A proposed California law would ban self-checkout counters at grocery stores if specific employee standards are unmet. State Senator Lola Smallwood-Cuevas of South Central Los Angeles says she wrote the bill to protect the jobs of grocery workers.
In The News
For more than a year, California businesses’ concerns about retail theft have taken top billing in the Capitol, spurring more than a dozen new laws. But the grocery and drug store workers who deal with thefts and other crimes every day have their own ideas about how to address those threats.
On Aug. 15, the Assembly Appropriations Committee voted 11-3 to pass a bill Sen. Lola Smallwood-Cuevas (D-Los Angeles) authored requiring state-funded contractors hired for large-scale infrastructure projects prioritize hiring “disadvantaged workers.”
On Aug. 15, the Assembly Appropriations Committee voted 11-3 to pass a bill Sen. Lola Smallwood-Cuevas (D-Los Angeles) authored requiring state-funded contractors hired for large-scale infrastructure projects prioritize hiring “disadvantaged workers.”
California state Sen. Lola Smallwood-Cuevas and former California state representative Lorena Gonzalez joined grocery and retail store workers, criminal justice advocates, and researchers for an online press conference on Aug. 14.
On Aug. 15, the Assembly Appropriations Committee voted 11-3 to pass a bill Sen. Lola Smallwood-Cuevas (D-Los Angeles) authored requiring state-funded contractors hired for large-scale infrastructure projects prioritize hiring “disadvantaged workers.” Senate Bill (SB) 1340 now moves to the Assembly floor for a full vote. During a rally on Aug. 13 in front of the State Capitol Smallwood-Cuevas said the bill would help ease the state’s “job crisis” – which only impacts Californians from underserved communities of color whose unemployment rates remain in the double digits. For all Californians, the unemployment rate is relatively low at around 5.2%.
A group of progressive state lawmakers on Monday rallied against Proposition 36, a ballot measure they are calling an “expensive” crime reform that will lead to the over-policing of underserved communities and incarcerate Californians at rates akin to the 1980s war on drugs.
Thursday was do-or-die for hundreds of bills in the California Legislature, with many high-profile pieces of legislation passing the key hurdle.
Bills with a fiscal impact had to pass their respective chamber’s appropriations committee on Thursday. Hundreds had gathered on the suspense file, a sort of holding pen where affected bills were placed in anticipation of Thursday’s hearings.