Kern growers applaud high court ruling challenging California labor law [Bakersfield Californian]
Kern County growers welcomed — and the United Farm Workers union shrugged off — a U.S. Supreme Court ruling Wednesday that sided with California agriculture businesses in their challenge to a state regulation giving unions access to private property in order to organize workers. … The president of the Kern County Farm Bureau hailed Wednesday’s ruling as an important victory for private property owners and said farmers have for too long endured government-sanctioned intrusions that violate their rights under the 5th and 14th amendments of the U.S. Constitution. “Farmers pride themselves in being efficient and responsible stewards of the land, and strong private property rights is something we take seriously as they are core to our ability to feed and clothe the nation and beyond,” President John C. Moore III said by email.
Supreme Court limits California union recruiting in favor of property rights [CalMatters/Salinas Californian]
… While growers celebrated the decision, labor activists say it will now be harder to access workers and advocate for their rights. … Monterey County Farm Bureau President Norm Groot, who runs the private nonprofit association of farmers and ranchers on California’s Central Coast, characterized the court’s decision as a big win for ag, landowners and farm operations. Groot said the decision championed property rights while prioritizing private farm operation security and food safety. “It’s good for food safety that you don’t have visitors making incursions into fields to talk to employees while they’re on break, at lunch or working,” he said.
Editorial: Supreme Court undercuts California farm labor organizers [Los Angeles Times]
… Yes, property owners have certain rights, but so do farmworkers. … Giving labor organizers limited access to farms and processing facilities solely to talk with workers strikes a proper balance between the rights and interests of the property owners and those of the people they employ. … This decision does not end labor rights in the fields, of course. It just makes it more difficult for members of a predominately nonwhite and non-English-speaking work force to exercise those rights, once again signaling to working Americans that at least before this Supreme Court, the deck is stacked against them.
California issued millions in COVID fines. Employers have paid almost none of them [Sacramento Bee]
… By April 2021, inspectors with California’s Division of Occupational Safety and Health, better known as Cal-OSHA, had ordered roughly $4.6 million in fines for wrongdoing related to COVID-19 in some 200 workplaces. But behind the scenes at the state’s workplace safety agency, California employers and their lawyers have filed an onslaught of appeals, delayed paying their fines and sought deals to pay next to nothing, a Sacramento Bee review of Cal-OSHA fines and payment data found. … The Bee’s analysis buttresses farmworkers’ and food-packing employees’ contention that Cal-OSHA hasn’t done enough to protect workers, said Ildi Carlisle-Cummins, director of the California Institute for Rural Studies, a Davis nonprofit that advocates for farmworkers.
https://www.sacbee.com/news/investigations/the-public-eye/article252288373.html
Newsom misled the public about wildfire prevention efforts ahead of worst fire season on record [Capital Public Radio, Sacramento]
… Climate change was sparking fires more frequent, ferocious, and far-reaching than ever before, Newsom said, and confronting them would have to become a year-round effort. The state’s response, Newsom added, “fundamentally has to change.” But two-and-a-half years later, as California approaches what could be the worst wildfire season on record, it does so with little evidence of the year-round attention Newsom promised. An investigation from CapRadio and NPR’s California Newsroom found the governor has misrepresented his accomplishments and even disinvested in wildfire prevention.
Opinion: Can California start taking droughts seriously, please? [New York Times]
… The way we manage our water is outdated, inefficient, uncoordinated and, to a lot of people, unfair. … The complexities in mitigating drought are less about innovation and more about determination — a collective will to recognize that the way we manage water now is not working and that we need big fixes. … California has an archaic system of water rights that allows longtime agricultural holders to use water essentially without limit while others are forced to skimp. This has created clear inequities. … California and the rest of the country can well afford to manage our water supplies more sustainably and equitably.
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/06/24/opinion/california-drought-water-climate.html
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