Why this matters
Wage theft far exceeds the combined financial losses of all traditional property crimes in the United States, including burglary, larceny and car theft. But victims rarely get justice.
San Diego County officials have known for years about a fundamental breakdown in workers trying to recover stolen wages from their employers.
According to the county’s own calculations, more than $30 million in unpaid wage theft judgments have accumulated across the region since 2017. That represents money that workers have been awarded but have not received. The recovery process can be challenging and lengthy for victims who receive little help from the state. And despite state laws aimed at protecting employees, wage theft is rarely prosecuted in San Diego County.
Changes were supposed to be on the way.
In May, Supervisor Paloma Aguirre was set to introduce a proposal that would have offered meaningful reforms to bolster investigative capacity on complaints of wage theft, enforce labor standards and help people recover stolen wages.
The county, through its Office of Labor Standards and Enforcement, has for years played a big role in investigating allegations of unpaid wages, supporting workers and coordinating enforcement. County officials even established the nation’s first Workplace Justice Fund to provide financial support to impacted workers. Aguirre’s proposal would have added two full-time positions to the office, pressed county officials to identify revenue streams to support impacted workers even further and opened the lines of communication among agencies to improve enforcement.
But without explanation, Aguirre pulled the proposal from the agenda at a Board of Supervisors meeting.
Aguirre’s spokesperson, Diane Castañeda, said it was due to “unprecedented changes.” She said two key things happened around the time supervisors were set to vote on Aguirre’s proposal. First, it was the day after the Islamic Center shooting, in which three people were killed. And second, Supervisor Terra Lawson-Remer, a Democrat who chairs the board, was absent from the meeting.
The county Board of Supervisors is a five-person nonpartisan body, meaning each candidate for office appears on the ballot without party affiliation. In practice, however, party politics influence the board and its decisions. With Lawson-Remer’s absence at the May 19 meeting, when the wage theft proposal was set to be heard, two Democrats would have been voting with two Republicans.
However, Aguirre could have brought the proposal back to the June 25 meeting — at a time when there wasn’t a local mass shooting and when all five members of the board were present. She never did.
Neither Aguirre nor Castañeda have answered why. Castañeda said staff plans to use this time to “further refine” the proposal and bring it back for consideration this fall. She has not answered what changes need to be made to the proposal.
Meanwhile, workers continue to wait years for money they are owed.
An inewsource investigation revealed seven caregivers at an elderly care company in Poway are each owed six-figure sums, totaling $2 million in wage theft judgments. The theft occurred between 2019 and 2022. The company, known as Wealthplus, leads the region with the highest amount in wage judgments. Wealthplus is still operating and its founder, Xiaoqing “Leslie” Wang, has never been charged with a crime.
Type of Content
News: Based on facts, either observed and verified directly by the reporter, or reported and verified from knowledgeable sources.
