Medical Leave: How and Why Chipotle Prevailed in a High-Stakes Pregnancy Discrimination Trial After an eight-day trial, a Southern California jury has decided that Chipotle Mexican Grill did not unlawfully discriminate when it fired a manager after she suffered a miscarriage and failed to return from a 12-week medical leave. The plaintiff claimed that she needed additional time off because of mental strain. The jury agreed that the plaintiff was suffering from a mental impairment but decided that the impairment itself did not entitle her to additional protected medical leave. More
 
Appeals Court Decision Challenges Independent Contractor Definition A recent California Court of Appeal decision indicates that the state is trending away from unifying its independent contractor law and leaving employers with even more questions than they had before. Now more than ever, employers need to be careful about how they classify their workers as different standards may apply to different industries, different statutory schemes, and beyond. More

Contractors team with AI company to improve workplace safety Nine major construction companies have partnered with software firm Smartvid.io to develop predictive analytics that can prevent accidents and improve safety throughout the industry. Suffolk, which will serve as chair of the council, contributed 10 years of project data and photos to the predictive model, and other partners will contribute data anonymously as the system develops. More
 
Thanks for the Help Assembly Speaker Anthony Rendon responded to Vice President Mike Pence, who had wished Rendon a productive session: "I would have to say you and the President have already done quite a bit to help us with that. Thanks to your policies, voters in California added five Democrats to the Assembly in the last election. In addition, one Republican has decided to jump to the Democratic party, citing the President's extreme positions." Read the letter here.
 
Lawyers Brace for Porter's Questions During Hearings: Freshman Rep. Katie Porter (D-Calif.), a former law school professor, has asked questions that have tripped up Wells Fargo and Equifax executives since she arrived in Congress and nabbed a seat on the House Financial Services Committee. Porter beat incumbent Mimi Walters in November. Her approach, according to The National Law Journal's C. Ryan Barber "has forced white-collar defense lawyers who specialize in congressional hearings to grapple with how to prepare clients for questioning that uses a company's own legal arguments against its top executive. Her repeated, effective use of that approach promises to make her a starring figure in preparations that have been known to include mock hearings, with lawyers playing the part of lawmaker during rehearsals. This tactic is a new and particularly effective example of what has long been the risk for a corporate executive, the face of a company, testifying in Congress," said David Leviss, a former senior investigative counsel for the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee who's now a partner at O'Melveny & Myers, in a Journal story.
 
And Then There Were None Sarah D. Wire from the LA Times profiles the now-unified force of Democrats representing the previous GOP bastion of Orange County. "Four of the newest members defeated Republicans in November to secure their seats. They joined Rep. Lou Correa (D-Santa Ana) who holds a seat that flipped to Democratic control in the mid-'90s, and Rep. Alan Lowenthal (D-Long Beach), one-third of whose constituents are O.C. residents." Story (registration may be required)
 
Thank You for being my Friend California's new online community college director, hoping to quickly establish her executive team, pushed Monday to grant a no-bid contract of up to $500,000 to an executive recruiter who is a friend and has long has been a part of San Francisco's political scene. Heather Hiles, president of the nascent online college, has a goal of starting classes this fall. The community college board approved Hiles' choice of executive recruiter Carolyn Carpeneti, even though some community college board members abstained, contending the contract should have been put out to competitive bid. Before becoming an executive recruiter, Carpeneti was a political fundraiser whose clients included then-San Francisco Mayor Willie Brown. Brown and Carpeneti became romantically involved and had a daughter in 2001. In 2003, the San Francisco Chronicle reported that "nonprofit groups and political committees controlled by the mayor and his allies" paid Carpeneti $2.33 million over a five-year period. Story

US Chamber files Amicus in ABC CCC SCOTUS Petition After a disappointing but not surprising decision in the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, the Associated Builders and Contractors of California Cooperation Committee asked the US Supreme Court to hear its case. At the request of WECA - an active US Chamber member - the US Chamber of Commerce Litigation Center provided an amicus in support of ABCCC's request for a writ of certiorari.
 
