adds another layer of process without demonstrating that existing enforcement mechanisms are insufficient, and for those reasons, we respectfully oppose this measure. Thank you. Any opposition, Me Too's, please come to the mic and state your name and affiliation. Seeing no opposition, I think. I just wanted to say, Elmer Lazar, down on behalf of the California Federal Labor Unions. What universe am I in right now? In support. Thank you, Chair. Thank you for that support, Me Too. We'll bring it to the members. Is there questions, comments? I'll give you a courtesy motion. Okay, we have a courtesy motion from Senator Strickland. Thank you very much. And Mr. Berman, would you like to close? I respectfully ask for an aye vote. We have a motion from Senator Strickland. Please call the roll. The motion is do pass to the Senate Committee on Appropriations Senator Smaller Cuevas aye Senator Strickland No Strickland no Senator Cortese Senator Durazo? Senator Laird? We have a vote of one to one. That bill is on call. Thank you. And Mr. Berman, we want to move to file item number 11 next. If you have witnesses for AB 2682, please have a seat at the table. Assembly member, you can proceed when you're ready. Thank you. I was just making a note on the last bill. Thank you, Chair and Vice Chair. Last year, Assemblymember Wicks and I authored AB 1340, which was transformational legislation to empower transportation network company drivers with the right to unionize. Our prior bill established a detailed process for the selection of a driver organization to represent rideshare workers and charged the Public Employment Relations Board with oversight. Subsequent to passage, it was discovered that we neglected to authorize the streamlined appeal process from a PERB decision or order that is provided in other collective bargaining statutes. AB 1282 would simply conform the TNC law with other collective bargaining statutes administered by PERB and allow a party to seek judicial review of a final decision or order. I respectfully ask for an aye vote, and joining me today is Terry Brennan with SEIU California. Thank you. You have two minutes. Madam Chair and Vice Chair, Terry Brown on behalf of SCAU California, the sponsors of this bill, as the Assembly Member stated, we're just gaining parity with other people in the same situation with PERB decisions. It is an agreement between the employers and the workers attempting to organize. So we urge your aye vote. Thank you. Thank you. Do we have any me-tos in support? Okay. Seeing none, do we have any opposition witnesses? Seeing none. Thank you. We have a motion from Senator Strickland. Assemblymember, would you like to close? I respectfully ask for your aye vote. We have a motion from Senator Strickland. Please call the roll. The motion is due passed to the Senate Committee on Judiciary. Senator Simón Cuevas? Aye. Simón Cuevas, aye. Senator Strickland? No. Strickland, no. Senator Cortese? Senator Durazo? Senator Laird? We have a vote of one to one. That bill is on call. We'll take it up when members return. Thank you very much. Thank you. Appreciate it. Oh, well, we have another author in the house. We are really moving now. Assemblymember Petrie Norris, file item number 17, and that's AB 2656. If you have witnesses, they're welcome to have a seat at the table. Thank you. Well, thank you, Madam Chair. Mr. Vice Chair, pleased to join you this afternoon to present AB 2656. This measure ensures that public employee organizations receive advanced notice of the proposed use of generative AI so that they are afforded a meaningful opportunity to provide input on the development, introduction, and use of Gen AI in the workplace. Artificial intelligence is increasingly being used in public sector workplaces, often without advance notice to the employees most directly affected. These tools can significantly impact job duties, performance evaluations, and overall working conditions, core subjects within the scope of representation. Without transparency, employees may be subjected decisions made by systems they don't understand, presenting the risk of bias, errors, or lack of human oversight. While existing law requires employers to meet and confer over changes to wages, hours, and working conditions, it does not explicitly address the growing use of AI. This creates a clear gap as this technology expands across government operations. So AB 2656 establishes a clear and common sense requirement. Public employers must provide at least 45 days written notice to recognize employee organizations before developing, purchasing, implementing, or using Gen AI to perform work within represented job classifications. This ensures that employee organizations have a meaningful opportunity to understand potential impacts and engage with employers consistent with existing collective bargaining frameworks. This