[House Hearing, 116 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
FROM THE FIELDS TO THE FACTORIES:
PREVENTING WORKPLACE INJURY AND
DEATH FROM EXCESSIVE HEAT
=======================================================================
HEARING
before the
SUBCOMMITTEE ON WORKFORCE PROTECTIONS
COMMITTEE ON EDUCATION
AND LABOR
U.S. HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED SIXTEENTH CONGRESS
FIRST SESSION
__________
HEARING HELD IN WASHINGTON, DC, JULY 11, 2019
__________
Serial No. 116-33
__________
Printed for the use of the Committee on Education and Labor
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Available via the World Wide Web: www.govinfo.gov
or
Committee address: https://edlabor.house.gov
______
U.S. GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE
37-319 PDF WASHINGTON : 2021
COMMITTEE ON EDUCATION AND LABOR
ROBERT C. ``BOBBY'' SCOTT, Virginia, Chairman
Susan A. Davis, California Virginia Foxx, North Carolina,
Raul M. Grijalva, Arizona Ranking Member
Joe Courtney, Connecticut David P. Roe, Tennessee
Marcia L. Fudge, Ohio Glenn Thompson, Pennsylvania
Gregorio Kilili Camacho Sablan, Tim Walberg, Michigan
Northern Mariana Islands Brett Guthrie, Kentucky
Frederica S. Wilson, Florida Bradley Byrne, Alabama
Suzanne Bonamici, Oregon Glenn Grothman, Wisconsin
Mark Takano, California Elise M. Stefanik, New York
Alma S. Adams, North Carolina Rick W. Allen, Georgia
Mark DeSaulnier, California Lloyd Smucker, Pennsylvania
Donald Norcross, New Jersey Jim Banks, Indiana
Pramila Jayapal, Washington Mark Walker, North Carolina
Joseph D. Morelle, New York James Comer, Kentucky
Susan Wild, Pennsylvania Ben Cline, Virginia
Josh Harder, California Russ Fulcher, Idaho
Lucy McBath, Georgia Van Taylor, Texas
Kim Schrier, Washington Steve Watkins, Kansas
Lauren Underwood, Illinois Ron Wright, Texas
Jahana Hayes, Connecticut Daniel Meuser, Pennsylvania
Donna E. Shalala, Florida William R. Timmons, IV, South
Andy Levin, Michigan* Carolina
Ilhan Omar, Minnesota Dusty Johnson, South Dakota
David J. Trone, Maryland Fred Keller, Pennsylvania
Haley M. Stevens, Michigan
Susie Lee, Nevada
Lori Trahan, Massachusetts
Joaquin Castro, Texas
* Vice-Chair
Veronique Pluviose, Staff Director
Brandon Renz, Minority Staff Director
------
SUBCOMMITTEE ON WORKFORCE PROTECTIONS
ALMA S. ADAMS, North Carolina, Chairwoman
Mark DeSaulnier, California Bradley Byrne, Alabama,
Mark Takano, California Ranking Member
Pramila Jayapal, Washington Mark Walker, North Carolina
Susan Wild, Pennsylvania Ben Cline, Virginia
Lucy McBath, Georgia Ron Wright, Texas
Ilhan Omar, Minnesota
Haley M. Stevens, Michigan
C O N T E N T S
----------
Page
Hearing held on July 11, 2019.................................... 1
Statement of Members:
Adams, Hon. Alma S., Chairwoman, Subcommittee on Workforce
Protections................................................ 1
Prepared statement of.................................... 3
Byrne, Hon. Bradley, Ranking Member, Subcommittee on
Workforce Protections...................................... 5
Prepared statement of.................................... 5
Statement of Witnesses:
Cannon, Mr. Kevin, Attorney, CSP, Senior Director, Safety and
Health Services, Associated General Contractors of America. 31
Prepared statement of.................................... 33
Chu, Hon. Judy, a Representative in Congress form the State
of California.............................................. 7
Prepared statement of.................................... 9
Bernard, Mr. Thomas E., Ph.D, Professor, College of Public
Health, University of South Florida........................ 12
Prepared statement of.................................... 14
Little, Mr. Bryan, Director of Labor Affairs, California Farm
Bureau Federation.......................................... 49
Prepared statement of.................................... 51
McCarthy, Dr. Ronda, Attorney, MD, MPH, American College of
Occupational and Environmental Medicine and Concentra...... 40
Prepared statement of.................................... 42
Rodriguez, Mr. Arturo S., President Emeritus, United Farm
Workers.................................................... 62
Prepared statement of.................................... 64
Rodriguez, Mr. Javier, Warehouse Worker, Worker Resource
Center..................................................... 22
Prepared statement of.................................... 24
Additional Submissions:
Ms. Adams:
Prepared statement and study from Public Citizen......... 100
Questions submitted for the record
Mr. Byrne:
Letter dated August 2, 2019 from the American Farm Bureau
Federation............................................. 124
Letter dated August 8, 2019 from the Construction
Industry Safety Coalition.............................. 126
Dr. McCarthy:
Slide: Heat-Related Illness Frequency Before and After
Implementation of the Heat Stress Awareness Program.... 133
Mr. Javier Rodriguez:
Slide: Assignment Goals Per Hour Safely.................. 134
Slide: WWU Leaders David Garcia and Manolo Fernandez
Document 100+ Temp In NFI Warehouse.................... 135
Responses to questions submitted for the record:
Mr. Bernard.............................................. 144
Dr. McCarthy............................................. 147
Mr. Arturo S. Rodriguez.................................. 154
Mr. Javier Rodriguez..................................... 159
FROM THE FIELDS TO THE FACTORIES:
PREVENTING WORKPLACE INJURY AND
DEATH FROM EXCESSIVE HEAT
Thursday, July 11, 2019
----------
House of Representatives,
Subcommittee on Workforce Protections,
Committee on Education and Labor,
Washington, D.C.
----------
The subcommittee met, pursuant to call, at 10:20 a.m., in
Room 2175, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Alma Adams
[chairwoman of the subcommittee] presiding.
Present: Representatives Adams, DeSaulnier, Jayapal, Wild,
McBath, Omar, Stevens, Byrne, Cline, and Foxx (ex officio).
Also Present: Representatives Scott, Grijalva, and Keller.
Staff Present: Jordan Barab, Senior Labor Policy Advisor;
Nekea Brown, Deputy Clerk; Ilana Brunner, General Counsel; Kyle
DeCant, Labor Policy Counsel; Emma Eatman, Press Assistant; Eli
Hovland, Staff Assistant; Stephanie Lalle, Deputy
Communications Director; Andre Lindsay, Staff Assistant;
Richard Miller, Director of Labor Policy; Max Moore, Office
Aide; Merrick Nelson, Digital Manager; Veronique Pluviose,
Staff Director; Banyon Vassar, Deputy Director of Information
Technology; Jonathan Walter, Labor Policy Fellow; Cyrus Artz,
Minority Parliamentarian; Courtney Butcher, Minority Director
of Coalitions and Members Services; Akash Chougule, Minority
Professional Staff Member; Cate Dillon, Minority Staff
Assistant; Rob Green, Minority Director of Workforce Policy;
Bridget Handy, Minority Communications Assistant; Dean Johnson,
Minority Staff Assistant; John Martin, Minority Workforce
Policy Counsel; Hannah Matesic, Minority Director of
Operations; Audra McGeorge, Minority Communications Director;
Carlton Norwood, Minority Press Secretary; Brandon Renz,
Minority Staff Director; Ben Ridder, Minority Professional
Staff Member; and Lauren Williams, Minority Professional Staff
Member.
Chairwoman Adams. Good morning. The Subcommittee on
Workforce Protections will come to order. Let me welcome
everyone who is present today. I do note that we have a quorum.
The Committee is meeting today for a legislative hearing to
receive testimony regarding ``From the Fields to the Factories,
Preventing Workplace Injury and Death from Excessive Heat.'' I
note for the Subcommittee that Congressman Grijalva from
Arizona, a member of the full committee, and Congressman Keller
of Pennsylvania, be permitted to participate in today's hearing
with the understanding that their questions will come only
after members of the Workforce Protection Subcommittee and the
full committee on both sides of the aisle who are present have
an opportunity to question the witnesses.
Pursuant to Committee Rule 7(c), opening statements are
limited to the Chair and the Ranking Member. This allows us to
hear from our witnesses sooner, and it provides all members
with adequate time to ask questions. I recognize myself now for
the purpose of making an opening statement.
Today, we are here to discuss the serious hazards of
excessive heat exposure in the workplace and the need for the
Occupational Safety and Health Administration, or OSHA, to
protect American workers. We are not talking about being
uncomfortable on a hot day. We are talking about excessive
heat, combined with heavy clothing and high humidity that can
incapacitate our body's natural cooling mechanisms, and lead to
injury, organ failure, and sometimes death. This hearing will
explore commonsense measures that employers can take to prevent
these tragedies.
The Bureau of Labor Statistics reports that from 1992
through 2016, workplace exposure to excessive environmental
heat killed 783 U.S. workers, and seriously injured 69,374. The
problem is getting worse. And while those working in air-
conditioned offices may not notice, climate change is all too
real for the roofer, the warehouse worker, the farm worker, and
the highway worker who worked for 8 to 10 or 12 hours a day in
record-breaking heat.
According to the fourth U.S. National Climate Assessment,
this warming trend is likely to only accelerate. The year 2017
was the second hottest year on record, surpassed by only 2016.
Last week, we even saw record-breaking heat in Alaska. Who
would have ever thought that workers in Alaska would have to
worry about the risks of heat-related illness?
The real impact of excessive heat on our country's workers
is tragic. Just last summer, a Florida landscaper suffered
multiple organ failures, severe dehydration, and hypothermia,
and died from heat stroke after using a lawn edger for 6 hours
in 100-degree heat. Georgia farm worker Miguel Angel Gomez
Chavez, 24, died of heat stroke after picking tomatoes in
direct sunlight with temperatures up to 97.5 degrees. And just
a few years ago, in my home state of North Carolina, a 56-year-
old farm worker died of heat stroke after spending 3 days
harvesting tobacco with a core body temperature of 108 degrees.
The good news is that we now know how to protect these
tragedies for workers on farms, highways, construction sites,
and other outdoor workplaces. Providing water and rest and cool
shaded areas can save lives. And for indoor workers in
factories and laundries and steel mills and lead smelters,
there are practical measures that can keep workers healthy.
These are not radical requirements, and as we will hear
today, the U.S. Army already maintains a rigorous heat standard
to keep our servicemembers healthy and ready to carry out their
missions. The National Institute for Occupational Safety and
Health has also issued workplace safety guidance and a
recommended standard addressing excessive heat.
And finally, three states have adopted their own heat
protection standards. Yet, there is still no nationwide safety
standard for excessive heat, leaving millions of workers
without basic workplace protections. That is why during this
hearing, we will also assess H.R. 3668, the Asuncion Valdivia
Heat Illness and Fatality Prevention Act of 2019, introduced by
Representative Judy Chu, who will testify today. This
legislation will require OSHA to issue a standard within 42
months that would mandate employers to provide both indoor and
outdoor workers exposed to excessive heat with the protections
they need.
Specifically, the bill would require the implementation of
well-organized safety measures, taking into consideration
recommendations of the National Institute for Occupational
Safety and Health, and ensure that the heat standards that is
no less protective than those already in place in states like
California.
OSHA may object that it doesn't have the resources to
quickly complete a standard. However, we must remember that
Congress cut OSHA's budget for standards by 10 percent in
fiscal year 2017, a short-sighted decrease that the Democratic
majority is fighting to reverse. And it is currently
squandering its scarce resources on rule-making efforts that
roll back the protections that workers already have instead of
moving forward on new protections that workers need.
At its heart, this hearing is about basic workplace safety
protections that all workers need to do their jobs. If our
military servicemembers, arguably our toughest, most in shape
workforce, rely on protections against excessive heat every day
to ensure they can defend our country, then surely we can agree
that the millions of workers who also endure intense heat to
ensure our country runs smoothly deserve those protections as
well.
I want to thank the witnesses for their testimony, and
Congresswoman Chu, thank you so much for being here. I express
my appreciation to those who have traveled long distances to be
with us today. I now recognize the Ranking Member, Mr. Byrne,
for an opening statement.
[The statement of Chairwoman Adams follows:]
Prepared Statement of Hon. Alma S. Adams, Chairwoman, Subcommittee on
Workforce Protections
Today, we are here to discuss the serious hazards of excessive heat
exposure in the workplace and the need for the Occupational Safety and
Health Administration, or OSHA, to protect American workers.
We are not talking about being uncomfortable on a hot day. We are
talking about excessive heat, combined with heavy clothing and high
humidity, that can incapacitate our body's natural cooling mechanisms
and lead to injury and sometimes death. This hearing will explore
common-sense measures that employers can take to prevent these
tragedies.
In fact, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reports that, from 1992
through 2016, exposure to excessive environmental heat killed 783 U.S.
workers and seriously injured 69,374.
And the problem is getting worse. While those working in air-
conditioned offices may not notice, climate change is all too real for
the roofer, the warehouse worker, the farm worker, and the highway
worker who works for 8, 10, or 12 hours a day in record-breaking heat.
According to the Fourth U.S. National Climate Assessment, this
warming trend is likely to only accelerate. 2017 was the second-hottest
year on record, surpassed only by 2016. Last week, we even saw record-
breaking heat in Alaska. Who would ever have thought that workers in
Alaska would have to worry about the risks of heat-related illness?
The real impact of excessive heat on our country's workers is
tragic. Just last summer:
A Florida landscaper suffered multiple organ failures, severe
dehydration, and hyperthermia and died from heat stroke after using a
lawn-edger for 6 hours in 100-degree heat.