The Chamber's decision is important because they were the plaintiff in an earlier case. They pointed out that "the Chamber regularly files amicus curiae briefs in cases that raise issues of concern to the nation's business community." This is such a case because California is abusing its massive public works spending to regulate in an arena Congress reserved for unrestricted private speech. Further, California seeks to tilt public debate about unionization against the free speech rights of employers. The California statute at issue seeks to effect a massive transfer of resources into the coffers of union-selected "industry advancement funds" opposing right-to-work laws. Even worse, the statute conscripts employers as unwilling participants in pro-unionization advocacy by compelling them to fund pro-unionization speech with which they may disagree. You can read the Chamber's Amicus here and ABCCC's petition here.
 
However, we have a long way to go, and there is no guaranty that the Court will grant ABCCC's petition. Nevertheless, the support of the Chamber is appreciated and demonstrates that the merit-shop supporters of fair and open competition are not alone.

Survey Shows Construction Contractors Struggle as Labor Shortage Persists The USG + U.S. Chamber of Commerce Commercial Construction Index (CCI) is a quarterly economic index designed to gauge the outlook for, and resulting confidence in, the commercial construction industry.

Recognizing a need to highlight the important contributions of this sector to the nation's economy, USG Corporation and the U.S. Chamber partnered to produce this first-of-its-kind index.

Each quarter, contractors across the country are surveyed in order to better understand their levels of confidence in the industry and top-of-mind concerns.

Download the full report and explore the top-line findings, here.
  

Santa Barbara Proceeds to "Negotiate" PLA Despite an outpouring of opposition from local contractors and the local chamber of commerce, the Santa Barbara City Council voted 6-1 to spend $100,000 to negotiate a PLA with the local building trades council for all city work over $5 million. Michael Vlaming, a Northern California attorney who has created a cottage industry of replacing one public agency's name with another and charging $50,000 for the search and replace, was hired. The Coalition for Fair Employment in Construction and WECA are continuing to work with the local contractors as negotiations unfold. The city also passed a sales tax increase last year to whet the appetite of the unions for the PLA - and found willing benefactors at the city council.
 
What's Going on in DC?
Hearing in the Democratic HELP Committee The House Education and Labor Committee's Subcommittee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions announced it will be holding a hearing, "Protecting Workers' Right to Organize: The Need for Labor Law Reform," on Tuesday, March 26, at 10:15 am. The hearing is likely to cover numerous issues employer groups have been actively fighting over the last 15 years. Most expect that the Democrats will introduce labor-related legislation similar to the Workplace Democracy Act and Workers' Freedom to Negotiate Act, which they introduced during the 115th Congress.

Lobbyists Backing Biden For President: Washington lobbyists on both sides of the aisle would like to see former Vice President Joe Biden win the Democratic nomination for president. Biden received 37 percent of the vote in a poll of 183 registered lobbyists conducted by PoliticoInfluence between March 4 and March 10. PI confirmed each respondent was a registered lobbyist or foreign agent. The sample included 88 Democrats, 77 Republicans and 18 lobbyists who identified as members of neither party, who were asked to choose the Democrat they would "most like to see become president." The poll isn't scientific and doesn't reveal much about who's likely to win the nomination. (There are few, if any, registered lobbyists in the early primary states.) But it sheds light on how Washington lobbyists in both parties view the presidential race. The lobbyists who voted include those who work at law and lobbying firms, trade groups and companies with Washington offices. Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) came in a distant second, with 9 percent of the vote. Former Colorado Gov. John Hickenlooper and former Rep. Beto O'Rourke (D-Texas) tied for third, with 8 percent of the vote. I don't think they asked about the Republican primary.

Gov. Newsom raised $2.5 million to pay the bills for parties around inauguration: "The biggest donor to the inaugural and the two days of parties was organized labor, which ponied up $775,000 to help stage the events, with $150,000 coming from the state's prison guards union and $100,000 from the California Teachers Association Political Action Committee." Story.
 
Acosta's Unlikely Allies: The AFL-CIO executive council held off Tuesday on asking Labor Secretary Alexander to resign over his 2008 plea deal with billionaire pedophile Jeffrey Epstein. On a conference call to discuss the controversy, the labor federation's executive council weighed the severity of a judge's ruling last week that the plea deal violated the Crime Victims' Rights Act, ultimately deciding not to act. According to press accounts, two union leaders on the call said they worried that Acosta's successor will end up being worse for workers, underscoring a counter-intuitive political dynamic: The same traits that make Acosta tolerable to unions - a propensity for deliberation, a preference for legal prudence, and a persistent fear of generating negative headlines - have eroded Acosta's support among pro-management lobbyists. Business groups are impatient to see more progress on deregulation at DOL by the end of 2020, lest the country elect a Democratic president. "The management community is becoming weary of the slow pace of rules," said one lobbyist. Meanwhile, Florida lawmakers are urging the House Oversight and Judiciary Committees to call the Labor Secretary to testify about the plea agreement, Glenn Thrush reported in the New York Times."House leaders are likely to approve some kind of a hearing, although it is unclear when," Thrush wrote.
 