bill doesn't prohibit or limit the use of AI. It simply ensures notice, communication, and collaboration. With that, I'm pleased to be joined by David Mustagni and Randy Perry, representing the Peace Officers Research Association of California. Thank you. And you each have two minutes. Madam Chair, members, Randy Perry on behalf of PORAC. The opening statement states that the bill simply requires a 45-day notice, a written notice. There's no mandatory bargaining involved, none of that. Just simply a notification so that the organization understands that they're potentially looking at AI, purchasing, using AI, and something that would impact their jobs. So that's all the bill does. Thank you. David? Good afternoon. I'm simply here to answer any questions that you might have regarding any implications or the absence thereof regarding collective bargaining. Do we have any support me to's for this bill? Please step forward and state your name and affiliation. Sandra Barrero on behalf of SEIU California in support. Thank you. Okay, we will move to opposition. Are there opposition witnesses? Please come and have a seat at the table. have a seat at the table. Thank you so much, Madam Chair and members. Jean Hurst here today on behalf of the urban counties of California in respectful opposition to AB 2656. As we note in our letter of opposition, obviously local agencies like much of the public sector are cautiously testing the use of artificial intelligent tools in our day-to-day operations. When tools become available that assist with specific aspects of public service, they are often vetted in partnership with our employees with the mutual goals of ensuring that staff is empowered to focus on certain aspects of their work and providing more efficient and effective outcomes that benefit the public. Local agencies, of course, remain subject to the statutory provisions of the Myers-Millius Brown Act and the Ralph C. Dills Act, which require local agencies to meet and confer with our employee organizations regarding changes to employees' wages, hours, or terms and conditions of employment. We believe that the use of artificial intelligence falls neatly into that category. Existing law provides a robust framework for determining how particular uses of generative artificial intelligence actually have a significant effect on the employment relationship and of course we are obligated already to notify and more under existing statutes For these reasons we remain respectfully opposed to the bill. Thank you. Thank you. Are there any other opposition me to please state your name and affiliation? Good afternoon Eric Lerr on behalf of the California State Association of Counties and the League of California Cities and respectful opposition. Thank you. Good afternoon, Madam Chair. Erin Avery, California Special Districts Association, respectfully opposed, also on behalf of my colleagues at the Association of California School Administrators. Thank you. Sarah Ducat on behalf of the Rural County Representatives of California in opposition. Good afternoon. Kira Ross on behalf of the California Association of Recreation and Park Districts in opposition. Thank you. Okay, that looks like the end of our Opposition, Me Too's. We have a motion from Senator Strickland. And I want to just say to the Assemblywoman, thank you for bringing this and to your sponsors. There have been a lot of bills attempting to get at this whole notion of notifying workers and putting up guardrails in terms of the use of AI tools in the workplace. And the governor recently issued his executive order, which was a first step, but very broad step in addressing this issue. And I think this helps us get a little further down the road. I had a bill that didn't make it. And so I just want to say how important it is for workers to know how technology is impacting their work and to be able to take proactive steps to address it. I did notice that, and there are several bills that are moving, particularly on the private sector, on this issue. But I was surprised that you didn't have more support on this bill. I was curious why that is and what other public sector organizations are you working with on this? Thank you, Madam Chair. I believe there's not a lot of support on it right now because there were a lot of other bills, as you well know. That's what I was going to say in my opening as well, that dealt with various aspects of this. One was a 90-day, another one. So I think those organizations are kind of looking at what's left, what's still standing. And I spoke with a few out in the hall today, and they were like, oh, my gosh, we didn't realize yours made it out of a probe. So it was like kind of the last bill standing. So I would probably see a lot of support. I did get some commitments out in the hallway. Okay, well, great. I was just curious about that. Thank