New State Laws May Affect Your Daily Life

A number of state and local laws took effect on July 1. Here is a summary of some of them that may impact your daily life:

1. The California sales and use tax decreased one percent from 8.25 to 7.25. Including the city sales tax, the Los Angeles rate is 8.75 percent.
2. Carbon monoxide detectors are required in all single family homes with gas stoves, fireplaces, attached garages or any other fossil fuel generators. The previous law required detectors only in new homes.
3. Students starting the seventh to 12th grades this fall will be required to show proof of having received an adolescent whooping cough booster shot.
4. Solo hybrid car drivers with yellow Clean Air decals will no longer be permitted to use carpool lanes. Electric and natural gas vehicles displaying white stickers will be able to use carpool lanes until Jan. 1, 2015. Plug-in hybrids and vehicles with hydrogen internal combustion engines will be issued green decals valid next year.
5. Attending traffic school no longer means violations will be completely removed from a driver’s record. Courts will keep the records, but they will be withheld from the Department of Motor Vehicles. This will enable courts to keep accurate records of a driver’s history without possibly increasing his or her insurance rates.
6. Restaurant employees will have to pass a food-handling course. Those hired after July 1 will have 30 days to comply. The course may be taken online or in-person.
7. The mostly commercial truck drivers who use push-to-talk phones are no longer exempt from the hands-free laws effective since 2008.
8. California drivers must now indicate if they want to be organ donors on their license application forms.
9. Shoppers at large supermarkets and pharmacies in unincorporated areas of Los Angeles County will no longer be given plastic bags at the checkout. Paper bags will be available for 10 cents each.
10. School construction plans must be submitted to the state with plans for securing classrooms from the inside in case a lockdown is required during a violent incident.