Take action today to support CA Senate Bill 686
Without the same protections that all other workers have, California’s domestic workers will continue to face exploitation, isolation, and life-threatening workplace conditions. Everyone deserves a safe workplace.
California leaders can make things right by supporting Senate Bill 686 and implement health and safety practices for domestic workers.
Only domestic workers and day laborers doing domestic work are omitted from California’s workplace health and safety safeguards (Cal/OSHA). This exclusion originates from the history of marginalizing Black workers during the Jim Crow era. Domestic work, often performed by women who are Black, Latina, Indigenous, and immigrants of color, is still disregarded and denied rights due to racism, sexism, gender injustice, and xenophobia.
Domestic workers provide essential care and support for families and homes across California, yet nannies, housecleaners and homecare workers face risk of injury and illness in the workplace everyday because they lack health and safety protections. These risks include exposure to toxic cleaning agents, extreme heat, wildfire smoke, and injuries from lifting.
We cannot devalue the work these workers do — not only do they care for our loved ones and our homes, they are central to our economy and future of work. Their workplaces are in the private home, and just like other workers who show up to job sites and offices, they deserve protection while on the job.
Senate Bill 686 will permanently end the exclusion of domestic workers from health and safety protections, fund the growth of current domestic worker and employer education, and offer aid to low-income domestic employers for health and safety costs, like protective gear and ergonomic support, such as Hoyer lifts.
In 2022, grassroots initiatives culminated in a Cal/OSHA advisory committee. This committee, composed of domestic workers, employers, and health and safety experts, developed the first ever health and safety guidelines for the domestic worker industry. This year, Senate Bill 686, titled ‘The Health and Safety for All Workers Act,’ takes this momentum further by enshrining health and safety as fundamental worker rights. Additionally, this bill equips employers with resources to avert worker health issues and injuries, curtail liability, and elevate household safety for all.
Send a letter to California Assembly Leaders urging them to support Senate Bill 686. It takes just 2 minutes but has a huge impact for California’s domestic workers!