you for answering the question. And we have a motion from Senator Strickland. Would you like to close, Assemblymember? Thank you, Madam Chair, for those comments. The goal of AB 2656 really is to promote a thoughtful and transparent approach to the use and deployment of AI in public sector workplaces. As you mentioned, there had been a lot of proposals trying to get at various aspects of this challenge. And certainly, I think now that we're all in the second house, we'll be looking for opportunities to harmonize those efforts and build broad support, I think, across a package of bills. So with that, respectfully ask for your aye vote. Thank you. We have a motion from Senator Strickland. Please call the roll. The motion is due pass to the Senate Committee on Privacy, Digital Technologies, and Consumer Protection. Senator Small Cuevas? Aye. Small Cuevas, aye. Senator Strickland? Aye. Strickland, aye. Senator Cortese? Aye. Senator Durazo? Aye. Aye. Senator Laird. We have a vote of 3 That bill is on call We take it up when the members return Thank you We are going to move back let see up to file item number 15 AB 2545 Assemblymember Charvo And if you have witnesses, they're welcome to have a seat at the table. Good afternoon, Madam Chair, members. Thank you so much for the opportunity to present AB 2545. I actually have a little handout for everyone up here. Sorry. Breaking rules. You know, sometimes you got to do it. Sometimes you got to do it. Oh, sorry, guys. So thank you so much for the opportunity to present AB 2545. This is the AI Deployment and Workforce Development Assessment Bill. And I wanted to start off by thanking the committee for their work on the bill and will be accepting the amendments today. I appreciate your help. Artificial intelligence is rapidly transforming, as I know this committee is talking about a lot. And we are seeing layoffs that are in the hundreds of thousands now per the handout that I passed around. If you look at some of these, Oracle, 30,000 workers, UPS, 30,000 workers, Dell, 12,000, over 12,000, Citigroup, over 20,000. Meta is both laying people off and also not hiring and not filling open positions. And some of it is direct AI replacement. a lot of it right now is also investment in AI. And part of the challenge that we have had is really getting a handle on this because what we hear from very trusted and respected economists and labor academics is you can hear from people you trust and respect on both ends of the spectrum. Some think it's going to be catastrophic and lead to serious impacts in the workforce. our overall economy. And others think, yeah, it's not going to be as bad as you think. It's hard for, you know, to take up technology. It's actually more work than, you know, than just simply replacing someone for that work. You got to, they got to manage it and make sure they actually work. And so, so we're at a place where we don't actually have a handle on what's actually happening. And it's a real challenge, I think, for us as state government, as we are seeing a handful of companies on their way to be trillion-dollar companies and have more money than governments as they displace workers. and the workers then come to us at the state government for unemployment insurance and job retraining and placement and education and housing assistance and food assistance and all of the things that they are going to need to get them through to the next job. And how are we going to pay for that if workers are not working and also paying into state government to cover those benefits? it could be catastrophic for our state budget. And I think for us to be responsible we really need to get a handle on this And this bill is an attempt to do that to both make sure that we identifying it creates a work group that helps us identify what we are not capturing now. So, for example, we're not capturing the many college students that we're hearing about who are graduating and not able to get jobs, you know, entry-level attorneys. That career, that job is disappearing because AI can do that job. And so we're not capturing where a lot of this displacement is happening, and so we want to identify what are we not capturing and what do we need to have a better understanding of. And we're not capturing when, you know, people are maybe not a one-for-one displacement, but they're displaced because of the investment piece in AI to eventually displace them. So that really is the goal of the bill, and we want to also look at who's going to pay for this, right? Who's going to pay for unemployment insurance and all of the things that are going to be needed for workers if they find themselves in this unfortunate position? so you know that is that is really the goal of the bill is to start having a conversation that i think we have been really too late on having and while we can't get ahead of