Georgia farmworker Miguel Angel Guzman Chavez, 24, died of heat
stroke after picking tomatoes in direct sunlight with temperatures up
to 97.5 degrees.
And, just a few years ago, in my own state of North Carolina, a 56-
year-old farm worker died of heat stroke after spending three days
harvesting tobacco with a core body temperature of 108 degrees.
The good news is that we know how to prevent these tragedies. For
workers on farms, highways, construction sites, and other outdoor
workers, providing water and rest in cool, shaded areas can save lives.
And, for indoor workers in factories, laundries, steel mills and lead
smelters, there are practical measures that can keep workers healthy.
These are not radical requirements. As we will hear today, the U.S.
Army already maintains a rigorous heat standard to keep our
servicemembers healthy and ready to carry out their missions. The
National Institute for
Occupational Safety and Health has also issued workplace safety
guidance and a recommended standard addressing excessive heat. Finally,
three states have adopted their own standards.
Yet, there is still no nationwide safety standard for excessive
heat, leaving millions of workers without basic workplace protections.
That is why, during this hearing, we will also assess H.R. , the
Asuncion Valdivia Heat Illness and Fatality Prevention Act of 2019,
introduced by Representative Judy Chu, who will testify today. This
legislation would require OSHA to issue a standard within 42 months
that would mandate employers to provide both indoor and outdoor workers
exposed to excessive heat with the protections they need. Specifically,
the bill would require the implementation of well-recognized safety
measures, taking into consideration the National Institute for
Occupational Safety and Health's recommendations, as well as a heat
standard that is no less protective than those already in-place in
states like California.
OSHA may object that it doesn't have the resources to quickly
complete a standard. However, we must remember that Congress cut OSHA's
budget for standards by 10 percent in FY17 - a short-sighted decrease
that the Democratic majority is fighting to reverse. And it is
currently squandering its scare resources on rulemaking efforts that
roll back the protections that workers already have instead of moving
forward on new protections that workers need.
At its heart, this hearing is about basic workplace safety
protections that all workers need do their jobs and stay safe. Each
day, our military servicemembers--arguably our toughest, most in-shape
workforce--rely on protections against excessive heat to ensure they
can defend our country. Surely, we can agree that the millions of
workers, who also endure intense heat each day to ensure our country
runs smoothly, deserve those protections as well.
I want to thank the witnesses for their testimony and express my
appreciation for those of you who have traveled long distances to be
with us today.
I now yield to the distinguished Ranking Member, Mr Byrne for an
opening statement.
______
Mr. Byrne. Thank you for yielding.
We all have a common goal of keeping American workers
healthy and safe. When they flourish and prosper, so does our
Nation. Safety and health in the workplace must be a priority,
and it is important that the government work with employers to
prevent related injuries and illnesses.
We are here today to discuss occupational exposure to heat,
a significant issue in many states, like my home state of
Alabama, even beyond the summer months. I have worked with an
industrial painting crew sandblasting storage tanks and
painting them in the Alabama hot summer. I have worked on a
used car lot maintaining the used cars on the car lot, keeping
them clean, never left the car lot, in the Alabama hot summer.
I have worked in a specialty woodworking plant making shutters.
Even though we were inside, we can't have any temperature
control in those type of plants. I worked there in the Alabama
hot summer. I know something about heat exposure in the
workplace.
Heat exposure is currently regulated under the General Duty
clause of the Occupational Safety and Health Act of 1970.
Employers are already required to take definitive steps to
protect employees and provide a safe work environment, and that
includes preventing workers from being exposed to heat that
results in illness.
Additionally, as we will hear today, several states have
taken action and created their own standards on heat illness
prevention that reflect their own unique economies, climates,
and workplace challenges. Heat safety should be given careful
deliberation so that we, as lawmakers, can make educated, well-
informed decisions.
Unfortunately, our colleagues on the other side of the
aisle appear to be scrambling to force the Occupational Safety
and Health Administration to impose another one-size-fits-all
Federal mandate for occupational heat exposure. We should look
at the history of this issue to understand where we are before
a new national regulation is considered.
In 2012, the Obama administration denied a petition to
establish a heat standard. In fact, at the time, OSHA's head
said their increased focus on enforcement and robust education
and outreach campaigns adequately addressed the hazard.
Nevertheless, committee Democrats are now moving forward with
legislation to mandate a national standard without fully
understanding if that is an appropriate and necessary course of
action. Additionally, the majority is, once again, holding a
legislative hearing on short notice on a bill that was
introduced only a day before this hearing. This unfortunate
habit, which we have seen time and time again this year,
doesn't give members the opportunity to properly examine the
issue or the bill text fully, and it demonstrates a lack of
seriousness about the issue at hand.
Before this Committee or the House rushes to mandate yet
another Federal regulation, members should strive to gain a
better understanding of how OSHA is currently preventing heat
illnesses and what impact a regulation would have at the
national level. More mandates from Washington do not
necessarily equal better policies to help workers, and rushed
partisan policies rarely yield efficient, effective, or
permanent solutions. We can and ought to be working together to
prioritize the interest of the American worker through
thoughtful deliberation, rather than hastily written press
relates about partisan legislation.
Regardless of the circumstances of today's hearing, I thank
the witnesses for being here today. I look forward to their
testimony so that we can begin to gain a better understanding
of how existing measures are preventing heat illness. And with
that, Madam Chairwoman, I yield back.
[The statement by Mr. Byrne follows:]
Prepared Statement of Hon. Bradley Byrne, Ranking Member, Subcommittee
on Subcommittee on Workforce Protections
Thank you for yielding.
We all share a common goal of keeping American workers healthy and
safe. When they flourish and prosper, so does our nation. Safety and
health in the workplace must be a priority, and it's important that the
government work with employers to prevent related injuries and
illnesses.
We are here today to discuss occupational exposure to heat a
significant issue in many states like Alabama even beyond the summer
months. Heat exposure is currently regulated under the general duty
clause of the Occupational Safety and Health Act of 1970. Employers are
already required to take definitive steps to protect employees and
provide a safe work environment, and that includes preventing workers
from being exposed to heat that results in illness. Additionally, as we
will hear today, several states have taken action and created their own
standards on heat-illness prevention that reflect their own unique
economies, climates, and workplace challenges.
Heat safety should be given careful deliberation so that we, as
lawmakers, can make educated, well-informed decisions. Unfortunately,
our colleagues on the other side of the aisle appear to be scrambling
to force the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) to
impose another one-size-fits-all federal mandate for occupational heat
exposure. We should look at the history of this issue to understand
where we are before a new national regulation is considered. In 2012,
the Obama administration denied a petition to establish a heat
standard. In fact, at the time, OSHA's head said their increased focus
on enforcement and robust educational and outreach campaigns adequately
addressed the hazard. Nevertheless, Committee Democrats are now moving
forward with legislation to mandate a national standard without fully
understanding if that is an appropriate and necessary course of action.
Additionally, the majority is once again holding a legislative
hearing on short notice on a bill that was introduced only a day before
this hearing. This unfortunate habit, which we have seen time and time
again this year, doesn't give Members the opportunity to properly
examine the issue or the bill text fully, and demonstrates a lack of
seriousness about the issue at hand.
Before this Committee or the House rushes to mandate yet another
federal regulation, Members should strive to gain a better
understanding of how OSHA is currently preventing heat illnesses and
what impact a regulation would have at the national level. More
mandates from Washington do not necessarily equal better policies to
help workers. And rushed, partisan policies rarely yield efficient,
effective, or permanent solutions.
We can and ought to be working together to prioritize the interests
of the American worker through thoughtful deliberation rather than
hastily written press releases about partisan legislation.
Regardless of the circumstances of today's hearing, I thank the
witnesses for being here today and look forward to their testimony so
that we can begin to gain a better understanding of how existing
measures are preventing heat illness.
Thank you, I yield back.
______
Chairwoman Adams. Thank you, Mr. Byrne. I will now
introduce our witnesses for panel one. Our first witness will
be Representative Judy Chu from the great state of California.
Representative Chu has a longstanding concern about the health
illness risk that workers face, and yesterday, introduced H.R.
3668. I would also note that Representative Chu formerly served
on this Committee during the 111th Congress.
We appreciate your being here today, Representative Chu,
and look forward to your testimony. Let me remind you that we
have read your written statement, and it will appear in full in
the hearing record. Pursuant to Committee Rule 7(d) and
Committee practice, you are asked to limit your oral
presentation to a 5-minute summary of your written statement.
And before you begin your testimony, please remember to press
the button on the microphone in front of you so that it will
turn on, and we can hear you.
As you begin to speak, the light in front of you will turn
green. After 4 minutes, the light will turn yellow to signal
that you have 1 minute remaining. And when the light turns red,
your 5 minutes have expired, and we ask that you please wrap up
at that time.
Congresswoman Chu, you may proceed.
STATEMENT OF THE HON. JUDY CHU, A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS
FROM THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA
Ms. Chu. Chairman Scott, Chairwoman Adams, Ranking Member
Byrne, and Members of the Subcommittee, thank you for inviting
me to speak about the importance of Federal heat standards to
protect workers. I have been passionate about this issue for
well over a decade when I first carried a heat protection bill
in the California legislature in 2005. I am thrilled that the
Subcommittee is now holding a hearing on this topic.
Yesterday I introduced the Asuncion Valdivia Heat Illness
and Fatality Prevention Act. Asuncion was a farm worker, and
his story was brought to me by the United Farm Workers while I
was in the California State Assembly. It was a story that I
could never forget.
One day, Asuncion picked grapes for 10 hours straight in
105-degree temperatures. Then he fell over unconscious. Instead
of calling an ambulance, his employer, Giumarra Vineyards,
instructed Mr. Valdivia's son to drive him back home. On the
way home, the father started foaming at the mouth and
ultimately died of a heat stroke. A son had to witness his
father die, a preventable death, at the age of 53.
I met his son. His grief was deep, especially because he
knew that his father's death was 100 percent preventable, and
that what the employer did was perfectly legal, despite 15
years of farm workers fighting for protections. So I carried a
bill in the California legislature to require water, shade, and
rest periods to protect all outdoor workers, and I am gratified
that thanks to my bill, California became the first State in
the country to protect farm workers and all outdoor workers
from the heat elements, and has now been in operation for 14
years.
The bill we introduced yesterday similarly establishes a
Federal standard for heat stress protections by directing OSHA
to adopt a final standard on the prevention of occupational
exposure to excessive heat, both in indoor and outdoor
environments. A number of these measures are commonsense
precautions, like ensuring that workers who are in high heat
environments have paid breaks and cool environments, access to
water for proper hydration, and limitations on how long workers
can be in high heat areas. The bill also directs the standard
to include training for employers and employees on heat stress
illness and prevention, and requires employers to implement
acclimatization plans to ensure workers can adjust to their
working conditions to reduce injury.
Washington and Minnesota currently have heat protections
for workers in place, and the U.S. military also has its own
heat protection standards. It is time that the rest of the
country's workers are equally protected.
Working in hot conditions raises the body's internal
temperature to dangerous levels. Without rest or cooling,
workers suffer from heat stroke or heat exhaustion. That can
bring on dizziness, nausea, or fainting. Eventually, their
kidneys break down, and in just the span of one 8- to 10-hour
shift, a worker can fall into a coma and die.
According to a 2015 study by the Occupational Safety and
Health Administration, exposure to heat led to 37 work-related
deaths, and 2,830 non-fatal occupational injuries and
illnesses. Not only do we know that this is happening each
year, but we also know it is getting worse. Just last week, a
new report by Moody's Analytics found that rising temperatures
from global warming could cost the global economy as much as
$69 trillion by 2100, thanks in part to the impact on workers'
health. And yet, OSHA does not have a Federal standard that
requires the breaks, shade, or water that we know can prevent
this, and OSHA merely suggests these provisions.
I am pleased that the Committee is taking the first
important step to shine a light on this problem, and I hope the
Committee will continue to move the Asuncion Valdivia Heat
Illness and Fatality Prevention Act forward so that we can be
one step closer to protecting workers from heat stress in all
50 States. Thank you again for allowing me to testify on this
important issue.
[The statement of Ms. Chu follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Chairwoman Adams. I want to thank you, Congresswoman Chu,
for taking the time to testify before the Committee today. Your
testimony is a valuable part of the legislative record. Thank
you so much for being here. Thank you for introducing this.
We will now seat the second panel, and I think everybody is
out there. We are going to take about a 5-minute break and seat
the next panel.
[Recess.]
Chairwoman Adams. I will now introduce our witnesses for
the second panel. Our first witness for the second panel will
be Dr. Thomas Bernard from the University of South Florida,
where he teaches occupational health and safety. Dr. Bernard's
primary research interest is in occupational heat stress. He
serves on the ACGIH Physical Agents Committee, and on ISO, the
working group on the thermal environment.
Our next witness will be Mr. Javier Rodriguez from Corona,
California. Mr. Rodriguez is an organizer with the Warehouse
Worker Resource Center, a non-profit advocacy organization in
southern California. Before joining the center, Javier spent
over 15 years as a worker in warehouses, construction, and farm
work.
Following Mr. Rodriguez will be Mr. Kevin Cannon. Mr.
Cannon is Senior Director, Safety and Health Services, for the
Associated General Contractors of America. He is currently
Chairman of the OSHA Advisory Committee on Construction Safety
and Health, and he has been a member of ACCSH since 2011.
The next witness will be Dr. Ronda McCarthy. Dr. McCarthy
is from Waco, Texas, is a medical doctor and board certified by
the American Board of Preventive Medicine and Occupational
Medicine. She also has a Master's degree in public health. Dr.
