California Workers To Get Indoor Heat Protections

The long and winding road to indoor heat protections for California workers took another turn Thursday: Cal/OSHA officials announced that they plan to finish rules this summer, covering employees in industries such as warehouses and manufacturing.

But as CalMatters Capitol reporter Jeanne Kuang explains, there’s a big exception: State prisons. The heat rule for correctional staff will be on a separate track because the state says the cost is much more than initially anticipated.

That 11-hour hitch emerged the night before the safety board’s March 21 meeting, when it was set to adopt the indoor heat rule, five years past the deadline set by the Legislature. State finance officials withheld a required sign-off, raising concerns that it could cost the Corrections Department billions of dollars to comply.

With the carve out for correctional facilities, however, the rule can move forward, and employers will be expected to either cool down workplaces when indoor temperatures reach 87 degrees or lower the risk of workers getting sick from heat illnesses. After a 15-day public comment period and another vote by the safety board, the rule will likely take at least a few weeks to be approved.

So what happens to workers inside jails and prisons? Eric Berg, a Cal/OSHA deputy chief, said it will separately propose a new rule for them, which will be expected to require a separate cost analysis and public hearing. The process could last a few months to a few years.

This has disappointed some workers’ advocates.

• AnaStacia Wright, an attorney at the advocacy group Worksafe: This leaves “not just guards but also nurses, janitors and many other prison workers across California unprotected from heat, not to mention all the incarcerated workers…”

Meanwhile, the Newsom administration has not provided a public explanation of its prison cost calculations — which far exceeded the safety board’s own estimate of $1 million in the first year — or why the costs were flagged so late.

Read more in Jeanne’s story.

The indoor heat rule isn’t the only policy that advocates for workers want:

• Jobless aid for undocumented: A coalition of workers and immigrant groups known as Safety Net for All marched in Sacramento Thursday to push for legislation that would extend unemployment benefits to undocumented immigrants. Describing it as “a matter of fairness,” one coalition member said in a statement that undocumented workers contribute to California’s economy and should be protected in “situations like a natural disaster or a pandemic.”

• Better working conditions for janitors: After rallying in support of a bill to curb overworking among janitorial staff, janitors from Sacramento and members of SEIU United Service Workers West voted Wednesday to authorize a strike. Other janitors from Los Angeles, Orange County, San Jose and San Diego are also expected to hold a vote strike on May 18 — laying the groundwork for a potential work stoppage of about 25,000 janitors statewide. Said the union: “For too long, immigrant janitors have been treated as commodities, not people.”

• Avoiding late-night boss calls: And a bill that would require employers to let workers ignore calls from their bosses’ outside work hours cleared its first hurdle Wednesday, advancing out of the Assembly’s labor committee. The measure’s author, Democratic Assemblymember Matt Haney of San Francisco, said his proposal protects workers from burnout but is also pro-business: “California businesses will be more competitive for desperately needed workers as a result of this law.”

CalMatters.org is a nonprofit, nonpartisan media venture explaining California policies and politics.