Carl Curtis v. Irwin Industries, Inc. , 913 F.3d 1146 ( 2019 )


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  •                       FOR PUBLICATION
    UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
    FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT
    CARL CURTIS, an individual;                   No. 16-56515
    ARTHUR WILLIAMS,
    Plaintiffs-Appellants,                  D.C. No.
    2:15-cv-02480-ODW-E
    v.
    IRWIN INDUSTRIES, INC., a                       OPINION
    California corporation; DOES,
    1 through 100, inclusive,
    Defendants-Appellees.
    Appeal from the United States District Court
    for the Central District of California
    Otis D. Wright II, District Judge, Presiding
    Argued and Submitted October 9, 2018
    Pasadena, California
    Filed January 25, 2019
    Before: Sandra S. Ikuta and John B. Owens, Circuit
    Judges, and Haywood S. Gilliam, Jr.,* District Judge.
    Opinion by Judge Ikuta
    *
    The Honorable Haywood S. Gilliam, Jr., United States District
    Judge for the Northern District of California, sitting by designation.
    2                  CURTIS V. IRWIN INDUSTRIES
    SUMMARY**
    Labor Law
    The panel affirmed in part the district court’s dismissal of
    a wage-and-hour suit and remanded in part.
    Plaintiffs worked for a company that conducted
    operations on oil platforms located off the coast of California,
    on the Outer Continental Shelf. The panel held that
    plaintiffs’ claim for overtime pay was preempted under § 301
    of the Labor Management Relations Act because California
    overtime law does not apply to an employee working under
    a qualifying collective bargaining agreement; therefore,
    plaintiffs’ right to overtime existed solely as a result of their
    CBAs.
    The panel remanded to the district court to review meal
    and rest period and minimum wage claims, as well as
    derivative claims, and address issues of preemption under
    § 301 and the Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act, as well as
    issues of California labor law.
    **
    This summary constitutes no part of the opinion of the court. It has
    been prepared by court staff for the convenience of the reader.
    CURTIS V. IRWIN INDUSTRIES                              3
    COUNSEL
    Michael A. Strauss (argued) and Aris E. Karakalos, Strauss
    & Strauss APC, Ventura, California, for Plaintiffs-Appellants.
    Ronald J. Holland (argued), Ellen M. Bronchetti, and
    Christopher M. Foster, DLA Piper LLP, San Francisco,
    California, for Defendant-Appellee.
    OPINION
    IKUTA, Circuit Judge:
    Carl Curtis brought a putative class action lawsuit against
    his former employer, Irwin Industries (Irwin), alleging that
    Irwin denied him overtime pay, failed to give him meal and
    rest periods, and failed to pay him minimum wage for the
    12 hours he was off duty.1 Curtis’s claim for overtime pay is
    preempted under § 301 of the Labor Management Relations
    Act (LMRA), 29 U.S.C. § 185, because California overtime
    law does not apply to an employee working under a
    qualifying collective bargaining agreement, Cal. Lab. Code
    § 514, and Curtis worked under such an agreement. We
    remand Curtis’s remaining claims to the district court to
    address in the first instance.
    1
    Arthur Williams is also a named plaintiff. However, because he
    raises the same arguments as Curtis, and the specific facts of his work for
    Irwin are not relevant to our disposition of the case, we refer only to Curtis
    in this appeal.
    4               CURTIS V. IRWIN INDUSTRIES
    I
    Curtis is a former employee of Irwin, a company that
    conducts operations on oil platforms located off the coast of
    California, on the Outer Continental Shelf.2 While working
    for Irwin, Curtis was regularly scheduled to work seven 12-
    hour shifts in a seven-day period, with twelve hours on duty,
    followed by twelve hours off duty.
    As a member of United Steel, Paper and Forestry, Rubber,
    Manufacturing, Energy, Allied Industrial and Service
    Workers International Union, Local 1945 (Union), Curtis was
    subject to two collective bargaining agreements (CBAs)
    between the Union and Irwin: the National Master
    Agreement by and between Irwin’s Operations Group and the
    Union, and the National Master Agreement by and between
    Irwin’s Maintenance and Construction Group and the Union.
