As virus surge hits, California workers could gain swee0ing new work0lace 0rotections from COVID-19

WHAT: In response to calls from California’s workers and advocates, the Cal/ OSHA Standards Board is poised to adopt new, stronger rules to protect nearly all California workers from COVID-19 in the workplace. The action, which could come T hursday, would mean Cal/OSHA enforcement officials would have stronger, swifter tools to ensure that employers follow basic protocols, such as maintaining physical distance between workers, to prevent transmission of the virus in the workplace.

The action on the new standard comes after workers and advocates submitted a petition to urge the Standards Board to develop an emergency temporary standard (ETS) tailored to COVID-19 hazards. Here is an FAQ about the ETS campaign: https:// docs.google.com/document/ d/1rg_ndynPRvAo1I_FTOPw ImW6 h E z y O 8 7 M W B - CeIDVpeyo/edit

WHO: A broad coalition of 45+ occupational health and safety organizations, labor unions, worker centers, community groups, and environmental organizations are actively supporting this campaign. See the full list online at https://worksafe. org/covid/action.html.

WHEN: 10 AM this

Thursday, Nov. 19, 2020

WHER E: T his pub - lic meeting will be online. The call-in information is on this agenda document: ht tps:// w w w. dir. ca . gov/ oshsb/document s/agendaNov2020.pdf.

WHY: As of November 15, there have been more than one million confirmed cases of coronavirus in California, and more than 18,000 deaths and an alarming rise in the number of cases and the rate of infection have forced the state to pull the “emergency brake” on California’s reopening plan. According to Cal/OSHA, COVID-19 “has killed hundreds of workers in California and sickened thousands, and workers will

continue to become ill and die until the pandemic subsides. COVID-19 is an occupational health emergency causing more deaths in less time than any other workplace crisis in the nearly 50year existence of Cal/OSHA” (source: https://www.dir. ca. gov/oshsb/documents/ petition-583- dosheval.pdf). And the impact has been unevenly distributed, with low-income workers, immigrants, and workers of color bearing the brunt.

Cal/OSHA and the State of California have published guidance documents for employers. But the guidance documents, while technically enforceable by Cal/OSHA, do not have the same force of law as a standard because they did not go through a rulemaking process by the Standards Board. A standard would give Cal/

OSHA a more powerful tool to enforce the rules and hold employers accountable.

According to Cal/OSHA itself: “While these general provisions provide Cal/ OSHA a regulatory basis for requiring employers to take measures to protect workers from COVID-19, Cal/OSHA’s enforcement efforts could be streamlined and strengthened through regulatory mandates specific to preventing the spread of infectious diseases.”