Grocery stores and pharmacies across Costa Mesa could soon be required to have employees oversee self-checkout stands.
It comes after city council members took their first steps in considering an ordinance aimed at putting workers at self checkouts.
The issue is playing out after the City of Long Beach recently adopted an ordinance setting staffing requirements at grocery and drug retail stores.
During the city council’s Nov. 4 meeting, officials voted 5-2 to have staff return with an ordinance proposal, with council members Jeff Pettis and Mike Buley dissenting.
Many employees and union members spoke in favor of the ordinance requiring employees at self checkouts, looking to the Long Beach ordinance as a guide.
“We are extraordinarily pleased at the seven week mark that the ordinance is working as intended,” said United Food and Commercial Workers 324 Political Director, Derek Smith at the meeting.
At the same time, the California Grocers Association argued against the idea, saying some of the issues the ordinance is aimed at solving – like theft – are not that prevalent in stores.
The Long Beach ordinance – adopted in August – aims to reduce theft and protect employees by requiring one employee per every three self-checkout stations and limiting self-checkout to 15 items or less.
Councilmember Manuel Chavez argued in favor of the ordinance, saying “It does give me concern when I have a young person or a more older person manning multiple self checkouts.
I think the idea that having better quality of life for our workers is very important,” added Chavez.
“As we move forward with this ordinance, I want to copy from who has done it right and done it well,” said Chavez, who motioned to direct staff to model the proposal on Long Beach’s law.
Scores of retail workers voiced support for the ordinance during the public comment portion of Costa Mesa City Council’s meeting.
“Over the past month I have spoken to many workers from Ralphs, Vons and CVS here in Costa Mesa about their thoughts and experiences about self checkout. A common response from many is that they feel overwhelmed and overworked,” said Costa Mesa resident Matt Walters, who said he’s been working in the grocery industry for around 24 years.
“Regular checkstands handle one customer at a time. Those working self checkout must monitor five, six, seven, even nine customers at a time,” added Walters.
Walters also presented a petition to the city clerk which had been signed by 179 workers at Vons, CVS and Ralphs.
Tim James from the California Grocers Association said the association wanted a similar opportunity to weigh in and tried contacting the city council but were ignored.
James criticized the surveys in the city staff report and said local stores weren’t contacted to verify the information.
“We have heard nothing from any council member. We have heard nothing from any staff. We now come to find out we had some level of surveillance in our stores without those stores being asked either before or afterwards if the information that was compiled was accurate,” said James.
“We believe that committing to a direction to move an ordinance forward at this time would be further disrespectful to grocery and also not taking into full account all the points of this issue going forward,” added James.
City Councilmember Loren Gameros disputed James’ comments.
“I don’t recall ever being reached out to specifically with their concerns so I wouldn’t really know how to address the claims made on the Dias earlier,” Gameros said.
Some city council members came out against the idea of an ordinance.
“We should not be in the business of regulating what private business does,” said Councilmember Jeff Pettis, who voted against the motion.
“I’m sympathetic and empathetic to what I heard tonight from a lot of the employees in the labor unions but I think this is just a bridge too far,” said Councilmember Buley
“It sounds as though what is being asked is that the city inject themselves into the collective bargaining arrangement. We have a system out there, there’s unions in place, there’s the ownership,”” added Buley, “I heard a lot of legitimate concerns addressed tonight, those should be addressed between the collective bargaining unit and the ownership.”
Mayor John Stephens, who supports the ordinance, said regulating private businesses is a challenge.
“We always have this kind of gas-clutch thing,” Stephens said. “Should the government be involved or shouldn’t they be involved? When they should be involved, when shouldn’t they be involved?”