New Laws Affecting Business in 2001.

As businesses close out the books and begin planning for the new year, employers need to be mindful of key changes in state law that will take affect on January 1, 2001. The new laws range from changes in employee leave requirements to employer required provisions for the disabled. Following is a brief summary of a few bills signed into law that are likely to impact business.

SB 88 -- Makes a variety of modifications to employment regulations. In particular, it exempts professional employees in the computer software field from overtime laws if the employee is primarily engaged in work that is intellectual or creative, the employee's hourly rate of pay is not less than $41, and the employee meets other requirements.

AB 2357 -- Prohibits employers with more than 25 employees from discharging, discriminating or retaliating against an employee who is a victim of domestic violence for taking time off from work to obtain judicial relief to help ensure their or their child's health, safety, or welfare. The Victims of Domestic Violence Employment Leave Act also prohibits an employer from discharging, discriminating or retaliating against an employee who is a victim of domestic violence if they take time off to seek medical attention, to obtain services from a domestic violence program, to obtain psychological counseling or to participate in safety planning.

AB 2222 -- Makes it unlawful, with specified exceptions, for an employer or employment agency to make any medical, psychological, or disability-related inquiry of any job applicant or, with regard to an employee, to make such an inquiry unless it is job-related and consistent with business necessity. The law also makes it an unlawful employment practice for an employer or other entity covered by the act to fail to engage in a timely, good faith, interactive process to determine effective reasonable accommodations, if any, at the request of an employee or applicant with a known disability.

Chamber Advocacy

As part of its advocacy efforts on behalf of Los Angeles area business, the Chamber lobbies for the passage of bills that will benefit business and against legislation that would impact the bottom line. Among the bills the Chamber weighed in on which were signed into law by Gov. Davis:

* AB 1873 -- Allocates $18 million for School-to-Career partnerships throughout California, including $1.1 million for UNITE LA'S School-to-Career program.

* SB 667 -- Appropriates funding for brownfields

* AB 505 -- Expands the powers of the Small Business Advocate

* AB 52 -- Encourages more championship boxing matches to take place in Los Angeles; thus, bringing in millions of dollars in new revenue

* SB 165 -- Requires local special tax measures to contain a statement indicating the purpose of the tax

* SB 1933 -- Creates a commission to study the state's entire system of tax policies and collection mechanisms

* AB 1263 -- Allows emergency calls made from wireless phones to be routed to the nearest dispatcher if the call is not made from a state highway Watch for regular legislative updates on the Chamber's Web site at www.lachamber.org.