Volunteer Labor Earns Bay Area Winery $115,000 Fine

Castro Valley winery crushed by steep fine.

2014 was a very bad year indeed for Westover Winery of Castro Valley.

This was the year that a $115,000 fine from the state for using volunteers to help make the wine put the small-time vintner out of business, according to The Daily Review.

Westover used volunteers who were paid in job experience in winemaking, according to owner Bill Smyth. That may have been common practice at wineries before, but the killer fine from the state Department of Industrial Relations means that volunteer crushers are now a thing of the past, the newspaper reported.

Other wineries in the area who used volunteers have ended the practice, according to the newspaper.

Westover received fines in July for not paying minimum wage or workers' compensation insurance, the state told the newspaper.

It's not legal for a for-profit business to use volunteer labor. The winery, once open for ten hours a week, made $11,000 a year, Smyth told the newspaper.

Some of the "volunteers" took classes on winemaking Smyth offered, he told the newspaper.

"We were just educating people about wine," he said.

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