The Southwest California Legislative Council provides advocacy for businesses in Southwest Riverside County. It was formed in 2005 as a coalition of four local chambers of commerce. The Council monitors thousands of bills introduced in the California legislature each year and takes positions to support legislation that benefits businesses and oppose legislation that harms businesses. It publishes annual vote records analyzing how local legislators voted on the Council's priority bills. The document provides details on the Council's 2021 strategic initiatives, bills it is tracking this year, and its 2020 vote record analysis.
3. A little history
In January 2005, the Temecula Valley, Murrieta and Lake Elsinore
Valley Chambers of Commerce formed the Southwest California
Legislative Council to serve as the regional business advocacy
coalition.
The mission of the Council is to provide a basis and voice for the
Chambers to act of local, state and federal legislative and
regulatory issues to secure a favorable and profitable business
climate for the region
Our 2021 Strategic Initiatives focus on:
Budget, Tax Reform & Economic Recovery/ Job Creation and
Retention / Healthcare / Infrastructure and the Environment /
Public Safety/ Public Safety
The group meets monthly at the Realtor® House to evaluate
legislation/regulation that may impact our local business
community, to adopt a position on those issues, and work with
policy makers to influence the outcome.
4. Every year in Sacramento:
• 3,000 +/- bills are introduced (2,502 this year)
• 1,500+ WILL have some impact on business
• 1,000 WILL get passed
• SWCLC has to read each bill,
Decide if we want to take action on it,
Monitor it all the way through until it’s passed,
is defeated, or dies.
Why?
7. Communicate our position
SB 389 (Dodd) Alcoholic beverages off-sale
privileges SUPPORT.docx - SB 389 - "If allowing
restaurants to sell carry-out cocktails alongside a meal helps
keep their doors open, we must do it."
2021/02/24 4:26:29 PM PST
Stance : Support for SB 389 Alcoholic beverages: bona fide
public eating place: off-sale privileges.(ver. 99)
Organization : SOUTHWEST CALIFORNIA LEGISLATIVE
COUNCIL
•Received by :Senate Governmental Organization Committee
9. 2021 Legislative Report #1 Action
1. ACA 1 (Aguiar-Curry) Local government financing: affordable housing and public infrastructure:
voter approval.
2. AB 5 (Fong) Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund: High Speed Rail Authority: K–12 education:
transfer and loan.
3. AB 12 (Seyarto) Personal information: social security numbers: the Employment Development
Department.
4. AB 15 (Chiu) COVID-19 relief: tenancy: Tenant Stabilization Act of 2021.
5. AB 24 (Waldron) Unemployment insurance: benefit determination deadlines.
6. AB 62 (Gray) Income taxes: credits: costs to comply with COVID-19 regulations.
7. AB 71 (Luz Rivas) Statewide homelessness solutions program. Homelessness funding: Bring
California Home Act.
8. AB 95 (Low) Employees: bereavement leave.
9. AB 115 (Bloom) Planning and zoning: commercial zoning: housing development.
10. SB 19 (Glazer) Wine growers: tasting rooms.
11. SB 39 (Grove) Fraudulent claims: inmates.
12. SB 62 (Durazo) Employment: garment manufacturing.
13. SB 102 (Melendez) COVID-19 emergency order violation: license revocation.
14. SB 218 (Jones) Corporations: ratification or validation of noncompliant corporate actions.
2021 Legislative Report #2 Action
1. AB 20 (Lee) Political Reform Act of 1974: campaign contributions: The Clean Money Act of 2021.
2. AB 48 (Lorena Gonzalez) Law enforcement: kinetic energy projectiles and chemical agents.
3. AB 76 (Kiley) Interdistrict transfer of pupils: prohibition on transfers by a school district of residence: in-
person instruction.
