California will keep workplace pandemic rules through 2022

SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) — California workplace regulators on Thursday extended mandatory pay for workers affected by the coronavirus through the end of 2022, acting more than two months after state lawmakers restored similar benefits through September.

The decision again pitted management against labor as the Occupational Safety and Health Standards Board renewed revised workplace safety rules that would otherwise have expired in early May.

“I don’t think we’re done with this yet,” board chairman David Thomas said of the pandemic.

“There’s going to be a surge in a week or so,” Thomas added. "This is the best … protection we have.”

Laura Stock, an occupational safety representative on the board, echoed employee advocates who lobbied board members to continue special protections for workers even as health officials ease mask, quarantine and other requirements for the general public.

Unlike members of the public who can choose their own risk tolerance, Stock said, “people who are in the workplace … have no choice but to be there.”

Management representative Kate Crawford said the rules have caused confusion as she cast the only “no” in a 6-1 vote.

Keeping what is known as “exclusion pay” for workers who are sent home due to the coronavirus is both costly and confusing, particularly since the Legislature recently approved COVID-19 sick leave, said Rob Moutrie, a policy advocate with the California Chamber of Commerce,

Small businesses have particularly struggled with the obligation, Moutrie said. The Cal/OSHA rule applies in almost every workplace in the state, covering workers in offices, factories and retail businesses, while the state sick leave law applies only to companies with 26 or more employees.

The debate comes...