In March 2018, the Supreme Court agreed to answer for the Ninth Circuit state law questions about rest and meal breaks for ambulance workers. A 5-2 high court decision two years earlier, in a case involving private security guards, interpreted a statute and regulation as requiring that employees be given 10-minute rest breaks where they are not on-duty or on-call. (Augustus v. ABM Security Services, Inc. (2016) 2 Cal.5th 257.)
Last November, voters approved an initiative overturning the Augustus decision as to ambulance workers. Soon after, the Supreme Court ordered supplemental briefing about the effect of the initiative on the questions the Ninth Circuit had asked. Today, nine months after the supplemental briefing, the court dismissed the matter, Stewart v. San Luis Ambulance, Inc., stating that, “In light of the passage of [the initiative], resolution of the questions posed by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals is no longer ‘necessary . . . to settle an important question of law.’ (Cal. Rules of Court, rule 8.548(f)(1).)” (Link added.)
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