The Great Resignation Comes to Sacramento

By Michael J. Arnold & Michael D. Belote, Esq.
CMA Legislative Advocated

As we enter the third year of the pandemic which was to last a couple of weeks, no part of society is unaffected. The media has coined the term “the great resignation” to describe employees dropping out of the workforce, or resigning in favor of jobs that permit work from home. A similar phenomenon is occurring in the State Capitol. January 3 marked the return of legislators to Sacramento for the second year of the current 2021-2022 two-year session. Members returned to a legislative environment dealing with three significant distractions. The first relates to the pandemic. At this point most legislative staff continue to work from home, as omicron outbreaks have hit legislators, staff and security personnel. The public is greatly discouraged from entering the Capitol building. Nearly all public or lobbyist testimony at committee hearings is conducted through an AT&T conference operator. This remote environment clearly hampers the legislative process, which works both more efficiently and more effectively on an in-person basis.

The second distraction relates to the Capitol building itself. The Capitol is actually made up of two parts, the grand original Capitol with the dome and ornate Senate and Assembly chambers, and an office building appendage known as the “annex.” The original Capitol was built in the 1870s and restored in 1980. It remains in beautiful condition. The problem is the annex, which was built in the 1950s and never significantly restored, with attendant asbestos, ADA, and other problems. The annex is decades past functional obsolescence and needs replacing.

What to do with the Governor and 120 legislators while the Capitol is being rebuilt? A ten-story office building has been constructed south of the Capitol, and everyone has now been moved out of the Capitol and over to the new building, known as the “swing space.” This new building will be the home of legislators and the Governor for at least the four or five years necessary to restore the Capitol. After that the members will be moved back into the Capitol, and the swing space will be repurposed for a state agency.

For the foreseeable future, then, we literally will be “walking the halls” of the swing space, rather than the Capitol, and legislators are just now getting adjusted to the new facility. The third and most significant distraction relates to redistricting. Every ten years an
independent citizens commission draws new boundaries for every state legislative and congressional district. Every member’s district lines are new, some for the better, but others for the worse. Members are thrown into districts with neighboring members, who will have to run against each other. Many will have to sell their homes to run in new districts, as state legislators (but not members of Congress) must actually live in their districts.

With all of these distractions, plus probably the sheer slog of flying up weekly to an empty Sacramento, an unprecedented number of members are resigning or deciding not to seek reelection in 2022. Staff turnover is increasing as well. The highest-profile resignation was that of Assembly Member Lorena Gonzalez, best known as the author of AB 5 dealing with independent contractors. Ms. Gonzalez left the Assembly in January and will become the head of the California Labor Federation, Sacramento’s most powerful labor organization. Others resigning include Assembly members Jim Frazier from Contra Costa County, Autumn Burke from Los Angeles, David Chiu from San Francisco and more. Many more have announced that they are leaving at the end of this legislative year.

Even with all of these distractions, the legislature is expected to introduce the usual 2500 or so measures prior to the bill introduction deadline of February 18. Every year CMA identifies nearly 100 pieces of legislation of interest to the membership, covering such diverse issues as housing, licensing, taxes, privacy and much more. 2022 may also see the enactment of AB 1093 (Jones-Sawyer), which is designed to add California to the roughly 40 other states which have legalized the practice of “remote online notarization.” On the regulatory front, CMA maintains a strong liaison with state agencies including the Department of Real Estate and the Department of Financial Protection and Innovation.

The simple truth is an effective government relations program requires legislative, regulatory, grassroots, and PAC elements. CMA is fortunate to be strong in all phases. Soon we will report more on what surprises lay in store from the 2500 bills beginning their journeys in 2022.