McCarthy is the National Medical Director for Concentra's
Medical Surveillance Services.
Following Dr. McCarthy, we will hear from Mr. Bryan Little.
Mr. Little is the Director of Labor Policy for the California
Farm Bureau Federation, and the Chief Operating Officer of the
Farm Employers Labor Service. He served as the Deputy Assistant
Secretary for Occupational Safety and Health during the George
W. Bush Administration.
Our final witness will be Mr. Arturo Rodriguez, who is the
recently retired President of the United Farm Workers Union.
Mr. Rodriguez spent 45 years with the United Farm Workers of
America, the last 25 as President, continuing to build the
union Cesar Chavez began into a powerful voice for farm
workers.
We appreciate all the witnesses for being here today, look
forward to your testimony. Let me remind the witnesses that we
have read your written statements, and they will appear in full
in the hearing record. Pursuant to Committee Rule 7(d) and
Committee practice, each of you is asked to limit your oral
presentation to a 5-minute summary of your written statement.
And let me remind the witnesses that pursuant to Title XVIII of
the U.S. Code, Section 1001, it is illegal to knowingly and
willfully falsify any statement, representation, writing,
document, or material fact presented to Congress or otherwise
conceal or cover up a material fact.
Before you begin your testimony, please remember to press
the button on the microphone in front of you so that it will
turn on and members can hear you. And as you begin to speak,
the light in front of you will turn green. After 4 minutes, the
light will turn yellow to signal that you have 1 minute
remaining. When the light turns red, your 5 minutes have
expired, and we ask that you please wrap up. We will let the
entire panel make their presentations before we move to member
questions, and when answering a question, please remember to,
once again, turn on your microphone.
I will first recognize Dr. Thomas Bernard.
STATEMENT OF THOMAS E. BERNARD, PH.D., PROFESSOR, COLLEGE OF
PUBLIC HEALTH, UNIVERSITY OF SOUTH FLORIDA
Mr. Bernard. I thank you, Chairwoman Adams, and Ranking
Member Byrne and the distinguished Members of the Committee. My
name is Thomas Bernard, and I am a Professor of Occupational
Health in the College of Public Health at the University of
South Florida. I thank you for this opportunity to talk on
behalf of heat stress.
Over 40 years, I have had the chance to develop heat stress
management programs over a wide range of industries. Heat
stress is an underappreciated workplace hazard. We have all
worked and/or played in hot environments. This common
experience leads us to underappreciate the real risk for heat
stress.
Heat stress is serious when the workplace is not prepared
to deal with it. Heat stroke, where the body's natural cooling
mechanisms shut down, can be fatal. One fatal heat stroke with
which I am familiar was a young high school player, played
football. He died his first day working for a landscaping
company in New Hampshire. Another was a roofer in Louisiana. He
threw down his tools, drove off the work site, and died in his
car driving down the road. Yet another was a postal worker. He
was not prepared to deal with the heat stress after a long
absence.
Even if a heat stroke is not fatal, it can cause permanent
damage to the brain, kidneys, and liver. Heat exhaustion
sometimes leads to hospital admissions. Heat stress also leads
to acute injuries and reduces productivity. All of these have
costs to both employers and employees.
By asking simple questions about the environment, like the
temperature and humidity, about the intensity of work, and
about the clothing being worn, interventions can be selected to
reduce the risk for heat illness. For instance, as mentioned
earlier, the military, which has a young and physically fit
population, limits the work that can be done and for how long,
depending upon the level of heat stress.
Occupational health and safety professionals have learned
lessons from the military. During the Deepwater Horizon
response, OSHA and NIOSH prepared guidelines based on the
military's for high temperatures and humidity of the Gulf
Coast. BP provided training and specified work and rest cycles
based on the ambient conditions. For instance, they restricted
work to 20 minutes with 40 minutes of rest in a shaded area
when the temperature was between 92 and 98. Considering they
employed 50,000 unfit workers on long shifts, it is amazing
there were few serious heat exhaustions and no heat strokes.
The evidence about the effectiveness of interventions has
evolved over these last 20 years. The 2016 NIOSH criteria
document on occupational exposure to heat and hot environments
has captured most of these lessons. It forms an excellent
starting point for an OSHA standard. Based on the NIOSH
criteria document and my experience, the essential elements of
a heat stress prevention program are training to understand the
effects and the symptoms, practices such as drinking and taking
rest in the shade, surveillance, and having an emergency plan
are essential.
Other interventions that may be used as appropriate are
engineering controls, which change the exposure conditions.
These may be things that reduce the work demands through
mechanization, reducing temperature and humidity and shading,
shielding from high radiant sources.
Administrative controls would change the way the work is
done. For instance, allowing for progressive increases in work
schedule to allow for acclimatization, an increased tolerance,
or allocating work and rest cycles. There are times where
personal protection, wearing something like an ice vest or air-
cooling systems under the clothing, will provide greater
cooling than just simple evaporative cooling. These are mainly
used in manufacturing or plant maintenance operations.
Finally, training employees and supervisors to recognize
heat-related disorders and provide appropriate first aid is
essential. With early identification and treatment, heat stroke
can be reversed. It is my opinion, based on my experience and
practice, that an enforceable OSHA standard can bring
visibility and clarity to the structure and function of an
effective heat stress management program.
Thank you, Madam Chairwoman.
[The statement of Mr. Bernard follows:]
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Chairwoman Adams. And thank you very much.
I will recognize now Mr. Javier Rodriguez. You are
recognized for 5 minutes, sir.
STATEMENT OF JAVIER RODRIGUEZ, WAREHOUSE WORKER, WORKER
RESOURCE CENTER
Mr. Javier Rodriguez. Chairman Adams, Ranking Member Byrne,
and distinguished Members of this Committee, my name is Javier
Rodriguez. In the past 15 years, I have had experience working
in southern California in several industries. In these
workplaces, I have witnessed employers neglecting workers
affected by the heat, and even retaliated against them, not
providing workers dealing with extreme heat with the basic
protections, like water and rest, and generally, not take this
issue of heat seriously.
I am now a staff member of the Warehouse Worker Resource
Center, the organization where my coworkers and I are receiving
training in our rights at work. In 2011 and 2012, I worked at
the NFI Cross Dock in Jurupa Valley, California, a facility
moving goods for Walmart. The temperatures in Riverside County
often go above 100 degrees in the summer when it is humid. We
have documented the heat index at 115 degrees inside the
containers.
The work pace at the work Cross Dock was extremely high.
Please look at the screen. We have a slide. This is the rate
sheet from NFI warehouse where I work. We had to load or unload
450 boxes per hour, boxes between 10 and 100 pounds, carry it
up to 40 feet out to the container and to the warehouse floor,
and stack onto the carts or pallets for 8 hours per day. You
will have to load, carry, and stack a box container containing
a microwave, TV every 7-1/2 seconds. I saw workers at this
warehouse faint from the heat.
People will feel sick and not know how to get help. Instead
of providing the rest of us with information on how to protect
ourselves, the company told the workers who fainted or feel
sick and were facing heat distress to rest or go home, and told
the rest of us keep working at the same pace of before.
We who worked at the warehouse knew that these conditions
were dangerous. We received training from educators and
occupational health expert from the institutions like UCLA. We
began to ask for clean water, education around heat, and more
breaks. The manager refused. We ended up filing a complaint
with OSHA in July of 2012, and the State issued serious
citations, but the heat continued to be a problem.
We have another display. It is a picture of some coworkers
with thermometers inside the warehouse showing 102 degrees that
summer. Some of us who ask for protections or who take breaks,
we are not brought back to work. But the NFI warehouse managers
and the staffing agency leads will constantly remind us that we
are temps, and that there will be not work for those who speak
up or slow down.
The previous summer, in August 2011, at the warehouse
operated by the same company, NFI, with the same safety manager
about 10 miles away in Chino, a worker named Domingo Blancas
fell ill on a hot day. He was employed by the staffing agency
Tristate, whose solution to Domingo reporting dangerous health
illness symptoms was to have another worker also complaining of
the heat illness symptoms, drive him to the clinic. The clinic
told him go to the ER, but Domingo had no vehicle and no health
insurance. He waited for hours before his son called to take
him to the hospital where he was treated for the heat. He was
in the hospital for 3 days, he had surgery, and the doctors say
that he could have died.
With the evidence of Domingo's heat illness and NFI's
inadequate response, Cal/OSHA cited both NFI and Tristate for
not having an adequate injury and illness prevention plan. NFI
and the staffing agency then spends much of the next 5 years
fighting this case in the court, denying the clear evidence
that Domingo had suffered heat-related illness.
It wasn't until July 2017 that the California Supreme Court
finally found substantial evidence that Blancas suffered a
serious heat illness requiring hospitalization, and NFI gave up
fighting this violation.
The current system is inadequate. That experience led us to
call for indoor heat standard in California which we won
through Senate Bill 1167 in 2016. Cal/OSHA is currently working
in this standard in rulemaking, and we hope it will go into
effect soon. This is why we also support the legislation by
Congresswoman Chu and Congressman Grijalva to require OSHA to
create a heat stress standard, and thank you for your
consideration.
[The statement of Mr. Javier Rodriguez follows:]
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Chairwoman Adams. Thank you. Thank you very much.
Mr. Cannon, you are recognized for 5 minutes, sir.
STATEMENT OF KEVIN CANNON, CSP, SENIOR DIRECTOR, SAFETY AND
HEALTH SERVICES, ASSOCIATED GENERAL CONTRACTORS OF AMERICA
Mr. Cannon. Chairwoman Adams, Ranking Member Byrne, thank
you for convening today's hearing. My name is Kevin Cannon. I
am a certified safety professional, and the current Chair of
the Advisory Committee on Construction Safety and Health. I am
testifying today in my capacity as Senior Director of Safety
and Health Services for the Associated General Contractors of
America.
AGC is a national organization representing more than
26,000 businesses involved in every aspect of construction in
all 50 states. AGC prioritizes worker safety and health, and
regularly educates, and provides services to ensure that our
workforce comes home safely at the end of every day.
In my testimony, I will discuss the impact of heat exposure
on workers, how the construction industry is proactively
addressing heat exposure, and why a new Federal standard and/or
law is unnecessary, unworkable, and impractical.
According to NIOSH, workers who are exposed to extreme
heat, or work in hot environments, may be at greatest risk of
heat stress. Heat stress can cause injuries and illness such as
heat cramps, exhaustion, heat stroke, and even death. But as
you will hear today, it is preventable with proper education
and teamwork.
Construction contractors are keenly aware of the dangers of
working in extreme temperatures, and have taken appropriate
steps to reduce the risk of injuries and illnesses. These
include scheduling work earlier or later to avoid performing
tasks during the time of day when temperatures are the highest
and using job-site trailers or company vehicles on remote job
sites as cool-down areas.
Some have taken a total wellness approach to educate their
employees on the importance of a proper diet and properly
managing their health, especially those with medical conditions
who are on regularly prescribed medications. Additionally,
contractors will routinely have toolbox talks prior to and
during the summer months to raise awareness of the issue and
reinforce the importance of proper hydration, being able to
identify the symptoms of heat stress, and how to prevent it
from occurring.
Existing Federal agency efforts and laws already address
heat exposure. OSHA's heat illness prevention campaign has
reached millions of employers and workers since 2011. Under the
OSH Act, employers are responsible for providing workplaces
free of known safety hazards. This includes protecting workers
from extreme heat. An employer who fails to implement measures
to protect workers exposed to high temperatures can be cited
under the General Duty Clause of the OSH Act. As it stands,
OSHA already conducts inspections related to heat. This
demonstrates the agency's continued commitment to appropriately
enforce its laws and protecting workplace safety.
In addition, there is no one-size-fits-all approach to
address this issue. Climate varies from region to region, and
what may be considered extreme temperatures in one part of the
country could be the norm in another. Also, in considering the
impacts of heat exposure on an individual, employers would have
to take into consideration the age of the employee, their
existing medical conditions, and whether an employee is taking
certain medications. Essentially, an employer would need to
have an individualized heat prevention program for each
employee as an effective program would have to consider
lifestyle habits among the workforce that an employer may have
no control over.
Furthermore, under the previous administration, OSHA
determined that such a standard was unwarranted, and Congress
should not legislate on an issue when an agency with the
authority and jurisdiction to promulgate such standards already
exists.
In addition to circumventing the rulemaking process, we
caution Congress against establishing an arbitrary deadline for
OSHA to promulgate a standard addressing heat illness
prevention. We also caution Congress from just drafting
legislative text that is overly prescriptive as to warrant the
rulemaking process useless by binding the agency to a specific
requirement.
The rulemaking process is intentionally deliberate to allow
for meaningful stakeholder input. Imposing an arbitrary and
compressed deadline could compromise the ability of the
regulating community to fully engage in the process and the
ability of regulators to do their job in creating the most
feasible standard that results in the protection of workers in
extreme temperatures. There must be a fair and transparent
process in the promulgation of this or any rule that would
impact a significant percentage of workplaces.
In conclusion, AGC believes OSHA should continue to
increase awareness by working with the regulated community to
further promote their heat illness prevention campaign, and
build on the success of their past efforts. OSHA should also
consider developing clear and consistent guidance for all
industry sectors that are impacted by hazards related to high
temperatures. The development of such guidance could help
identify best practices and better promote what employees and
workers can do to prevent injury, illness, and death from
exposure to high heat. We firmly believe that building strong
partnerships is the best approach to realizing the desired
results.
Madam Chairwoman, thank you again for allowing the AGC to
participate in today's important discussion. I look forward to
your questions.
[The statement of Mr. Cannon follows:]
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Chairwoman Adams. Thank you, Mr. Cannon.