San Diego Dem-On-Dem? Sunday Gover had more reason than most to be shocked when state Assemblyman Brian Maienschein switched his registration from Republican to Democrat: Gover, a Democrat, had just fallen short by a mere 607 votes in her bid to unseat Maienschein. While state Assembly Democrats exulted and Republicans branded their erstwhile caucus colleague a turncoat, Gover vowed vigilance, saying she'd be "watching closely to see whether Mr. Maienschein fully embraces our community's values" or was just engaging in some self-preservation. Democratic sources have seemed confident Gover wouldn't run in 2020, but we could still get a now-intraparty rematch. The ever-useful California Target Bot turned up a newly created Gover for Assembly 2020 committee. 2018 campaign consultant Dan Rottenstreich said the formation of the committee was just "procedural" and doesn't mean Gover is announcing another campaign - but she's also "not ruling it out," depending how Maienschein behaves.
 
Does Harris have a Lock on the Nomination? "Ever since Sen. Kamala Harris announced her presidential campaign, there's been a gush of speculation about the importance of her home state in the nomination process - especially since the California primary has been moved up to March. I'm neither for nor against Harris in the primary, and I will enthusiastically support her if she is the Democratic candidate. But much of the hype about the supposed primacy of the California primary for her candidacy ignores the recent history of the state's role in the Democratic nominating process." More (registration may be required)
 
2020 Election
 
Klobuchar's Paid Leave Problem: The New York Times joined other publications (HuffPost, Yahoo, and BuzzFeed) to run a mean-boss profile of Sen. Amy Klobuchar.All the stories have reported that Klobuchar's Senate office has an unusually high staff turnover, that Klobuchar has a terrible temper, and that she frequently requires staffers to run personal errands. The Times story included an odd anecdote about the Minnesota Democrat eating salad with a comb after an aide misplaced her fork, and then ordering the aide to clean the comb. The Times also said that Klobuchar required staff returning from paid parental leave to remain employed in her office at least three times as long as the leave - or pay the difference out of pocket. A Klobuchar spokeswoman told the Times that Klobuchar offers 12 weeks' paid leave and has "never made staff pay back any of their leave and will be changing that language in the handbook." More here.

DYNAMEX - The gift that keeps on giving At a recent informational hearing, business owners and labor leaders could agree on one thing - the California Supreme Court's decision in the Dynamex case will affect California workers - but that was all they agreed upon. The Assembly Labor and Employment Committee examined the decision - issued last April by the California Supreme Court - that changed the test to determine whether an individual is an employee or independent contractor. Many business leaders, small business owners, and independent contractors expressed the need for the Legislature to intervene and modernize state labor laws. The pleas fell mainly on deaf ears of the committee members present.   Assembly Member Ash Kalra (D-San Jose), Chair of the Committee, stacked the panels of witnesses with left of center academics, and labor lobbyists. They argued the case will either have limited application beyond those making at or close to minimum wage or alternately, will be a "game-changing" realignment that will end the "race to the bottom" and guarantee a path to the middle class for all independent contractors - who will be made employees - whether they want to be or not. Kalra observed, "Worker misclassification is a significant and ongoing issue with real economic consequences for every day working people." That echoes Gov. Gavin Newsom's State of the State call for a "new modern compact for California's changing workforce" that's "much bigger than Dynamex."   Assembly Member Lorena Gonzalez (D-San Diego), former head of the San Diego Labor Federation and author of Assembly Bill 5 (which would codify and expand the court's decision), made it clear that her goal was to not only reduce (or eliminate) independent contracting in California, but to also give access to more union organizing of these new employees.   A representative of the California Hospital Association pointed out that contrary to the suggestion that Dynamex only applied to low-wage workers subject to California Wage Orders, a hospital emergency room doctor had already sued his physicians group - as well as the hospital that employed the physicians group - to staff the emergency room as joint employers. (Note: in general, hospitals are prohibited from employing physicians directly).   The hearing took no action and was just an opportunity to stake out the issues. It seems that labor, and their Democratic benefactors, have no interest in rolling back the court's decision.   Who Should Install Energy Storage Systems? Perform a Google search for the terms 'IBEW' and 'solar' and it becomes clear that IBEW wants to dominate the solar marketplace. They have successfully used project labor agreements (PLAs) and greenmail to control many new large-scale projects, and now appear to be using their political power to go after another target - C46 solar contractors. IBEW and NECA are asking the Contractors State License Board (CSLB) to rule that only a C10 licensed contractor is qualified and allowed under existing law to install the energy storage systems that are commonplace in photovoltaic system (PV) installations.

