Governor Newsom signs commonsense legislation to make your life easier

SACRAMENTO – Today, Governor Newsom signed commonsense bills aimed at making everyday life easier for Californians. The new laws crack down on blaring podcast and streaming commercials, make it easier to reach a real person for customer service, eliminate unnecessary fees for paid family and medical leave paperwork, speed up heat pump, water heater, and HVAC installations, and make it easier for parents to stay involved in their kids’ education.

The Governor is signing common sense bills to make life easier by: 

✅ Helping customers connect with a human, not a bot (and know the difference!), requiring large businesses to make a good-faith effort to connect a customer to a human within 15 minutes after a request for human customer service is made, or schedule an appointment with the customer. The law also requires large companies to disclose when connecting with customer service if the representative is a chatbot and not a human, and also requires certain large businesses to list contact information on their websites so customers know how to reach customer service.

✅Turning down the volume on excessively loud commercials, building on legislation the Governor signed last year focused on television advertisements, by requiring that podcast and music streaming commercials can’t be louder than the content itself. 

✅ Helping parents more easily connect with their child’s teacher, by giving parents the ability to request a parent-teacher conference online or over the phone if they are unable to attend in person. Building on Governor Newsom’s work to make it easier for parents to be engaged in their child’s education. 

✅ Keeping more money in your pockets by eliminating junk fees for completing medical documents. Now in California, physicians can’t charge unnecessary fees to complete forms required for paid family or medical leave. 

✅ Allowing teenagers to get a library card without parental accompaniment — if you can drive a car, you should also be able to get a library card. Now 16- and 17-year-olds don’t need to bring a parent with them to get a public library card.  

✅ Eliminating red tape to install residential heat pumps. When a homeowner wants to make a commonsense upgrade to their home, they shouldn’t have to worry about navigating a Byzantine permitting process. Also, creating an automated and streamlined permitting process for standard heat pump water heaters and HVAC installations, reducing the time and energy needed to make these critical upgrades. 

The Governor has signed the following bills

• AB 1609 by Assemblymember Rick Chavez Zbur (D-Hollywood) — Customer service chatbots.

• AB 2292 by Assemblymember Chris Ward (D-San Diego) — Disability benefits: certificates 

• SB 96 by Senator Thomas Umberg (D-Santa Ana) — Streaming services: commercial advertisements. 

• SB 222 by Senator Scott Wiener (D-San Francisco) —  Residential heat pump water heater or heat pump HVAC systems. 

• SB 965 by Senator Catherine Blakespear (D-Encinitas) — Public libraries: library cards. 

• SB 1412 by Senator Susan Rubio (D–Baldwin Park) — Parental communication: teacher meetings.

Expanding on previous actions to make life easier 

Since 2019, Governor Newsom and the legislature have worked together to increase affordability, pass commonsense laws, and helped make families’ lives easier by:

• Moving more DMV services online so Californians can renew registrations, replace licenses, and complete other tasks without visiting the DMV.

• Implementing Universal TK saving each family nearly $14,000 every year. 

• Requiring companies to allow people to cancel their subscriptions with the same ease as it was to sign up. 

• Giving TWO free meals for all TK-12 public school students.

• Protecting families from unfair fees, including limits on the amount credit unions can charge for overdraft fees.

• Making it easier for consumers to access refunds when a food delivery platform fails to deliver.

• Requiring that rental units must include a working stove and refrigerator to be considered habitable.

• Strengthening consumer protection laws, including by preventing car retailers from tacking on add-on services and other features that do not benefit car buyers.

• Requiring social media companies to make it clear and easy for a user to delete their account, and requiring that deletion also trigger full deletion of the user’s personal data.

• Allowing for homeowners to cancel a contract for home improvement and home solicitation via email or phone.

• Increasing price transparency and ensuring that consumers are aware whether they are renting a gas-powered or electric vehicle.