4. AB 248 (Choi) Income taxes: credits: cleaning and sanitizing supplies: COVID-19.
5. AB 395 (Lackey) Unlawful entry of a vehicle.
6. AB 513 (Bigelow) Employment: telecommuting employees.
7. SB 30 (Cortese) Building decarbonization.
8. SB 37 (Cortese) Contaminated sites: the Dominic Cortese “Cortese List” Act of 2021.
9. SB 220 (Skinner) Craft distillers: direct shipping.
10. SB 238 (Melendez) Fair employment and housing protections: political affiliation.
11. SB 249 (Melendez) Educational equity: political affiliation.
12. SB 285 (McGuire) California Tourism Recovery Act.
13. SB 314 (Wiener) Alcoholic beverages.
14. SB 389 (Dodd) Alcoholic beverages: bona fide public eating place: off-sale privileges.
28 bills so far this year
10. Southwest California Legislative Council
2020 Vote Record
This report for the second year of the
2019-2020 legislative session
summarizes California legislators’ floor
votes on Southwest California
Legislative Council priority bills.
This is the 15th vote record the SWCLC
has compiled. The SWCLC publishes
this report in response to numerous
requests by member firms and coalition
members that would like a gauge by
which to measure the performance of
their legislators.
Partial Picture
No vote record can tell the entire story
of a legislator’s attitude and actions on
issues of importance to business. Each
year, legislators cast thousands of
votes on thousands of proposed laws.
To fully evaluate your legislative
representative, consult the legislative
journals and examine your legislator’s
votes in committee and on floor issues.
You can view these via links at
http://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/
The SWCLC adopted positions on 91
state bills this year, down from 110 last
year. The Council supported 39 and
opposed 52. Only 11 bills made their
way through the legislative process and
were among some 1,000 that landed on
the Governor's desk. Of those 11,
SWCLC supported 4 and opposed 7.
Nearly 2,500 bills, constitutional
amendments and other measures were
introduced this session. Many bills, both
JOB KILLERS and JOB CREATORS
were rejected by legislators in policy or
fiscal committees, thus stopping
proposals before they reached the floor
for a vote.
The vote record does not capture these
votes. Most bills in this report cover
major business bills that are of concern
to both small and large companies and
especially to companies doing business
in Southwest California and fit the
Strategic Initiatives of the SWCLC.
The SWCLC recognizes that there
are many bills supported or opposed
by business that may not be included
in this vote record and analysis. A
full list of bill positions for SWCLC is
available at http://SWCLC.biz
Factors Considered
● The bills and votes reflect legislators’
attitudes toward private enterprise, fiscal
responsibility and the business climate.
● Each bill was a priority for the SWCLC, a
position had been adopted by the SWCLC
and that position had been communicated
one or more times to the author of the bill,
the appropriate committee and to our local
legislators.
● The bills were voted upon by the full
Senate and Assembly. This year just 11 of
the 91 met that criteria. Last year 34 of 110
bills met that criteria.
● Unless otherwise noted, final floor votes
are shown. Concurrence votes and
conference report votes are considered final
votes.
Historical Record
Once again MOST Southwest California
legislators scored well, but not all. Some
scores were abysmal.
As in past years, this is indicative of the fact
that Southwest County tends to elect more
business-friendly, fiscally conservative
legislators who reflect the needs of their
constituency. But not all.
The SWCLC focused on a broad spectrum of
issues in keeping with our Strategic
Initiatives of budget & tax reform, job creation
& retention, infrastructure & the environment,
and healthcare.
Within that framework, the SWCLC weighed
in on transportation and housing issues,
reducing or eliminating tax and regulatory
burdens, onerous environmental legislation,
minimum wage and healthcare reform, and
of course COVID-19.
The Council worked to support issues of
local concern like extending funding for
UCR Med School (SB 56 – died),
repealing AB 5 (AB 1928 – failed), sought
to exempt more than 32 occupations
from AB 5 (all failed) and opposed
onerous rent moratoriums (AB 1436),
corporate head tax (AB 298) and
numerous efforts to raise taxes and/or
increase regulations. Chaptered bills
dealing with family and employee leave
(SB 1383), wage enforcement (AB 3075)
and employment violations (AB 1974) will
increase costs and potential litigation,
especially for small businesses.
