New Workplace Laws for California (Effective January 1st, 2019)

Anti-Harassment Requirements

Employers may need to expand their sexual-harassment-prevention training to comply with new standards. Brown signed SB 1343, which requires businesses with five or more employees to provide sexual-harassment-prevention training to all workers by Jan. 1, 2020, and every two years thereafter.

Lactation Accommodations

Brown also approved AB 1976. Among other things, this bill will make California’s lactation-accommodation law consistent with federal law on the requirement that a lactation space can’t be a bathroom.

Women on Boards

Brown signed SB 826, which will require publicly traded California companies to appoint a certain number of women to their boards of directors. Covered corporations must have at least one female on their board by the end of 2019.

Vetoed Arbitration Bill

Attorneys said they were not surprised that Brown vetoed AB 3080, which would have banned employment arbitration agreements. The bill was introduced in response to the #MeToo movement but would have applied to a wide array of employment claims beyond those involving sexual harassment, including all forms of discrimination and all wage and hour issues

For complete coverage, check out this post from SHRM.