Thursday, February 18, 2021
On February 2, 2021, the City Council of Oakland, California, passed the “Grocery Worker Hazard Pay Emergency Ordinance” to provide a boost in pay for frontline workers during the COVID-19 pandemic. Oakland is located in Alameda County and is just across the Bay Bridge from San Francisco, California. The ordinance requires large grocery stores in Oakland to provide their workers with premium pay of $5.00 for each hour worked. The ordinance takes effect immediately and is in effect during those periods when Oakland’s risk of COVID-19 transmission is elevated, according to the state’s four-tiered color-coded framework. The order applies at the widespread (purple), substantial (red), and moderate (orange) COVID-19 transmission risk levels under state health orders. The ordinance is not in effect only during “minimal” (yellow) risk periods.
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On February 2, 2021, the City Council of Oakland, California, passed the “Grocery Worker Hazard Pay Emergency Ordinance” to provide a boost in pay for frontline workers during the COVID-19 pandemic. Oakland is located in Alameda County and is just across the Bay Bridge from San Francisco, California. The ordinance requires large grocery stores in Oakland to provide their workers with premium pay of $5.00 for each hour worked. The ordinance takes effect immediately and is in effect during those periods when Oakland’s risk of COVID-19 transmission is elevated, according to the state’s four-tiered color-coded framework. The order applies at the widespread (purple), substantial (red), and moderate (orange) COVID-19 transmission risk levels under state health orders. The ordinance is not in effect only during “minimal” (yellow) risk periods.
Highlights
The California Supreme Court in Vazquez v. Jan-Pro Franchising
International, Inc. ruled that its decision in Dynamex Operations
West, Inc. v. Superior Court 4 Cal. 5th 903 (2018) (Dynamex),
applies retroactively to all cases not yet final as of the date
Dynamex issued on April 30, 2018.
This critical holding finally and definitively answers the open
question regarding the retroactive application of the ABC test for determining employee vs. independent
contractor status.
The ruling means that nearly all cases that were not final as
of the date Dynamex issued will be governed under the ABC standard instead of Borello.
The California Supreme Court in
Seyfarth Synopsis:
In a unanimous decision, the California Supreme Court held that the worker friendly “ABC” test set forth by the Court in its 2018 landmark ruling, Dynamex Operations West, Inc. v. Superior Court, applies retroactively. The ABC test thus applies to all pending cases governed by the California Wage Orders in determining whether a worker is an independent contractor or an employee. Vazquez v. Jan-Pro Franchising Int’l, Inc.
The Facts
Jan-Pro Franchising, International, Inc. is a franchisor whose franchisees offer cleaning and janitorial services. In May 2017, the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California granted Jan-Pro summary judgment in a case brought by independent contractor franchisees claiming they should have been treated as Jan-Pro employees. The plaintiffs then appealed the ruling to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit.