CSAC, along with a number of coalition partners, sent a letter
yesterday in opposition to
AB 2307 (Bonta), which would create a statewide standard of
paid time off for public employees to engage in specified
activities related to employer-employee relations, also known as
“release time.” Current law allows the decision to be made
locally, through the collective bargaining process, as to whether
new employee orientations are included in release time.
Leaving the issue of release time to the local bargaining
process was explicitly agreed to by all stakeholders in the deal
that granted unions statewide access to new employee
orientations. A bill to reverse that deal was introduced the very
next session.
For some agencies that hold weekly new employee orientations, any
number of employees could be granted two to three hours per month
of paid time to complete duties on behalf of their unit. Larger
agencies that may have bi-weekly orientations would see even
greater paid time through local revenue for the purposes employee
representative outreach to their membership.
A nearly identical bill was
passed by the Legislature last year, before being
vetoed by Governor Newsom. The Governor shared counties’
concerns that the bill tried to address issues in an overly broad
way instead of leaving them to the collective bargaining process.
