Governor Signs Legislation Promoting Nutrition and Healthier Options

DR. SORENSEN: Hello and welcome. My name is Dr. Bonnie Sorensen, I'm from the California Department of Public Health and it's a great honor to welcome all of you here today as we take another important step toward our efforts to create a healthier California.

In addition to our Governor, I'm very pleased to announce that we are joined today by Jot Condie, president and CEO of the California Restaurant Association, Dr. Harold Goldstein, Executive Director of the California Center for Public Health Advocacy, Assemblymember Mark DeSaulnier, a Democrat of Concord, Senator Alex Padilla, a Democrat of Pacoima. Also in this audience we have Alecia Sanchez, our legislative advocate for the California Division of the American Cancer Society, Dr. Richard Frankenstein, president of the California Medical Association, Jim Gordon, president of the Consumer Federation of California, Ignacio Hernandez, legislative director of the Consumer Federation of California, Supervisor Liz Kniss of the Santa Clara County Board of Supervisors, Vanessa Cajina, regional director of the Latino Coalition for a Healthy California.

I'm very proud that under the leadership of Governor Schwarzenegger we are taking aggressive steps to combat the obesity epidemic and create a healthier California. The Governor's leadership has put in place some of the nation's most innovative and successful strategies to promote health and nutrition. Among other successes the Governor has established; the toughest school nutrition reforms in the nation, taking junk food and sugary sodas of our campuses, banned trans fat and fried food and unhealthy oils in school meals and invested millions of dollars in fresh fruit and vegetables in school meals.

And today, under the Governor's leadership, we take another major step forward in our efforts to help consumers make more informed, healthy food choices to help reduce obesity, hypertension, coronary disease and related costs. Please join me in welcoming Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger. (Applause)

GOVERNOR SCHWARZENEGGER: Thank you very much, Bonnie, for the wonderful introduction and I want to thank everyone for coming out here today on this beautiful day. And Senator Padilla, thank you very much for giving us a reason to celebrate healthy choices here today.

SB 1420 is a great bill and I want to say thank you to Senator Padilla for working so hard not only this year but even last year he'd started already working on this bill and always coming down to our office and talking about we've got to go and have menu labeling. And he was persistent and he was passionate about it, so thank you very much. Let's give him a big hand for the great work that he has done. (Applause)

He also worked together with Assemblywoman Nicole Parra, we want to thank her also. And a big thank you should also go to Jot Condie, who is right here today and also the California Restaurant Association, because it is very important that they have supported the bill. And I, of course, love when you can bring those various different stakeholders together and sit down at a table and agree and work through the various different differences that they had. And let me tell you, with SB 1420 that table is going to be a lot healthier.

Starting in 2011, restaurants will provide calorie information on their menus. When people go to the grocery store now, or to supermarkets, they can already read the labels and make informed decisions about what to eat. But now they also have that pleasure when they go to the restaurant. They will be able to go and see how many calories that they take in. That will lead to healthier options on the menu and it will benefit all of the people.

I'm really pumped up about this, because once again, I tell you, California is the leader in something. We are the leader in many different areas but here is one more area. We are the first state in the union that actually has this and requires this kind of information. And the federal government, may I remind you, is already being pushed to follow our lead.

Health and fitness are important to me and since I have taken office I have waged a war on obesity and have promoted a healthy lifestyle through our Governor's Council on Physical Fitness and Sports, or through signing bills and passing laws like signing a bill to remove the dangerous trans fats in our restaurants. I also worked with the legislators to make sure that our children have healthy alternatives in the schools and that we terminate all the junk food and the sodas from our vending machines in our public schools and give them alternatives like adding fruit and vegetables, so that kids can learn good nutrition early.

We have accomplished a lot in those areas but of course there is a long ways still to go, because if you think about it, that in the last decade Californians have gained 360 million pounds. Think about that for a little bit. Now, when I was in the Austrian Army I drove a tank that weighed 50 tons. Now multiply that by 3,500. That's as many pounds as Californians have gained. That's huge. This epidemic leads to major problems like diabetes, heart diseases, sleep disorders and depression and it is no surprise that obesity is the number two killer in the United States right behind smoking.

That is why I am very happy to be here today with Senator Padilla and all the other elected officials and big believers in this cause, to stand here today and to celebrate this. We want to make sure that we have healthier choices in our supermarkets, healthier choices in our restaurants, healthier choices in our schools, so that people can make healthier decisions.

