Dear Restaurant Friends,
We urgently need your help to echo our message to LA City Councilmembers!
Next week, the LA City's Economic Development and Jobs Committee is set to vote on unwarranted changes to local labor enforcement laws that will unfairly target employers, undermine employee privacy, and erode due process.
These proposals are being framed as worker protections, but they lack balance, assume widespread misconduct, and target food service businesses without adequate data or community outreach.
The proposals being considered would:
- Create New Enforcement Powers
- Duplicating State and County efforts, the LA Office of Wage Standards (OWS) would gain expanded authority to investigate and enforce meal & rest breaks, overtime, and late pay violations.
- Unwarranted granting of subpoena power to the Bureau of Contract Administration, enabling them to issue administrative subpoenas to small businesses!!
- Public Shaming of Employers
- Establish a public online database of employers cited for violations, regardless of the severity, intent, or whether issues were resolved amicably.
- This could damage reputations, drive away customers, and impact staffing even for businesses making good-faith efforts to comply.
- Random Employer Inspections; Ditching the Complaint-Based System
- Launches random or targeted inspections in industries deemed "high risk" — with restaurants explicitly named in the proposal.
- This opens the door to surprise audits, increased administrative burdens, and unfair targeting of compliant businesses.
- Empowering Activists for Enforcement
- The City is pushing for increased collaboration with community organizations and labor advocates to share co-enforcement duties.
- This could undermine impartial enforcement and expose businesses to biased investigations or activist-driven complaints.
- Threats to Permits and Licensing
- Recommends revoking food facility permits for alleged violations — putting your entire operation at risk without due process.
Labor enforcement should focus on proven bad actors, not create unnecessary burdens for law-abiding restaurant owners.
Please take a quick moment to use the tool below to send a pre-written message to your Councilmembers urging them to OPPOSE these overreaching proposals.
Thank you.