Dr. McCarthy, you are recognized for 5 minutes.
STATEMENT OF RONDA MCCARTHY, MD, MPH, AMERICAN COLLEGE OF
OCCUPATIONAL AND ENVIRONMENTAL MEDICINE AND CONCENTRA
Dr. McCarthy. Thank you all for allowing me to -- thank you
for inviting me to testify today. My name is Dr. Ronda
McCarthy. I am testifying for myself, the American College of
Occupational and Environmental Medicine, my employer,
Concentra, a national occupational healthcare provider. We
serve thousands of employers, and treat millions of workers
annually. It is this extensive contact with employers and
workers that brings me here today.
In the past 20 years, I have treated too many workers for
heat-related illnesses, which are 100 percent preventable. My
testimony is grounded upon 9 years of developing and
administering a heat-related illness program in central Texas
that is comparable to the requirements in the bill discussed
today.
Because of the striking results of this program, I believe
this bill will protect the health and lives of countless
workers. Moreover, employers will benefit from decreased cost,
from injuries and illnesses, and will experience increased
worker productivity.
I spent the first part of my career trying to convince
multiple employers to implement NIOSH recommendations related
to heat exposure. I unsuccessfully implored plant and health
and safety managers to implement simple measures such as worker
training, hydration, rest breaks, and access to shade or
cooling to avoid costly and perilous accidents, injuries, and
illnesses from excessive heat exposure. Some employers even
declined my offer to simply educate workers on heat stress.
In 2006, I became the Medical Director for a central Texas
municipality, where I provided occupational medical care at an
onsite employee health clinic. After noting increased
accidents, injuries, and illnesses during the summer months in
outdoor workers, and little to no preventive measures in place,
I explained the benefits of a heat-related illness prevention
program to the employer. The city manager agreed to the
prevention program for at-risk workers in streets, traffic,
parks and recreation, solid waste, and utilities departments.
I used the information from OSHA's technical manual on heat
stress and NIOSH's criteria for standard occupational exposure
to heat and hot environments to create the city's heat stress
awareness program. This program included hydration, access to
shade, supervisor and worker training on heat stress and heat-
related illness, first aid and emergency response procedures,
establishing a 3- to 4-day gradual heat acclimatization
schedule, altered high heat work schedules, communication
procedures, and medical monitoring of the at-risk workers.
I then worked with two faculty members from the University
of Pennsylvania Health System to analyze the data collected
from the program, and here is what we found: The total number
of heat-related cases significantly decreased after
implementation of the heat stress awareness program, and the
workers' compensation costs went down 50 percent for heat-
related illness.
There are two possible factors that led to this reduction
in workers' compensation costs. The intervention increased
supervisors' and workers' awareness of their signs and symptoms
of heat-related illness, and their knowledge of when to seek
medical attention. These factors may have allowed for earlier
medical intervention, leading to lower workers' compensation
costs and, indeed, the last 2 years, there were no associated
costs.
Over the course of the program, the frequency of heat-
related illnesses decreased over the years, and by the last 2
years, there were no reported heat-related illnesses during the
season. Please refer to the graph displayed, which shows that
heat-related illness cases before and after implementation of
the program.
Six hundred and four workers participated in the 7-year
program. Over the 9-year study period, the odds of a worker
having a heat-related injury decreased 66 percent in the 2012-
2014 period, and then by 91 percent for the 2015-2017 period.
That was statistically significant. Notably, the average high
temperatures remained consistently over 90 degrees Fahrenheit
during the summer months over the 9-year study period.
In light of the research presented, and my 20 years of
experience treating Texas workers in hot environments, it is my
expert opinion that all workers exposed to excessive heat
should be protected by regulations mandating employers
implement a plan to prevent heat-related injuries and illnesses
that includes the recommendations in NIOSH's criteria for a
standard. And the recommendations presented today, if they are
promulgated into law, many workers' lives will be saved, and
employers will benefit by increased worker productivity as well
as decreased accident, injury, and illness costs.
Thank you, and I will be happy to answer any questions.
[The statement of Dr. McCarthy follows:]
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Chairwoman Adams. Thank you, Dr. McCarthy.
Mr. Little, you are now recognized for 5 minutes, sir.
STATEMENT OF BRYAN LITTLE, DIRECTOR OF LABOR AFFAIRS,
CALIFORNIA FARM BUREAU FEDERATION
Mr. Little. Good morning, Chairwoman Adams, Ranking Member
Byrne, and Members of the Subcommittee. Thank you for the
opportunity to testify today on heat illness. My name is Bryan
Little, and I am here representing the California Farm Bureau
Federation as Director of Employment Policy. I also serve as
the Chief Operating Officer of the Farm Employers Labor
Service, which is a subscriber organization affiliated with the
California Farm Bureau.
Over a 14-day period in July of 2006, California
experienced a heat wave that caused an estimated 163
fatalities, as many as 600 additional heat-related deaths,
1,200 hospitalizations, and 16,000 emergency department visits
among the state's overall population.
Recognition that outdoor workers are potentially vulnerable
to extreme heat prompted our state's occupational safety and
health agency, Cal/OSHA, to adopt the first-in-the-nation heat
illness prevention standard for employers with outdoor workers.
Some aspects of our standard are applicable at all times in
all seasons, particularly the requirements to provide water and
to all outdoor activity with special requirements for certain
industries like construction, landscaping, and agriculture when
the temperature exceeds 95 degrees.
Major requirements of the HIP standard for employers
include provisions to allow employees to, at all times, get a
cool down rest period, provide fresh, pure, and suitably cool
water, to train employees about heat illness, and to closely
monitor them. Farm employers have worked in good faith to
implement these requirements, and in most cases, Cal/OSHA has
engaged in enforcement aimed to help employers protect workers
from heat illness.
Workers need to understand what heat illness is, what it
looks like, and what it feels like and how to protect
themselves and personal risk factors, like obesity and
diabetes, and the use of certain prescription drugs that may
influence their vulnerability to heat illness. California
agriculture has been forthright and proactive in addressing
heat illness by fully accepting our responsibility as producers
and employers to take every action we can to ensure the health
and safety of our agriculture workforce.
We believe the greatest need is for workers, supervisors,
farm and labor contractors, and farm employers to understand
the key steps to take to avoid incidents of heat illness, and
deal effectively and promptly with incidents that occur. We
have worked each year to identify any gaps or weaknesses in
training, prevention, and emergency response.
The industry has also been proactive by working with the
University of California system and other partners to create
and distribute information through pocket heat illness
educational cards, Spanish language radio advertisements and
public service announcements, newspapers, and our own
publications to our own members. We have worked closely with
the agency to better define the agency's expectations for
compliance.
The heat illness prevention standard is coming a long way
toward achieving its goal. We in the agency have been
successful in protecting more than 450,000 employees who work
in California agriculture at any given time during our peak
seasons. Compared to hundreds of fatalities that have
historically accompanied heat waves in the overall population,
the agency reports two occupational-related fatalities between
2014 and 2016, one in 2017, and two last year.
Make no mistake. Any work-related fatality is one too many,
and it is hard to overstate what a tragedy a workplace fatality
can be.
I want to acknowledge the United Farm Workers efforts in
this area and applaud Mr. Rodriguez' testimony for highlighting
the tragic and untimely deaths of farm workers who suffer from
heat illness. Our hearts go out to all farm employees who
suffered an illness. We extended our deepest condolences to
their families of those who are affected.
I can assure the Committee the farmers want to protect all
employees from illness because it is the right thing to do.
Should the Department of Labor's Occupational Safety and Health
Administration undertake a heat illness prevention program, we
hope the agency will benefit from what we have learned
California in the creation and refining of our heat illness
prevention standard.
The law will be better if it is simple, collaborative, and
flexible. California's efforts to protect employees from heat
illness have been most successful when Cal/OSHA has adopted a
collaborative approach, engaging in an open exchange with all
stakeholders, including employer stakeholders. The result has
been a relatively simple outdoor heat illness standard non-
regulatory guidance developed with significant input from
employers and cooperative educational programs to help the
regulated community understand the enforcement agency's
expectations.
Our HIP standard has succeeded in preventing heat illnesses
and fatalities because it is relatively simple, limited in
scope, and general in its requirements with special
requirements for certain industries with specific risk factors.
Federal OSHA should follow a model that prioritizes simplicity,
training and collaboration.
Thank you for the opportunity to testify, and I look
forward to answering any questions you may have.
[The statement of Mr. Little follows:]
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Chairwoman Adams. Thank you, Mr. Little. Mr. Rodriguez, you
are recognized for 5 minutes, sir.
STATEMENT OF ARTURO S. RODRIGUEZ, PRESIDENT EMERITUS, UNITED
FARM WORKERS
Mr. Arturo Rodriguez. Chairwoman Adams, Ranking Member
Byrne, and distinguished Members of the Subcommittee, thank you
for the opportunity to testify today. Today, I am representing
the United Farm Workers, and the United Farm Workers
Foundation.
Ultimately, though, I am here today for Maria Isabel,
Miguel Angel, and many other workers who needlessly died due to
heat exposure. Maria Isabel Vasquez Jimenez was 17, and an
immigrant farm worker and pregnant. She collapsed after
harvesting grapes in temperatures above 100 degrees Fahrenheit
in a vineyard near Stockton. No paramedics were summoned.
Instead, she was left in the field, and at the end of the
workday, she was put in a non air-conditioned van that was
hotter than it was in the vineyards.
On the trip home, her fiance convinced the driver to take
her to a clinic. Her strong heart failed, her body temperature
had reached 108 degrees Fahrenheit, and she died the next day.
Just last year, Miguel Angel Guzman Chavez, a 24-year-old
farm worker that came to the United States under the H-2A guest
worker program, died after picking tomatoes with a heat index
that exceeded 100 degrees Fahrenheit. He had only been in the
United States 5 days.
I have the privilege of sitting here with you here today in
an air-conditioned hearing room while farm workers like Maria
and Miguel are toiling under the scorching sun to harvest the
food that reaches our tables. If any of us had to spend several
hours toiling in the high temperatures, the basic protections
that we would need would include water, shade, breaks, and
training to prevent heat illness tragedies. Outdoor workers
deserve nothing less.
Overall, there are approximately 2-1/2 million farm workers
across the country, including hundreds of thousands of miners,
who work in remote and rural areas. As a result of language
barriers, status issues, and economic vulnerability, most farm
workers won't speak out in the workplace, be adequately
informed about heat illness prevention, or have access to
timely medical attention when illness or injury strikes.
The issues I speak of are not hypotheticals. The farm
worker communities that we serve are intimately and tragically
familiar with the dangers of heat exposure. They experience a
risk of heat-related death that is 20 times higher than the
risk for workers overall.
This drove us to take action. After a string of heat deaths
in 2005, the UFW worked with now Representative Judy Chu and
Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger to issue the first comprehensive
regulations in the Nation to protect farm workers and other
outdoor workers from dying or becoming ill when temperatures
soar.
Later in 2015, we worked with Governor Jerry Brown to
ensure more effective, timely, and consistent enforcement of
State heat rules. Furthermore, the State issued strengthened
heat regulations for all employees that work outdoors. Their
rules require that employees are provided with fresh and cool
water, shade be present at 80 degrees, and accommodate all
employees on recovery or rest periods and those on-site taking
meal breaks. High heat procedures are triggered at 95 degrees
and ensure observation and monitoring of employees, and
training to identify and prevent illnesses.
And over time, we have seen the progression of the
standards implementation in fields across California. When
driving along Highway 99 and Highway 5 initially, all you would
see was tarps put out there for workers in an attempt by
employers to provide workers with shade.
In those cases, workers would be left to sit in the dirt or
have to bring their own blankets or portable chairs so they
could be more comfortable during their breaks or while they
were eating. Nowadays, oftentimes, we see many growers
embracing the standard. Many of them, even now, have trailers
in place that have roofs over tables and benches so workers can
rest and sit down when eating and taking their breaks.
The road to implementation and enforcement of the
California State standard has not been an easy one. When
implementation and enforcement have occurred, the standard has
secured meaningful improvements for farm workers and resulted
in a notable reduction in the number of farm worker deaths
related to heat hazards.
California is a prime example that implementing commonsense
heat illness protections is good for workers, employers, and
for our food system, but we did not stop and should not stop
there. Maria Isabel, Miguel Angel, and the other heat victims
had only one life. The only way we, the living, can affirm that
the lives of farm workers are important and that they didn't
die in vain is by bringing the protections we want in
California throughout outdoor and indoor workers across the
Nation.
Thank you very much.
[The statement of Mr. Arturo Rodriguez follows:]
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Chairwoman Adams. Thank you very much, and thank you all to
all the witnesses.
Under Committee Rule 8(a), we will now question the
witnesses under the 5-minute rule. I now recognize myself for 5
minutes.
Dr. Bernard, the testimony of Mr. Cannon from the AGC calls
the legislation before us a one-size-fits-all bill, because
different parts of the country have different temperatures, and
because people are different because of age, preexisting
conditions, drug use, and lifestyle choices. But it seems to me
that this bill allows an employer to choose from a number of
options to protect its workers, depending on the heat
conditions and their workplace and the type of work that they
do. It seems to me that as long as they seriously consider how
to make their workers safe from excessive heat, it is more like
a Burger King slogan, ``have it your way.'' A little heat water
and shade if it is cool, or a lot if it is hot, air
conditioning when it is appropriate or cooling suits when it is
not. Dr. Bernard, would you agree?
Mr. Bernard. I do agree.
Chairwoman Adams. Thank you.
Dr. McCarthy, do city employees such as those studied do
dangerous work that places them at risk of occupational
injuries or illnesses?
