by Andy Chen | Jul 8, 2015 | Law, in real life
I was at a grocery store recently and came across this sign in the bathroom. I’m sure many of us have seen this sign before. I looked it up what this California state law was (something tells me it’s in the Health and Safety Code… call it a hunch) and found section 113953.3(a) which specifies a hand and arm washing procedure, including “vigorously rubbing together the surfaces of lathered hands for at least 10 to 15 seconds.” The subsections of 113953.3 list out the situations in which hand and arm washing is required. Subsection (a)(3) says that employees shall wash their hands “After using the toilet room.” Section 113953.3 applies to employees (defined in Health and Safety code 113770) of a food facility (defined in Health and Safety Code 113789(a)). A “food facility” means any “operation that stores, prepares, packages, serves, vends, or otherwise provides food for human consumption at the retail level”. In my opinion, this would include both grocery stores and...
by Andy Chen | Jul 1, 2015 | California, Law, in real life
Little known fact, I love Subway Sandwiches. Like a lot. In law school, there was one on my home and I’d stop in there every night. If you’re in California and have been to a Subway Sandwich, you may have noticed that a hot or toasted sandwich costs more than a cold one, all else being equal. One of the Subways in my neighborhood has this sign on its register: Now, personally, a hot sandwich sounds disgusting as all get out, but to each their own. This “sales tax on hot sandwiches” things is apparently a big deal as I’ve seen other Subways with signs similar to this, no doubt attempting to placate customers of hot sandwiches angry about the higher price. I spent some time looking and as best I can tell, the California state law in question is California Revenue and Taxation Code section 6359. It is a bit long to cut and paste for you, but the basic idea is this: Those of us who have gone grocery shopping in California know that you don’t pay sales tax on most grocery items. That is the general rule that, essentially, described in section 6359(a). Section 6359(b) defines in very broad strokes what groceries are exempt from sales tax under Section 6359(a). Section 6359(c) defines some grocery categories that you definitely have to pay sales tax on. As usual, though, there are exceptions to the general rule in section 6359(a). Section 6359(d) defines seven categories of items on which you have to pay sales tax. Number 7 (i.e. Section 6359(d)(7)) is products sold as “hot food products”. “Hot...
by Andy Chen | Jun 27, 2015 | California, Law, in real life, Statutes... and stuff
If you’ve never been to the Central Valley of California (where my Modesto office is), one thing you’ll quickly realize in the summer is that it gets hot. Like 110 degrees hot. All the time. I was at the Modesto Home Depot the other day and came across this sign reminding employers to provide drinking water for their employees — and, of course, to do that with a water cooler from Home Depot. I knew that California required employers to provide water, but I had never looked up what the precise law was. Having seen this sign and being a lawyer and very nerdy, I decided to look it up. It turns out that it isn’t statute that requires employers to provide cooling water to employees, but rather that it’s a regulation. Specifically, it’s Title 8 Section 3395 of the California Code of Regulations entitled “Heat Illness Prevention” issued by the Department of Safety and Health within the California Department of Industrial Relations. Lawyers often cite this as “8 CCR 3395.” Under Labor Code section 6308 and 6317, the Department of Safety and Health — otherwise known as Cal/OSHA — has the authority to enforce Section 3395. Section 3395(c) of Title 8 specifies what the providing of water: “Provision of water. Employees shall have access to potable drinking water meeting the requirements of Sections 1524, 3363, and 3457, as applicable, including but not limited to the requirements that it be fresh, pure, suitably cool, and provided to employees free of charge. The water shall be located as close as practicable to the areas where employees are working. Where drinking water is...
by Andy Chen | Aug 2, 2013 | Law, in real life
I’m in California Superior court quite several times a week for one thing or another. Because of that, I meet a lot of regular lay people (i.e. non-lawyers) at the courthouse who, upon seeing me in a suit, inevitably engage me in conversation during which they ask me a legal question. Unlike most lawyers, I don’t mind this and try to help them as best I can in the minute or so I’m in line with them. One of the things I see a great deal is that non-lawyer lay people do not have access to basic resources that people who are around the law a lot (e.g. lawyers like me) take for granted. There’s the legal research resources, of course, but the resource problem goes deeper than that. One of the things lay people lack is pleading paper, or the paper that has the line numbers on the left and the title page listing out the parties, the name of the court, etc. Pleading paper is really easy to make in Microsoft Word. Since most people have Word, I’ve made a Word document of blank pleading paper for use in California Superior Court. This document should be compatible with Word 2003 and later versions of Word. If you do use it, please modify it for your individual case (e.g. insert the county you are in, the name of your parties, etc). As always, because I don’t know the details of your particular situation, I don’t guarantee or promise the paper will be useful in your situation. Please exercise common sense and ask for help when you don’t understand...
by Andy Chen | Jul 29, 2013 | Swag
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