this issue because it is literally happening in real time as you see from the handout that's you know just the ones we could easily find that's over 164 layoffs because of ai or ai investment just this year This is just 2026. So, you know, we are seeing this is happening right now. We have to get a better handle on both the information that we need to be able to make policy decisions here at the state level and also the budget decisions that are going to be before us because of the impact of this industry. And with that, I will turn it over to our wonderful supporters here today. I'm joined by Elmer Lazardi from the California Labor Federation and Sam Gordon from Tech Equity. Thank you very much. You each have two minutes. Thank you, Chair. Elmer Lazardi here with the California Federation of Labor Unions. We're here in support of AB2545, which will commission the report to assess how AI will impact California's workforce and help policymakers make informed decisions on the future of workers and AI. CHAGBT was introduced in 2022, sparking an explosion of AI investment in public attention. And within days, it had gained a million users breaking records for the fastest adoption of technology in history and also ushering in the potential for massive job elimination as users began experimenting with outsourcing tasks to this new AI chatbot. And as we've all seen, this is set off an arms race with companies such as Google, Anthropic, Meta, DeepSeek, and so many others now developing advanced AI technology and products. According to the Challengers job report that tracks workforce trends, 2023, a year later, was the first year that companies cited AI as a reason for layoffs. In 2025, they were at 55,000 AI-related layoffs, and as our author has spoken today, that number has only dramatically increased. As an example, Salesforce laid off 4,000 customer support staff, but also importantly, froze hiring of lawyers and software engineers stating that AI now does up to 50% of the work of the company. And now we're seeing an entire ecosystem of AI support. startup companies that are beginning to operate with business models that have cut out young workers entirely by simply deciding not to hire them anymore. And this is going to have catastrophic effects in the future when we have no real pipeline to fill jobs because employers have refused to hire and those workers are therefore not gaining any applicable experience in the careers for which they have studied. While various agencies collect workforce economic data has been stated, there's no real unified effort to assess AI's specific impacts or to identify gaps in that data for us to work with. And without solid projections or widespread agreement that AI could have drastically huge impacts on employment and labor markets, we could see substantial pressure on the state's social safety net in the long term. For these reasons, we think that AB 2545 will help policymakers in the state better plan for the future where AI continues to exacerbate these pressures on workers and job markets. Time is up. Please close. And to take action to protect workers. So thank you for that, and we respectfully ask for a nine vote. Thank you. Good afternoon, Chair and members. Thank you for the opportunity to testify. My name is Samantha Gordon. I am with TechEquity. As the Assembly member laid out, the headlines are kind of everywhere. We're seeing this, right? The layoffs are happening. And one thing that we've been trying to explain to folks as we've talked about this issue is the data that is coming out is coming out from the AI companies right now. And it's based on a methodology that's called task exposure. And so what task exposure does is the AI sort of itself, right, if you have Claude, if you have ChatGPT, Grok, what have you, it will look at sort of how users are using the AI tool right now and then make an assessment using AI to say which of these tasks are likely to be exposed to displacement. So it basically is looking at you and me going in and using a chat bot and saying, okay, Sam asked it to do these three things. they kind of fit into these tasks. So how many people are using it to do that task? That is the type of job that's going to be exposed to automation. So it's a really, all due respect to them, I'm really glad that they're putting the data out that they have, but it is a flimsy methodology. And it's not one that we can base our entire social safety net and planning on, because it just tells us one very particular narrow piece of the picture. It's an important piece of the picture. But for instance, when Claude says these tasks are likely to be displaced, There's no one that is an expert, like let's say, you know, something in nursing is likely to be displaced. There's no nurses evaluating that AI's assessment, right? It's the AI's assessment. So we want to