Dr. McCarthy. Yes. They work in dangerous atmospheres. They
use heavy equipment. They work in confined spaces and high
places. Yes.
Chairwoman Adams. In my state of North Carolina, State and
local government employees are covered under a State OSHA plan,
but I realize that 24 of the states do not have these legal
protections in place.
In your view, would it be a good idea to provide OSHA
coverage for State and local government employees in states,
such as Texas, which currently have no OSHA protections?
Dr. McCarthy. Of course. All workers should have a place of
employment where they do not have to risk serious physical harm
or their life to provide for themselves and their family.
Chairwoman Adams. Why did you decide to implement a heat
stress prevention program for the city given that Federal OSHA
has no jurisdiction over State and local governments in States
such as Texas?
Dr. McCarthy. For that very reason. These employees had
serious heat illnesses, and it is just -- it is the right thing
to do to protect them.
Chairwoman Adams. All right.
Mr. Little, your testimony concludes that the California
outdoor heat standard has been a great success in terms of
saving lives. I am happy to hear that. Would you be supportive
if OSHA decided to issue a similar standard?
Mr. Little. I think if the agency takes the kind of
flexible and collaborative approach that Cal/OSHA took in
originally developing and revising our standard in 2010 and
2015, it could be a worthwhile exercise to try to do something.
But it is going to be very important, I think, to avoid
creating a standard that is going to be a one-size-fits-all
standard, because our conditions in California are different
than they are in most places. Employers in different places in
California face different conditions and different challenges
in providing protection for employees.
So I would simply urge a collaborative approach to learn
from what we learned when we went through this process in
California.
Chairwoman Adams. Okay.
Mr. Cannon, you state that this bill presents a one-size-
fits-all approach because climate varies from region to region.
I think we can all agree that climate varies from region to
region.
So can you tell me what burden an OSHA heat standard would
put on an employer in a mid-region of the country where workers
are not exposed to excessive heat?
Mr. Cannon. Thank you for the question, Chairwoman. Sorry,
Chairwoman. Now, your question is regarding the central part of
America, correct?
Chairwoman Adams. Yes.
Mr. Cannon. I am not certain, you know -- without
understanding what the final rule looks like, I cannot tell you
what burdens that these employers would face. I will say that,
you know, I think everyone on the panel has pretty much
repeated the same approach to prevent these types of illnesses,
which is water, rest, shade, and education.
So, so long as, you know, these requirements are, you know,
following those basic guidelines -- I really can't tell you
what the impacts would be without seeing what the final rule
would be.
Chairwoman Adams. So give me a ``yes'' or ``no.'' I just
have a few seconds. Mr. Cannon, you stated, referring to OSHA's
general duty clause, the fact that current law already protects
workers from extreme heat.
You are familiar with the Sturgill decision by the
Occupational Safety and Health Review Commission. So -- and
there was a citation against an employer after a roofer died on
the job from heat stroke after internal body temperature
reached over 105 degrees.
Yes or no?
Mr. Cannon. I am, yes.
Chairwoman Adams. Okay. Are you aware that OSHA has not
appealed this decision so it sets a precedent for enforcing the
heat standard? Yes or no, are you aware?
Mr. Cannon. That OSHA appealed the decision?
Chairwoman Adams. Right -- has not appealed.
Mr. Cannon. Oh, has not?
Chairwoman Adams. Yeah.
Mr. Cannon. I am aware.
Chairwoman Adams. Okay. And do you think, as a result, that
workers are now more protected or less protected from heat
hazards? Yes or no -- more or less?
Mr. Cannon. I am sorry?
Chairwoman Adams. Are they more protected or less?
Mr. Cannon. I would say neither at this point. I think the
general duty clause is still in place to enforce hazards
related to heat.
Chairwoman Adams. So you don't know, you don't have an
opinion about whether it is more or less.
Mr. Cannon. As I stated, I think --
Chairwoman Adams. Okay.
Mr. Cannon. -- the general duty clause --
Chairwoman Adams. Okay. All right. Thank you.
My time has expired. Okay. I want to recognize the Ranking
Member of the committee.
Ms. Foxx, you are recognized now for 5 minutes.
Ms. Foxx. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman.
And I want to thank our witnesses for being here today.
Mr. Little, as you mentioned in your testimony, California
experienced a heat wave in 2006 which prompted the State to
implement a heat illness prevention standard. But the climate
differs dramatically throughout the country. When it gets to be
75 where I live, it is a heat wave.
How should we take that into consideration when considering
whether to impose legislatively a one-size-fits-all Federal
regulation?
Mr. Little. We have 26 state plan states, and the rest are
under Federal coverage for most private employers. And I think
that you can give those state plan states a lot of flexibility
to be able to figure out how to go about best protecting
workers on the basis of conditions that are unique to their
States.
That is why we have state plan states in the first place
and why California opted to have its own plan, because we have
unique conditions in California that don't exist anywhere else.
Perhaps one of the most important unique conditions that exists
in California is that, since we grow more food than any other
State in the country, we employ about two out of every three
farm workers that work in the United States.
We also have kind of a unique climate where, unlike today
where you can wear the air it is so humid here in Washington,
in Sacramento it is going to be 96 degrees but the humidity is
only going to be 20 percent. So it is going to be much more
comfortable to work outside.
And what kind of remedy you pursue on any given day is
going to be different depending on what activity you are doing,
what the weather conditions are, and just what the local
conditions are. So I think that you can give a lot of different
parties a lot of flexibility to be able to decide what is going
to work best for them.
Ms. Foxx. Thank you.
Mr. Cannon, as you mentioned, employers are already
required under the law to provide employees a workplace free of
known safety hazards.
Can you expand upon actions that OSHA is currently
undertaking to ensure that employees are protected from heat
illnesses? And, in your view, has the agency been effective in
its outreach to industry and in raising awareness on heat
illness prevention?
Mr. Cannon. Thank you for that question.
As I mentioned in my written as well as oral testimony, the
heat illness prevention campaign has been a huge success. I can
cite a handful or several AGC chapters who have taken that
campaign and spread the word throughout their local
memberships. And even according to OSHA's website, the campaign
has reached millions of workers and employers.
So I think, you know, if data were collected -- I am not
for sure if you are familiar with their annual Fall Stand-Down,
but I think, you know, the numbers of participants in this
campaign itself would rival that.
So I think they are doing a good job with spreading the
word about what needs to be done to protect workers from, you
know, extreme temperatures, especially heat.
Ms. Foxx. Thank you.
Mr. Little, in your testimony, you said that California is
in the process of promulgating an indoor heat standard, and
there is confusion about what is considered an indoor versus an
outdoor environment. Can you expand upon the uncertainty in
this area?
Also, what lessons should we take from California's recent
rulemaking on an indoor standard when considering whether
Federal legislative action should be taken?
Mr. Little. We have recommended to the agency that the
indoor standard that they are considering should be
considerably simplified from what they have produced so far,
should be more similar to the outdoor standard than what they
have created up to this point, that it should focus on specific
industries and activities where there is significant risk
related to heat illness.
The warehouse work that was cited by another one of the
witnesses today is a pretty good example of an indoor
environment that needs to have something done about heat
illness because of the conditions you face.
Trying to impose a one-size-fits-all indoor regulation on
the huge variety of indoor employers, where you have everything
from an air-conditioned dentist's office to an un-air-
conditioned warehouse facility, trying to create a one-size-
fits-all program that will fit all those will fit none of them.
So we would, again, strongly suggest that, should Fed OSHA
decide to go down this road, that they learn from what we've
learned in California while putting our standard together and
doing what was necessary to make it work.
Ms. Foxx. Thank you.
Mr. Cannon, when considering new laws or regulations that
affect the American workplace, we need to understand the full
impact these policies would have on industries that employ tens
of thousands of people.
Can you walk us through how employers typically participate
in OSHA's traditional rulemaking process? Why is it so
important that the agency follow that process and allow the
public sufficient opportunity for input?
Mr. Cannon. Thank you for that question.
Oftentimes, you know, the primary way that employers are
engaged in the rulemaking process is the review-and-comment
period. OSHA issues a proposal, whether it is an advance notice
of proposed rulemaking, a notice of proposal, or request for
information, and it gives the regulated community the
opportunity to review what is being put out there for
consideration and respond accordingly.
One of the things that, you know, I have observed is that
oftentimes some of these proposals can be complex and require
extensive review and analysis. And I think that is where it
takes some time and, I think, we have historically asked for
extensions.
And so, you know, it does take some time for employers to
review the proposals, analyze what is being proposed, and
respond with complete and comprehensive remarks so that the
agency can take them into consideration.
You know, I think the second piece that is equally
important is giving the agency enough time to review --
Chairwoman Adams. We have run out of time, so if you could
--
Ms. Foxx. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman. Thank you for your
indulgence.
Chairwoman Adams. All right. Thank you very much. Thank
you.
I want to recognize now the gentlelady from Pennsylvania,
Representative Wild.
Ms. Wild. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman.
I would like to address my first questions to Mr. Javier
Rodriguez.
Sir, I read your testimony with interest, and it deeply
concerned me. And I would like to ask you if you could tell us
a little bit about the situation that actually occurred with
your wife when she was working so that we get that on the
record.
Mr. Javier Rodriguez. Yes. The last year in Ontario,
California, we had high temperatures, 110, 120. My wife work in
the warehouse. She packaged clothes for some of the very
important stores, like Charlotte Russe. And she starts, like,
typical day, she starts, like, at 2:00 p.m.
And 2 hours after she started, she started feeling bad. And
she went with the supervisor, and then she is telling him,
like, she feels sick, like, it is too hot, like, we need
drinking water and take some break. And the supervisors respond
like, oh, well, you can rest and back to work, or you feel bad,
go home and come in tomorrow when you feel better.
And she went back to the house. And she called me. Hey,
Javier, I feel bad. And I said, hey, you know, like, this is a
serious problem. Like, we need to go to the doctor. And we went
to the doctor. The doctor diagnosed it like, oh, you have a
stomach flu.
So this is hard for, like, for example, my wife or another
workers in California make some complaint or do something
against the heat, because the doctors never give a real
diagnosis.
Ms. Wild. Let me ask you another question.
Mr. Javier Rodriguez. Yes.
Ms. Wild. So that is your wife's experience, and you
commented in your testimony about some other coworkers or
people that you knew in the workforce who had heat-related
problems. Was your wife's experience in getting the doctor to
diagnose it as being work-related typical?
Mr. Javier Rodriguez. Yeah.
Ms. Wild. Okay.
Mr. Javier Rodriguez. It is typical for the workers, yeah.
Ms. Wild. And do you know workers who have filed workers'
compensation claims related to heat-related illnesses?
Mr. Javier Rodriguez. Not -- no. I never hear of some of
the workers, like, file a workers' comp complaint around the
heat, the heat illness.
Ms. Wild. All right.
Mr. Javier Rodriguez. It is not easy because what I
mentioned before. Like, the doctor diagnosis never say, like,
oh, this is something for the heat. It is all the time, like,
different kind of diagnosis, like, high pressure, diabetes,
flu, so much, like in my wife's case.
Ms. Wild. Okay.
So let's talk for a moment about the warehouse work that
you have done. My district in Pennsylvania is home to many
warehouses and factories. My understanding is that you worked
in a warehouse moving freight in and out of metal shipping
containers. Is that --
Mr. Javier Rodriguez. Correct.
Ms. Wild. -- right? Can you give us some idea of how hot it
gets in those metal shipping containers and inside the
warehouse compared to outdoor temperatures?
Mr. Javier Rodriguez. Yes. The warehouse doesn't have any
air circulation. And these containers, this is small -- we have
the small space. We load and load merchandise. And when the
temperatures outside is, like, 100, inside the containers,
these metal containers, it is 115, 120.
Ms. Wild. So did they have any fans inside the --
Mr. Javier Rodriguez. No, we don't have any fans.
Ms. Wild. And are the containers in any way air-conditioned
from the truck that is going to be pulling the container?
Mr. Javier Rodriguez. No. This kind of container doesn't
have any air conditioner, because it is a metal -- these
containers come from China and other regions.
Ms. Wild. So what would you do if you became overheated
while working inside one of these metal containers?
Mr. Javier Rodriguez. What we do is, like, go outside and
try to drink water, rest. But like I mentioned before, the
supervisor don't like that. Like, we need to continue work, we
need to produce. So this is a real situation, a real problem,
when the worker is trying to do something to feel better, like
-- yeah.
Ms. Wild. I would like to switch over to Dr. McCarthy.
Dr. McCarthy, can you comment, please, on the clinical
symptoms and prognosis of heat stroke?
Dr. McCarthy. Yes. The clinical symptoms of heat stroke,
usually you start with heat exhaustion, which can have
dizziness, headache, profuse sweating, nausea. The change
occurs when you start having neurologic symptoms, when the
thermoregulatory system breaks down and cannot keep the core
temperature maintained at the 98.6 degrees, give or take a
degree --
Ms. Wild. Can heat stroke have long-term implications for a
person other than death?
Dr. McCarthy. Yes. You begin to have multi-organ failure,
and this affects the brain, liver, kidneys. And if not treated
within 2 hours, it is a true medical emergency. You can have
long-term chronic health symptoms related to those organs that
are affected and/or death.
Ms. Wild. Thank you very much.
My time is up.
Chairwoman Adams. Thank you very much.
I want to recognize the Representative from Michigan,
Representative Stevens.
Ms. Stevens. Thank you, Madam Chair.
And thank you to our panel of expert witnesses.
I also happen to serve on the House Science Committee, and
we are having a hearing today on glacier ice melt and rising
sea levels. And this is a conversation about climate change.
