California Attorney General XavierBecerra (Photo: Jason Doiy/ALM)

Over 30 trade associations and companies co-signeda letter this week to CaliforniaAttorney General Xavier Becerra asking him to push backthe July 1 enforcement date for the California ConsumerPrivacy Act (CCPA) due to the new coronavirus and a lackof clarity on the enforcement rules.

"The undersigned organizations employ millions of individualswho are faced with this crisis and are doing their best to managetheir personal and professional lives in the face of uncertaintimes. Many companies have instituted mandatory work-from-homemeasures to limit community," the letter states.

United Parcel Service, Feld Entertainment Inc., and the NationalAssociation of Mutual Insurance Companies are among theorganizations that signed onto the letter.

An adviser to the attorney general said in an email to CorporateCounsel on Friday that the office is "mindful of the new realitycreated by Covid-19," but said the office still plans on enforcingthe rules when they are finalized or on July 1, whichever comesfirst.

The letter states keeping that date would force companiesto consider tradeoffs "between decisions that are best fortheir employees and the world-at-large that may help theorganizations they lead avoid costly and resource-intensiveenforcement actions."

One issue is that many companiesacross the country are now requiring their employees to work fromhome. On Thursday, California Governor Gavin Newsom ordered allemployees to work from home. On Friday, New York Governor AndrewCuomo ordered companies to keep their employees home beginningSunday evening.

Michelle Hon Donovan, a partnerat Duane Morris inSan Francisco, said in an interview that working from home is goingto be a barrier to CCPA compliance.

"The big issue with many of my clients is that they're workingfrom home and they're not as efficient," Donovan said.

See also:

• Under the CCPA, Start Tracking Employee DataNow
• Companies Want Clarification on Proposed CCPARegulations

Another issue cited in the letter is that companies will nothave enough time to process rules because they continue to evolve.So far, Becerra has put out two revisions to the final regulationsand has offered additional time for a comment period on thoserules.

"It's not clear to me when we're going to see the final rules,"Donovan said. "The comment period for the most recent versiondoesn't end until March 27."

Donovan further said the last guidance, which was published onMarch 11, did not have many substantive changes from the firstguidance published in January. She said while the employees in theCalifornia Office of the Attorney General are working from home,they also will not be at full capacity.

The letter says the third comment period will "delay theultimate finalization of the rules until at least the end of April2020, leaving very little time for entities to understand what isrequired of them under the final regulatory scheme and to buildthose requirements into their business processes."

From: Corporate Counsel