make sure that the public sector, the government, has an important role to play and actually understanding what's happening, what's being automated, where are we most exposed. There have been recent reports that, you know, high school women are likely to face, high school educated women are likely to face a massive exposure to AI displacement. We've seen reports of college-educated grads not being able to find jobs, as the Assemblymember said. And so we really support this legislation because we believe it's within the state's best interest to actually have this be a rigorous methodology collected from employers, understanding the various dynamics, not just task exposure but costs. Thank you for your support today. Thank you. Are there any Me Too supports? Please step to the mic and state your name and affiliation. Good afternoon. Mario Guerrero with the California Faculty Association in support. Thank you. Good afternoon, Chair Committee members. Brian Maramontes with the California Teachers Association in support. Good afternoon, Carlos Lopez with the California School Employees Association in support. Sandra Guerrero with SEIU California in support Good afternoon Eric Lair on behalf of the California State Association of Counties the Urban Counties of California the League of California Cities and the Association of California School Administrators in support Thank you Catherine Vieira, Houston United Steelworkers District 12 in support. support. Thank you. We will move to opposition. Do we have any opposition witnesses here today? Seeing none, any opposition me twos? Okay, we will bring it back to the dais. We have a motion from Senator Strickland. Any other comments, questions? Well, I just want to say to the author, Assemblywoman, thank you so much for bringing this critical piece of legislation Employers, we know, are increasingly using AI, and these statistics that you shared with us are certainly troubling. We know that these are tools to cut costs without regard to what that means to working communities, what it means to our way of creating safety net for Californians. We also know that these tools are plagued with bias and discrimination. and very hard to identify what the guardrail should be, and I think this is one of the ways that we can start to move it forward. I want to thank you for also working with our committee on a couple of important amendments to your bill, one, to help ensure that nonprofit members of the advisory panel have experience assessing equity amongst our most vulnerable communities. I had the unfortunate experience of being in a workforce development board meeting with some of the creators of AI who emphatically explained that equity was not their responsibility. I was at that meeting with you. Oh, yes, you were. And so, you know, we also appreciate that you've taken amendments to ensure that we have local government employer representative on the advisory panel and that we're expanding the study parameters to include an analysis of how those technological advances are impacting various demographic groups in the state as well as the impacts of worker displacement on state revenues, which is critically important because the one stabilizing factor we have in this economy, in this budget fiasco that we're in the middle of right now is income tax helps to keep our regularity around keeping our safety net and our commitment to our residents in place because of what workers bring to the table as taxpayers. So these are key elements of the discussion around AI that are often missed but are critical and really appreciate your hard work on this. And with that, we have a motion from Senator Strickland. Would you like to close? Thank you so much. Thank you to you and the committee's leadership on those amendments. I very much appreciate incorporating them and how important they are, you know, based on you and I. I think we're both equally shocked by those statements. but this is really transforming our way of life and I see my kiddo who's just about to go to high school has changed what they see their future as being multiple times because they can't be a graphic artist anymore they're seeing whole careers disappearing that they had been looking toward and I think the discussion is so lacking on what the solution is, especially you hear people in the tech industry say, you know, now they promoting universal basic income And who going to pay for that Number one is it us the state Is it the trillion companies which is an outstanding question but also I think it really undervalues the importance of work in people's lives and how much value people get from it. I don't want a universal basic income to sit at home on my couch. I want to be working. I want to be doing this job, and I think a lot of people feel like that, And also, what is universal basic income pay for? Does it pay for