This is a conversation about what climate change is posing to
our economy, to our people, to our workforce.
And heat has obviously always existed in, you know, the
United States and in the fields of work that we have heard from
today and that are in the testimony, but the expectation that
it is going to get worse is spot-on. And how we as a body take
these matters seriously and for what they mean for people and
for workers is of paramount importance.
There is also something significant in this room, which is
that I am reconnecting with a friend, Arturo Rodriguez, who may
or may not remember me from the time that I picked him up from
the airport, O'Hare Airport, in March of 2016.
And we find ourselves yet again, my friend, in this
important hearing. And so I would like you to be my first
question, which is: Could you just talk to us a little bit more
about your personal experiences, particularly in the warehouse
lines of work, people who you have had the privilege of
representing? We would love to get some more of that narrative,
sir.
Mr. Arturo Rodriguez. Well, I will leave the warehouses to
Javier.
Ms. Stevens. Yeah. That is Javier, yeah, but --
Mr. Arturo Rodriguez. I will definitely talk about, you
know, the fields. And Mr. Little made some good comments in
regards to the situation with agriculture. The reality is,
folks, that, I mean, the temperatures are soaring. The
Coachella Valley, if not already, very soon it will be 115 to
125 degrees. Workers working out there harvesting vegetables
primarily, at this point in time, and some citrus.
But we have to have standards. And we have seen the
standards that have been implemented now with water, shade, and
rest breaks. And ensuring that supervisors and foremen are
well-trained but also that the workers really understand what
the symptoms are has helped out tremendously to reduce the
number of deaths and to ensure that we lower the worker
compensation costs for the employers and ensure that there is
better production because workers are feeling like they can
produce in an environment where they do have the water, the
rest, and the breaks and so forth.
And so we are very fortunate to be able to have passed
those regulations thanks to the hard work of Representative
Judy Chu and others to really make that possible. And so we are
really looking forward to this being expanded throughout the
Nation.
Ms. Stevens. And you might not know this, but you are a
pride and joy of southeastern Michigan. And I am a
Representative from southeastern Michigan, and we are so
thrilled to have your connection to the labor movement. It is
tied to Michigan and your time in Michigan. We know you lived
in Michigan, in my great State.
What is the role here of the medical professionals? And I
kind of open this up to the panel with the remaining time I
have left. Why have doctors not been recognizing some of these
conditions as tied to workplace protections, particularly as it
pertains to the excessive heat?
Dr. McCarthy. Okay. I think it has just been under-
recognized as an illness related to the workplace because it
does have a multi-organ effect. I think it has been under-
reported by workers. It is under-recognized as an illness by
clinicians. And it is great that it is becoming more
recognized.
When it affects a certain system, such as the
cardiovascular system or the kidneys or the liver, it gets that
diagnosis on the chart versus the heat-related illness. Or you
get dehydration. And I think that is why we don't get the
recording of a heat stroke or heat exhaustion, because the
doctor is attending to the specific system that is being
treated.
I hope that helps.
Ms. Stevens. Thank you.
Madam Chair, I yield back.
Chairwoman Adams. Thank you very much.
I yield to the gentleman from California, Mr. DeSaulnier.
Mr. DeSaulnier. Thank you, Madam Chair, for your
leadership.
And to the panel, Mr. Little, Mr. Rodriguez, particularly
Mr. Little, it is nice to see you.
I was Chair of the California State Senate Labor Committee
when we were having hearings on our law and we were working
with the farm workers. It was not always easy, I think is the
proper way -- from my memory, Mr. Little.
But maybe you could expand a little bit on what you and the
employers have discovered as you have gone through this process
and hopefully worked with the State Department of Labor but
also with the researchers in the field and your employees on
the benefits of it and the challenges, to be quite honest.
Mr. Little. The challenges, I think, are mostly logistical.
We have long had to comply with field sanitation
requirements that require you to provide some sort of toilet
facility, often a chemical toilet, like you find any outdoor
chemical toilet at any outdoor event, and figure out how to
manage the logistics of getting that to the field, getting it
to where the workers are, getting it at the appropriate
location so they don't have to walk too far in order to get to
it.
And then with heat illness it is a slightly different
situation, because you need to have the water within -- I mean,
the agency picked the word ``practicable'' to put in our
regulation. And I am not sure I know how to define
``practicable.'' Maybe it is like ``truth'' and ``beauty''; it
is in the eye of the beholder. But the general idea is you keep
the water and the shade as close as you can with practical
means.
And that gives us an opportunity to try a lot of different
things to try to provide that shade. We invented -- I didn't do
it, but we invented a piece of farm equipment that didn't exist
prior to the heat illness standard, and that is the shade
trailer. I don't know if you have ever seen one of these
things.
I think you might have.
But it is basically a two-wheel trailer that you haul
around behind a pickup truck that has two wings that unfold,
that has a picnic table in the middle so the workers can sit on
the benches, facing what amounts to a picnic table, eat their
meal, their midday meal, there. You can stow personal articles
in the trailer -- tools, water. Usually they have a rack on it
for a 5-gallon Igloo cooler.
But if you are already hauling the portable toilet out to
the field, then you have to find another truck to haul the
shade trailer or, more often than not, several shade trailers
out to the field.
So that flexibility in logistics, making sure you always
have enough water on hand is something I -- when I talk to
people about, I put a lot of emphasis on making sure you have
worked out how you are going to make sure you have the
requisite amount of water and give some thought to how you are
going to do that. Don't do something like --
Mr. DeSaulnier. This isn't a hearing about water in
California --
Mr. Little. Sorry.
Mr. DeSaulnier. -- Mr. Little. You don't want to go down
that road.
Mr. Little. All right.
Mr. DeSaulnier. Go ahead.
Mr. Little. Oh, I am sorry, I just was going to make one
last point related to that, and that is, don't make the mistake
that I have seen farm employers make from time to time, where,
in their zeal to try to make sure they have water out there for
everybody, they go out and they pick up all the Igloos and they
take them in town to Taco Bell to fill them up with ice and
water, but you are leaving the workers that are there with no
water while you are doing that.
Mr. DeSaulnier. Right.
Mr. Little. So just thinking ahead a little bit and having
a plan for how you are going to do this can make it a lot
easier to deal with it and make sure you provide water and
shade for people, as you are required to do under our standard.
Mr. DeSaulnier. Mr. Rodriguez, passing effective policy is
one thing, but having the cultures change to see the value,
both from the employer and the employee, how do you see that,
as the regulation continues to be enforced, particularly in
California?
And, by the way, we are happy to have you in California
from Michigan.
Mr. Arturo Rodriguez. Thank you.
I think it has created a situation whereby employees feel
much more respected, feel like they are being treated as human
beings and not as agricultural implements.
I mean, they know what they have gone through year after
year after year. And, unfortunately, we weren't able to get
these regulations, to even begin consideration, until 2005. But
I think a lot has changed over the course of the last two
decades, and we have seen significant improvements in terms of
what has transpired.
And we are hopeful that there are new innovations that are
going to come up. Like, the shade trailer was one, and I am
sure there are going to many, many more as we look to how we
can protect employees and how we can create a better work
environment for them.
Mr. DeSaulnier. And how has that improved the agricultural
industry in California, from your perspective?
Mr. Arturo Rodriguez. Well, one, I mean, in terms of -- as
already mentioned by Mr. Little and as I mentioned in my
testimony, we have seen the shade trailer come out, which, for
the first time -- I mean, it is hard for us to imagine. Can you
imagine sitting in the dirt eating your lunch every single day?
And that has just changed now within the last 5 years, where
you see shade trailers.
So I think more and more of those types of things are going
to come and take place and become a reality, as well as
thinking about how do you provide cool water to folks and get
it close enough to them when they are working in fields with
long rows and many, many acres and so forth so that we can
provide the immediate attention folks need.
Mr. DeSaulnier. Thank you. Thank you, both.
I thank the panel, and I thank the Chair.
Chairwoman Adams. Thank you very much.
I will now yield to the gentlelady from Minnesota, Ms.
Omar.
Ms. Omar. Thank you, Chairwoman.
Over 30 million people in the United States have jobs that
require them to work outside, according to the Bureau of Labor
Statistics, which makes the issue of deadly heat exposure a
very serious workplace safety concern.
Frankly, I find it disturbing that a country like ours has
to adopt safety standards surrounding this problem. I sit on
another committee just across the hall, Foreign Affairs
Committee. And there I often talk about the importance of
upholding the same values and standards here at home that we
are promoting around the world, and this is a perfect example
of that.
Just a couple of years ago, I remember the world calling
out Qatar to establish some kind of heat exposure rules to
protect the migrant workers dying doing construction in
preparation of the World Cup. And so how could it be that here
in the United States we are still lacking those standards
ourselves?
And this concern is only made more serious when you
consider the climate crisis we are currently facing. Climate
change is making extreme heat days more frequent, and it is
bringing about record-breaking summers. And that is a trend
that is only going to continue unless we take serious action
and we take it soon.
It is true that only three States here in the United States
have established these standards. Those are California, my home
state of Minnesota, and Washington. And so we have to make sure
that we are doing something to standardize it for the whole
Nation.
So I wanted to chat a little bit about the kind of
vulnerable communities that are in some of these workplaces.
And to Mr. Rodriguez, you mentioned in your testimony that
nearly 70 percent of our agricultural workforce comes from the
immigrant communities. I believe that it is an important factor
we need to take into consideration here, because it is no
secret that immigrant workers, even though they are often
facing high risk, they are high risk of injury or illness, are
more likely to suffer in silence because of the fear of
retaliation. The threat of violence and harassment and fear of
having their status held against them is something that many
immigrant workers know a little too well, regardless of what
industry they might be in.
And so could you, Mr. Rodriguez, share with us a little bit
more on how the lack of strong Federal workforce regulation is
hurting these workers particularly and how it makes an already
vulnerable community more vulnerable?
Mr. Arturo Rodriguez. Thank you very much for the question.
It definitely has an impact because of the fact that, one,
probably the percentage of immigrant workers in this country
working in agriculture today is probably even much higher than
70 percent; and, secondly, many of them do not speak the
language or English, and so they are not aware of what
regulations are, they are not aware of what the rules are, and
so forth.
Thirdly, there is an extremely high percentage, as many on
the committee know, that these workers that come here to work
in agriculture do not have legal status in our country today.
So they are extremely fearful about the fact that many will
hold that over their head and, ``If you don't work, then I am
going to report you to the authorities.''
And none of these workers that are here come here to work
because, one, they want to improve their families, but, most
importantly, they want to be able to provide for their
families, and they know and they are experienced and they are
professionals in agriculture. So, as a result, the fact that
they don't have legal status and that oftentimes is utilized
against them has a really severe impact.
We are confident that, much like in California, where we
have instituted these regulations, that if we do this on a
national basis -- and you have done in your State already, in
Minnesota, and Washington State -- that we will be successful
at workers, one, being protected and, secondly, being much more
open about the fact that these issues have to be addressed.
Ms. Omar. And what are other proposals that you have,
beyond just addressing the workplace, that we can address to
make sure that these vulnerable communities don't continue to
be vulnerable?
Mr. Arturo Rodriguez. Well, I think in terms of, as
mentioned already by others testifying this morning, that we
need to figure out how to do an educational program in the
languages that workers speak, in the language oftentimes that
supervisors and foremen speak, so that people are much more
aware of what is needed and so, as a result, they can take
immediate action when they feel symptoms of heat stress and so
forth.
Ms. Omar. Yeah. Considering the safety of our workers
allows us to consider their dignity and make sure that their
humanity is intact. So I look forward to us addressing this.
And I yield back.
Chairwoman Adams. Thank you very much.
Ms. Jayapal, you are recognized for 5 minutes.
Ms. Jayapal. Thank you so much, Madam Chair.
And thank you all very much for being here.
We have heard today that workers are dying from heat
exposure both outdoors and indoors in places like warehouses
that routinely exceed 100 degrees. And we have also heard that
many heat-exposed workers have contracted chronic illnesses,
like kidney disease, and that medical professionals are
concerned that there is a link between those diseases and heat
exposure.
In some unionized warehouses, workers already have heat
standards. I am proud of my State for having some standards.
For example, ILWU's Local 26 has a collective bargaining
agreement with heat standards that protects workers in the Rite
Aid distribution centers in the Mojave Desert.
Before workers unionized, though, let's be clear that the
temperatures in the warehouses were so high that a worker died.
And across the country, despite your tremendous work, Mr.
Rodriguez, not all workplaces are unionized, and many workers
are suffering terribly.
So let me start, Mr. Javier Rodriguez, with you. You worked
in a warehouse where you faced horrific conditions, and you
then started organizing other warehouse workers to take action.
Thank you very much for your courage.
When a worker doesn't feel well on a job, do the labor
contractors or the warehouse companies do any follow-up to see
if the worker is actually okay?
Mr. Javier Rodriguez. Not any follow-up. Basically, the
company don't care. Like, especially with the warehouse workers
in our area, the majority work for the staffing agencies, and
these staffing agencies don't have any, like, prevention plan,
health insurance. What we say with the staffing agencies, you
are hired in the morning, you are fired in the afternoon. So,
basically, no, any follow-up.
Ms. Jayapal. And so, if there is some sort of a medical
emergency, there is really no support whatsoever to deal with
that on the job.
Mr. Javier Rodriguez. No. No. Because -- I don't know.
Like, I think -- I have a lot ideas in my mind. But when you
feel bad, what the company do is, like, ``Oh, sit down, like,
couple minutes. When you feel better, back to work. If you
don't feel good, like, go home. Take the day.'' So this is how
the companies probably, like, wash their hands --
Ms. Jayapal. Yeah.
