Would you believe that a state Department of Labor and Industries regulation that took effect June 18 requires that employees who work outside during hot weather be provided with shade canopies or tents that have air conditioners or misting stations? And that employers provide one quart of water per hour per worker and a positive signal informing workers when to take a drink? This heat stress regulation isnt new. DLI proposed it last year but there was such a flap from employers that it wasnt adopted. Its back as an emergency rule, which means that it stays in effect for 120 days, without the usual public hearings and an economic impact statement that are required for adoption of non-emergency rules.
Business is climbing the walls, as much for the emergency designation as DLIs doing anything at all. They dont need any more bureaucracy injected into their current program of seeing to it that there is adequate water for all outside workers, said the Building Industry Association of Washington, Washington Contract Loggers Assn., Washington Farm Bureau, Associated Builders and Contractors of Washington and the Washington Assn. of Landscape Professionals, plus Sens. Jim Clements, Jim Honeyford, Mark Schoesier and Rep. Joel Kretz in a letter to the governor. Please repeal this, they asked.
She said no. They must have forgotten her remarks at the State Labor Council picnic in Wenatchee in 2003, You and labor will always have a voice in every decision I make.
Organized labor wants this rule. So long as Christine Gregoire is governor, organized labor will get anything it wants that she has any control over. For example, the raises provided for state workers during the last collective bargaining between the unions and her office are so generous even the liberal Seattle Times has editorialized that the collective bargaining law be reviewed.
I talked to Elaine Fischer at DLIs public affairs office and was told that there has been an indoor heat stress regulation for years, but not one dealing with outdoor workers.
Four workers have died from heat stress in the last 10 years, she said. Just two years ago, a farm worker in Moxie collapsed and died while cutting grass with a machete. Last summer, a laborer coming in and out of a four-foot trench, collapsed and died a few days later. Another worker died from complications he developed in 2004 while working as a roofer. He was awaiting a liver transplant at the time.
Internal organs heat up and by the time you realize you dont feel good, its too late, she said. It gets really hot out there in Eastern Washington. In the last 10 years, besides the four deaths, hundreds of claims have been filed.
DLI has had many meetings with the people affected by the rule, Ms. Fischer said, and weve gotten good feedback. This rule only affects this summer because the emergency rule effect expires in 120 days, and then we will begin the permanent rule process. This is only a stopgap.
Now, all that sounds pretty harmless, but what set business alarms off was the sample heat stress program DLI created for employers to follow, including this: Any new employees starting that day or crew members returning to work who have been off work two weeks or more, will limit their time at moderate to heavy work to 50 percent of routine that day and after that day will increase their time at moderate to heavy work only l 0 percent a day for five days. Sounds nit picky to me.
BIAW says it will file a lawsuit challenging the rule when DLI issues its first citation to a business accused of not complying. Business will not knuckle under without a fight.

Adele Ferguson can be reached at P.O. Box 69, Hansville, WA 98340.