    Both agreements include detailed provisions regarding wages,
    overtime, and hours, as well as provisions requiring
    employees to grieve and arbitrate disputes concerning the
    application and terms of the CBAs.
    Without using the dispute-resolution provisions of the
    CBAs, Curtis filed a putative class action complaint against
    Irwin in California state court. The complaint was based on
    Curtis’s theory that his 12 off-duty hours counted as “hours
    worked” for purposes of California labor laws, see Cal. Lab.
    Code § 510, because, as a practical matter, he was unable to
    leave the oil platform during that time. Curtis relied on a
    recent California Supreme Court case holding that security
    guards were “entitled to compensation for all on-call hours
    2
    Curtis worked for Irwin from approximately December 2013 to
    April 2014.
    CURTIS V. IRWIN INDUSTRIES                            5
    spent at their assigned worksites under their employer’s
    control.” Mendiola v. CPS Sec. Sols., Inc., 
    60 Cal. 4th 833
    ,
    836 (2015). Extending Mendiola’s reasoning from on-call
    hours to off-duty hours, Curtis argues that Irwin violated
    various California wage and hour laws by failing to recognize
    his 12 hours of off-duty time as “hours worked.”
    Specifically, the complaint alleges that Irwin denied him
    overtime pay for the 12 hours he was off duty, see Cal. Lab.
    Code § 510, failed to give him meal and rest periods for that
    period, see Cal. Lab. Code §§ 226.7, 512, and failed to pay
    him minimum wage for that period, see Cal. Lab. Code
    §§ 1194, 1197. The complaint also raised four claims that are
    derivative of his overtime, meal and rest period, and
    minimum wage claims.3
    Irwin removed the action to district court, relying on
    § 301 of the LMRA, 29 U.S.C. § 185, and the Outer
    Continental Shelf Lands Act (OCSLA), 43 U.S.C.
    § 1331–1356b, as the basis for federal jurisdiction. Once in
    federal court, Irwin filed a motion to dismiss on the ground
    that Curtis’s claims are preempted by § 301 of the LMRA. In
    his opposition, Curtis raised a number of arguments,
    including his contentions that the CBAs did not apply at all
    because their scope does not extend to work conducted on the
    Outer Continental Shelf; California’s minimum wage and
    hour standards are not preempted by § 301 of the LMRA
    3
    These derivative claims are: (1) failure to provide an accurate pay
    stub, Cal. Lab. Code § 226(e); (2) engaging in unfair business practices,
    Cal. Bus. & Prof. Code § 17200; (3) failure to pay the correct wages at
    termination, Cal. Lab. Code § 201; and (4) a demand for civil penalties
    under California’s Private Attorneys General Act, Cal. Lab. Code § 2699.
    These claims can succeed only if Curtis prevails on his claims that Irwin
    violated California labor law by failing to recognize his 12 off-duty hours
    as “hours worked,” see Cal Lab. Code § 510.
    6               CURTIS V. IRWIN INDUSTRIES
    under binding state and federal precedents; Curtis’s overtime
    and meal break claims were not precluded by section 514 of
    the California Labor Code; and California law applied to the
    Outer Continental Shelf.
    The district court granted Irwin’s motion to dismiss. The
    court based this conclusion solely on the ground that there
    was a need to interpret the CBAs in order to resolve the
    parties’ dispute regarding their applicability, and therefore the
    state law claims were preempted by § 301 of the LMRA.
    Additionally, the district court ordered the parties to proceed
    to arbitration under the terms of the applicable CBAs.
    Curtis filed a motion for reconsideration, arguing that his
    claims were founded on non-negotiable state-law rights that
    are independent of the CBAs. In his reply to Irwin’s
    opposition, Curtis stated, for the first time: “Plaintiffs are
    willing to concede that the CBAs are generally applicable to
    Plaintiffs because such a concession has zero effect on their
    ultimate rights to pursue their statutorily-guaranteed rights in
    court—a right that exists independently of these CBAs.”
    Given the timing and minimal nature of this concession,
    it is not surprising that the district court missed it.
    Accordingly, the district court affirmed its dismissal of
    Curtis’s claims as preempted under § 301 on the ground that
    Curtis disputed the applicability of the CBAs, and it would be
    necessary to give the CBAs “more than merely a cursory
    reading to determine whether they actually apply to [Curtis’s]
    claims.” The court did not address any other basis for
    preemption. However, the district court retracted the order to
    arbitrate.
