Micha Star Liberty

Liberty entered her year as president of the Consumer Attorneys of California with big plans. Then 2020 happened.

“It was definitely not the year we thought we were going to have,” said the owner of Liberty Law Office in Oakland. “But when things like this happen, you just have to step into whatever the moment brings and deal with it.”

The “thing” was the coronavirus pandemic. The civil courts largely shut down. So did the Legislature for much of the summer. Gov. Gavin Newsom signed eight of the group’s high-priority bills in 2019. He signed just two this year, both of them covering courtroom procedure rather than big policy changes. In fact, according to researchers in the Legislature, 2020 marked the fewest new laws signed by a California governor since 1967, before the first Jerry Brown administration.

Liberty said the organization had “a full agenda of legislative ideas” for the year, including changes to laws around personal injury, workers’ rights, civil rights, sexual abuse, insurance and regulating online marketplaces. With legislators jettisoning most of the year’s legislative agenda to focus the virus and just a few other topics, Liberty, such an ambitious program just “wasn’t on the menu.”

But Liberty said holding the presidency during such a tumultuous year presented other opportunities. When courts began shutting down in March, the organization quickly reached out to Gov. Gavin Newsom, the Judicial Council and the defense bar to help shape emergency rules designed to keep the civil courts operating.

Then there were the massive protests against police violence around the country. The Consumer Attorneys always had an interest in policing issues, she said, but current events caused the group to get more actively involved.

“The killing of George Floyd really called out for a number of civil rights reforms,” Liberty said.

The group ended up joining the effort to pass SB 731. This bill would have created a process to decertify police officers found liable to wrongdoing and make it more difficult for them to get jobs elsewhere in the state. Liberty said California is one of only five states without such a law. That bill also failed, but advocates plan to bring the idea up again in next year’s session.

Liberty said there was an upside to the pandemic. In a year where she expected to spend much of her time traveling, suddenly everything was happening by Zoom and telephone. From keeping her civil cases going, often in mediation, to the legislative efforts, Liberty said the work came to her.

“Because I was remote, I was really able to throw myself into everything,” Liberty said. “It allowed me to be so much more involved in an organization I love.”

— Malcolm Maclachlan