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"content": "\u003cp>A hospitality staffing company with headquarters in Los Angeles is seeking damages from several competitors, accusing them of gaining an unfair competitive advantage by misclassifying workers as \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/tag/independent-contractors\">independent contractors\u003c/a>, who are generally considered cheaper than employees.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Party Staff claims it lost numerous clients to gig-economy platforms Qwick, Instawork and Tend, which can offer lower prices for staffing services by avoiding the costs of \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/tag/minimum-wage\">minimum wage\u003c/a>, overtime and other employee benefits.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>According to legal experts, wage and hour lawsuits are typically filed against companies by employees or former employees, not competing businesses.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Party Staff also sued Aramark and ISS Guckenheimer, two major hospitality and food services companies with contracts with the defendants, according to the lawsuit filed in San Francisco Superior Court on Wednesday.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Last year, Qwick \u003ca href=\"https://www.sfcityattorney.org/2024/02/22/chiu-secures-2-1-million-deal-requiring-gig-economy-company-to-reclassify-workers-as-employees/\">agreed\u003c/a> to reclassify thousands of waiters, dishwashers and other workers after San Francisco City Attorney David Chiu sued the company for wage theft through misclassification. As part of the settlement, Qwick was ordered to pay the workers $1.5 million in restitution and $250,000 in civil penalties to the city. Party Staff’s lawsuit still seeks damages from Qwick stemming from its prior practices.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Party Staff’s legal challenge is the first of its kind in the hospitality industry, said Shannon Liss-Riordan, an attorney for the plaintiffs who has represented Uber drivers and other workers in the gig economy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Defendants’ unlawful conduct negatively affects competitive conditions by reducing competition between providers and threatens to drive businesses that follow the law out of business,” Riordan wrote in the complaint.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postID=news_12020585 hero='https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/NapaCountyWineCountryGetty-1020x680.jpg']\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Under California law, workers should generally be classified as employees unless they operate their own business. A big exception is for app-based transportation and delivery companies such as Uber and Lyft, which successfully pushed a 2020 ballot proposition that allows them to keep classifying their drivers as independent contractors.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Last year, the U.S. Department of Labor finalized \u003ca href=\"https://www.dol.gov/newsroom/releases/whd/whd20240109-1\">a new rule\u003c/a> seeking to expand employee protections to more workers by making it harder for employers to misclassify them. However, the incoming Trump administration is expected \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/12014254/federal-enforcement-worker-protections-likely-shifting-california-under-trump\">to rescind\u003c/a> or weaken that rule.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>David Sherwyn, a law professor at Cornell University’s School of Hotel Administration, said the potential impact of Party Staff’s unique lawsuit will depend on how successful the company is in winning monetary damages. The argument that clients would have hired Party Staff if competitors had paid their workers as employees is a difficult one to prove, he added.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“If the court says that those damages are way too speculative and can’t be awarded, then this is not going to be a new frontier because there’s no money in it for the plaintiff’s lawyer,” said Sherwyn, who directs Cornell’s Center for Innovative for Hospitality Labor & Employment Relations.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In a statement, a Qwick spokesperson denied the allegations.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Business partners choose to work with Qwick over other providers for many reasons, including finding our innovative, tech-driven approach to staffing to be more efficient and superior overall,” the spokesperson said. “We are compliant with all California labor laws and exclusively staff W-2 personnel in the state.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Tend and ISS Guckenheimer could not be reached for comment. Spokespeople for Instawork and Aramark said their companies do not comment on pending litigation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We prioritize compliance with applicable regulations and understand that the growing community of Partners and Pros who use our platform choose Instawork because they trust the quality and reliability we bring to both businesses and workers looking to find and fill local staffing opportunities in a rapidly evolving modern economy,” Kira Caban, head of strategic communications for Instawork, said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n",
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"excerpt": "Party Staff accuses Qwik, Instawork and Tend of misclassifying workers, alleging lost clients and unfair competition in the San Francisco hospitality market.",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>A hospitality staffing company with headquarters in Los Angeles is seeking damages from several competitors, accusing them of gaining an unfair competitive advantage by misclassifying workers as \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/tag/independent-contractors\">independent contractors\u003c/a>, who are generally considered cheaper than employees.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Party Staff claims it lost numerous clients to gig-economy platforms Qwick, Instawork and Tend, which can offer lower prices for staffing services by avoiding the costs of \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/tag/minimum-wage\">minimum wage\u003c/a>, overtime and other employee benefits.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>According to legal experts, wage and hour lawsuits are typically filed against companies by employees or former employees, not competing businesses.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Party Staff also sued Aramark and ISS Guckenheimer, two major hospitality and food services companies with contracts with the defendants, according to the lawsuit filed in San Francisco Superior Court on Wednesday.