Mr. Javier Rodriguez. -- to take responsibility with the
workers.
Ms. Jayapal. Thank you.
Mr. Cannon, let me turn to you. In your testimony on behalf
of AGC, you state that Asuncion Valdivia Heat Illness and
Fatality Prevention Act would be too burdensome for employers,
if I understood your testimony.
Do you agree that, as we have heard today, that workers are
dying from heat-related causes?
Mr. Cannon. We do recognize that heat is a problem in our
industry. What we are saying is that there is no one-size-fits-
all approach to regulating the heat, especially in the
construction industry. When you have the various trades, you
have some --
Ms. Jayapal. But do -- I am sorry. Let me just stop you for
a second. You agree that death because of heat-related
illnesses on the job is a problem in the industry?
Mr. Cannon. Yes.
Ms. Jayapal. Okay. And do you think it is wrong when
workers die on the job?
Mr. Cannon. Yes, it is wrong.
Ms. Jayapal. Okay. And do you agree that, while some
employers voluntarily adopt standards because they may be
higher-road employers, do you agree that legislation should be
focused not on the top of the barrel but on the bottom of the
barrel, the employers that refuse to adopt standards, refuse to
actually take action when workers are dying on the job?
Mr. Cannon. What I think would help is better outreach.
Ninety percent of the construction industry are employers with
20 or fewer employees. So these are the ones that I think are
not as informed, I will say, and --
Ms. Jayapal. Do you think that we should wait to inform
employers and allow workers to die while we wait for that? I
mean, how long -- do you think one death is --
Mr. Cannon. One death is too many.
Ms. Jayapal. One death is too many.
Mr. Cannon. Yes.
Ms. Jayapal. So then why wouldn't you -- because I think
you are an employer who has taken some precautions around this.
Mr. Cannon. Yes.
Ms. Jayapal. You have admitted that there are workers who
are dying on the job. Why wouldn't you want legislation to make
sure that every employer takes precautions as you do?
Mr. Cannon. Regardless of whether it is the legislation or
a regulation or standard, you still need to reach the small
employer.
Ms. Jayapal. Sure. But you don't you think that legislation
gives an added push for an employer who isn't paying attention,
is allowing for workers to die?
Because you agreed with us that workers are dying on the
job and that there is a problem in the construction industry.
So why wouldn't you want to -- well, I mean, I have heard your
answer, but why would an OSHA heat standard be too burdensome?
Because, according to your testimony, you already encourage
contractors to engage in safe heat-related practices. But the
reality is they are not listening to you, Mr. Cannon. Maybe
they would listen to the Federal Government if we actually had
some standards around this.
Let me just -- I guess my time has expired. I am sorry, Mr.
Rodriguez. I was going to ask you a question. I just want to
thank you for your decades of service on behalf of farm workers
and people across the country who are providing such tremendous
service every day to all of us as we eat the food on the table.
Thank you.
Chairwoman Adams. And thank you very much.
Mr. Cline, you are recognized for 5 minutes, sir.
Mr. Cline. Thank you, Madam Chair.
Before I get to my first question that I had written down
here, Mr. Rodriguez, you said in your answer to Ms. Jayapal
that you were told, if it is too hot, to take a break, to sit
down, to have some water, to take a rest, or to take the day,
potentially, if you need to take time off?
Mr. Javier Rodriguez. When it is too hot --
Mr. Cline. Didn't you just say that? Isn't that how you
responded to the question that was just asked of you?
Mr. Javier Rodriguez. Yes, I would take the breaks.
Mr. Cline. Okay.
Mr. Javier Rodriguez. We forced the company to give us
breaks.
Mr. Cline. But the company gave you breaks. And, in fact,
if you said you --
Mr. Javier Rodriguez. The company don't give you no breaks.
We force it.
Mr. Cline. Okay.
Mr. Cannon, your testimony is that a one-size-fits-all
policy does not apply. But you did acknowledge that deaths due
to heat-related illness is a problem in some States, correct?
Mr. Cannon. I was just speaking in general. Any death, you
know, whether it be heat-related, fall-related, is a problem in
our industry.
Mr. Cline. In some states, deaths related to heat are
reduced or may not even occur because the heat is not
excessive, correct?
Mr. Cannon. Correct.
Mr. Cline. Okay. So to require each state, which has
different levels of heat, different rates of heat-related
illness, to go through all of the plan content that is in this
legislation, which was just given to us, I believe, yesterday -
- a plan to include hazard prevention, including engineering
controls, administrative controls, personal protective
equipment, local exhaust ventilation, shielding from a radiant
heat source, insulation of hot surfaces, the provision of air
conditioning, cooling fans, cooling mist fans, evaporative
coolers, natural ventilation, administrative controls, rotating
employees, scheduling work earlier or later in the day using
work-rest schedules, personal protective equipment which may
include water-cooled garments, air-cooled garments, reflective
clothing, and cooling vests.
Would you say that constitutes a one-size-fits-all regime
that may be overly burdensome in some parts of the country?
Mr. Cannon. I am sorry. Can you repeat that?
Mr. Cline. All of the things I just said are part of a plan
that has to be developed under this legislation. Would you say
that the imposition of a one-size-fits-all solution on
employers, large and small, no matter what region of the
country they are coming from, would be excessively burdensome
on some employers, whether it is in parts of the country or
some smaller employers?
Mr. Cannon. I think if you are requiring an employer to --
or prescribing an employer to implement measures that are not
applicable to what they do, then it could become burdensome.
Mr. Cline. Okay.
Dr. McCarthy. May I interject?
Mr. Cline. No.
Ms. Chairwoman, I agree that occasional exposure to heat
and the illnesses that result is a very serious issue, and we
are looking to reduce and eliminate the consequences of this.
But it is important to be mindful of the individual
considerations and norms that States have. More mandates don't
always equate to better practices. That is what we should be
focused on in this hearing.
One-size-fits-all becomes far more complicated for certain
industries, such as truck drivers, who are changing
environments from one place to another. And when a request was
made in 2012 to push OSHA to issue a one-size-fits-all
standard, the last administration denied the petition due to
the complications and ineffectiveness that one overreaching
standard would have.
I look forward to discussing further potential ways that
employers and States can work together to prevent the effects
of occupational heat exposure, but I would warn against the
imposition of a one-size-fits-all mandate on employers that
would harm the economy and harm workers at the end of the day.
I yield back.
Chairwoman Adams. The gentleman yields back.
All right. I want to officially welcome Mr. Keller of
Pennsylvania to the Committee on Education and Labor.
And, Mr. Keller, I now recognize you for 5 minutes.
Mr. Keller. Thank you, Madam Chair.
It is an important issue when we are talking about safety
of the people that work in the United States. I was in private
industry, and I was also in State government. And I guess I
would have a question for Mr. Little.
When we are looking at Congress trying to implement a one-
size-fits-all approach, being the diversity of our Nation and
the working conditions from California to New York and from
Maine to Alabama, do you feel it would be best to let this
decision up to the States, have OSHA work with the States and
let it up to the States to determine what might work best to
protect the workers in those areas?
Mr. Little. Twenty-six states have state plans, and they
have the legal capacity to be able to promulgate standards,
just like California did. Some may choose to do so, as some
have already have, and some may choose not to. Some may choose
to rely on what may be in their law already.
In the Federal law, we have the General Duty Clause. In
California, we have an injury and illness prevention plan
requirement. They are kind of analogous, because if your injury
and illness prevention plan doesn't cover the hazards that you
actually have in your workplace, then you need to modify it and
take those hazards into account. Heat is obviously one for
outdoor workers.
So there is usually more than one way to fix a problem,
depending on what the problem is. And I think, to the extent
that you give people flexibility and space to be able to figure
out their problems, whether or not -- whether it is Federal
OSHA perhaps doing a standard at some point or the way we went
about doing our standard in California, where we talked to all
the stakeholders, including employers who have to actually
implement whatever it is the regulation comes up with, is going
to be very important to create something that you can actually
make work on the ground in the real world.
Mr. Keller. Okay.
As far as the California standard, has there been any
enforcement or audits of the California standard with any of
the employers?
Mr. Little. There has been quite a bit of enforcement
around our heat and illness prevention standard, yes.
Mr. Keller. Okay. And has that been working out well for
the people that work in California?
Mr. Little. Sometimes -- I think we accomplish more when we
undertake the education than we do when we undertake
enforcement, some types of enforcement, where you are
penalizing an employer for failing to have a written copy of
the program at each individual work site.
For agricultural employers, probably for construction
employers too, you could have dozens of active work sites on
any given day. If someone forgets a piece of the notebook they
carry with them that happens to be their heat and illness
prevention plan, the person who is in charge of safety for the
company knows how to implement it, knows how to direct others
to implement it, but if you don't have that copy of that plan
at each individual work site, that is a violation of our
standard.
I understand you want to educate people, and maybe part of
education is making that available. But what harm occurs if you
don't have that, and why are you penalizing that employer? I
think the penalty is $7,500 for failing to do that. So there is
a right way and wrong way to do a lot of different things. I am
not sure that penalizing people for paperwork violations is
constructive.
Mr. Keller. Well, I guess I would have a question, then,
because I come into mind, in Pennsylvania, we have PennDOT,
which is the Department of Transportation, and a lot of times
they have flaggers out when there is construction work. And it
is hot and so forth. I imagine California's Department of
Transportation does the same thing for road construction. Would
they fall under the same enforcement rules as the farmers, the
agriculture community, landscapers?
Mr. Little. To the best of my understanding, yes, they do.
Mr. Keller. They do. Okay.
Do they have the plans -- or how do they do it? I guess
that might be a way to look, how the government -- are you
aware of how the government makes sure that there is a plan in
place for that worker that is standing on a highway as the
flagger? How do we take care of them and make sure they do
their paperwork?
Mr. Little. I don't know. I have never worked with them, so
I don't know what they do.
Mr. Keller. I think it would be incumbent upon Congress to
make sure we understand that we are protecting all the workers
and we are not putting some regulations on private industry.
And we need to make sure everybody is safe. And I think going
about this from Congress rather than letting the states do it,
I think we are probably creating some unintended consequences
for the workers and for the States in order to enforce a good
policy.
I yield back my time. Thank you, Madam Chair.
Chairwoman Adams. Thank you.
I now recognize the gentleman from Arizona, Mr. Grijalva.
Mr. Grijalva. Thank you, Madam Chair. And thank you very
much for the hearing. Much appreciated.
Dr. McCarthy -- and Dr. Bernard, if you want to also chime
in -- it is not only here, but every time that there is a
discussion about promulgating a regulation or a rule around
worker protections, we get the one-size-fits-all
counterargument and also what I heard from one of the
witnesses: We will be forced to do individualized plans for
each worker.
Respond to that. Because we are talking about standards
here as the guardrails to protect workers. Talk about the
argument that we can't do this because one-size-fits-all does
not work.
Dr. McCarthy. There are many OSHA Federal standards for
hazardous exposures, such as asbestos, lead, and the list goes
on, and they are not a one-size-fits-all for all employers.
They have action levels, permissible exposure levels, ceiling
limits. NIOSH has recommended action levels and exposure
levels. And so, just like the weather, the NOAA has a chart
where you calculate heat index, what temperature, OSHA also has
a standard.
So it is not -- if the employer does not fit in that heat
and temperature, we also have, for indoor workers, wet bulb
globe temperatures. And this takes into account four different
measures for heat, so you can apply it equally among outdoor
and indoor workers. Because, as Mr. Rodriguez said, the indoor
can be much higher than even the outdoor worker.
Mr. Grijalva. Thank you very much.
Any addition to that?
Mr. Bernard. Yes. Thank you for asking.
I feel, far from it being a one-size-fits-all, I really
think it is a menu of options. There are things that we do that
are kind of transcendent through any jobs. And we talked a bit
about that in terms of the education and the drinking and
surveillance. So those are common elements. How you execute
them are individual.
Then we talked about a long list of others that really are
very much, does it apply to the particular workplace?
With regard to people with individual susceptibilities,
most of the guidance for occupational exposures are
acclimatized, healthy people. It is the reason why you want to
have a good emergency plan to take those other people who may
be individually at risk --
Mr. Grijalva. Gotcha.
Mr. Bernard. -- that fall out.
Mr. Grijalva. Appreciate that.
Mr. Arturo Rodriguez, good to see you again, my friend. We
talked a lot about Cal/OSHA. Would employers be providing
water, rest, shade, and innovations that we see now in
California had Cal/OSHA not been implemented or passed?
Mr. Arturo Rodriguez. No, I don't believe so. I mean, as
mentioned earlier today by Mr. Little, 26 States, I believe, do
have the opportunity to employ some type of standards as we
have been discussing here today and only 3 have done so.
So I think it is incumbent upon OSHA to really take action
on a Federal basis to ensure that we do have standards set
across the country.
Mr. Grijalva. Yeah.
Farm workers, many times, are paid on the piecework, and
many farm laborers are on a piecework basis. They could lose
pay for taking shade and rest breaks. How are they compensated
within Cal/OSHA?
Mr. Arturo Rodriguez. So my understanding is and the way
that we have chosen to do it in the State of California has
been -- and piecework is very common there -- that they will
take the average of the hours worked during the week and look
at the wage that they have earned and average it out, and that
becomes the hourly rate for the worker to be paid, whatever
break time that they took.
Mr. Grijalva. Cal/OSHA -- again, another question. Would
the agency have taken the initiative to adopt the heat illness
prevention standards if the legislature had not passed a bill
that mandated that?
Mr. Arturo Rodriguez. In our opinion, no, they wouldn't
have.