So thank you very much, everyone, for being here again. And I want to say thank you again to Senator Padilla and we want him now to come out to say a few words about his great bill. Please welcome Senator Padilla. (Applause)

SENATOR PADILLA: Thank you, Mr. Governor. I want to thank you not just for the introduction but for demonstrating strong leadership in the effort to improve public health here in the state of California. And I too am very happy to be here celebrating the signing of SB 1420. Governor, with your signature, you are making California the nation's leader in nutrition policy. As the Governor said, California will become the first state in the nation to utilize menu labeling in our fight against the obesity epidemic.

Now, we've all heard the same advice from doctors and other medical and health experts; as individuals, we need to exercise more and eat better. But in order to eat more healthy, we need to know the nutrition information of the food that we're eating. And it's easy to do when we go to the supermarkets but when we eat out it's a different story and that's where this bill comes in.

SB 1420 is a major breakthrough in the fight against the obesity epidemic and it represents nothing less than a sea change; the way Californians order food is about to change. Californians will soon be empowered with reliable, accessible nutrition information at the point of purchase, at the point of ordering, so we can all make better, more informed and healthier choices. And when I say ‘all Californians' I mean all Californians. No matter where you live in this state, no matter which county you live in, in this state, the benefits of making this information available is coming to you. We estimate that more than 17,000 restaurants will be soon posting nutrition information on their menus and their menu boards.

There are a couple of people I need to thank that have helped get this bill to the Governor's desk this year, beginning with our legislative leaders, both the President Pro Tem of the Senate Don Perata, Speaker Karen Bass, my joint author Senator Carole Migden from San Francisco, principle co-author in the Assembly Mark DeSaulnier, soon to be Senator Mark DeSaulnier -- Senator Elect, I'll say, DeSaulnier.

ASSEMBLYMEMBER DESAULNIER: There's still an election.

SENATOR PADILLA: Yes, there's an election; Wall Street hasn't canceled that. He was particularly important in this effort. He is a former restaurateur and his early support and name on the bill gave it a lot of early credibility. And I think it's safe to say that without his leadership in the Assembly the bill would not have gotten to the Governor's desk.

I also want to acknowledge a couple of people from my staff; my legislative person last year, who is now at UCLA Law School, Lisa Alarcon, is here for the ceremony and taking pictures. She was also helped this year by Alicia Prego and Bill Mabie, my chief of staff. I want to thank them for fighting this fight, even when people said we had no chance.

And I want to acknowledge also the sponsors of the bill; the California Center for Public Health Advocacy -- both Harold Goldstein and Amanda Bloom were tenacious fighters since day one on this bill and here we are celebrating a victory, like I said, that some people said would never happen -- the American Cancer Society and specifically Alecia Sanchez, who was part of every strategy session, every committee, testifying, organizing support, lobbying for votes on the bill. And together they built an extraordinary coalition of public health groups and individuals, local governments throughout the state, in support of this bill. I also want to take a second to recognize Supervisor Liz Kniss from Santa Clara, one of the various counties in this state who not just introduced but adopted, their own local ordinance that added to the momentum that brought us here today.

And last but not least, the California Restaurant Association. It was fierce opposition at the beginning but much negotiation and compromise at the end that allowed us to achieve a final product that preserved the spirit and the core provisions of the bill while addressing a lot of the concerns to the business community and developed the bill in a way that's going to be much more easily implemented and still provide the benefits to consumers.

So I want to close by saying that the obesity and diabetes impact is prevalent in every community in our state. That's why we needed the benefits of this bill to apply to every community in our state. In my district alone, the San Fernando Valley, more than a third of children in my district are overweight or at risk of becoming obese. The Governor reminded us all of the consequences of those conditions. Many times it's diabetes, it can be heart disease, high blood pressure, hypertension. All told, it is nothing less than a public health crisis.

One of my goals when I ran for the Senate and when I got sworn into the Senate was to do everything in my power to empower families to become healthier, to exercise more and eat better. And I looked at Governor Schwarzenegger and saw a natural partner in that effort and today he is proving me right.

New York City might have taken the first step as a municipality by adopting a menu-labeling ordinance but today the state of California becomes the first state in the nation to adopt menu labeling on a statewide basis. California is taking the lead and I can only imagine many other states will soon follow. Thank you, Governor Schwarzenegger, again. And I just can't help but say, this is fantastic.