you to take your kids to the movies? Probably not. And so I think there's a lot of really important discussions for us. While UBI can have an important role to get people through a hard time, it's not a long-term solution for our society. And I hope that these are some of the important discussions that can happen with this process. With that, respectfully, you request an aye vote. Thank you. Thank you. And we have a motion from Senator Strickland. please call the roll. The motion is due pass as amended to the Senate Committee on Privacy, Digital Technologies and Consumer Protection. Senator Smolk-Cuevas? Aye. Senator Strickland? Aye. Strickland, aye. Senator Cortese? Aye. Cortese, aye. Senator Durazo? Aye. Durazo, aye. Senator Laird? We have a vote of 4-0. That bill is on call. Thank you. And I see we have the man of the hour, Assemblymember Valencia. Thank you for coming and then going back and coming back again. We appreciate that. Not a problem. A lot going on this morning. I had to jump over to insurance, so I appreciate you guys' patience as well. Absolutely. And you may begin when you're ready. Thank you, Madam Chair, and good now afternoon, Senators. AB 1619 would increase trustee stipend limits for County Employees Retirement System Boards, California State Teachers Retirement System, known as CalPERS, and California Public Employees Retirement System, known as CalPERS, from $100 to $320 per meeting. Employees Retirement Boards oversee complex public pension systems, often managing multi-billion dollar investment portfolios. Despite these responsibilities, the stipend of $100 has not been increased in nearly 40 years. AB 1619 maintains local control. Since the increase for county employee retirement system, board members is subject to approval by a majority vote of the Board of Supervisors. I think this bill is necessary and timely and happy to answer any questions that the committee may have. Thank you so much. And you have two minutes.
Good morning. Honorable Chair, Honorable Committee Members. My name is Roger Hilton. I served as a Deputy Sheriff for 33 years. I also served as the elected Safety Board Member for the Orange County Employees Retirement System, and now I've served a little over three years as a retiree board member on Orange County Employees Retirement System. When I first started in the system, we had about $9 billion. We now just crossed over $30 billion. We started with, I think we were about 62% funded, and I think today we're about 86% funded. This is from the good governance that, I mean, the market gods gave us some momentum, but mostly it was from good governance of the board members. I'm here today in support of AB 1619 to adjust the stipend for certain retirement board members. The current stipend was set nearly 40 years ago It has not kept pace with economic realities and the growing complexity of these systems AB 1619 gives county board supervisors for these 20 counties to approve up to $320 per meeting and then allows the retirement boards the flexibility to adjust the compensation between $100 and $320 per meeting to meet the needs of their county system. This preserves full local control. AB 1619 modernizes compensations to reflect the weight of the responsibility and to account for inflation. Helps attract qualified, experienced members and expands the pool of candidates. The current limited stipend can discourage participation due to financial constraints and the amount of time needed to carry out the duty. Without action, the current stipend structure limits diversity of candidates able to serve. It also improves retention, continuity, better governance, reduces risk, and improves outcomes for public employees, employers, and taxpayers. I respectfully request an aye vote. Thank you.
Any Me Too's in support of this bill, please come to the mic and state your name and affiliation.
Good afternoon, Chair and Members. Naomi Padron on behalf of the Los Angeles County Employee Retirement Association or LACERA. We're pleased to support the bill.
Good afternoon, Madam Chair, members of the committee. Steve Delaney, Chief Executive Officer of the Orange County Employees Retirement System on behalf of the Board of Retirement, which does ask your support of AB 1619.
