• Amid extreme heat waves across California and the nation, U.S. Sen. Alex Padilla (D-California) applauded the Biden administration’s proposed rule to establish the first-ever federal safety standard to protect workers from the severe risks of excessive heat, according to a July 2 statement from Padilla’s office. The rule, proposed by the Department of Labor’s Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA), would implement key provisions from Padilla’s Asunción Valdivia Heat Illness and Fatalities Prevention Act by putting forward a federal standard to ensure workers and employers can address increasing heat stress risks. Last summer, Padilla and his colleagues led 112 members of Congress in calling on the Biden administration to implement an OSHA workplace federal heat standard as quickly as possible. The proposed OSHA rule would implement work practice standards such as required rest breaks, access to shade and adequate hydration, and acclimatization to high-heat working conditions. It would also require employers to identify potential heat hazards, develop plans to respond to heat illness emergencies, and train employees and supervisors to manage the risks of excessive heat. This rule would impact roughly 36 million workers and aims to reduce heat-related injuries, illnesses, and deaths at work. “With climate change shattering new heat records every summer, holding employers accountable to provide commonsense heat-stress protections like shade and water breaks has only become more important,” Padilla said in the statement. “I am thrilled to see OSHA act on our calls to put the health and safety of our workers first by proposing a federal heat standard that would prevent millions of heat-related illnesses and save lives.”
• U.S. Rep. Salud Carbajal (D-Santa Barbara) is encouraging Central Coast families to take advantage of the expanded suite of federal nutrition programs available for kids across California, according to a June 28 statement from Carbajal’s office. The new suite of programs launched by the U.S. Department of Agriculture gives families more choices and convenient ways to get summer nutrition support for their children and teens with the new SUN Bucks, as well as SUN Meals, and the previously-launched SUN Meals To-Go program. “Even on the beautiful Central Coast, summer vacation is not always a welcome time for some of our children and families. The end of the school year can leave families struggling to make ends meet in limbo, with many school meal programs shuttering until the fall. That is what makes summer nutrition programs like SUN programs so critical to helping keep food on the table for thousands of food insecure families across our region,” Carbajal said in the statement. “I was proud to work with my colleagues to create and fund the SUN Bucks program in our last term, and I’m glad to see it launching this summer to support the California and Central Coast children who lack access to nutritious meals in between school years.”
• Gov. Gavin Newsom announced a ballot measure to tackle property crime and the fentanyl crisis, including through targeted reforms to Proposition 47, according to a July 5 statement from Newsom’s office. Passed in 2014, the bill classified certain crimes as misdemeanors, changed resentencing laws, and created the Safe Neighborhoods and Schools fund to support rehabilitation programs and fund drug and mental health treatment. This year’s ballot measure establishes penalties for repeat petty theft or shoplifting offenders, empowers law enforcement to combine the value of multiple thefts to charge a felony, introduces stiffer penalties for knowingly selling or providing drugs mixed with fentanyl without informing the buyer, makes it easier for prosecutors to charge drug dealers supplying fentanyl with murder if death occurs, and expands drug addiction treatment programs in communities. “With targeted reforms to Prop. 47, this ballot measure is a critical step forward in our efforts to strengthen California’s public safety laws and provide law enforcement with additional tools to address the growing concerns of property crime and the fentanyl crisis,” Newsom said in the statement. “This balanced approach cracks down on crime and protects our communities—without reverting to ineffective and costly policies of the past.”
This article appears in Jul 11-21, 2024.