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Last year, Qwick \u003ca href=\"https://www.sfcityattorney.org/2024/02/22/chiu-secures-2-1-million-deal-requiring-gig-economy-company-to-reclassify-workers-as-employees/\">agreed\u003c/a> to reclassify thousands of waiters, dishwashers and other workers after San Francisco City Attorney David Chiu sued the company for wage theft through misclassification. As part of the settlement, Qwick was ordered to pay the workers $1.5 million in restitution and $250,000 in civil penalties to the city. Party Staff’s lawsuit still seeks damages from Qwick stemming from its prior practices.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Party Staff’s legal challenge is the first of its kind in the hospitality industry, said Shannon Liss-Riordan, an attorney for the plaintiffs who has represented Uber drivers and other workers in the gig economy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Defendants’ unlawful conduct negatively affects competitive conditions by reducing competition between providers and threatens to drive businesses that follow the law out of business,” Riordan wrote in the complaint.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Under California law, workers should generally be classified as employees unless they operate their own business. A big exception is for app-based transportation and delivery companies such as Uber and Lyft, which successfully pushed a 2020 ballot proposition that allows them to keep classifying their drivers as independent contractors.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Last year, the U.S. Department of Labor finalized \u003ca href=\"https://www.dol.gov/newsroom/releases/whd/whd20240109-1\">a new rule\u003c/a> seeking to expand employee protections to more workers by making it harder for employers to misclassify them. However, the incoming Trump administration is expected \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/12014254/federal-enforcement-worker-protections-likely-shifting-california-under-trump\">to rescind\u003c/a> or weaken that rule.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>David Sherwyn, a law professor at Cornell University’s School of Hotel Administration, said the potential impact of Party Staff’s unique lawsuit will depend on how successful the company is in winning monetary damages. The argument that clients would have hired Party Staff if competitors had paid their workers as employees is a difficult one to prove, he added.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“If the court says that those damages are way too speculative and can’t be awarded, then this is not going to be a new frontier because there’s no money in it for the plaintiff’s lawyer,” said Sherwyn, who directs Cornell’s Center for Innovative for Hospitality Labor & Employment Relations.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In a statement, a Qwick spokesperson denied the allegations.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Business partners choose to work with Qwick over other providers for many reasons, including finding our innovative, tech-driven approach to staffing to be more efficient and superior overall,” the spokesperson said. “We are compliant with all California labor laws and exclusively staff W-2 personnel in the state.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Tend and ISS Guckenheimer could not be reached for comment. Spokespeople for Instawork and Aramark said their companies do not comment on pending litigation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We prioritize compliance with applicable regulations and understand that the growing community of Partners and Pros who use our platform choose Instawork because they trust the quality and reliability we bring to both businesses and workers looking to find and fill local staffing opportunities in a rapidly evolving modern economy,” Kira Caban, head of strategic communications for Instawork, said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"slug": "napa-countys-legal-battle-with-family-run-winery-sparks-a-federal-court-challenge",
"title": "Napa County’s Legal Battle With Family-Run Winery Sparks a Federal Court Challenge",
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"content": "\u003cp>After a yearslong legal battle, a small winery in \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/tag/napa-county\">Napa County\u003c/a> could be forced to pay more than $8 million for hosting tastings and other experiences while its owners challenge the county’s rules in federal court, arguing that wine country’s small winery ordinances violate state law.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Napa County filed a lawsuit against Hoopes Family Winery and Vineyard in 2022, saying it was illegally using some of its land for purposes outside of winemaking, in violation of its “small winery” status. In November, Judge Mark Boessenecker agreed with the county, issuing a decision that Napa’s county code “precludes ‘small winery’ public tours and all tastings, by definition.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The county is now seeking an injunction to allow it to enforce the judge’s ruling and requesting more than $8 million from Hoopes in penalties and reimbursement of legal fees — a bill that would effectively shut down the vineyard, founder Spencer Hoopes \u003ca href=\"https://www.sfchronicle.com/food/wine/article/hoopes-vineyard-napa-penalty-20018873.php\">told the \u003cem>San Francisco Chronicle\u003c/em>\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>While tastings and other experiences are common at any number of the wineries lining Highway 29 \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11838178/the-birth-of-wine-country-is-a-story-of-bugs-taxes-and-war\">up and down the Napa Valley\u003c/a>, Spencer Hoopes began planting grapes in front of his home nestled between Napa and Yountville in 1983 and originally made his living selling to other vintners. In the ’90s, though, he decided to create wine under his own name after gaining a reputation for his cabernet sauvignon, according to Hoopes Vineyard’s website.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>His daughter Lindsay took over the winery in 2012, and more than a decade later, it has expanded in its locations and offerings. Originally selling just one bottle of wine on-site, Hoopes now also hosts “experiences” and “timed table visits,” invites guests to an on-site animal sanctuary and features two Airstreams for lounging and drinking at a property bought in 2017.