    CURTIS V. IRWIN INDUSTRIES                          7
    Curtis timely appealed. The district court had jurisdiction
    under 29 U.S.C. § 185(c),4 and we have jurisdiction under
    28 U.S.C. § 1291. We review de novo a district court’s
    dismissal under Rule 12(b)(6) of the Federal Rules of Civil
    Procedure. Puri v. Khalsa, 
    844 F.3d 1152
    , 1157 (9th Cir.
    2017). We accept “all factual allegations in the complaint as
    true and construe the pleadings in the light most favorable to
    the nonmoving party.” Rowe v. Educ. Credit Mgmt. Corp.,
    
    559 F.3d 1028
    , 1029–30 (9th Cir. 2009) (internal quotations
    marks and citation omitted).
    II
    The central dispute on appeal is whether Curtis’s claims,
    which he styles as state law claims, are preempted by § 301
    of the LMRA. Section 301 provides that “[s]uits for violation
    of contracts between an employer and a labor organization
    . . . may be brought in any district court of the United
    States.” 29 U.S.C. § 185(a). Although § 301 contains no
    express language of preemption, the Supreme Court has long
    interpreted the LMRA as authorizing federal courts to create
    a uniform body of federal common law to adjudicate disputes
    that arise out of labor contracts. See Allis-Chalmers Corp. v.
    Lueck, 
    471 U.S. 202
    , 210 (1985); Teamsters v. Lucas Flour
    Co., 
    369 U.S. 95
    , 103–04 (1962). Thus, any suit “alleging a
    violation of a provision of a labor contract must be brought
    under § 301 and be resolved by reference to federal law.”
    
    Lueck, 471 U.S. at 210
    . “A state rule that purports to define
    the meaning or scope of a term in a contract suit therefore is
    4
    Irwin asserts that the district court had jurisdiction pursuant to
    OCSLA as well. Because we hold that jurisdiction over the overtime
    claim was proper under § 301 of the LMRA, we do not address whether
    complete preemption exists under OCSLA.
    8               CURTIS V. IRWIN INDUSTRIES
    pre-empted by federal labor law.” 
    Id. Although normally
    federal preemption is a defense that does not authorize
    removal to federal court, § 301 has such “extraordinary pre-
    emptive power” that it “converts an ordinary state common
    law complaint into one stating a federal claim for purposes of
    the well-pleaded complaint rule.” Metro. Life Ins. v. Taylor,
    
    481 U.S. 58
    , 65 (1987). In other words, a civil complaint
    raising claims preempted by § 301 raises a federal question
    that can be removed to a federal court. See 
    id. As explained
    in Alaska Airlines Inc. v. Schurke, federal
    preemption under § 301 “is an essential component of federal
    labor policy” for three reasons. 
    898 F.3d 904
    , 917–18 (9th
    Cir. 2018) (en banc). First, “a collective bargaining
    agreement is more than just a contract; it is an effort to erect
    a system of industrial self-government.” 
    Id. at 918
    (internal
    quotation marks and citations omitted). Thus, a CBA is part
    of the “continuous collective bargaining process.” United
    Steelworkers v. Enter. Wheel & Car Corp. (Steelworkers III),
    
    363 U.S. 593
    , 596 (1960). Second, because the CBA is
    designed to govern the entire employment relationship,
    including disputes which the drafters may not have
    anticipated, it “calls into being a new common law—the
    common law of a particular industry or of a particular plant.”
    United Steelworkers v. Warrior & Gulf Navigation Co.
    (Steelworkers II), 
    363 U.S. 574
    , 579 (1960). Accordingly,
    the labor arbitrator is usually the appropriate adjudicator for
    CBA disputes because he was chosen due to the “parties’
    confidence in his knowledge of the common law of the shop
    and their trust in his personal judgment to bring to bear
    considerations which are not expressed in the contract as
    criteria for judgment.” 
    Id. at 582.
    Third, grievance and
    arbitration procedures “provide certain procedural benefits,
    including a more prompt and orderly settlement of CBA
    CURTIS V. IRWIN INDUSTRIES                   9
    disputes than that offered by the ordinary judicial process.”
