CA - ASSEMBLY BILL: 1340 has passed!

AB 1340: Transportation network company drivers: labor relations

Source: https://calmatters.digitaldemocracy.org/bills/ca_202520260ab1340

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Existing law declares the public policy of the state regarding labor organization, including, among other things, that it is necessary for a worker to have full freedom of association, self-organization, and designation of representatives of their own choosing, to negotiate the terms and conditions of their employment, and to be free from the interference, restraint, or coercion of employers of labor, or their agents, in the designation of such representatives or in self-organization or in other concerted activities for the purpose of collective bargaining or other mutual aid or protection.

Existing law,

 the Protect App-Based Drivers and Services Act, 

added by Proposition 22, as approved by the voters at the November 3, 2020, statewide general election (the initiative), categorizes app-based drivers for network companies, as defined, as independent contractors if certain conditions are met. Existing law requires, among other things, that the network company provide a health care subsidy to qualifying app-based drivers, provide a minimum level of compensation for app-based drivers, and not restrict app-based drivers from working in any other lawful occupation or business. Existing case law holds that specified provisions of the initiative are invalid on separation of powers grounds; however, the court severed the unconstitutional provisions, allowing the rest of the initiative to remain in effect.

Existing law also establishes

 the Public Employment Relations Board,

(board) in state government as a means of resolving disputes and enforcing the statutory duties and rights of specified public employers and employees under various acts regulating collective bargaining. Existing law vests the board with jurisdiction to enforce certain provisions over charges of unfair practices for represented employees.

This bill,

 The Transportation Network Company Drivers Labor Relations Act,

would establish that transportation network company (TNC) drivers have the right to form, join, and participate in the activities of TNC driver organizations, to bargain through representatives of their own choosing, to engage in concerted activities for the purpose of bargaining or other mutual aid or protection, and to refrain from such activities. The bill would require the board to enforce these provisions.

This bill would require all TNCs to submit certain information every quarter, including information identifying and related personal work information about TNC drivers to the board in a list format, as prescribed. The bill would establish various procedures governing the certification and decertification of TNC driver organizations for purposes of representing drivers in the collective bargaining process. In this connection, the bill would require the board to determine if an entity is a TNC driver organization, as prescribed, and make certain determinations as to whether a specific organization has been designated as the bargaining representative for TNC drivers pursuant to an election process. The bill would establish various notice requirements, conditions, and timelines governing the representation of TNC drivers. The bill would, among other things, require TNCs and certified driver bargaining organizations to negotiate in good faith pursuant to the act, as described, and would set forth procedures for mediation and arbitration for purposes of reaching a sectoral agreement. The bill would set forth procedures and guidelines for the board to approve or disapprove sectoral agreements. The bill would require a TNC that was not a covered TNC when a sectoral agreement took effect but subsequently became a covered TNC to be bound by all terms of the sectoral agreement, as specified.

This bill would make it an unfair practice for a TNC, an agent of a TNC, or a multicompany committee, as defined, to fail or refuse to negotiate in good faith with a certified driver bargaining organization, among other things. The bill would also make it an unfair practice for a certified driver bargaining organization or its agents to fail to negotiate in good faith with a TNC or multicompany committee, among other things. The bill would set forth unfair practice charge procedures and remedies for those practices. The bill would define terms for purposes of the act, make the provisions of the act severable, and make related legislative policy statements.

Existing law, 

the Bagley-Keene Open Meeting Act,

 generally requires all meetings of a state body to be open and public.

This bill would exempt any meeting of a mediator or arbitrator with any party or group to the negotiations process and the mediation and arbitration processes in the act from the Bagley-Keene Open Meeting act.

Existing law,

 the California Public Records Act, 

requires state and local agencies to make their records available for public inspection, unless an exemption from disclosure applies.

This bill would exclude from public disclosure information regarding TNC drivers that is submitted to the board pursuant to the act, except as specified.

Existing constitutional provisions require that a statute that limits the right of access to the meetings of public bodies or the writings of public officials and agencies be adopted with findings demonstrating the interest protected by the limitation and the need for protecting that interest.

This bill would make legislative findings to that effect.

Standing at the Fork in the Road:

 How Communities Can Thrive After the Economy We Know Breaks

Good evening, friends, neighbors, and fellow humans trying to make sense of a strange moment in history.

Let me start with something simple—and uncomfortable:

The economy we grew up with is not coming back.

Not because we failed.
Not because we didn’t work hard enough.
But because it was built on assumptions that no longer hold: infinite growth, infinite energy, infinite stability, and someone else always being in charge.

That doesn’t mean the future is hopeless.

It means the future is local.

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Collapse Is Not the End of Society—It’s the End of an Arrangement

When people hear “collapse,” they imagine chaos, Mad Max, fear, survivalism.

That’s not how collapse actually works.

Collapse is usually quieter than that. It looks like:

• Systems that sort of work… until they don’t.

