Good morning, my intrepid colleagues, and welcome to my latest edition of Monday Morning Briefings. I don’t know why, but it really does feel like we are slogging through this year together. And I’m sure I join everyone when I say that my thoughts are with all the families of the victims of this weekend’s tragic shootings. Again. And yes, I know thoughts and prayers are not enough. That’ a discussion for another day.
MINIMUM WAGE HIKES ARE COMING
Governor Newsom’s office announced last Thursday that California would be raising its minimum wage to $15.50 on January 1, 2023, for ALL sized employers, given the soaring inflation that the state and nation continue to experience. California’s minimum wage law already contained a provision that envisioned an annual increase to the minimum wage based on the Consumer Price Index. Usually, employers under 26 employees have received something of a break under California and local minimum wage laws, but not this time.
Another reminder that BOTH Los Angeles CITY and the UNICORPORATED areas of Los Angeles County will be seeing their minimum wages increase on July 1, 2022, just a little over a month from now. And for the first time, those minimum wages will be DIFFERENT. The minimum wage for the unincorporated areas of LA County will be going to $15.96 an hour. However, the CITY of Los Angeles will be going to $16.04, and West Hollywood will go to $16.50 (large employers, and yes, I know you just went up in January, you’re going up AGAIN in January of 2023). There are other local cities increasing as well, I will have a formal chart of the specifics as we near the deadline.
JUST a reminder, because no matter how often I go over this, Angelenos get confused. Being in the unincorporated area of Los Angeles County is DIFFERENT from being in LA County. There are 88 cities in Los Angeles County, the City of Los Angeles being the largest. The other 87 are cities like West Hollywood, as an example, and Santa Monica, both of whom have their own minimum wage ordinances like Los Angeles. If you operate in one of those cities, you are governed by THAT minimum wage ordinance. If you are in another CITY in LA County, like Burbank, Beverly Hills, Santa Fe Springs, Calabasas, Glendale, etc, which does NOT have its own minimum wage, then you are governed by the state of California’s minimum wage. If you are in an area like Encino or Woodland Hills or Sherman Oaks, those are all very lovely areas of the San Fernando Valley (no sarcasm meant), but they are NOT separate cities. They are part of Los Angeles the CITY. You are governed by the LOS ANGELES CITY minimum wage.
If you are lucky enough to live in one of the VERY FEW little corners of Los Angeles County that is NOT covered by one of these 88 cities (and I have actually lived in THREE such areas, crazy enough), like just outside Agoura Hills, just outside Westlake Village, and just outside Marina Del Rey – none of those were cities and none were in the city of LA. THOSE are in the unincorporated areas of Los Angeles County. If I were an employer and still living in those areas, I would be paying NOT $16.04 minimum wage as my friends down the street in the city of LA, and not $15.00 as my friends in the cities of Agoura Hills or Thousand Oaks, but $15.96 on July 1!
All you folks who are NOT in Los Angeles, if you’re reading this and thinking we are bat s— crazy . . .you are so very right.
But on that note, I will end this Los Angeles geography/history lesson and this week’s Briefing. I’ve probably made your head spin enough for one day, if not one week.
OKAY, SO COVID IS FOR SURE STILL HERE
Last week I told you all about the most recent Cal/OSHA Temporary Emergency Temporary Standards that have been issued and are now in place until the end of 2022. As an aside, am I the only one who finds it odd that Cal/OSHA always issues emergency standards that are temporary? Or maybe that is just the nature of EMERGENCY Temporary Standards. Yet it does sort of explain a bit why we all walk around uneasy – the backbone of our entire society has been fluid for the past three years. Nothing is stable, not even our laws.
So that being said, last week I talked about the fact that the revised ETS lessened the requirements for most employers to formally mask in the workplace and maintain some of the rigorous requirements we had during the height of COVID. However, one change came to light last week that some of you called to question, now that employees are once again starting to call in sick with COVID now that we have another small surge with another sub-variant.
One question that arose is that Los Angeles County Department of Public Health (LADPH) had changed the rules regarding quarantines, and its definition of “contact tracing,” back in April, purportedly to help allow asymptomatic employees to return to work when facing a quarantine. The change would permit employees who had no COVID symptoms to return to workplace. The employer still had to do a contact trace, but now, the definition of “contact trace” was changed to: “Someone sharing the same indoor space with an infected person for a total of 15 minutes or more within a 24-hour period may be considered to be a “close contact” for COVID-19.”
At the time back in April, we looked at this language and thought, how does this crazy, vague, expansive language look like we are giving employers more leeway? Before, close contact was “someone who worked within six feet for more than 15 minutes within a 24 hour period.” What the heck is “shared air space?” That could be an entire office? But we decided we really didn’t have to think about it yet, because LADPH made it very clear – while Cal/OSHA still used the old six feet-15 minute test, that more restrictive test still stood.
Fast forward to last week. Cal/OSHA did its thing and revised the ETS. And if you looked at the FAQs for the ETS, the FAQs there say that to find out about quarantine information, you need to go to CDPH (California Department of Health). And they walk you through a whole table of what to do if someone tests positive and has to isolate, and also if someone is a close contact and has to quarantine. So then you have to scroll around and find the definition of “close contact,” which by the way, is NOT on the same page as the Isolation and Quarantine page (why not??). But finally, by searching around, I found it. And as of May 5, 2022, CALIFORNIA has now changed its definition of “close contact to the following:
What is a “close contact” for COVID-19?
Someone sharing the same indoor space with an infected person for a total of 15 minutes or more within a 24-hour period may be considered to be a “close contact” for COVID-19. This includes people living in the infected person’s home, caregivers, classmates, work colleagues within the same office space, and others who may have been close enough to the infected person to be exposed to the virus and possibly infected.
So that’s it. That is now our test. No more six feet, 15 minutes thing. If you have an employee who has tested positive for COVID, here is what you must do with your “close contacts,” which may well be everyone in the same office, floor, restaurant, building:
If they are asymptomatic:
- Exposed employees must test within three to five days after their last close contact. Persons infected within the prior 90 days do not need to be tested unless symptoms develop.
- Employees must wear face coverings around others for a total of 10 days after exposure. Please refer to the FAQs on face coverings for additional information.
- If an exposed employee tests positive for COVID- 19, they must follow the isolation requirements of a positive employee.
- Employees are strongly encouraged to get vaccinated and boosted.
And of course, if they get symptoms, you keep them home and treat them as a potentially sick employee, get them tested, etc. And they are eligible for COVID pay.
So the bad news is that nearly everyone is a close contact and may have to wear a mask again and get tested. The good news is, they mostly likely don’t have to miss work and you don’t have to pay them COVID pay. And the world keeps spinning. And I think that was the point of the new rules.
So that’s it. Carry on, and call if you have any questions. I’m attaching a PDF of the Isolation and Quarantine Rules from Cal/OSHA just because I love you all.
This subvariant does not seem as transmissive as Omicron, but it’s out there. I myself have gone back to wearing masks when in crowded indoor spaces. Hope you and your people are all staying safe. And remember to keep giving grace to yourself and the world around you.
#StandWithUkraine