Assemblymember Eduardo Garcia Moves Forward Legislation Offering Economic Empowerment to Immigrant Families
Back to homepageAssemblymember Eduardo Garcia Moves Forward Legislation Offering Economic Empowerment to Immigrant Families
Local Legislator advances over two dozen measures this week.
(SACRAMENTO, CA) —This week, Assemblymember Eduardo Garcia (D- Coachella) successfully advanced over two dozen bills and resolutions including two measures that would offer significant means of economic empowerment for immigrant
AB 626, Homemade Food Operations Act (E. Garcia) would allow for a permitting process for the sale of home food sales. This legislation passed the Senate Committee on Health with wide-spread support from home cooks and food justice advocates.
What is AB 626?
AB 626 creates a low cost and accessible way for independent cooks to start a small cooking business from home, selling any type of food (with a few exceptions):
Legalizing small-scale home food operations: Microenterprise home kitchens will be allowed to sell up to $50,000 per year— these new operations are intended for incubators or ancillary income, not a substitute for commercial-scale operations.
SB 946, Safe Sidewalk Vending Act (Lara/E. Garcia) would decriminalize sidewalk vending and establish various requirements for local regulation of sidewalk vendors. Following its favorable vote in the Assembly Committee on Local Government, this measure will next go before the Assembly floor.
“Homemade food sales and sidewalk vendors create opportunities for healthy, self-reliant communities, and to economically empower talented cooks with a pathway to attain income self-sufficiency and realize their ‘American dream’ of success,” said Assemblymember Eduardo Garcia.
“These measures would establish a lawful permitting process allowing these already occurring informal food sales to come out of shadows, become legitimate businesses and better ensure overall public health.”
Eduardo Garcia Legislative Highlights for the Week of June 18-22, 2018:
AB 626 – Homemade Food Operations Act: This act would amend Section 113789 of the Health and Safety Code to expand the “Private Homes” exemption within the Retail Food Code’s requirements for “Food Facilities” to include self-registration or permit for Homemade Food Operations. This measure will also permit the sale of prepared meals and other foods from small-scale, home kitchen operations.
Passed Senate Health (7-0)
SB 946 – Safe Sidewalk Vendor Act: This bill would allow local governments to regulate vendors by creating a permitting process, and prohibits the criminalization of sidewalk vending.
Passed Assembly Local Government (6-1)
AB 2106 – California Grown: California Grown will increase the maximum percentage a bid or price of the California-grown product can exceed the lowest bid for an agricultural product produced outside of the state from 5% to 10%. It will also increase this maximum percentage when it comes to agricultural products grown outside the state but which are processed or packed in the state when compared to agricultural products packed and processed outside the state. This preference will continue to not include public universities, colleges, or school districts.
Passed Senate Agriculture (4-0)
AJR 34 – Agricultural Workers: Labor Shortages: This measure would urge the Congress of the United States to acknowledge the problem of a labor shortage in the agricultural industry in California and to work together with California to solve the issue.
Passed Assembly Labor (4-0)
AB 2006 – Agricultural Worker Vanpool Programs Initiative: This bill would establish the Agricultural Worker Clean Transportation Investment Program, which would be administered by the state board to fund the deployment of near-zero-emission and zero-emission vehicles, as defined, used for agricultural vanpools, as defined, serving disadvantaged or low-income communities, as defined, to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
Passed Senate Transportation & Housing (12-0)
AB 3007 – Children of Incarcerated Parents: This bill will statutorily authorize the creation of Services to Children of Incarcerated Parents Program in the County of Riverside in an after-school setting. Through a $10 million budget appropriation to support the launch and operation of the CIP program, participants, upon enrollment, will have access to various resources. Service providers would come to the site to deliver the services directly in the after-school program.
Passed Senate Health (8-0)
AB 2495 – Protecting Defendants Against Criminal Prosecution Costs: This bill would, with exceptions, as specified, prohibit a city, county, or city and county, including an attorney acting on behalf of a city, county, or city and county, from charging a defendant for the costs of investigation, prosecution, or appeal in a criminal case, including, but not limited to, a criminal violation of a local ordinance.
Passed Senate Public Safety (7-0)
AB 2704 – Family Empowerment Centers on Disability: This bill would revise and recast the provisions related to Family Empowerment Centers on Disability, including requiring the department to give in those of the 32 regions in the state that do not have a center, increasing the minimum base rate for each center awarded a grant from $150,000 to $223,000 commencing with the start of the fiscal year after a center has been established in each of the 32 regions, and, commencing with the 2020–21 fiscal year, providing for an annual cost-of-living adjustment of the grant amount, as specified. The bill would impose additional requirements on centers as a condition of receiving a grant and would require the department, among other actions, to, on or before June 30, 2020, develop a data collection template for use by centers and provide guidance to centers on how to define and report data.
Passed Senate Education (7-0)
AB 3136 – Special Education Funding: This bill requires that special education funding rates to be equalized to the 95th percentile after the Local Control Funding Formula (LCFF) is fully funded and makes other various special education funding changes.
Passed Senate Education (7-0)
AB 2060 – Advanced Water Payments: Requires the Department of Water Resources (DWR) and the State Water Resources Control Board (SWRCB) to provide advance funding, under specified conditions, of Integrated Regional Water Management Plan (IRWMP) and State Water Pollution Control Revolving Fund Small Community Grant Fund grants. The bill also requires the SWRCB to provide advance funding, under specified conditions, of Proposition 1 bond funding for public water system infrastructure improvements and related actions to meet safe drinking water standards, ensure affordable drinking water, or both.
Passed Senate Environmental Quality (5-0)
ACR 248 – Parks Make Life Better! Month: This measure would recognize the importance of access to local parks, trails, open space, and facilities for the health and development of all Californians and would declare the month of July 2018 as “Parks Make Life Better!” Month.
Passed Assembly Floor (80-0)
AB 1945 – Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund: This bill amends Health and Safety Code Section 39715 to expand the list of co-benefits defined by ARB to include: Public and community access, food access, Access to services, Partnerships between multiple jurisdictions, improved community resiliency, Avoided emissions, and Benefits to the California-Mexico Border. This bill also directs ARB to work with administering agencies to ensure that applicants from Imperial County and San Diego County are able to count daytime population in their grant applications.
Passed Senate Environmental Quality (4-2)
AB 2453 – Air Pollution in Schools: Children of color and low-income children are more likely to be attending a school with high exposure to pollution. There are currently no statewide programs designed to reduce exposure to air pollutants at existing school sites. AB 2453 adds Section 44391.3 to the Health and Safety Code to make schools in communities identified for Community Emission Reduction Programs pursuant to AB 617 (Chapter 136, Statutes of 2017) eligible for funding for air quality adaptation efforts, including but not limited to installing vegetative barriers and upgrading or installing air filtration systems.
Passed Senate Environmental Quality (7-0)
Eduardo Garcia 56th District Assemblymember
Assemblymember Eduardo Garcia (D-Coachella) serves as the chairperson of the Assembly Committee on Water, Parks and Wildlife. He represents the 56th district, which comprises the cities and communities of Blythe, Brawley, Bermuda Dunes, Calexico, Calipatria, Cathedral City, Coachella, Desert Hot Springs, El Centro, Holtville, Imperial, Indio, Mecca, Oasis, North Shore, Salton Sea, Thermal, Thousand Palms, and Westmorland.
