Leeway Proposed on Workers’ Meal Breaks

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A proposal that would make the state’s meal break rules more flexible for employers is close to becoming law.


Currently, wage employees must receive a 30-minute meal break before completing more than five hours. Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger had wanted to give employers the right to have employees take them during the sixth hour of work, as long as they were notified of the right to take them sooner.


The move was prompted by restaurant owners who claimed that employees often waited for their lunch breaks in order to receive more tips for the day, but employee groups complained that businesses could take advantage of the regulations by not providing adequate lunch breaks.


The revised changes require employers to keep additional records, and also clarified that the rules do not apply to mandatory 10-minute rest breaks, which must be given to employers twice during an eight-hour shift.


“We really defined these issues so that employers and employees are clear as to what is required here,” said Dean Fryer, a spokesman for the Department of Industrial Relations, which drafted the changes.


The department developed the revised proposal after holding public hearings in February and March. It then accepted additional comments on the new regulations during a 15-day period that ended last month.


The department now plans to submit a final proposal to the state’s Office of Administrative Law, which can make changes or approve the law as is. It would become effective within 30 days after approval.



Fried Finale


New York-based Fried Frank Harris Shriver & Jacobson LLP is closing its Los Angeles office on June 30 after 19 years.


The 10 attorneys in the local office, located on South Grand Avenue, include two partners, David Robbins and Stephen Alexander.


Robbins, a corporate attorney, represented Roy E. Disney and Stanley Gold in their shareholder campaign against Walt Disney Co. Chief Executive Michael Eisner. Alexander, a litigation attorney, has represented L.A. Gear Inc. in securities class actions and a major shareholder in a proxy fight for the Hollywood Park racetrack.


It’s unclear where the attorneys at the firm will be heading. They did not return telephone calls for comment.



Redevelopment Development


An appellate decision has allowed two redevelopment projects in downtown Los Angeles to move forward, but it also has limited the amount of tax increment funds available to the city.


The City Center and Central Industrial redevelopment zones include parts of the former Central Business District project, which was subject to a cap of $750 million in tax increment funds exceeded five years ago. (The cap was part of a consent judgment signed by the Community Redevelopment Agency in 1977 to end litigation over the project.)


After the redevelopment agency created the two new projects, the County of Los Angeles sued the city to invalidate the projects on grounds that they illegally violated the consent agreement. Two lower court judges invalidated both projects in separate 2003 decisions, but the 2nd Appellate District panel reversed part of those rulings last month.


“The Court of Appeal said that the projects cannot be held up because of the stipulated judgment; however, what the Court of Appeal ruled was that we must take out the tax-increment financing for the parcels that used to be in the Central Business District,” said Murray Kane, principal at Kane Ballmer & Berkman LC.


Given those rules, the city could see its tax increment cut by 75 percent for the City Center project and 15 percent of the Central Industrial project. Kane is considering further appealing the decision to the state Supreme Court to obtain the full increment for the city.


Paul Gale, a partner at Stradling Yocca Carlson & Rauth PC who represents the county, did not return calls.



Train Suit


The widow of a Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputy who was killed in the Jan. 26 Metrolink crash has filed a wrongful death complaint against the transportation agency.


Robins Kaplan Miller & Ciresi LLP partner Jerome Ringler filed the suit on behalf of Rita Kay Tutino, whose husband, James Tutino, was one of 11 people who died in the crash near Glendale.


In February, Ringler received an $8.5 million settlement on behalf of a Metrolink conductor who was injured in 2002 after the train he was riding collided with a Burlington Northern and Santa Fe Railway train in Orange County. Ringler also represented a woman in December who received a $9 million jury verdict for injuries sustained from the Orange County crash.



*Staff reporter Amanda Bronstad can be reached at (323) 549-5225, ext. 225, or at

[email protected]

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