    
    Schurke, 898 F.3d at 918
    (internal quotation marks and
    citations omitted).
    While § 301 preemption furthers important interests, the
    Supreme Court has stressed that Ҥ 301 cannot be read
    broadly to pre-empt nonnegotiable rights conferred on
    individual employees as a matter of state law.” Livadas v.
    Bradshaw, 
    512 U.S. 107
    , 123 (1994). To extend § 301
    preemption beyond its defined role “would be inconsistent
    with congressional intent.” 
    Lueck, 471 U.S. at 212
    . For this
    reason, “[s]etting minimum wages, regulating work hours and
    pay periods, requiring paid and unpaid leave, protecting
    worker safety, prohibiting discrimination in employment, and
    establishing other worker rights remains well within the
    traditional police power of the states,” and claims alleging
    violations of such protections will not necessarily be
    preempted, even when the plaintiff is covered by a CBA.
    
    Schurke, 898 F.3d at 919
    –20.
    To ensure that § 301 preemption “extends only as far as
    necessary to protect the role of labor arbitration in resolving
    CBA disputes,” we employ a two-step test. 
    Id. at 913–14.
    First, we ask whether the asserted cause of action involves a
    “right [that] exists solely as a result of the CBA.” Kobold v.
    Good Samaritan Reg’l Med. Ctr., 
    832 F.3d 1024
    , 1032 (9th
    Cir. 2016) (quoting Burnside v. Kiewit Pac. Corp., 
    491 F.3d 1053
    , 1059 (9th Cir. 2007)). The essential inquiry is this:
    Does the claim seek “purely to vindicate a right or duty
    created by the CBA itself[?]” 
    Schurke, 898 F.3d at 921
    . If
    so, “then the claim is preempted, and [the] analysis ends
    there.” 
    Burnside, 491 F.3d at 1059
    .
    10                    CURTIS V. IRWIN INDUSTRIES
    But if not, we proceed to the second step and ask
    “whether a plaintiff’s state law right is substantially
    dependent on analysis of [the CBA],” which turns on whether
    the claim cannot be resolved by simply “look[ing] to” versus
    “interpreting” the CBA. 
    Kobald, 832 F.3d at 1033
    (internal
    quotation marks and citations omitted). We have stressed
    that “interpretation” is construed narrowly in this context.
    See 
    Schurke, 898 F.3d at 921
    . At this second step of the
    analysis, “claims are only preempted to the extent there is an
    active dispute over ‘the meaning of contract terms.’” 
    Id. (quoting Livadas,
    512 U.S. at 124). Accordingly, a state law
    claim may avoid preemption if it does not raise questions
    about the scope, meaning, or application of the CBA. See
    
    Livadas, 512 U.S. at 125
    .
    III
    We first apply this framework to Curtis’s claims that
    Irwin violated California labor law by failing to recognize his
    12 off-duty hours as “hours worked,” see Cal Lab. Code
    § 510(a), in order to determine whether these claims are
    preempted by § 301 of the LMRA.
    We begin with Curtis’s claim that Irwin violated section
    510(a) of the California Labor Code, which provides a default
    rule for overtime.5 This section provides that any work in
    5
    California Labor Code section 510(a) states, in pertinent part:
    (a) Eight hours of labor constitutes a day’s work. Any
    work in excess of eight hours in one workday and any
    work in excess of 40 hours in any one workweek and
    the first eight hours worked on the seventh day of work
    in any one workweek shall be compensated at the rate
    of no less than one and one-half times the regular rate
    CURTIS V. IRWIN INDUSTRIES                        11
    excess of a specified number of hours “shall be compensated”
    at a specified rate of pay. Cal. Lab. Code § 510(a). Curtis
    argues that Irwin violated this section by failing to pay him
    the required overtime rates for the 12 hours he spent off-duty.
    Further, Curtis argues that this section gives him a non-
    negotiable state right to such overtime pay for his 12 off-duty
    hours, independent of any interpretation of the CBA.
    Curtis’s argument fails, however, in light of section
    510(a)(2), which provides that the “requirements of this
    section do not apply to the payment of overtime
    compensation to an employee working pursuant to . . . [a]n
    alternative workweek schedule adopted pursuant to a
    collective bargaining agreement pursuant to Section 514.”