Should C10 contractors be the only CSLB approved contractors to install ESSs? Let us know what you think by taking our single-question survey, here.

Ask Richard Markuson of WECA Government Affairs Submit your legislative or political question to Richard Markuson. He may address your question in a future editorial.  Ask Richard

Requiring a Nonexempt Employee to Call-In to Work May Require Providing Reporting Time Pay On February 4, 2019, the California Court of Appeal issued its ruling in Ward v. Tilly's, Inc. The Court held that employers requiring a nonexempt employee to report in by telephone, text message, or computer before a possible on-call shift to find out whether to report to work may be required to provide reporting time pay. (Read more about the case here) The case related to retail (Wage order 7), but I asked WECA Attorney extraordinaire Dennis Cook if this could apply at some future date to wage order 16. His response is as follows:
 
We would argue that the Tilly's decision was limited to the retail industry scheduling practice. The court held that the "on-call scheduling alleged in this case triggers Wage Order 7's reporting time pay requirements." The court chastises this practice that is fairly prevalent in the retail industry: "Reporting time pay requires employers to internalize some of the costs of overscheduling, thus encouraging employees to accurately project their labor needs and to schedule accordingly. The court notes that the text of Wage Order 7, alone, is not determinative; thus, it discusses "unpaid on-call shifts".

We are nervous that the reasoning could be extended to the construction industry due to the inconveniences employees experience if they must call before reporting to the jobsite. This is not overscheduling like that which occurs in retail, but there are some similarities. As the Tilly's court observed:

"[When] Tilly's tells the employee at 8 a.m. that she is not needed for the on-call shift, she will not be paid anything for that shift. Nevertheless, she will necessarily have forgone sleeping, working another job, taking a class, etc. both at 8 a.m. and between 10:00 a.m. and 12:00 p.m. In short, the employer will have imposed to some degree on four hours of the employee's time-an imposition for which it will not owe the employee any compensation."

That same rationale could apply to the requirement that the construction employee call-in to see if work is available.
 
A word to the wise - if you require workers to call ... you could be the next Tilly's. If you have questions, consult your legal counsel.

Seventh Circuit Deflates Scabby the Rat's Ego and What It Means for Employers This image will be familiar to most readers. But last month the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit put Scabby back in its rat hole. In Constr. & Gen. Laborers' Union 330 v. Town of Grand Chute, No. 18-1739 (7th Cir. Feb. 14, 2019), the appellate court held that a Grand Chute, Wisconsin zoning ordinance banning all private signs on public rights-of-way permitted town officials to order Local 330 of the Construction and General Laborers' Union to deflate the labor icon without violating the union's First Amendment rights. This ruling creates a glimmer of hope for employers in what has otherwise been a frustrating and ineffective battle to curb an annoying union tactic. More

SCOTUS Denies Cert to In-N-Out Burger: The Supreme Court on Monday declined to review a ruling that required In-N-Out Burger, a popular fast-food restaurant chain in California and the southwest, to allow its employees to wear pins supporting Fight for $15. The fast food chain petitioned the high court to overturn a July Fifth Circuit ruling that found the company violated the National Labor Relations Act when a manager told employees they couldn't wear the buttons because they weren't part of their uniform. Counsel for In-N-Out argued (unsuccessfully) that the buttons compelled the burger chain "to endorse or subsidize messages with which they do not agree," and that this violated the precedent set in last year's Janus v. AFSCME decision. Fight for $15 said in a statement that the court's decision is a "victory for workers" and "affirms that no company can just unilaterally decide to take away our right to speak out and join together in a union."

