Comstock's magazine 1119 - November 2019 | Page 35

and law yers and accountants that can
organize that, but for a small-business
owner that has a cookie store, a book-
store or a restaurant, they will now be
required to drop everything, gather that
data themselves and lose valuable time
working in their business, or more like-
ly hire IT professionals, law yers, other
experts for them, and obviously spend
an exorbitant amount of money. We’re
asking for clarifying what “personal in-
formation” means, clarifying what “con-
sumer” means — the term right now is
very broad and could even apply to an
employee of a business. … And digital
selling and loyalty programs will be se-
verely harmed, if not eviscerated, if the
law goes into effect. (We want to) ensure
we can preser ve loyalt y and rewards
programs for places like grocery stores,
restaurants, retailers.
California recently approved a longer
paid family leave — up to eight weeks
for each parent. What’s the response of
NFIB to this change?
California small businesses are already
required to offer their employees the
most generous, expensive paid leave
programs and workplace benef its. A
mandated paid parental leave program
adds massive costs to already-fragile
mom and pops, which will result, once
again, in the law of unintended conse-
quences for workers in our state: scaled-
back hours and shifts, reduced benefits,
layoffs and for-sale signs on Main Street
businesses.
Immigrant small-business owners rep-
resent a significant and growing part
of the economy, constituting 18 percent
of small-business owners. How many
of California NFIB’s members are im-
migrant-owned small businesses? How
do you do outreach to this community?
NFIB has many immigrant-owned small
businesses, something we know first-
hand in our regular meetings with them
and all our members. We don’t, however,
keep a statistic on how many there are,
just as we don’t keep a political party
affiliation statistic. What unites all our
members is the shared difficulties in
running their enterprises, which you
can find in our monthly Small Business
Economic Trends reports and in our
quadrennial Small Business Problems
and Priorities study, listing the 75 issue
concerns. As with all our members, our
main outreach vehicles include state and
federal ballots that guide our lobbying
strategies in Sacramento and in Wash-
ington, D.C.; action alerts; our state and
federal webpages; and regular meetings
throughout California. n
Sena Christian is managing editor of
Comstock’s. On Twitter @SenaCChristian
or senachristian.com.
S ac r amen to 's on l y Pr ohi bi t ion-Er a T hemed Fundrais er
F e a tu r i n g
THE SYMPHONIA
PHONOTONE
ORCHESTRA
RSVP CHOIR
& Ma ster o f C er emon ie s ,
ROB STEWART
OF KVIE'S
'ROB ON THE ROAD'
Than k Y ou S p ons or s
Benefiting
DECEMBER 7
F rom 6: 0 0 t o 1 0 :0 0 pm
a t t he H i st o r ic
SACRAMENTO MASONIC TEMPLE
S po n s o rs hi p s a nd Ti c ke t s a v a i l a b le a t :
HTTPS://JOSHUASHOUSEHOSPICE.ORG/GALA-EVENT
YOLO HOSPICE, INC.
KAISER PERMANENTE
SUSAN & JERRY BEREIKA
FAMILY FOUNDATION
SACRAMENTO ASSOCIATION
OF REALTORS
COMSTOCK'S MAGAZINE
SACRAMENTO MAGAZINE
JEAN & DON
WIGGLESWORTH
PACIFIC INVESTMENTS
CONSULTANTS
CAPITAL CONNECTION
November 2019 | comstocksmag.com
35