    Section 514 in turn states that “Sections 510 and 511 do not
    apply to an employee covered by a valid collective bargaining
    agreement if the agreement expressly provides for the wages,
    hours of work, and working conditions of the employees, and
    if the agreement provides premium wage rates for all
    of pay for an employee. Any work in excess of
    12 hours in one day shall be compensated at the rate of
    no less than twice the regular rate of pay for an
    employee. In addition, any work in excess of eight
    hours on any seventh day of a workweek shall be
    compensated at the rate of no less than twice the regular
    rate of pay of an employee. Nothing in this section
    requires an employer to combine more than one rate of
    overtime compensation in order to calculate the amount
    to be paid to an employee for any hour of overtime
    work. The requirements of this section do not apply to
    the payment of overtime compensation to an employee
    working pursuant to any of the following: . . . (2) An
    alternative workweek schedule adopted pursuant to a
    collective bargaining agreement pursuant to Section
    514.
    12              CURTIS V. IRWIN INDUSTRIES
    overtime hours worked and a regular hourly rate of pay for
    those employees of not less than 30 percent more than the
    state minimum wage.” Cal. Lab. Code § 514. By its terms,
    therefore, the default definition of overtime and overtime
    rates in section 510 does not apply to an employee who is
    subject to a qualifying CBA. If Curtis’s CBAs in this case
    meet the requirements of section 514, Curtis’s right to
    overtime “exists solely as a result of the CBA,” and therefore
    is preempted under § 301. 
    Kobold, 832 F.3d at 1032
    .
    Curtis does not dispute that both CBAs expressly provide
    for “the wages, hours of work, and working conditions of the
    employees, and . . . premium wage rates for all overtime
    hours worked and a regular hourly rate of pay for those
    employees of not less than 30 percent more than the state
    minimum wage,” as required by section 514. See Cal. Lab.
    Code § 514. Rather, he argues that the CBAs do not meet the
    requirements of section 514 because the CBAs’s definition of
    overtime (and overtime rates) is not the same as section 510’s
    definition of overtime (and overtime rates). Put differently,
    Curtis argues that to qualify for the exemption from section
    510’s definition of overtime, a CBA must provide employees
    with overtime that is equivalent to section 510’s definition of
    overtime.
    This interpretation of section 510 fails as a matter of
    statutory interpretation, and as construed by state courts.
    Obviously, if every employer had to meet all the requirements
    of section 510(a), it would render the collective bargaining
    exception in sections 510(a)(2) and 514 superfluous. The
    California Supreme Court has long made clear that
    “interpretations which render any part of a statute superfluous
    are to be avoided.” Wells v. One2One Learning Found.,
    
    39 Cal. 4th 1164
    , 1207 (2006), as modified (Oct. 25, 2006).
    CURTIS V. IRWIN INDUSTRIES                   13
    Moreover, California courts have rejected this
    interpretation of section 510. See Vranish v. Exxon Mobil
    Corp., 
    223 Cal. App. 4th 103
    , 107 (2014). In Vranish, union-
    represented workers claimed that their employer violated
    section 510 by failing to pay premium wages for all
    “overtime hours worked.” 
    Id. at 106.
    While it was
    “undisputed that plaintiffs were compensated for all overtime
    worked in accordance with the CBA,” the CBA’s definition
    of “overtime” was less generous than section 510’s definition.
    
    Id. Specifically, the
    CBA provided “that overtime is not paid
    for hours worked between eight and 12 in a workday,” while
    section 510 required that overtime wages be paid for any
    work in excess of eight hours in one workday. 
    Id. at 107,
    109. The parties disputed whether the employer was
    “required to pay plaintiffs ‘overtime,’ as that word is defined
    in section 510, subdivision (a), or was it only required to pay
    a premium for overtime worked as that word is defined in the
    CBA.” 
    Id. at 109.
    The court concluded that “pursuant to the
    plain statutory language, . . . legislative history and opinions
    and comments from the [California Division of Labor
    Standards Enforcement]” an employer is required to pay only
    for overtime as defined by a qualifying CBA. 
    Id. at 113.
    Thus, if a CBA satisfies the requirements of section 514, the
    requirements of section 510(a) “do not apply.” Cal. Lab.