I now want to introduce our next speaker, the champion on the Assembly side for this bill, Assemblymember, soon to be Senator, Mark DeSaulnier. (Applause)

ASSEMBLYMEMBER DESAULNIER: Thanks, Alex. It's really a pleasure to be here. This is truly a celebration of many of the stakeholders, I would say, over the course of the last two years. My dream was to have this kind of press conference, where the Restaurant Association was here with the public health advocates and legislative leaders and the Governor. So it's a little surreal, given some of the things that we've been through politically in the last few months but this is a celebration of the system working. First of all, I'd like to thank the Governor and his leadership and his staff. They were tenacious and ultimately we have this better product.

Senator Padilla -- really the word for today, I think particularly for you, is tenacity. His passion and his tenacity on this issue and on public health was evident to all of us. To my colleagues, Senator Migden and Speaker Bass, Speaker Núñez, who helped very much in the first iteration and the Pro-Tem, thank you for your efforts. For the public health advocates who stayed with us all the time, urging and urging and then particularly for the Restaurant Association Senator Padilla mentioned. I'm a former restaurateur; I expect I will be a future restaurateur when my political life is through. I've spent over 30 years in the restaurant industry and I was -- and Jot and I were just discussing whether I'm still a member or not.

JOT CONDIE: We'll send you a bill.

ASSEMBLYMEMBER DESAULNIER: "We'll send you a bill." I was a member of the Restaurant Association and I think what's really important here is the Association and the industry stepped up to provide their leadership. In my years in the restaurant industry I was told over and over again that the most valuable thing you had as an industry was good will, which is not unlike government. The most valuable thing we have as elected officials and as members of your state government is good will and we are trying to reestablish that.

Lastly, I'd just like to say that this -- Jefferson once said that politics is the art of compromise and that's what you have in front of us. This is really a remarkable bill, because we stuck with it, all of us and the goal was to provide health for all of our citizens but particularly for young people. We of our generation that you see in front of you may be the first American generation that gives to future generations a shorter life expectancy. We want to change that. And the first big effort that we're doing right here in terms of transparency and cooperation with the regulated industry, the Restaurant Association, is to give a better life for future generations of Californians.

So with that I'm happy to introduce Harold Goldstein, who will give the perspective from the public health advocates. (Applause)

HAROLD GOLDSTEIN: Thank you, Assemblymember DeSaulnier and thank you, Mr. Governor. The California Center for Public Health Advocacy and the American Cancer Society are the proud sponsors of SB 1420. Alicia Sanchez and I are here to thank all of you who have spoken today and especially to thank Mr. Padilla and Mr. DeSaulnier, Ms. Migden, for your extraordinary, absolutely extraordinary leadership in making this happen. Thank you.

And Mr. Governor, thank you for sticking with us for the last two years to find a genuine and workable strategy for implementing menu labeling here in California. Mr. Governor, in signing SB 1420, you are once again leading the nation in finding solutions to the growing obesity epidemic. Just like your decision in 2005 to get soda and junk food out of California's schools created a national movement with states following in your footsteps, today you're clearing the way, your signature will stimulate states and localities all over the country to establish menu-labeling laws in cities and counties and states.

Because when it comes right down to it, menu labeling is just plain old common sense. It gives the consumers the information they need to make healthier food choices and it creates an incentive for restaurants to continue reformulating their menu items so that they can be healthier. On behalf of all of us who are committed to solving this obesity crisis, we thank you, Mr. Governor and Mr. Padilla. (Applause)

And it's my pleasure to introduce Jot Condie, the president of the California Restaurant Association.

JOT CONDIE: I never thought that he would introduce me and I don't think he wanted to but thanks anyways.

You may be asking yourself why is the leader of the restaurant industry here under normal circumstances I would be considered a skunk at a garden party at a gathering like this. After all, historically, we as an industry have opposed menu-labeling proposals throughout the state and in Sacramento for many years, including SB 120 authored by Senator Padilla last year.

There are a couple reasons why we're here. First of all, if the government is going to mandate on restaurants, the posting of caloric information, then it ought to be the state government and it ought to be consistent. What we've seen over the last year or so has been a trend -- Santa Clara County, for instance, that actually did, as a county and San Francisco, of course, sort of helped the momentum of this proposal move forward quicker. You don't want to have a patchwork of menu-labeling laws throughout California that's confusing to chain restaurants, so it's important for the consumers to have consistency and predictability and it's important to the restaurant industry.

Secondly, if the Governor is going to mandate specific information be posted on menus and menu boards, then restaurants ought to have some level of assurance that they're not going to be subject to drive-by lawsuits for frivolous lawsuits. After all, our industry is considered more of an art than a science in many respects. And so this bill before the Governor today does represent a compromise and I want to thank Senator Padilla, Senator Migden and Assemblyman Mark DeSaulnier and of course Governor, for your leadership on this. And it is a compromise and it's the best that we could have gotten and we think it's a law whose time has come. And again, thank you for all your leadership, Governor. Thank you. (Applause)

GOVERNOR: Thank you very much. And now let's go and sign the bill.

