Stance on Overtime Dooms Nomination

SACRAMENTO — Faced with defeat at the hands of Senate Democrats, Gov. Pete Wilson on Monday withdrew his nomination of an appointee who favors abolishing overtime pay for employees who work longer than eight hours a day.

The Republican governor acted only minutes before the Democratic-dominated Senate Rules Committee was to vote on the confirmation of Carolyn P. Arnold as a member of the state Industrial Welfare Commission.

The commission voted 3 to 2 in January to abolish overtime for work performed in excess of eight hours a day, an action that is expected to be made final in May. Arnold voted with the majority.

The commission’s majority favors paying overtime for work exceeding 40 hours a week.

Major California employer organizations support the change. It will apply to employees who are not covered by union contracts, often women in clerical positions.

But organized labor, and its allies in the Democratic-dominated Legislature, oppose repeal of the eight-hour overtime rule.

The commission also sets the minimum wage in California. Arnold, whom Wilson appointed to represent employers, is an opponent of raising the minimum wage. “I don’t apologize for my stand on the minimum wage,” she said.

The defeat of Arnold, who operates nearly 20 fast-food franchises in San Bernardino County, had become a top priority of organized labor, whose representatives have expressed fear that overtime paid on a weekly basis, rather than a daily basis, could find its way into union contracts.

Senate President Pro Tem Bill Lockyer (D-Hayward), a labor ally, warned in January that, because Arnold voted in favor of repealing the eight-hour overtime rule, she would be defeated when she came to the Senate for confirmation to a full four-year term.

Wilson appointed Arnold only one week before the commission’s vote in January.

Arnold and a platoon of labor representatives testified before the Rules Committee on Monday, but it became clear that the panel’s majority of three Democrats would not vote for her.

Lockyer, the chairman, was absent and spent much of the afternoon meeting in the governor’s office with Wilson representatives. He returned shortly before a vote was to be taken and announced that Wilson had agreed to withdraw Arnold’s name.

Sean Walsh, the governor’s spokesman, told reporters that it became obvious to Wilson that Arnold would be rejected.

Arnold’s service to the commission ended immediately, but Walsh indicated that a new appointee would be named before the commission takes a final vote in May on scrapping the eight-hour overtime rule.