Apprenticeship Growth 

The State Legislature --- at the behest of the State Building and Construction Trades Council --- passed AB 235 last year as an urgency measure. In the 16 days preceding the adjournment of the two-year session, Assemblymember Patrick O' Donnell's bill --- which originally added a minimum fund balance in the Public School System Stabilization Account (PSSSA) to the conditions that must be met for the cap on school district reserves to be triggered --- turned into a bill that dramatically altered the way new and innovative apprenticeship programs are approved by the State.
 
This massive re-altering of apprenticeship had a single after-hours hearing in the Assembly Labor Committee, which is chaired by now-Superintendent of Public Instruction Tony Thurmond. There was a plethora of union support for the bill, and support from a few organizations such as the Coalition for Adequate School Housing, who seek to curry favor with the building trades.
 
The measure was co-sponsored by the Department of Industrial Relations' Division of Apprenticeship Standards, but it was evident the State Building and Construction Trades Council (SBCTC) was in the lead. According to SBCTC, AB 235 "would authorize a bilateral method for the approval of apprenticeship programs by maintaining and reinforcing the existing process for the construction trades and firefighters programs, and establish a separate path for new and emerging industries interested in apprenticeship". AB 235 "provides the necessary flexibility to DAS to approve and support the development of new programs without interfering or disrupting the backbone of the apprenticeship system, which are the building and construction trades' programs." The only problem is, SBCTC didn't bother to ask their apprenticeship programs (or the firefighters) for their input --- and now AB 235 is driving the Joint Apprentice and Training Committees (JATC's) nuts.
 
The problem --- from the JATC's perspective --- is that new programs which are not identified as building trades are approved by the Chief of Apprenticeship after only a 30-day notice, in which the program's new proposed standards are posted on DAS's website. If no one complains, the Chief proceeds to approve and notifies the CAC at their next quarterly meeting.
 
To "protect" existing building trades programs, the chief cannot approve a new apprenticeship program that includes a substantial number of work processes covered by a program in the building and construction trades or firefighters, or approve the amendment of apprenticeship standards to include those work processes, unless either of the following applies:
(1) The program is in the building and construction trades or a firefighter program and subject to the rules and regulations of the California Apprenticeship Council (CAC) (in other words - subject to the "needs test") or;
(2) The CAC has granted consent to the approval of the program or the amendment to the apprenticeship standards. If no party files an objection with the chief to the approval of the proposed program or amendment alleging overlap of work processes under this subdivision, the chief shall not be required to seek the consent of the CAC prior to approving the program or amendment.
 
So, the big question is, "how many work processes constitute "substantial?" To the JATC's, one work process would constitute as being substantial if the complaints heard at a more than three-hour discussion at this week's CAC meeting is indicative. One program sponsored by West Hills Community College District proposed to add 10 new occupations to their instructional program in: Quality Assurance Technician, Pest Control Advisor, Irrigation Design Specialist, Farm Equipment Mechanic, Industrial Maintenance Mechanic, Industrial Welder, Industrial Electrical Technician, Plant Production Supervisor, Ag Business Sales Professional, and Human Resources Generalist. The Iron Workers objected to the Industrial Welder program even though it has a different O-Net code than any iron worker trade. Additionally, an apprentice in this program would not be approved for dispatch to a Public Works job because, in the view of many of the CAC members, the role of the CAC is to protect existing programs --- not to help facilitate the development of new and innovative apprenticeship opportunities.
 
Governor Newsom has stated he would like to see apprenticeships grow to over a half million from its current 80,000, but as long as he continues to pack the CAC with union officials, I doubt this will happen. Unions --- in the final analysis --- are out to protect their control, not to develop the economy.