Okay. Do we have any opposition against this bill today? Okay. No opposition witnesses. Any opposition? Me too. Seeing none, we'll come. We have a motion from Senator Strickland. Would you like to close? Thank you, Madam Chair. In my opinion, public employees deserve a well-compensated retirement, and in order to achieve that, we also need individuals who are fiscal stewards and can make decisions on their behalves. With that, I respectfully ask for a yes vote. Thank you. We have a motion from Senator Strickland. Please call the roll. The motion is do pass to the Senate Committee on Appropriations. Senator Small Cuevas? Aye. Aye. Senator Strickland? Aye. Senator Cortese? Aye. Senator Durazo? Aye. Senator Laird? We have a vote of 4-0. That bill is on call. Thank you. Thank you. Okay, seeing that we have our members here, we are going to start with the consent calendar. Assistant, please call the roll. On the consent calendar, Senator Durazo? Aye. Durazo, aye. Senator Laird? Aye. Laird, aye. Thank you. We have a vote of 5-0. The consent calendar is adopted. We will now move on to file item number 1, AB 1729. File item 1, AB 1729. The motion is do pass to the Senate Committee on Governmental Organization. Current vote is 2-1, with the chair voting aye and the vice chair voting no. Senator Durazo? Aye. Durazo, aye. Senator Laird? Aye. Laird, aye. We have a vote of 4 to 1. That bill is out. Moving on to file item number 2, AB 72, Jackson. The motion is due pass to the Senate Committee on Appropriations. The current vote is 2 to 1. The chair voting aye and the vice chair voting no. Senator Durazo? Aye. Durazo, aye. Senator Laird? Aye. Laird, aye. We have a vote of 4 to 1. That bill is out. File Item 3, AB805, Bong. The motion is do pass as amended to the Senate Committee on Appropriations. The current vote is 3-0, with the Chair and Vice Chair voting aye, Senator Durazo. Aye. Durazo, aye. Senator Laird. Aye. Laird, aye. We have a vote of 5-0, and that bill is out. Moving on to File Item 5, AB1576, Ortega. The motion is do pass to the Senate Committee on Appropriations The current vote is 2 with the chair voting aye and the vice chair voting no Senator Durazo? Aye. Durazo, aye. Senator Laird? Aye. Laird, aye. We have a vote of 4-1 and that bill is out. We are moving on to file item number 6, AB 1582, Ortega. The motion is due passed to the Senate Committee on Judiciary. The current vote is 2-1 with the chair voting aye and the vice chair voting no. Senator Durazo? Aye. Durazo, aye. Senator Laird? Aye. Laird, aye. We have a vote of 4-1. That bill is out. Moving on to file item number 7, AB 1619, Valencia. The motion is due passed to the Senate Committee on Appropriations. The current vote is 4-0, with the Chair and Vice Chair voting aye. Senator Laird? Aye. Laird, aye. We have a vote of 5-0, and that bill is out. File item number 8, and that's AB 1630, Calusa. The motion is due passed to the Senate Committee on Appropriations. The current vote is 2-1, with the Chair voting aye and the Vice Chair voting no. Senator Durazo? Aye. Durazo, aye. Senator Laird? Aye. Laird, aye. We have a vote of 4 to 1. That bill is out. Moving to file item number 10 AB 1838 Berman The motion is do pass to the Senate Committee on Appropriations The current vote is 1 to 1 with the chair voting aye and the vice chair voting no Senator Cortese Aye Cortese aye Senator Durazo? Aye. Durazo, aye. Senator Laird? Aye. Laird, aye. We have a vote of 4-1 and that bill is out. Moving on to file item number 11, AB 2682, Berman. The motion is due passed to the Senate Committee on Judiciary. The current vote is 1-1 with the chair voting aye and the vice chair voting no. Senator Cortese? Aye. Cortese, aye. Senator Durazo? Aye. Durazo, aye. Senator Laird? Aye. Laird, aye. The vote of 4-1. That bill is out. File item number 12, AB 2054, Gibson. The motion is due passed to the Senate Committee on Military and Veteran Affairs. The current vote is 3-0 with the chair and vice chair voting aye. Senator Durazo? Aye. Durazo, aye. Senator Laird? Aye. Laird, aye. We have a vote of 5-0. That bill is out. File item number 13, AB 2157. The motion is due passed to the Senate Committee on Appropriations. The current vote is 1-1 with the chair voting aye and the vice chair voting no. Senator Cortese? Aye. Cortese, aye. Senator Durazo? Aye. Durazo, aye. Senator Laird? Aye. Laird, aye. Okay we have a vote of four to one That bill is out Moving down to file item number 15 AB 2545 Schravo Motion is due pass as amended to the Senate Committee on Privacy Digital Technologies and Consumer Protection The current vote is 4 to 0, with the chair and vice chair voting aye. Senator Laird? Laird, aye. Okay, we have a vote of 5 to 0, and that bill is out. File item number 16, AB 2650, Pellerin. The motion is due passed to the Senate Committee on Revenue and Taxation. The current vote is 2-1 with the chair voting aye and the vice chair voting no. Senator Durazo? Aye. Durazo, aye. Senator Laird? Aye. Laird, aye. We have a vote of 4-1. That bill is out. File item number 17, AB 2656, Petrie Norris. The motion is due passed to the Senate Committee on Privacy, Digital Technologies, and Consumer Protection. The current vote is 3-0, with the chair and vice chair voting aye. Senator Cortese? Aye. Cortese, aye. Senator Laird? Aye. Laird, aye. 5-0. That bill is out. Okay, that concludes all of our file items for the day. Senate Labor Public Employment and Retirement Committee is adjourned. Thank you.