Why state hasn't ditched daylight saving time yet

Pair of bills would make standard time permanent

At 2 a.m. Sunday, clocks in California will jump forward an hour as we make the switch to daylight saving time.

The impending loss of 60 minutes of precious sleep got me wondering why the state hasn't abandoned the twice-a-year changing of the clocks, even though I've been hearing about that possibility for years.

It turns out to be complicated.

As a refresher: Each year in the United States, we spring forward an hour in March and then go back to standard time in November. The idea is to shift an hour of sunlight from the early morning to the evening, when more people can make use of it. One of the oldest arguments for the time change is that it saves energy, but there have been many conflicting studies about whether that's true.

Changing our clocks has been linked not only to disrupted sleep, as you might expect, but also to a higher risk of car accidents, heart attacks and more. The only states that don't make the biannual switch are Arizona and Hawaii.

In November 2018, Californians overwhelmingly approved a ballot measure to allow the Legislature to change the daylight saving time period. But the measure didn't actually end it.

There have been several failed attempts since then to abolish the time change by making daylight saving time permanent. But federal law does not currently allow for such a thing. In the past five years, 19 states have enacted legislation or passed resolutions to move to daylight saving time year-round, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures, but they're all contingent on congressional action.

California lawmakers are now taking a different approach. In the past few months, state legislators have introduced a pair of bills in the Assembly and Senate to make standard time permanent, which would not need federal approval.

Assemblyman Tri Ta, a Republican who represents Garden Grove, Westminster and other communities in western Orange County, said his bill would make good on a promise from the 2018 ballot measure. Californians “did not expect the Legislature to stall the will of the voters by refusing to take up this important measure,” he said in a statement.

Ta is working with Sen. Roger Niello, a Republican who represents parts of Sacramento and Placer counties and who introduced the other bill. Their proposals are part of a larger strategy with Washington, Oregon, Idaho and Utah, where legislators have proposed similar changes, to ultimately have much of the West on the same time zone, Niello said.

As for why Niello took up the cause: “It's something that I've become increasingly tired of myself,” he said.