Vote Record
Senators Melissa Melendez (R) SD 28
and Mike Morrell (R) SD23 scored
perfect 100% voting records on SWCLC
priority bills this session while Senator
Richard Roth (D) SD 31, voted in accord
only 44% - up from 38% last year.
Assembly Members Marie Waldron (R)
AD75 voted with the Council 90% of the
time, differing on only a single issue.
Sabrina Cervantes (D) AD60 scored
44% and Jose Medina (D) AD61 scored
30%, little improvement from his 25%
vote record in support of business
friendly bills the prior session.
Governor Gavin Newsom passed all 4
bills supported by the SWCLC and
vetoed 3 of the 7 bills we opposed for a
64% vote record. This ties the 64%
accord vote set by Jerry Brown in 2013
and doubles the 32% vote record by Gov.
Newsom in his first outing last year.
In spite of his votes in accord with our
issues, there were plenty of ‘bad’ bills that
made it through on issues not pertinent to
SWCLC strategic initiatives, although
many will impact our local business
community and/or property rights.
The Southwest California Legislative
Council considers it a privilege to
advocate on behalf of business interests
in Southwest Riverside County.
We would also like to thank our
dedicated Legislators and their local
staffs for their support and cooperation in
2020.
Thanks also to our sponsors,
supporters and Chamber coalition
partners.
Year-end vote record published
11. 2020 Report Card
Bill # Author Party Intent Position Melendez Morrell Roth Waldron Cervantes Medina Governor
AB 1551 Arambula D PACE S NV NV Y Y Y NV Y
AB 2013 Irwin R Taxes -home reconstruction S Y Y Y Y Y Y Y
AB 2143 Stone D Settlement agreements S Y Y Y Y Y Y Y
AB 2920 Obernolte R Waste manifests S Y Y Y Y Y Y Y
AB 685 Reyes D OSHA notification O N N Y N Y Y Y
AB 1947 Kalra D Employment violation O N N Y N Y Y Y
AB 2360 Maienschein D Telehealth psych O N N NV Y Y Y V
AB 3075 Gonzalez D Wages - enforcement O N N Y N Y Y Y
AB 3216 Kalra D Employee leave O N N Y N NV Y V
SB 972 Skinner D Corporate taxes O N N Y N NV Y V
SB 1383 Jackson D Family leave O N NV NV NV Y Y Y
Votes in accord 10/10 9/9 4/9 9/10 4/9 3/10 7/11
Percent in accord 100% 100% 44% 90% 44% 30% 64%
SWCLC
2020 Bill Tracker - Final
Senate
• Adopted positions on 91 bills
• SUPPORTED 39
• OPPOSED 52
• Only 11 survived
• SUPPORTED 4
• OPPOSED 7
• Governor Newsom AGREED 64% of the time
• Only 32% last year
12. What impacts YOUR business?
As you become aware of bills that would impact
YOUR business – either positively or negatively –
please bring it to our attention for possible
inclusion into our agenda.
Contact: GAD@SWCALADVOCACY.COM
13. The Southwest California Legislative Council Wishes to thanks Our
2020 Partners:
Southwest Riverside Country Association of Realtors
Metropolitan Water District of Southern California
Elsinore Valley Municipal Water District
Western Municipal Water District
Economic Development Coalition
California Apartment Association
Southwest Healthcare Systems
CR&R Environmental Services
The Murrieta Temecula Group
Southern California Edison
Temecula Valley Hospital
The Gas Company
Abbott Vascular
Temecula Valley Chamber of Commerce
Murrieta/Wildomar Chamber of Commerce
Lake Elsinore Valley Chamber of Commerce
Menifee Valley Chamber of Commerce
A coalition of the
Temecula Valley, Murrieta-Wildomar, Lake Elsinore Valley, and Menifee Chambers of Commerce