Sen. Niello’s SB 84 Would Help Repair California’s Judicial Hellhole Status

There have been numerous legislative attempts in the California Legislature over the years to stop lawyers who file frivolous lawsuits and shakedown businesses for not having “adequate” Americans With Disabilities Act handicapped accessibility, or who have access issues deemed “not adequate enough.”

The intent of ADA laws was to make sure that retail and public businesses made the appropriate changes to accommodate handicapped persons in bathrooms, at public counters, in parking lots and garages, restaurants and the like.

To get an idea of what a judicial hellhole the entire state of California is, you need only to read American Tort Reform Foundation’s latest Judicial Hellholes® list – Los Angeles made the No. 1 spot, but not because it is the best. Here’s what they say:

Los Angeles’s out‑of‑control civil courts earned the No. 1 spot on this year’s Judicial Hellholes® list, driven by high-dollar “nuclear verdicts®” and fraud allegations. Los Angeles set itself apart from the rest of the state for the first time in more than 15 years for creating a culture of lawsuit abuse that negatively affects consumers, small businesses, and local jobs.

“Los Angeles didn’t land at the top of this list by accident — it earned that spot because its courts have become the go-to venue for outsized payouts and questionable tactics,” said Tiger Joyce, president of the American Tort Reform Association. “When you see a steady drumbeat of eight‑and nine‑figure awards, you’re seeing a legal culture that rewards emotion over evidence. That same culture is forcing businesses to fight back with RICO complaints describing serious allegations of fraud, signaling a complete failure of the system.”

This is just one city in the state of California. And businesses are having to resort to RICO complaints (Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act).

In 2023, the Globe reported California was named one of the worst Judicial Hellhole’s in the country, coming in third place. American Tort Reform Foundation explained:

The “Golden State” is the plaintiffs’ bar’s laboratory for finding innovative new ways to expand liability through both the courts and legislature. These novel theories of liability are burdening small businesses and bogging down the state’s economy. Even in areas where the U.S. Supreme Court has stepped in to rein in lawsuit abuse, the California Supreme Court has disregarded precedent and expanded liability.

From abusive Proposition 65 and Private Attorneys General Act (PAGA) litigation, to serial plaintiffs filing hundreds of lawsuits under the Americans with Disabilities Act, the list of issues with the state’s civil justice system is endless. Rather than address the abuses and improve the litigation climate, state leaders seem to embrace the Judicial Hellholes® moniker.

Today it has only gotten worse. Senator Roger Niello (R-Sacramento) authored Senate Bill 84 in 2025 to address the serial plaintiffs filing hundreds of lawsuits under the Americans with Disabilities Act, shaking down unsuspecting business owners, most of who are small business owners, non-English-speaking, and/or living in economically disadvantaged parts of the state. His bill will allow a business owner the right to correct the problem before a lawsuit is filed. In an interview with the Globe, Senator Niello, who has worked on this issue since he was in the Assembly, said the bill is not only common sense, but is bipartisan, as he has many Democrats as co-authors. Apparently, Democrat lawmakers have also heard from constituents that this is a terrible problem in their communities. 

I’ve been writing about this litigious problem many years as well.

Back in 2011, I reported that then-Sen. Bob Dutton (R-Inland Empire) authored Senate Bill 783 which would have required the owner of a property to be notified of an Americans With Disabilities Act (ADA) violation before a lawsuit could be filed. The property owner would have had 120 days to fix the violation. If the violation(s) was not fixed within the timeframe, a lawsuit would then be allowed to move forward.

That bill was killed by Democrats during a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing.

What a deja vu – Sen. Niello is facing an Assembly Judiciary Committee that refuses to hear his bill. He’s hoping cooler heads prevail since his bill has bipartisan support.

Sen. Niello told the Globe that there are 3-4 law firms in the state who specialize in disability access lawsuits intimidating non-English-speaking business owners, who out of fear, end up paying the shakedown fees to make the lawsuit or threat of a lawsuit go away.

According to Niello, “two plaintiffs filed more than 1,000 combined ADA lawsuits across California from 2020-2021 and are some of the most frequent filers in Northern California, according to an NBC Bay area analysis. In 2021, California had more disability access lawsuits filed than the remaining 49 states, combined.”

“Amongst the suits filed are those for a bathroom mirror being one and a half inches too high, the handicap sign on a restroom being the wrong shape, and the color of the handicap parking space sign not being the specified shade of blue.”

Sen. Niello reports that the average settlement can be as much as $14,000, but the cost of litigating will easily cost hundreds of thousands of dollars in legal fees. That can and does destroy businesses.

SB 84 would address this issue by providing small businesses with an opportunity to fix all the alleged violations within 120 days of receiving a demand letter, which will improve access in California and allow businesses to avoid high price tag shakedowns.

Is it any wonder California is named every year by CEOs participating in Chief Executive Magazine’s annual survey of business-friendly states as the worst place in the country to do business. And California ranks dead last once again in Chief Executive Magazine’s Best & Worst States For Business 2025.

I even reported in 2010, Chief Executive magazine called California “the Venezuela of North America.”

Unless Sen. Niello’s SB 84 is passed by serious lawmakers, busy ADA lawyers will be allowed to shake down more California businesses for another year in an already failing state, listed as the worst place in the country to do business.