Mr. Grijalva. You know, one of my colleagues mentioned the
point about climate change. And, yes, that is part of the
discussion. Everything is warming. The globe is warming. We can
have that debate some other time. And I know it will be an
intense debate about what we do about climate change in this
Congress.
But, nevertheless, this is not part of that debate. This is
about worker protection, regardless of the source of the heat,
regardless of the exposure. And we should deal with that on
that level, because, yes, climate change is part of it, but
this is the easy part that Congress faces in dealing with this
issue.
I yield back and thank you again, Madam Chair.
Chairwoman Adams. Thank you.
I want to now recognize the Ranking Member of the
Subcommittee, Mr. Byrne from Alabama.
You have 5 minutes, sir.
Mr. Byrne. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman.
Mr. Cannon, I know a lot of contractors in Alabama. I think
most of them are your members. And they tell me, to a person,
that they are having a hard time finding workers. So they are
doing everything they can to attract workers, and once they get
them, they are doing everything they can to keep them.
I wouldn't think it would be positive to attract workers
and certainly to keep them if you are exposing them to an
unhealthy environment. So I would think most of your members
are doing what they know to do to try to make sure that they
maintain a healthy environment, including one involving heat.
Is that correct?
Mr. Cannon. That is correct. You know, our members are
encouraging their workers to report any and all hazards,
including heat-related hazards. They ask them to report any and
all injuries and illnesses regardless of what the source of the
injury and illness was. I think, as you pointed out, you know,
trying to keep workers and keep the positive image of the
industry is very important to us in attracting new talent to
the industry.
So, you know, they are committed to the safety of their
workers. They give them the authority to stop work if they
encounter a situation that they deem to be unsafe and discuss
it and come up with a plan to complete their task in a safe
manner.
Mr. Byrne. Well, you also said something earlier that I
think is very important. Most of your members -- and, in my
State, most employers, period -- are not big companies. They
are smaller operations. So what can we do, what can government
do, to help them accomplish what they want to accomplish, which
is a safe workplace, particularly with regard to this heat
issue?
Mr. Cannon. Very good question, but I think that definitely
presents a challenge. I think we struggle with trying to reach
that demographic of our membership. I know, you know, OSHA as
well as NIOSH, they have continued discussions as to how they
can better reach the small employer.
So, I mean, I don't have a solution or a recommendation, at
this point, as to how we can get to that group of employers.
But I definitely think, if we are able to reach them on, you
know, heat or whatever else, you know, safety-related matter
there is, I think we will definitely make improvements and good
strides in that area.
Mr. Byrne. Mr. Little, some advocates for a national
occupational heat illness standard push for very specific
requirements such as maintaining water at a specific
temperature.
Does it make sense for the Federal government to prescribe
such specific rules? And is it even possible to meet some of
these requirements in an outdoor environment?
Mr. Little. I don't think that trying to be that specific
with standards that you are required to meet for a heat illness
prevention standard really makes a lot of sense.
We had debate around that in -- I think it was 2012, about
whether or not the agency should specify a temperature for
drinking water. What we settled on was that the water should be
palatable, that the whole point of the exercise was to place
shade in a place where workers will use it, to provide water
that is of a quality and temperature that workers will want to
drink it.
The regulation leaves employers some leeway to figure that
out, and I think that is a very practical solution to that
problem.
Mr. Byrne. Well, one of the things that concerns me is
that, when we start to put down these big national standards,
it is very difficult to do it without it being one-size-fits-
all. You start down the path, and it is like you can't help but
go where you are going.
Is it possible to create a regulation that would allow for
the flexibility that we would need in order to make an
effective applicable regulation to the entire country? Can we
achieve that level of flexibility in a national regulation?
Mr. Little. That is a difficult question to answer. I don't
know. I don't think you can if you don't listen to the
regulated community and talk to them about what they can
actually do in the real world. That is what Cal/OSHA did, and I
think that is probably the right approach if you are going to
go down that road.
Mr. Byrne. Well, I think that is another good point that
you have made, and that is that this has to be a collaborative
effort between employers, OSHA, but also employees. Because if
you get a regulation that is too onerous to comply with, then
you won't get the employees to do what they need to do, because
employees have to play their role.
So we have to have everybody involved in this, and it takes
time to do that, doesn't it?
Mr. Little. Oh, yes, it does. We have been working on it
for 15 years.
Mr. Byrne. Fifteen years. I think Ms. Chu's bill would
require us to get this done in 2 years on a national basis,
when you all did it on a State basis.
So I guess I have some concerns about the bill just in the
fact that it puts these sort of arbitrary, false time
limitations on our ability to get all the stakeholders to the
table so we can listen to all of them.
And, with that, Madam Chairwoman, I yield back.
Chairwoman Adams. Thank you, Mr. Byrne.
I am pleased to recognize the gentleman from Virginia, the
Chair of the Education and Labor Committee, Mr. Scott.
You are recognized now for 5 minutes, sir.
Mr. Scott. Thank you, Madam Chair.
Dr. Bernard, NIOSH and OSHA already have recommended
standards. Is that right?
Mr. Bernard. They are both active in providing information
about managing heat stress. So I stayed away from the word
``standard'' a little bit.
Mr. Scott. They have recommendations.
Mr. Bernard. They have recommendations, yes.
Mr. Scott. And they can't be enforced because they are just
recommendations, not formal rules. Is that right?
Mr. Bernard. That is correct.
Mr. Scott. How difficult would it be to change the
recommendations to rules? How complicated would it be to
implement?
Mr. Bernard. No, I believe the groundwork has already been
laid between the criteria document of NIOSH and their online
activities.
Mr. Scott. And for businesses, how complicated would it be
to implement what would then be regulations?
Mr. Bernard. My experience is that it is not that
complicated to work with a company to implement a heat stress
management program.
Mr. Scott. Is it expensive to implement, including the lost
productivity?
Mr. Bernard. I don't believe that it is expensive. It is,
you know, on the order of implementing any other health and
safety program. It is not extraordinary in that regard.
I think you have picked up that there are costs of
accepting those risks of heat-related disorders that need to
also be included.
Mr. Scott. The military has implemented programs for a long
time. Has there been any research to show how effective that
program has been?
Mr. Bernard. There has been some research over the years
that has convinced the military to continue doing it. And that
is up to the most recent paper I saw recently, where, during
Ranger training, they actually provide cooling stations, where
they immerse their arms in ice water to reduce their body
temperature as they move on to their next activity.
Mr. Scott. Thank you.
Dr. McCarthy, from a medical perspective, is this a
situation where you can know that you are getting into problems
and stop working or get into shade? Or is it a situation where,
by the time you get symptoms, it is already too late?
Dr. McCarthy. Heat strain has symptoms that can identified.
Workers can be trained to recognize those symptoms. If they are
not trained, sometimes they just feel like they are just having
a bad day or, you know, just nondescript, headache, dizziness,
nausea. And if they are trained that if it is hot and they are
having those symptoms, they need to drink water, go into shade
or a cooled area, and rest, and that can help avert more
serious illness.
But if they go on to more severe symptoms, such as heat
stroke, it can have neurologic symptoms, where they can lose
the inability to think for themselves. And that is why
communication procedures or buddy systems are so important,
because they may not be able to take themselves out of that
situation.
Mr. Scott. Now, you showed the number of incidents from the
twenties down to zero in the city. Can you translate that into
cost savings of workers' compensation?
Dr. McCarthy. Yes. We showed that -- well, the last 2
years, we had no heat-related illnesses, so, therefore, no
cost. But per heat-related illness, we had a reduction to 50
percent prior to implementation of the program.
And we believe that was due to workers understanding what
their signs and symptoms were and, therefore, seeking medical
attention earlier and, therefore, getting treatment earlier, so
having a less severe illness to treat for those workers.
Mr. Scott. And did the cost savings exceed the cost of
implementing the program?
Dr. McCarthy. I do not have that data.
Mr. Scott. And I think you wanted to make a comment on a
previous question. Did you want to make that comment now?
Dr. McCarthy. Oh, I was able to answer it at a previous --
but, basically, I do not feel it is a one-size-fits-all. I feel
like the recommendations, if implemented today, can be
administered to employers on a graduated basis, depending on
the circumstances of the employee, depending on the temperature
levels, what the employee's work environment is and their job
description. And it has been used in the military successfully,
this program, successfully.
Mr. Scott. Thank you, Madam Chair.
Chairwoman Adams. Thank you.
Thank you for your responses.
I want to remind my colleagues that, pursuant to committee
practice, materials for submission for the hearing record must
be submitted to the Committee Clerk, preferably in Microsoft
Word format. The materials must address the subject matter of
the hearing. Only a member of the committee or an invited
witness may submit materials for inclusion in the hearing
record.
Documents are limited to 50 pages. Documents longer than 50
pages will be incorporated into the record via an internet link
that you must provide to the Committee Clerk within the
required timeframe. But please recognize that years from now
that link may no longer work.
Again, I want to thank the witnesses for their
participation today. What we have heard from each of you is
very valuable.
Members of the Committee may have some additional questions
for you, and we ask the witnesses to please respond to those
questions in writing. The hearing record will be held open in
order to receive those responses.
I remind my colleagues that, pursuant to committee
practice, witness questions for the hearing record must be
submitted to the majority committee staff or Committee Clerk
within 7 days. The questions submitted must address the subject
matter of the hearing.
I now want to recognize the Ranking Member for his closing
statement.
Mr. Byrne. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman.
Thank you all for being here. That was very interesting. I
learned a lot. You all have a lot to offer us as we consider
what we are going to do here.
Mr. Rodriguez was talking about workers sitting on the
ground eating their lunch. I remember doing that in the
summertime, and it is hot. And it is hard to get the rest you
need from your working environment when you are not in the
shade. And probably sitting on the ground is probably not good
for you either. I didn't have a pickup truck, so I couldn't sit
on the back of a tailgate, so most of us sat on the ground.
I do worry about workers. And when I drive by them in
Alabama in the summertime and I see them working on a roof or
out there doing a road job out there in the sun, asphalt, it is
hot. But I know these employers, and they don't want those
workers to get sick. It is not good for them for their workers
to be sick. But they need our help to understand what they can
do, and we need to figure out a better way to give them the
information that they need.
OSHA has the general duty standard, and they enforce under
the general duty standard. In fact, they enforce on heat-
related illnesses under the general duty standard.
Perhaps that is why, in 2012, the Obama administration,
which was not known for being pro-employer, denied the petition
to establish a heat standard. In fact, at that time, OSHA's
head said their increased focus on enforcement and robust
education on outreach campaigns adequately addressed the
hazard.
Now, I would like to hear from OSHA. That is what they said
in 2012. If we are going to consider a piece of legislation
that is going to force them into a sort of arbitrary timeframe,
et cetera, I would kind of like to hear what OSHA says about
this. Because, after all, they are going to have to be the ones
to implement it if we pass it.
I also think that we need to hear from people who have more
experiences like we heard here today from the folks from
California. That would be helpful for us to understand how has
this worked in other places.
I think that we need to be very careful in Congress, when
we start legislating an area like this, that we pass the law
that we perhaps pass most frequently around here, and that is
the law of unintended consequences. Because you can enact a
very prescriptive statute, and you get exactly that: unintended
consequences that make it difficult, if not impossible, for
employers to comply with it. And worse than that, it makes it
very difficult for the employees to get the help that they
need.
I remember working on the job. When you have all that
safety stuff, the burden still falls on the employee to comply
with the rules. And if we put too much rules on the employees,
they won't do it even though they are required to do it by
their employers.
So I want us to be very, very careful here. I am skeptical
about a two-year timeline in Ms. Chu's bill. I think that is
way too short, particularly given the California example. And I
think we need to think long and hard before we prescribe a
bunch of things in a statute directed at an agency about how
they are going to carry out their job, because I am not sure we
know enough to do that.
So I really do appreciate everybody's testimony today. This
is an important issue, there is no question about it. I just
hope that this committee will go about its job in a very
thoughtful and deliberative way and that we consult with the
agency before we do anything.
With that, Madam Chairwoman, I yield back.
Chairwoman Adams. Thank you, Mr. Byrne.
I now recognize myself for the purpose of my closing
statement.
Let me again thank the witnesses for providing us with
valuable expertise. I think that I speak for all of the Members
of the Subcommittee when I say that we learned an enormous
amount of valuable information from each of you today.
We have heard compelling evidence about the serious and
often deadly hazards that millions of workers face in this
country from uncontrolled exposure to excessive heat. But the
good news is that we know these deaths and illnesses can be
prevented. The science and practice have proved the
effectiveness of these measures. Now, workers await only action
from OSHA to make sure that these protective measures are
implemented. Passage of H.R. 3668 will go far toward
establishing and accomplishing that goal.
But even with the progress we hopefully are making, we are
reminded again of the larger structural problem within the
Occupational Safety and Health Act. Even if this bill becomes
law and OSHA issues a heat standard, public employees in 24
States will receive no protection because they are not covered
by Federal OSHA. As the committee continues its critical
oversight of the Occupational Safety and Health Act, we look
forward to addressing some of these serious weaknesses.
And before I conclude, I ask unanimous consent to insert
into the record testimony from Public Citizen, ``Public Law and
Climate Disasters from Occupational Health and Safety Law'' by
Sidney Shapiro and Kathleen Tracy.
Without objection, so ordered.
[The information follows:]
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[Additional submissions by Mr. Byrne follow:]
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[Additional submission by Dr. McCarthy follows:]89
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[Additional submissions by Mr. Javier Rodriguez follows:]
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[Additional questions for the record and their responses
follow:]
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Chairwoman Adams. If there is no further business, without
objection, the Committee stands adjourned.
[Whereupon, at 12:26 p.m., the Subcommittee was adjourned.]