The beginning of a new year often brings a slate of laws and amendments that go into effect across California. Several new 2025 laws relating to the food and restaurant industry, including minimum wage adjustments, expanded entertainment zones, and a phase-out of polystyrene foam for takeout containers. Here are the biggest new laws that will impact California’s restaurants and bars.

Formation of entertainment zones

Former state legislation allowed California cities to create entertainment zones in San Francisco. Senate Bill 969 is an amendment that changes the game for cities and neighborhoods across the state. Before SB 969, only private vendors could sell alcohol at parades, festivals, and events. Now, restaurants can also sell alcoholic beverages that customers can consume on public streets and sidewalks that are within the entertainment zones (think Bourbon Street in New Orleans or the Las Vegas Strip). This could change drinking culture in California but participation conditions, requirements, and guidelines are quite specific and on the Bureau of Alcoholic Beverage Control website.

Amsterdam-style cannabis cafes

Though touted as the Amsterdam Cafe-style law, Assembly Bill 1775 is a bit more complex. For decades, Amsterdam maintained a community of cafes that permit consuming cannabis, with California’s new law expanding options for dispensaries and cannabis lounges. These businesses can now prepare and sell nonalcoholic and non-psychoactive drinks like coffee or soda that can be consumed on-site. Cafes can now sell food at lounges and dispensaries. Prior to January 1, 2025, consumption lounges were required to pay two different taxes and payroll as a restaurant and a cannabis lounge. The Woods in West Hollywood will soon serve coffee drinks and pastries in addition to cannabis.

Though the City of Los Angeles does not allow dispensaries to have live entertainment or DJs, AB 1775 now allows any dispensary and lounge throughout the state to hold live music performances. Though adult cannabis use has been legal in California since 2017, dispensaries have struggled to compete with the black market due to the state’s tightly regulated cannabis industry.

Farmworker unionization

California restaurants depend heavily on farmworkers who harvest produce and work with livestock. Gov. Gavin Newsom signed two bills designed to protect the health and safety of these workers. AB 2240 aims to create more stable housing for farmworkers, which helps avoid disruptions caused by seasonal work and keeps children enrolled in the same schools. The country’s housing shortage also applies to farmworkers, and AB 3035 makes it easier to build farmworker housing. The laws might help lower or keep more consistent prices for consumers and restaurants. The California Farm Bureau says Central Valley’s migrant farmworkers have not been showing up for work over the last week in fear of ICE immigration raids, reports NBC Bay Area.

Paid family leave

Under SB 951, California’s eligible workers earning less than $63,000 a year can receive up to 90 percent of their regular wages while on paid family leave, while workers earning above that threshold will receive 70 percent. These new increases apply to new claims filed on or after January 1, 2025. This is a significant change for restaurant employees hoping to start a family or care for a sick family member with less of a financial burden. However, there are questions surrounding cost.

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Fast food worker’s wages

Beginning on April 1, 2024, fast-food workers must be paid at least $20 an hour under AB 1228. The law defines a fast-food establishment as a limited-service restaurant that is part of a chain with at least 60 locations nationwide and primarily sells food and beverages for immediate consumption. The law exempts restaurants that operate a bakery on-site. In addition to the wage raise on April 1, the law allows the Fast Food Council to set minimum wages for fast-food restaurants beginning on January 1, 2025. Under AB 1228, the fast-food minimum wage is currently higher than California’s state minimum wage, which rose to $16.50 an hour on January 1.

Polystyrene foam phase-out

On January 1, 2025, a law went into effect banning the production of polystyrene containers, more commonly known as Styrofoam, for takeout. The shift is part of SB 54, a set of ordinances called the Plastic Pollution Prevention and Packaging Producer Responsibility Act. The statewide law was predated by Los Angeles legislation that banned the sale or distribution of the containers in a phased roll-out between April 2023 and April 2024. Producers of the foam containers can seek an exemption from the ban by proving that at least 25 percent of their products are recyclable.