[conspire] New California laws, 2018

[Ehud Kaldor]

I must admit that I love it that there is a cannabis.ca.gov....


On Sun, Dec 31, 2017, 17:49 Rick Moen <rick at linuxmafia.com> wrote:

> Every year, a bunch of new state laws take effect with the new year.
> This go around:
>
> 1.  Legal sales of recreational marijuana, to persons 21 and over with
> proper identification.  Except each town/city/county wants it to be
> somewhere else that allows the storefronts.  (You may buy lawfully only
> at a licensed dispensary.) This will by 2020 probably create a lawful
> market bigger than the California dairy industry and almost as big as
> the almond industry.  Recreational users may grow up to six plants for
> personal use, but access must be controlled (e.g., a locked gate) and
> out of site.
>
> The state Bureau of Cannabis Control will publish a list of licensed
> dispensaries, https://cannabis.ca.gov/ .  Retail customers may buy 28.5
> gm (just under 1 oz.) at a time, or 8 grams. of cannabis concentrates or
> infused foods.  Transport of personal amounts of cannabis has been
> legalised (with the rare exception of USCBP checkpoints).  Personal
> amounts may also be lawfully given as gifts to adults 21 and older.
> Medical marijuana customers may buy more, and are exempted from a 15%
> state excise tax, plus a per-purchase $1.15 state cultivation tax.
> Cities may at their option add a 7.75 - 9.75% excise tax on top of that.
> So, recreational pot will be state-legal but enormously more expensive
> (about 41% more) than medical pot.
>
> Dispensaries (if permitted by local authorities) must be at least 600'
> away from schools and close by 10PM.
>
> (Jeff Sessions won't like you, though, and his lot of Feds still class
> pot as a Schedule 1 drug under the hallucinatory delusion of it being as
> dangerous as heroin.  So, if you induldge, watch out about Border Patrol
> checkpoints like the one on I-5 north of San Diego and at ports and
> airports.)
>
> The January 1st rollout deadline apparently applies to state business
> permits, but county and city jurisdictions are permitted by AB-64 to
> drag their feet longer on local permitting that is necessary before the
> store can get a state permit.  Initially there will be about four dozen
> dispensaries around the state.  (It's been very amusing to watch the
> parade of municipal NIMBY-ism on this matter.)
>
> Locally, San Jose, Oakland, Berkeley, and Santa Cruz have issued
> permits to a few dispensaries.  In San Francisco, local permits
> are in the works but not issued yet.
>
>
> 2.  But you may not consume marijuana in any form while driving or
> riding in a motor vehicle on roads (AB-65).  (Any bicyclist want to be a
> test case?)  Nor in public places.  The penalties for pot use in a car
> (even as a passenger) are about as harsh as for drunk driving.
>
>
> 3.  Seatbelts for bus riders (SB20) - starting July 1st.  (Subject to
> $20 fine if you don't.) But buses that don't yet have seatbelts are
> still grandfathered in.
>
>
> 4.  Job applicants may no longer be asked about salary (/benefits)
> history or relying on salary history as a factor in determining salary
> for a new employee (AB-168), nor (in general) whether they have criminal
> convictions (AB-1008).  Latter law applies to private employers, state
> agencies, and public utilities with five or more workers.  (Employers
> may still ask about criminal convictions after a tentative job offer
> has been extended.)
>
> The idea here is that people who've served their time aren't supposed to
> be punished yet more for the rest of their lives by being functionally
> unemployable.  That has tended, in fact, to keep ex-felons stuck
> in the criminal underworld, as a result of employees simply discarding
> any applicant who checked that checkbox.
>
>
> 5.  Vote-by-mail (no more neighbourhood voting stations in San Mateo
> County (along with Sacramento, Madera, Napa and Nevada counties).
> This is Phase One of a statewide move (well, following Sacramento
> County having already gone first).  Next will be L.A. County in 2020,
> then the rest of the state.  Voters will still be able to do in-person
> voting at, or bring their mail-in ballots to, several county voting
> centres if they prefer, with drop-off locations starting up to four
> weeks before the election, and in-person 'vote centres' opening ten days
> before election day to register voters and take votes (SB-450).
>
>
> 6.  The California Disclose Act (AB-249) requires for the first time
> that who bought a ballot initiative be disclosed.  The law requires
> that political advertisements disclose the top three donor of $50k or
> more to a campaign and improves disclosure of 'earmarked' donations to
> make it more difficult to conceal who's behind them.
>
> (Reminder:  Before each election, I publish a thorough analysis of
> the entire ballot, with links to other such analyses.  Master link:
> http://linuxmafia.com/~rick/vote.html )
>
>
> 7.  AB-390 has now amended CVC section 21456(b), which until now said
> 'No pedestrian shall start to cross the roadway in the direction of the
