New Year Brings New Laws in California

The New Year will bring with it new laws set to take effect on Jan. 1.

Among the changes affecting Pasadenans:

• If you don’t work in Pasadena, the new minimum wage is set to increase on Jan. 1, rising to $14 per hour for businesses with 26 or more employees and $13 per hour for those with 25 or less employees. (The minimum wage for people who work inside Pasadena already is $15 per hour at businesses and nonprofits which have 26 or more employees, and on July 1 smaller businesses and nonprofits in Pasadena are scheduled to increase to $15 per hour.)

• New requirements under AB 685 will require businesses to notify employees of potential COVID-19 exposures in the workplace within one business day, and mandates reporting of workplace outbreaks to public health officials and the public.

• AB 979, authored by State Rep. Chris Holden, D-Pasadena, will require publicly owned executive boards to have at least two female members by the end of 2021. Minimum criteria for membership of “underrepresented communities” are also established.

• Convicted felons who have completed their sentences will regain the right to vote under Prop. 17.

• Police will be banned from using chokeholds or carotid artery restrains under AB 1196. Such holds were already barred by Pasadena Police Department policy over the summer.

• Businesses with five or more employees will be required to offer “up to 12 workweeks of unpaid protected leave during any 12-month period to bond with a new child of the employee or to care for themselves or a child, parent, grandparent, grandchild, sibling, spouse, or domestic partner, as specified,” under SB 1383. Similar regulations already apply to businesses with 50 or more employees.

• AB 2717 adds protection from civil or criminal liability for those who attempt to break into a car to rescue an unattended child.

• Distracted driving penalties will increase under AB 47, allowing two convictions in a 36-month period to result in points added to drivers’ records.

• Drivers will be required to move to a farther traffic lane or slow to an appropriate speed when passing stationary emergency vehicles with emergency lights activated, including tow trucks and Caltrans vehicles, on surface streets under AB 2285. A similar requirement is already in place on freeways.

• Prop. 19 will change rules related to property tax transfers, beginning in February. It will allow qualifying seniors and homeowners with disabilities to transfer existing property tax assessments to new homes of equal or lesser value.

• Inmate firefighters will be eligible to petition the courts to have their criminal records cleared upon release under AB 2147.