Unreported / Non-Citable
Background
Lydia Lopez alleges that she has worked since about 2015 as an hourly home care aide for Institute on Aging entities (IOA) in San Francisco. In a putative class action filed in San Francisco Superior Court on April 28, 2026, she alleged that IOA failed to pay for all hours worked, including off-the-clock time, failed to provide compliant meal and rest periods, paid final wages late, and issued inaccurate wage statements. These are allegations only, and the court made no findings on them. IOA removed the case on June 8, 2026, arguing that the claims were preempted by Section 301 of the Labor Management Relations Act because collective bargaining agreements (CBAs) with SEIU Local 2015 covered her employment.
After IOA moved to dismiss, Lopez filed a First Amended Complaint that dropped the overtime and expense-indemnification claims, leaving six causes of action: minimum wages (including a Labor Code section 204 pay-timing theory), meal periods, rest breaks, final wages, wage statements, and unfair competition. She moved to remand. IOA moved to dismiss for preemption, failure to exhaust the CBA grievance procedure, and failure to state a claim, or alternatively to strike the class claims. The record included two CBAs (IOA's judicial-notice request was unopposed) and a declaration filed with Lopez's reply stating that roughly 30 percent of her work was housekeeping and 70 percent caregiving. The parties consented to magistrate jurisdiction, and the court heard both motions on August 31, 2026.
The Court’s Holding
The court held that the first cause of action, for minimum wages and pay timing, is preempted under Section 301, and it denied remand as to that claim. IOA relied on Labor Code section 204(c), which applies CBA pay arrangements to covered employees. The CBAs provide for bi-weekly pay, while section 204(a) requires two paydays per month, and the court found those schedules substantively different. The claim therefore gave effect to the CBA at the first Burnside step, and it would also have required interpreting the CBA at the second.
Because the claim was preempted, Lopez had to use the CBA grievance procedure first. The complaint did not allege that she filed a grievance, that IOA repudiated the process, that the union acted in bad faith, or that grievance would have been futile, and her counsel identified no such facts at the hearing. The court dismissed the claim with prejudice, noting that Lopez had notice of the defect from IOA's first motion and did not cure it in her amended complaint. It did not reach the Rule 12(b)(6) merits of that claim.
The meal and rest break claims were treated differently. The parties agreed that Wage Order No. 15 exempts personal attendants from meal and rest period rules, but disagreed whether Lopez qualified. The court considered her reply declaration over IOA's objections, reasoning that a court deciding removal may look beyond the complaint, IOA had a chance to respond, and IOA bears the burden of proving federal jurisdiction yet offered no contrary evidence. It found that IOA had not shown the exemption applies at this pleading stage, so those claims rest on state statutory rights and are neither preempted nor subject to exhaustion. With the only federal claim dismissed, the court declined supplemental jurisdiction over the remaining claims and remanded the five surviving state claims to San Francisco Superior Court. It did not decide their merits or the motion to strike class allegations, and it expressed no opinion on whether grievance or arbitration provisions bar them.
Key Takeaways
- A state-law pay-timing claim under Labor Code section 204 can be preempted when the CBA sets a materially different pay schedule, here bi-weekly rather than twice monthly.
- A preempted Section 301 claim is subject to dismissal if the employee neither alleges nor can allege exhaustion of the CBA grievance procedure.
- On a remand motion the removing employer bears the burden of proof, and a preemption theory that depends on facts such as personal-attendant status can fail if the employer offers no supporting evidence.
- Once the sole federal claim is dismissed early, the federal court may decline supplemental jurisdiction and send the state claims back to state court.
Why It Matters
This is an unpublished district court order, so it is persuasive at most, and it rests on a pleading-stage record. Its main practical point is that, in unionized workplaces, preemption can split a single wage complaint: a claim tied to a CBA's pay arrangements may be dismissed in federal court for lack of grievance exhaustion, while statutory break claims return to state court.
The personal-attendant ruling reflects only that IOA did not carry its jurisdictional burden on this record. It does not decide Lopez's status for merits purposes, and the 20 percent figure comes from an agency interpretation Lopez cited, not from a holding of the court. Whether the meal and rest claims succeed, and whether CBA procedures apply to them, remain open in state court.