Johnson’s Bill to Oust Fabric Board Shelved

Assemblyman Ross Johnson (R-La Habra) unceremoniously shelved his bill to abolish the state Board of Fabric Care Monday, ending for now an intense legislative effort to shut down the obscure agency that regulates California dry cleaners.

Lacking votes to get his bill approved by the Senate Business and Professions Committee, which killed a similar measure last year, Johnson postponed consideration until next January, when he vowed to renew his fight.

Board Survives Again

“I’m totally convinced this board deserves to be put out of business,” said Johnson, who heard of the board only after an elderly constituent complained last year that he had been unfairly jailed.

The withdrawal of Johnson’s bill marks the seventh time that the Fabric Care Board, which licenses and inspects the state’s 6,000 dry-cleaning establishments, has survived legislative efforts to abolish it.

Fabric Care Board executive director Michael Siegel said after Johnson’s announcement he was pleased that the agency’s continued existence is ensured for now.

But “it is still hanging over our heads. We’ll be fighting . . . again in January.”

Johnson set out to abolish the board partly to get even for the treatment of Joe Kaska, a 76-year-old Anaheim dry cleaner who was jailed for what Johnson insists was an inadvertent licensing violation. But he soon found himself allied with consumer groups and other groups opposed to excessive government regulation.

‘They Are Just Powerless’

Gene Erbin, of the San Diego-based Center for Public Interest Law, said the failure of Johnson’s bill shows that the Legislature is unwilling to do away with any licensing agency once it is in place.

“If they can’t abolish this one, they are just powerless,” said Erbin.

Erbin said there are other examples of excessive government regulation that are “equally bad, but there are none worse.”

Board backers concede that the panel’s performance during its 40-year history has been poor. However, they say there has been significant improvement recently.

Defenders say that besides its licensing, inspection and examining functions, it is needed to mediate consumer complaints and police the handling and use of toxic solvents.

“I want to know who’s going to handle those functions if we abolish this board,” said Sen. Herschel B. Rosenthal (D-Los Angeles), one of the Fabric Care board’s defenders.

Although Johnson’s effort to abolish the board is apparently dead for this year, it has resulted in a change in the way board agents operate.

New Policy for Agents

Partly to avoid more jailings like Kaska’s, Siegel said Department of Consumer Affairs agents who police dry-cleaning establishments for compliance with state laws have been instructed to make no more arrests for first offenses.

Instead, agents were instructed last month they can only issue “notices to appear,” or citations.

Although he said he was pleased with the new policy, Johnson said it does not change his opinion that the board is useless.

Johnson had known before Monday that the Senate panel, chaired by state Sen. Joseph B. Montoya (D-Whittier), would be his toughest hurdle. He met with key senators on the panel Monday morning and afternoon, trying to win support, before withdrawing his bill.

Besides killing a similar bill last year, the committee overwhelmingly approved legislation earlier this year to expand the agency’s authority.

Only State With Board

Although legislators once allowed a licensing board for construction inspectors to expire under a so-called “sunset clause,” state lawmakers have never voted an end to a licensing board.

No other state licenses or regulates its dry-cleaning industry.

Oklahoma, the last besides California to do so, abolished its counterpart earlier this year. Oklahoma’s Dry Cleaning Board went out of existence July 1.

Only three other states have ever regulated dry cleaners. North Carolina stopped doing so in 1940; Florida stopped in 1943, and New Mexico stopped in 1979.