(Bill Signing)

QUESTION/ANSWER:

GOVERNOR:           If you have any questions about the menu labeling, we have the authors and everyone here. Or if you have any other questions, please feel free. Yes?

QUESTION:             Can l ask you a question about the bill-signing process?

GOVERNOR:           Sure.

QUESTION:               Sorry. The bill-signing process, in particular this year, you vetoed hundreds of bills and a lot of those bills have had basically a generic message that said because they came to you too late. A lot of folks have said you have passed on some very good legislation. Can you explain your criteria for what you did not sign, why you didn't sign some of them because of the budget impasse?

GOVERNOR:           Well, first of all, as you know, we have normally 30 days to sign bills and because of the delay in the budget we only had 10 this year, so that put a tremendous amount of pressure on us. But I can assure you that every bill got full attention. We have a terrific staff and I want to thank Chris Kahn and his entire Leg Team that have done extraordinary work and worked literally around the clock to get all of this done.

Now, of course there are many bills, like today we have signed one that is a great, great bill that really moves the state forward and then there are other bills that are not good and that's just the way it is every year. And I make decisions based on what bills are job-killing bills, what bills will cost more money to the state when we are in a financial crisis, what bills are "Mickey Mouse" bills and they shouldn't even be considered for anything and what bills are really good bills and those are the ones that I'm signing. So this is my responsibility that I have every year and I'm always looking forward to it. But this year it was a short time but we got it done.

QUESTION:             Governor?

GOVERNOR:           Yes?

QUESTION:              The bailout plan stalled in Washington, the stock market in trouble. Is it time for you now to start accepting that governor's salary?

GOVERNOR:           No, I'm still OK. Don't worry about me. But I think that one thing we know for sure and that is that we want to urge the legislators in Washington, Democrats and Republicans, to get together and to put aside all the politics and to think about the people of this great nation. It is very important now that they step in and they do exactly what President Bush has recommended. I think they have a good package there together, Democrats and Republicans have come together but it just needs now this extra push. And it doesn't have as much to do with Wall Street, it has more to do with the ordinary folks out there with little businesses that need loans, people that need student loans, families that want to pay for the education for their kids, or little businesses that want to borrow money to pay for the wages for their employees and stuff like that. So I think everyone is going to be hurt right now if they don't come to a solution right away and help the situation, so I urge both of them.

And also I want to say, on top of that, that both of the candidates, the presidential candidates, talk a lot about leadership. This is now the time to show leadership. This is the time where they should encourage their parties to go and work together and to get this done.

QUESTION:              What do you think the voter fallout will be this November if, in fact, this package does not pass and if the economy continues to worsen?

GOVERNOR:           Well, I think we know one thing and we have seen it here on the state level, that when there is an election year and the election is near that people are just very concerned about the decisions that they make and I think this is also what you see in Washington right now. So I think the election does have an effect and people are somewhat -- legislators are somewhat frozen because they're in a bind. If they make a little wrong move they could lose the election and so on, so that also comes into play.

QUESTION:              Winding down the Legislative session and today being the final day of bill signing, a lot of the issues that you wanted to address did not get accomplished this year, health care, education, flood control, water. Are you disappointed? Some people have called this legislative session a big failure. How would you characterize this year as you wind it down?

GOVERNOR:           Well, you know, I'm an optimist and so I look at the things that were accomplished and there were some great things accomplished. But, of course, those big issues that you mention were not. And like Senator Padilla, he tried to get his bill passed last year and he did not get it passed. But he was persistent and he came back and this year it did get passed. And this is going to be exactly what we are going to do with water, that's what we're going to do with health care and with education reform. We're going to be back and we're going to work together. The important thing is that Democrats and Republicans come together on those things. There's a new year starting and we're going to work and work and work until those things get done.

Thank you very much. Yes, there was one question over here.

QUESTION:              Governor, thank you very much. You've talked about imposing penalties on legislators. I'm wondering if by the number of your vetoes this year if you're imposing your own penalties?

GOVERNOR:           No, I'm into that at all. I think that we are all too busy with solving the problems of California to think about any of that. We look at the bills in a very serious way and some bills, like I said, get vetoed and some bills will pass and I will sign. It's just the normal process that we always go through.

Thank you very much. Thank you.