    Code §§ 510(a), 514.
    Further, Vranish noted that this “interpretation makes
    
    sense.” 223 Cal. App. 4th at 111
    . While section 510
    establishes a default definition of overtime applicable to non-
    unionized employees, unionized employees “have sought and
    received alternative wage protections through the collective
    bargaining process.” 
    Id. (quoting Firestone
    v. S. Cal. Gas
    Co., 
    219 F.3d 1063
    , 1067 (9th Cir. 2000)). Thus, the
    California legislature deemed it appropriate to allow
    14              CURTIS V. IRWIN INDUSTRIES
    unionized employees to contract around section 510(a)’s
    requirements by “bargain[ing] over not only the rate of
    overtime pay, but also when overtime pay will begin.” 
    Id. (internal quotation
    marks and citation omitted). Accordingly,
    when such a bargain has been struck, courts look to the CBA
    to determine the definition of “overtime.” See Flowers v.
    L.A. Cty. Metro. Transp. Auth., 
    243 Cal. App. 4th 66
    , 85
    (2015) (holding that the exemption for collective bargaining
    agreements in section 514 allows parties to “contractually
    agree, through the collective bargaining process, to exclude
    the specified tasks from the definition of ‘overtime hours
    worked’”).
    Curtis argues that we should adhere to our analysis in
    Gregory v. SCIE, LLC, 
    317 F.3d 1050
    , 1053 (9th Cir. 2003),
    which was issued before Vranish was decided. Gregory
    assumed that the collective bargaining agreement at issue met
    the requirements of section 514 and provided “premium wage
    rates” for overtime hours worked, as “overtime hours” were
    defined in the CBA. 
    Id. But without
    the benefit of any
    California cases, Gregory held that section 510, rather than a
    CBA, defined which hours constituted “overtime hours.” 
    Id. at 1053
    n.4. Under this interpretation, we held it was
    necessary to interpret state law in order to resolve the parties’
    dispute, and therefore the employee’s claim was not
    preempted. 
    Id. at 1054.
    Curtis’s argument fails, however, because we are bound
    to follow the rulings of intermediate state courts “absent
    convincing evidence that the California Supreme Court would
    reject th[ose] interpretation[s].” In re Watts, 
    298 F.3d 1077
    ,
    1082–83 (9th Cir. 2002) (collecting cases); see also Muniz v.
    United Parcel Serv., Inc., 
    738 F.3d 214
    , 219 (9th Cir. 2013).
    Because Vranish and Flowers provided a reasonable statutory
    CURTIS V. IRWIN INDUSTRIES                         15
    interpretation that avoided rendering sections 510(a)(2) and
    514 superfluous, and was consistent with legislative history,
    see 
    Vranish, 223 Cal. App. 4th at 109
    –10, we see no reason
    that the California Supreme Court would reject it.
    Accordingly, we conclude that Gregory was overruled by
    intervening California case law.
    Under the reasoning of Vranish and Flowers, Curtis’s
    CBAs in this case meet the requirements of section 514, and
    therefore Curtis’s claim for overtime pay is controlled by his
    CBAs. Because Curtis’s right to overtime “exists solely as a
    result of the CBA,” 
    Kobold, 832 F.3d at 1032
    , his claim that
    Irwin violated overtime requirements by not paying him for
    the 12 off-duty hours is preempted under § 301. Thus, his
    claim fails at step one of the preemption analysis.6
    IV
    We now turn to Curtis’s remaining claims. Curtis argues
    that Irwin improperly denied him rest and meal periods
    during the 12 hours he was off duty, in violation of sections
    226.7 and 512(a) of the California Labor Code. He also
    claims that Irwin violated sections 1194 and 1197 of the
    California Labor Code, which establish a right to receive the
    “legal minimum wage” during this 12-hour off-duty period.
    Irwin, in turn, argues that Curtis’s rights to rest and meal
    periods and to a minimum wage substantially depend on an
    analysis of the CBAs, and therefore are preempted under
    6
    Because we hold that Curtis’s state law overtime claim is preempted
    by § 301, we need not address whether Curtis “clearly and unmistakably”
    consented to the arbitration of his state law claims pursuant to 14 Penn
    Plaza LLC v. Pyett, 
    556 U.S. 247
    , 251 (2009).