SCOTUS Watch -- "Ruth Bader Ginsburg was seen in public Monday. Conspiracy theorists still insist she's dead," by WaPo's Eli Rosenberg and Abby Ohlheiser: "Robert Barnes has been a reporter and editor at The Washington Post for more than 30 years. For the past 12, he has covered the Supreme Court. This week he experienced something he says was a first in his career: a storm of commentators, many anonymous, swarming his social media accounts and email inbox to tell him that something he saw with his own eyes and reported in The Post did not actually happen: Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, alive and well, attending a performance about her life at a museum in Washington --- her first public appearance since she underwent cancer surgery in December. A falsehood has been spreading in dark corners of the Internet that Ginsburg is dead --- and in the hours after Barnes published his report, conspiracy theorists pelted him with their doubt-mongering." WaPo
 
California Class Actions and PAGA ("Pretty much All is Going to the Attorneys") Claims Continue to Overwhelm the State Much has been written about the huge jury verdicts that get handed out in California with alarming regularity and California's sustained number one ranking as the Top Judicial Hellhole in the nation. A corollary problem continues unabated: the prevalence of class actions and lawsuits under the Private Attorneys General Act (PAGA). Though California accounts for 12 percent of the population of the United States, currently more than 50 percent of all class actions in the country are filed here. Further, PAGA claims, which operate essentially like sloppy class actions with far fewer procedural hurdles for the plaintiff and far less oversight by judges, have flooded the courts since PAGA was enacted in 2004. Since then, more than 35,000 PAGA lawsuits have been filed and thousands more are filed each year against employers great and small. More

Newsom Appoints New CAC Members
 
Governor Newsom announced appointments to the CAC California Apprenticeship Council:
 
Yvonne de la Pena of Elk Grove, member since 2015. De la Pena is executive director of the California Firefighter Joint Apprenticeship Committee (JAC), a position she has held since 1999. She was assistant to the president for the California Professional Firefighters from 1986 to 1990. De la Pena is a Democrat.
 
Richard Harris of Villa Park, member since 2007. Harris has been the president of Residential Contractors Association since 1987. He held multiple positions at Wesseln Construction Company from 1965 to 1987, including general superintendent and apprentice carpenter. Harris is a Republican.
 
James Hussey of San Leandro, member since 2013. Hussey has been president of Marina Mechanical since 1990 and was chief operations officer at the Sheet Metal Workers' Local 104 Bay Area Industry Training Fund from 2010 to 2015. He was president of Bay Point Control Inc. from 1980 to 1990 and master electrician at the City of Concord Department of Leisure Services, Concord Pavilion from 1978 to 1980. Hussey was a service manager at Scatena York Company from 1977 to 1978 and at Marina Heating and Air Conditioning from 1972 to 1977. He is a member of the Air Conditioning Contractors of America and the Sheet Metal and Air Conditioning Contractors' National Association. Hussey is a Republican.
 
Derrick Kualapai of Pittsburg is a new member of the CAC. Kualapai has served as special representative of the States of California and Hawaii for the United Association since 2018. He was President at the Plumbers and Pipefitters Local 342 from 2004 to 2012. Kualapai is an executive board member of the California State Pipe Trades Council and a trustee on the Contra Costa County Building Trades Council. He is a graduate of the United Association's Certified Instructors Training program. Kualapai is a Democrat.
 
Louis Ontiveros of Riverside is a new member of the CAC. Ontiveros has served as director of training at Southwest Carpenters Training Trust since 2017. He was a team lead and executive board member of the Southwest Regional Council of Carpenters Local 944 from 2002 to 2017. Ontiveros was an apprenticeship instructor at Southwest Carpenters Training Trust from 1998 to 1999. He served as a U.S. Marine from 1985 to 1993. Ontiveros is a Democrat.
 
Paul Von Berg of Newport Beach, member since 2011. Von Berg retired as executive vice president of Brutoco Engineering and Construction, where he worked from 1992 to 2012. He was director of West Coast operations at Park Construction from 1987 to 1992. Von Berg is registered without party preference.
 
Richard Zampa of Rodeo, member since 2018. Zampa has served as the California, Nevada and Arizona apprenticeship director at the California Field Ironworkers Apprenticeship & Training Program since 2005. He was an apprentice ironworker at the Ironworkers Apprenticeship Program from 1973 to 1976. Zampa is a member of Ironworkers Local 378. Zampa is a Democrat.
 
Two weeks
 
That's how much time is left for California lawmakers to introduce new bills this year. Legislators filed 747 bills as of today. There will be about 2,300 total bills for the 2019 session, meaning 1,600 more could be on the horizon in the next two weeks. Housing and wildfires will be at the top of the priority list, according to Assembly Speaker Anthony Rendon and Senate President Pro-Tem Toni Atkins.