AB 1066
This month, Governor Brown signed AB 1066, which significantly changes overtime payment rules for agriculture companies. Wage Order 14, which applies to agricultural occupations, currently provides for overtime after ten hours of work in a workday. The new law will affect employers of 25 or more employees beginning in 2019, gradually reducing the daily overtime threshold to eight hours by 2022. Smaller employers would experience similar incremental changes beginning in 2022.
Additionally, the Department of Homeland Security has announced that a revised Form I-9 will be available by November 2016. Employers may continue using the current version with a revision date of 03/08/2013 until Jan. 21, 2017. After that date, all previous versions of Form I-9 will be invalid.
Employers of 20 or more employees within a 75-mile radius will want to watch for developments in the pending New Parent Leave Act, which would require up to six weeks of unpaid leave for new parents to bond with a child within one year of the child’s birth, adoption, or foster care placement. (This is in addition to any Pregnancy Disability Leave needed by a new mother.) Employers would also be required to maintain group health insurance for the duration of the leave. If passed, the law would become effective on January 1, 2018.