• Institutions that exist on paper but not in practice.

• Money that still circulates, but buys less trust every year.

• Jobs that don’t cover life.

• Services that become conditional, delayed, or unavailable.

Collapse is not one moment.
It’s a long unraveling.

And here’s the key insight:

The opposite of collapse is not growth.
The opposite of collapse is relationship.

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Economies Don’t Run on Money—They Run on Trust

Before there were markets, there were people.

Before contracts, there were promises.
Before currencies, there were favors.
Before banks, there were neighbors.

Money is not value.
Money is a symbol of value.

And when symbols fail, societies don’t disappear.
They revert to older, deeper technologies:

• Cooperation

• Reciprocity

• Shared responsibility

• Local knowledge

• Mutual aid

These are not nostalgic ideas.
They are battle-tested survival systems older than civilization itself.

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A Post-Collapse Economy Is Not About Going Backward

This is important.

Preparing for a post-collapse economy is not about:

• Rejecting technology

• Abandoning modern knowledge

• Romanticizing hardship

• Pretending the past was better

It’s about changing what we optimize for.

The industrial economy optimized for:

• Efficiency over resilience

• Scale over care

• Growth over continuity

• Profit over people

A post-collapse economy optimizes for:

• Resilience over efficiency

• Sufficiency over excess

• Relationship over extraction

• Continuity over growth

Different values create different systems.

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The Economy Is Becoming Bioregional—Whether We Like It or Not

Here’s a truth most policy discussions avoid:

When global systems weaken, local systems matter more.

Food becomes local.
Energy becomes local.
Care becomes local.
Decision-making becomes local.

Not because it’s trendy.
Because it’s reliable.

The communities that will suffer least are not the richest ones.
They are the ones that can answer basic questions together:

• Who grows food here?

• Who fixes things?

• Who knows the land?

• Who cares for children, elders, and the sick?

• How do we make decisions when no one is coming to help?

Those are economic questions.
They just don’t show up on stock tickers.

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What a Post-Collapse Local Economy Actually Looks Like

Let’s make this concrete.

A post-collapse economy is not one system.
It’s a mesh.

It includes:

• Formal money and informal exchange

• Businesses and cooperatives

• Skills and relationships

• Trade and gift economies

Some examples you can imagine right now:

• A local repair culture where broken things are resources, not trash

• Skill-sharing networks where knowledge circulates without permission

• Community land trusts protecting housing from speculation

• Local food webs instead of single supply chains

• Time banks, mutual credit, or local exchange systems

• Shared tools, shared spaces, shared responsibility

This isn’t radical.
It’s what humans do when systems thin out.

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The Most Important Infrastructure Is Social

Let me say this plainly:

You cannot out-prepare collapse with supplies alone.

You can have food, tools, generators—and still fail if:

• No one trusts each other

• Conflict escalates unchecked

• Decisions are centralized and brittle

• Knowledge is hoarded

• Care work is invisible

The strongest communities are not the most armed.
They are the most connected.

Social trust is infrastructure.
Story is infrastructure.
Care is infrastructure.
Conflict resolution is infrastructure.

If your town has those, it already has a foundation.

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Governance After Collapse Is About Participation, Not Control

Large systems govern by distance.
Local systems govern by presence.

In a post-collapse economy:

• Leadership rotates

• Decisions are contextual

• Elders matter

• Lived experience matters

• Feedback loops are short

This isn’t chaos.
It’s adaptive governance.

The question shifts from:

“Who’s in charge?”

To:

“Who is responsible for what—and accountable to whom?”

That shift alone changes everything.

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This Is a Moral Transition, Not Just an Economic One

Every economy encodes values.

The old economy asked:

• How much can we extract?

• How fast can we grow?

• Who can we externalize costs onto?

The emerging economy asks:

• How do we care for what cares for us?

• What is enough?

• How do we stay human under pressure?

This is not about being perfect.
It’s about being appropriate to the moment.

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The Good News No One Tells You

Here’s the part people don’t expect:

A post-collapse economy can be more humane than the one we’re leaving.

Slower—but more meaningful.
Smaller—but more alive.
Less abstract—but more real.

People often say:

“I just want things to go back to normal.”

But for many, normal was:

• Precarious

• Lonely

• Exhausting

• Disconnected from land and meaning

We don’t need to recreate the past.
We need to build something honest enough to survive the future.

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The Invitation

So here is the invitation—not to panic, not to retreat, not to wait.

Start asking different questions together:

• What do we already have?

• Who already knows how to do what we need?

• What relationships need strengthening now, not later?

• What can we practice locally before we’re forced to?

Collapse does not reward speed.
It rewards preparedness, humility, and cooperation.

And the most powerful move a community can make right now is simple:

Turn toward each other.

That’s not idealism.
That’s strategy.

Thank you.

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Source: 

http://the8thfire.org/8thfire/index.htm