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Assemblyman Vince Fong (R-Kern County) introduced a package of business relief legislation for the 2021 legislative session. During COVID-19, small businesses faced enormous challenges in light of the shutdowns across the state. In response, government has provided short-term grants and loans, however the best way to help businesses in the long-run is to provide regulatory relief and reform that reduces costs and burdens imposed by state government.

The package includes three bills:

AB 2: requires all proposed major regulations (with a cost impact of $50 million or more) to be reviewed and approved by the state legislature before they can go into effect.

AB 530: reforms an oft-abused Private Attorney Generals Act so that any allegations of labor code violations need to be sent to the employer indicating specifically what labor code has been violated.

AB 1380: provides a major tax break to California businesses by allowing business expenses made with Paycheck Protection Program loans to be deductible from state taxes.

"I hear from my local businesses every day who were already burdened by onerous taxes and regulations, and now they are getting absolutely crushed by these shutdowns," said Assemblyman Fong. "I introduced this bill package to reduce the cost of doing business in this state. Government must allow businesses to safely re-open and remove all the unnecessary policy and regulatory barriers that put a strangle-hold on the business community's ability to recover and re-hire quickly and efficiently."

These bills are currently in the Assembly Rules Committee where they will be assigned for policy committee hearings in the coming months.