> signal', creating the counterintuitive situation where some cities
> raised revenue by citing pedestrians for stepping into the crosswalk
> after the flashing countdown timer started, even though they finished
> crossing before the red.  This was a $197 fine for the basic violation.
> LAPD issued more than 17,000 such citations just in the downtown L.A.
> area over a recent four-year period, for example.  The reform puts an
> end to this racket.
>
> The new law makes it lawful to enter a crosswalk during a countdown
> signal if there is sufficient time to reasonably complete crossing.
>
>
> 8  All ammunition sales most be made in person 'through' a licensed
> vendor, including purchases from out-of-state (e.g., online) vendors
> (AB-693).  E.g., online sales must be shipped to a licensed vendor
> for pickup.  Exempted:  law enforcement of city, county, state, and
> Federal governments.  School administrators will no longer be permitted
> to give certain employees with concealed-carry permits permission to
> carry firearms onto campus (AB-424).  Persons convicted of hate crimes
> will lose the right of firearms possession for ten years (AB-725).
>
>
> 9.  Statewide minimum wage goes up to $10.50/hour for businesses with 25
> or fewer rworkers, $11/hour for businesses with more.
>
> The statewide wage is scheduled to increase $1 each year to $15 in 2022,
> except that the governor may halt these increases if negative job growth
> ensues.
>
>
> 10.  Vehicle regristrations/renewals will be hiked between $25 and $175
> depending on vehicle value, funding being earmarked for repairs to state
> roads and bridges (SB 1).  The fee depends on current state-estimated
> vehicle value:
>
> $25 for $0-4999
> $50 for $5000-24999
> $100 for $25000-34999
> $150 for $35000-59999
> $175 for $60000 and up
>
>
> 11.  The state high school exit exam (suspended in 2015 for a rewrite)
> has been abolished.
>
>
> 12.  Pet stores may no longer sell dogs, cats and rabbits unless they
> are rescue animals -- an effort to discourage rather horrific 'puppy
> mill' mass-breeding operations.  However, this _had_ been scheduled to
> take effect right away, and has been delayed to Jan. 1, 2019 (AB-485).
>
>
> 13.  State and local law enforcement are barred from giving out
> information to Federal Immmigration and Customs Enforcement for
> deportations (because Tenth Amendment), except for in cases where
> immigrants have been convicted of certain very serious crimes (SB-54)
> including felony DUI, child abuse, gang-related offences, and about 800
> other serious crimes, and are prohibited from asking persons about their
> immigration status.  Also landlords will be subject to civil fine if
> they fink out their renters to La Migra (AB-291), and workplaces will be
> required to give their workers 72 hour notice and insist on a warrant if
> immigration raids will occur (AB-450).  Students whose parents have
> been deported are required to be permitted to continue attending
> California schools (SB-257).
>
>
> 14. New swimming pools will now be required to have two meaningful
> safety features to protect children against drowning (SB-442).
>
>
> 15. First year of community college in California will be free of
> tuition for first-time full-time students (AB-19) -- provided there's
> enough money in the new 2018-19 year's state budget for the necessary
> fee waivers.
>
>
> 16. DMV may no longer withhold driver's licences or vehicle
> registrations for unpaid parking tickets:  Low-income Californians
> and students at CSU and community colleges will be offered payment
> plans for parking fines (AB-503).
>
>
> 17. Some rather pernicious rent-to-own contracts for dog and cat
> purchases have been banned.  (People apparently didn't understand
> that Fluffy was subject to repossession.)
>
>
> 18. Parental leave:  Mothers and fathers at small businesses with 20-49
> employees are guaranteed up to 12 weeks of unpaid parental leave within
> the first year of their child's birth.  (Larger businesses already
> give this benefit.)  SB-63.  Workers taking paid time off to temporarily
> care for a family member will now get 60% of their regular wage during
> tempary leave.
>
>
> 19.  Permanent handicapped placards will now need renewal every six
> years under stricter oversight (replacing automatic two-year renewal)
> an applicants will be required to prove their name and birth dates by
> submitting a copy of their driver's licences or similar.  Sen. Jerry
> Hill (D-San Mateo) sponsored this reform after it was found that more
> than 26,000 Californians over age 100 had in-force disabled placards,
> even though there are are only 8,000 centenarians in the state and few
> of them drive.  (Therefore, the system has been corrupted by fraud.)
> DMV will be required to periodically compare its list against the SSA's
> 'death file' and cancel placards of deceased drivers.
>
>
> 20.  No pesticide spraying within 1/4 mile of schools and day-care
> centres during school hours (8-6, M-F).
>
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