Cal/OSHA’s new emergency COVID-19 workplace protections take effect
Dec 1, 2020
California’s Office of Administrative Law (OAL) approved on Nov. 30, 2020 the California Occupational Safety and Health Standards Board (Cal/OSHA) proposed rules that expand how far California employers must go to protect employees from COVID-19 at work. Those regulations were unanimously adopted Nov. 19, 2020 by the Cal/OSHA Board.
The regulations impose dramatic requirements on employers of all sizes, both public and private, and will remain in effect through Oct. 2, 2021, per Cal/OSHA’s website.
While Cal Cities supports reasonable accommodations and modifications to support and protect employees, the emergency regulations are of concern because they may become burdensome to cities’ mandate to provide critical services to residents. Cal Cities negotiated successfully with coalition partners on the final versions of AB 685, which established requirements for COVID-19 notifications in the workplace and SB 1159 which mandated changes to the workers’ compensation system due to COVID-19.
As a part of Cal Cities advocacy efforts, we joined a broad coalition of private and public sector organizations to comment on the multiple issues presented by these regulations and their apparent conflicts and overlapping requirements with the previously mentioned legislation. The following challenges are the biggest issues that cities need to be aware of, as they prepare to implement AB 685 and SB 1159 requirements:
We encourage all cities to work with their respective city attorneys and human resources departments on implementing these changes as soon as possible.
The regulations impose dramatic requirements on employers of all sizes, both public and private, and will remain in effect through Oct. 2, 2021, per Cal/OSHA’s website.
While Cal Cities supports reasonable accommodations and modifications to support and protect employees, the emergency regulations are of concern because they may become burdensome to cities’ mandate to provide critical services to residents. Cal Cities negotiated successfully with coalition partners on the final versions of AB 685, which established requirements for COVID-19 notifications in the workplace and SB 1159 which mandated changes to the workers’ compensation system due to COVID-19.
As a part of Cal Cities advocacy efforts, we joined a broad coalition of private and public sector organizations to comment on the multiple issues presented by these regulations and their apparent conflicts and overlapping requirements with the previously mentioned legislation. The following challenges are the biggest issues that cities need to be aware of, as they prepare to implement AB 685 and SB 1159 requirements:
- The regulations’ scope under §3205(a) do not account for employees who split their time between working from home and the workplace, and situations where employees may be working from a non – “place of employment.”
- The regulations create an ambiguity in §3205(b) about when an individual who is a “COVID-19” case ceases to be so for purposes of the “return to work criteria” in the regulations.
- §3205(c) of the regulations places numerous requirements on cities such as:
- Requiring modifications to a city’s “COVID-19 Plan,” such as new reporting procedures both to public health officials, along with required information that must be disseminated to employees about testing options, consequences of a positive test result, and other information, but triggers this notification on a definition of exposure different from AB 685.
- Creating potential HIPPA concerns regarding the verification and monitoring of an employee’s COVID-19-case status.
- Not adequately clarifying or providing an exemption for public safety personnel, who in the course of their responsibilities may not be able to abide by COVID-19 prevention best practices, such as officers in one patrol car.
- Potentially having to provide paid time off for an employee who contracts COVID-19, even if all other relevant or required leave time has been exhausted.
- §§ 3205.1 and 3205.2 create new testing requirements in the case of an outbreak as defined that would be infeasible to implement because of the number of tests required and the number of employees these sections would require be tested. Additionally, the outbreak determination and requirements differ from what AB 685 and SB 1159 require.
We encourage all cities to work with their respective city attorneys and human resources departments on implementing these changes as soon as possible.