    16              CURTIS V. IRWIN INDUSTRIES
    § 301. According to Irwin, California’s Industrial Welfare
    Commission has issued an order that exempts an employer
    from providing the statutory meal and rest breaks where a
    qualifying CBA is in place. See Wage Order 16-2001, Cal.
    Code Regs. tit. 8, § 11160(11). Further, Irwin argues that
    resolving Curtis’s minimum wage claims requires an analysis
    of the CBAs to determine the degree of Irwin’s control over
    Curtis’s off-duty activities, which Mendiola deemed to be the
    central inquiry for overtime claims.
    In addition to these preemption issues, there remains a
    dispute as to whether Curtis’s meal and rest period, final pay,
    and pay stub claims are preempted by OCSLA. Under
    OCSLA, federal law generally governs claims relating to the
    Outer Continental Shelf, but the civil and criminal laws of
    each adjacent state are deemed to be applicable federal law to
    the extent they are “applicable and not inconsistent” with
    federal law. 43 U.S.C. § 1333(a)(2)(A). In Newton v. Parker
    Drilling Management Services, Ltd., we held that claims
    brought pursuant to California’s minimum wage and overtime
    laws are applicable and not inconsistent with the Fair Labor
    Standards Act, and therefore applied on the Outer Continental
    Shelf. 
    881 F.3d 1078
    , 1084 (9th Cir. 2018), cert granted, ___
    S. Ct. ___, 
    2019 WL 166875
    (U.S. Jan. 11, 2019). But
    Newton did not resolve whether California’s meal period,
    final pay, and pay stub laws are “applicable” and “not
    inconsistent with existing federal law,” instead remanding
    those claims to the district court. 
    Id. at 1099.
    Nor did
    Newton address whether the LMRA (or the National Labor
    Relations Act) is consistent with California labor law.
    The district court did not consider any of these issues,
    focusing instead on Curtis’s argument that the CBAs did not
    apply to his activities on the Outer Continental Shelf.
    CURTIS V. IRWIN INDUSTRIES                       17
    Although Curtis conceded the applicability of the CBAs in
    his motion to reconsider reply brief, the district court did not
    consider Curtis’s claims in light of this concession.7
    Moreover, these claims raise complex issues of state law that
    have not been fully briefed by the parties.8 Because the
    district court is better able to decide these questions in the
    first instance, see Ariz. Libertarian Party, Inc. v. Bayless,
    
    351 F.3d 1277
    , 1283 (9th Cir. 2003), we remand to the
    district court to review Curtis’s meal and rest period and
    minimum wage claims, as well as the four derivative claims.9
    AFFIRMED IN PART AND REMANDED IN PART.
    7
    Because Curtis first conceded that the CBAs apply to him in his
    motion for reconsideration reply brief, Irwin argues that Curtis is
    precluded from arguing that his claims are not preempted by § 301 even
    though the CBAs apply. But Curtis vigorously argued that his claims
    were not preempted by § 301 before the district court. Because “it is
    claims that are deemed waived or forfeited, not arguments,” we reject
    Irwin’s contentions that Curtis waived this argument. United States v.
    Pallares-Galan, 
    359 F.3d 1088
    , 1095 (9th Cir. 2004).
    8
    The parties have not addressed, for example, whether Curtis’s claim
    that Irwin denied him meal periods in violation of California Labor Code
    section 512(a) requires an analysis of whether Curtis is “an employee
    specified in” section 512(f), in which case Curtis may be subject to the
    CBA exemption in section 512(e). Nor did the parties discuss whether the
    CBA exemption applies to Curtis due to Wage Order 16-2001, Cal. Code
    Regs. tit. 8, § 11160(11), and whether the Wage Order could be
    “harmonize[d]” with section 512. See Brinker Rest. Corp. v. Superior
    Court, 
    53 Cal. 4th 1004
    , 1027 (2012). In addition, as explained above,
    Curtis argues that Mendiola, 
    60 Cal. 4th 833
    , provides the legal basis for
    his minimum wage claim, but the parties failed to fully address whether
    applying Mendiola here requires an analysis of the CBA.
    9
    The parties shall bear their own costs on appeal.