Corey Booker Seeks to Drop Protections for Police with New Bill.

Via NPR

https://www.npr.org/sections/live-updates-protests-for-racial-justice/2020/06/07/871713872/cory-booker-wants-to-end-qualified-immunity-for-police-officers?utm_source=twitter.com&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=npr&utm_term=nprnews&utm_content=20200607

As protests against police violence continue throughout the country, Democratic lawmakers in the House and Senate are working on sweeping new federal legislation to combat police misconduct.

The bill, called the Justice in Policing Act of 2020, includes an array of measures intended to increase police accountability, data collection and training. Co-sponsored by Sen. Cory Booker, D-N.J., the bill would ban the use of chokeholds, "no knock" warrants and religious and racial profiling.

"These are common sense changes that, frankly, will create a far greater level of accountability for those police officers who violate the law, who violate our rights and who violate our common community standards," Booker told NPR's Sarah McCammon on All Things Considered Sunday.

If enacted, it would also change the way police are held accountable in courts by eliminating qualified immunity, which shields public officials like police officers from being sued for actions that don't violate a clearly established statutory or constitutional right. In 2014, the Supreme Court heard two cases on qualified immunity and handed down two unanimous decisions upholding the legal doctrine.

"Qualified immunity is something that has evolved over time. It's not written into any law," Booker said. "But our highest courts in the land have decided that police officers are immune from civil cases, unless there's been specifically in the past a case of generally the exact circumstances that has led towards a successful action. … It creates this bar towards civil action against a police officer for violating your civil rights."

Opponents to eliminating qualified immunity argue that police need protection from unnecessary lawsuits. But Booker says he thinks there should still be an option to allow citizens to open civil action against officers.

"I'm a big believer that police officers and towns and communities that employ them should protect them from frivolous lawsuits," Booker said. "But when it's so clear that an officer has violated community standards, department standards and the civil rights of Americans, that they should be open to civil action."

The measure comes just days after House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., asked the Congressional Black Caucus to draft legislation in response to the weeks-long protests that have erupted across the nation following the death of George Floyd.

"It is time for us to address the concerns that were being expressed by the protesters," Pelosi said Tuesday. "This is not a single incident. We know this is a pattern of behavior and we also know the history that brings us to this sad place."

Robert Baldwin III and Tinbete Ermyas produced and edited this story for radio.

Tyson Passes on the Cost of Coronavirus onto Consumer

Via WSJ

https://www.wsj.com/articles/food-companies-adjust-to-operating-with-coronavirus-costs-11591534800?mod=e2tw

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June 7, 2020 9:00 am ET

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Food-processing companies have spent millions of dollars on testing and safety to stay in operation during the pandemic. Now they are looking to the next phase: figuring out how much of that spending is here to stay and how to get higher production in a new reality.

Companies such as Hormel Foods Corp. and Tyson Foods Inc. have invested heavily in on-site testing, plexiglass dividers, masks and special bonuses for front-line employees, expenditures necessary to stay in operation as some meat-processing plants across the country temporarily closed due to coronavirus outbreaks.

But finance chiefs now are weighing which of those costs are temporary, and which are permanent. Hormel spent $20 million on virus-related precautions in recent months, and is now doing a deep dive on them, looking for ways to trim expenses, but also to get more out of production lines slowed by worker absences and social-distancing rules, said Jim Sheehan, chief financial officer at the Austin, Minn., company.

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“It was to beat the emergency and do everything possible, as quickly as possible, and sometimes almost at any expense,” Mr. Sheehan said of the company’s Covid-19-related investments. “And now we get better at it.”

That could mean buying less expensive masks as supply increases and prices stabilize, or getting protective gear from new suppliers, Mr. Sheehan said. It could also mean finding ways to automate some functions in meat-processing facilities to increase production, he said.

Still, Hormel, which is best known for producing Spam, turkeys and bacon, expects to spend as much as $80 million on such changes in the second half of the year. Profit declined almost 10% to $227.7 million in the quarter ended April 26, due in part to lower demand from food-service companies and plant disruptions, the company said.

A can of Hormel chili. The company is reviewing its Covid-related spending and looking for ways to raise efficiency at its plants.

Photo: Daniel Acker/Bloomberg News

“Covid-19 costs are likely to be bigger than we (and we think most investors) anticipated,” said Thomas Palmer, an analyst with JPMorgan Chase & Co., in a May research note about quarterly results at Hormel, which also makes foods such as peanut butter and guacamole.

Costs associated with testing, in particular, are expected to remain high in the months ahead. Hormel and other food producers have begun offering on-site tests at plants in areas with significant outbreaks. The cost can exceed $100,000 per plant, Mr. Sheehan said, describing testing as an important way to contain future outbreaks.

Tyson has begun releasing test results at its various meatpacking plants across the country. A facility-wide testing at a pork plant in Storm Lake, Iowa, showed 26% of the plant’s 2,303 workers were positive for Covid, though three-quarters of them didn’t show any symptoms, the company said last week. The Storm Lake plant was one of several that was briefly closed because of an outbreak.

More

Food Companies Adjust to Operating With Coronavirus Costs June 7, 2020

3M Names New CFO to Help Navigate Effects of Coronavirus Pandemic June 3, 2020

Tesco CFO to Step Down in April 2021 June 2, 2020

Tyson, which is based in Springdale, Ark., has spent $120 million in recent weeks on bonuses for front-line workers, in addition to the millions of dollars spent on protecting them from infection, the company said.

Tyson expects most of the extra costs associated with Covid will be temporary, CFO Stewart Glendinning said at a conference last month. Making sure its employees are healthy and able to work is a priority for the company—and good for the bottom line too, he said.

“If you’re a business you want to make money, and the only way to do that is by continuing to operate the plants with healthy employees,” he said. “So what is good for employees is also good for business.”

Write to Kristin Broughton at Kristin.Broughton@wsj.com and Nina Trentmann at Nina.Trentmann@wsj.com