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Blog / The Business Perspective

California Legislature Wraps Up 2018 Session

September 5, 2018

by Maria S. Salinas

As the leading voice of the business community in Southern California, the Chamber's efforts, in large part, are spent representing your voices in Sacramento. It’s our job to ensure that when legislators debate new laws, regulations and programs, that they understand the impacts to the economy, job creation, and the everyday operations of businesses small and large.

The Chamber has a great track record of evaluating state-wide legislation and taking positions. Topping our priority list was addressing the State’s housing supply and affordability crisis. Key victories include the passage of bills to update and reform the Regional Housing Needs Assessment, streamline the approvals for supportive housing projects, provide density bonuses for student housing and place a measure on the November ballot to allocate funds to housing for the mentally-ill community. We wish more progress had been made on accessory dwelling unit streamlining and increasing housing supply in transit-rich areas, we look forward to resuming work on those in 2019.
On economic development legislation, we advocated for a wide-range of policies touching some of our region’s signature industries. Bills were passed to establish a California Aerospace & Aviation Commission, initiate a pilot program for select cities to extend bar hours, develop a statewide Economic Development Strategic Plan and efforts to extend the film tax credit through 2025 were successfully folded into the budget.
 
We were able to help prevent the passage of a number of costly mandates and additional approval hurdles for infrastructure projects, but there remain a few bills that are regulatory overreach and would result in costly litigation for business. We’ll be urging the Governor to veto. 
Our advocacy work will now turn to the Governor, who has until Sept. 30 to sign or veto the legislation on his desk. Thank you to all who worked with our policy team this year to identify impactful legislation and share your stories. 
 
Here is a full status update:  

Chamber-opposed legislation we successfully advocated against:

  • AB 3001 (Bonta)- Building mandate for all electric appliances
  • SB 623/844/845 (Monning)- Would have created a water tax
  • AB 1000/SB 120- Would have added additional regulatory review to water conveyance projects; created bad precedent
  • SB 460 (de Leon)- Guidelines for net neutrality regulation

Chamber-supported legislation headed to the Governor:

  • SB 910 (Hernandez)- Bars short term health insurance in CA
  • AB 2798 (Maienschein)- MRI permit streamlining for hospitals
  • SB 1108 (Hernandez)- Prohibits work-requirements for Medi-Cal eligibility
  • SB 828 (Wiener)- RHNA reform to accurately assess housing needs
  • AB 2162 (Chu)- Allows supportive housing projects by-right
  • SB 1227 (Skinner)- Density bonuses for student housing
  • SB 905 (Wiener)- Pilot program to extend bar hours in select cities
  • AB 427 (Muratsuchi)- Establishes the CA Aerospace and Aviation Commission
  • AB 2596 (Cooley)- Directs GO-Biz to develop at CA Economic Development Strategic Plan
  • AB 2980 (Gipson)- Allows for shared common space permitting for cannabis businesses
  • SB 607 (Skinner)- Keep Kids in School Act to minimize student suspensions
  • AB 2548 (Friedman)- Metro commuter benefit ordinance (Governor signed)

Chamber-opposed legislation we’ll be asking the Governor to veto:

  • SB 1300 (Jackson)- Expansion of harassment discrimination and retaliation liability
  • SB 1402 (Lara)- Holds end client retailers responsible for trucking company business practices
  • AB 3080 (Gonzalez Fletcher)- Ban on settlement and arbitration agreements
  • AB 2361 (Weber)- Mandates additional reporting requirements for UC contracting process
  • SB 822 (Wiener)- Implements state rules for net neutrality, creating a state by state patchwork

Advocacy helped amend bills to be better for business:

  • SB 1249 (Gagliani)- Animal testing ban, amendments added for limited exemptions
  • AB 2447 (Reyes)- Would have added additional CEQA analysis 

Budget victories:

  • Film tax credit extension until 2025
  • Small Business Technical Assistance Expansion Program at GO-Biz
  • SB 940 (Beall) which improves Cal Grant access to foster youth

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