California Surveyors Forums

Last spring -- March, I think -- I tried to renew my PWCR, but the DIR website said that registrations were disabled until further notice. I tried again in April, and maybe in May, same result. Then I went on vacation for a few weeks and pretty much forgot about it, figuring that they'll let me know when I can renew. When I checked again a couple of days ago, I was dismayed to learn that the system was again accepting renewals and I was now delinquent.

I was able to renew without paying the late fine -- so far -- but I'm kind of pissed that DIR disrupted the renewal process and then didn't do anything that I could discern to inform the PWCR community that renewals were once again due.

Anyone else here run into this, or did I just happen to miss a notification?

You’re right to be pissed—this PWCR renewal hiccup is just the tip of California’s systemic dysfunction. Even if the DIR portal had been open, their certified-payroll system was broken, rejecting or never acknowledging CPRs for months and leaving compliant contractors exposed.

Consider this broader pattern of failure:

Unemployment Fraud: The EDD lost $31 billion to fraudulent pandemic claims—one of the largest such scams in U.S. history.

Homeless Spending: California poured $24 billion into homelessness programs over five years, yet nightly homelessness still climbed past 181,000 people.

High-Speed Rail: Approved in 2008 at $33 billion for completion by 2020, today it has zero miles of track laid and a projected cost north of $100 billion.

Wildfire Devastation: January’s Los Angeles wildfires destroyed nearly 16,000 structures across 59 square miles—causing over $250 billion in losses—and displaced roughly 150,000 residents.

Rebuild Permits: Six months later, L.A. County received 1,207 applications for fire-damaged properties but issued only 90 rebuild permits—a pace that leaves communities in limbo for the next several years, maybe a decade.

And on the legislative front:

AB 1234 (pending) would invert the presumption of innocence for small businesses by imposing “guilty until proven innocent” labor-claim procedures. It mandates automatic investigations, rigid timelines, and a 30% administrative fee on any award—regardless of merit—funding a new Wage Recovery Fund. Appeals would be treated as full civil cases, dragging contractors into costly litigation under thousands of pages of cross-referenced Labor Code.

AB 825 (pending) strips the existing $5 billion loan cap on state-backed bonds—creating unlimited lending to privately owned, Wall Street utility companies with zero job-protection safeguards. Even worse, it forces JPAs and co-sponsoring agencies to fund fire-insurance pools, exposing local governments to unlimited wildfire liabilities.

Recall, the California Labor Code itself spans over two inches of printed statute, layered with regulations that no layperson could feasibly master before being hauled into a hearing.

Meanwhile, Hollywood money throwaway:

AB 1138 (passed into law this year) more than doubles California’s annual Film & TV Tax Credit from $330 million to $750 million per year (FY 2025–26 through ’29–30), raises base credit rates from 20%/25% up to 35%/40%, and doubles the per-project cap from $375,000 to $750,000 —arriving three to five years too late to stem runaway production flight.

I could go on for days—but you get the picture.

DWoolley

One positive development: last month, CLSA formally voted to oppose AB825 unless amended. The amendment they sought would protect California jobs by requiring that all bond-funded labor be performed exclusively by California residents.

DWoolley