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The county contends that Hoopes’ introduction of what are functionally tastings and tours requires a use permit and said in its lawsuit that the winery failed to seek one.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The previous owners of the vineyard land had purchased a Small Winery Certificate of Exemption in 1984. The short-lived county program, which issued exemptions from 1982 to 1986, still allows certificate holders to make wine on their land without going through an arduous, and expensive, permitting process. Napa’s county code requires larger wineries to apply for use permits in order to host tastings, weddings, tours and other non-agriculture-related activities on land in Napa’s extensive — and \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/forum/2010101870749/forum-on-the-road-land-use-battles-continue-as-napa-county-passes-controversial-tree-water-ordinance\">highly protected\u003c/a> — agricultural preserve.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postID=news_11838178 hero='https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/02/GettyImages-143709552-e1517698014347.jpg']\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>According to Arthur Hartinger, who is representing the county in its lawsuit against Hoopes, the program was designed so that low-impact vineyards could “continue to have a small family farm, grow grapes, produce wine, and sell it in a retail fashion” despite the land’s preservation requirements.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“They just can’t do these other kinds of things that bring more people onto the property and create impacts that have very serious potential consequences,” he continued.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Bringing more people onto the property or expanding its footprint would require a use permit because it could have environmental consequences for the preserve land, such as wastewater impacts, increased water use or traffic in the surrounding area, Hartinger said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>While Hoopes’ exemption allows for two employees and no visitors on-site daily, Lindsay Hoopes testified that the winery welcomes around 60 guests to the grounds per day, along with a number of employees. To qualify for a use permit, it would need to make updates to its wastewater, freshwater and fire protection systems, along with its road and parking. According to the county’s complaint, this could cost the winery between $500,000 and $1 million.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Hoopes, meanwhile, has joined with two other small wineries to allege in a federal lawsuit that some of Napa County’s applicable ordinances are unconstitutionally vague and that the county’s interpretation of these ordinances has changed over the years unfairly.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I have an email [from the county] that says ‘visitor’ means a liquor store owner, but then, two years ago when they sued Hoopes, [the county] said ‘No, visitor means a customer,’” said Joseph Infante, a lawyer representing the wineries in the federal case. “That’s two different things, and so that violates your constitutional right to engage in your business without arbitrary governmental interference.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The suit follows a similar one in Michigan, in which a federal court found that local municipalities’ vague ordinances were out of line with state law. Infante worked on that 2020 case and said similarly that the goal of the Hoopes federal case is to “enjoin enforcement of ordinances that are affecting and violating the constitutional rights of wineries.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The county said in a recent federal court filing that it plans to file a motion to dismiss the case and asked the court to stop litigation from proceeding in the interim. U.S. District Judge Charles Breyer ruled Monday that the case would continue to move forward and required that the county turn over discovery to the plaintiffs’ legal team in the coming weeks, but it’s possible that the county could ask the court to dismiss the case entirely.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The trial is currently set to begin at the end of the month.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>If the county’s ordinances are allowed to stand, and the court grants its injunction next month, it could affect far more than just Hoopes — other similar small wineries could have to change the way they function in Napa Valley.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>After a yearslong legal battle, a small winery in \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/tag/napa-county\">Napa County\u003c/a> could be forced to pay more than $8 million for hosting tastings and other experiences while its owners challenge the county’s rules in federal court, arguing that wine country’s small winery ordinances violate state law.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Napa County filed a lawsuit against Hoopes Family Winery and Vineyard in 2022, saying it was illegally using some of its land for purposes outside of winemaking, in violation of its “small winery” status. In November, Judge Mark Boessenecker agreed with the county, issuing a decision that Napa’s county code “precludes ‘small winery’ public tours and all tastings, by definition.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The county is now seeking an injunction to allow it to enforce the judge’s ruling and requesting more than $8 million from Hoopes in penalties and reimbursement of legal fees — a bill that would effectively shut down the vineyard, founder Spencer Hoopes \u003ca href=\"https://www.sfchronicle.com/food/wine/article/hoopes-vineyard-napa-penalty-20018873.php\">told the \u003cem>San Francisco Chronicle\u003c/em>\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>While tastings and other experiences are common at any number of the wineries lining Highway 29 \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11838178/the-birth-of-wine-country-is-a-story-of-bugs-taxes-and-war\">up and down the Napa Valley\u003c/a>, Spencer Hoopes began planting grapes in front of his home nestled between Napa and Yountville in 1983 and originally made his living selling to other vintners. In the ’90s, though, he decided to create wine under his own name after gaining a reputation for his cabernet sauvignon, according to Hoopes Vineyard’s website.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>His daughter Lindsay took over the winery in 2012, and more than a decade later, it has expanded in its locations and offerings. Originally selling just one bottle of wine on-site, Hoopes now also hosts “experiences” and “timed table visits,” invites guests to an on-site animal sanctuary and features two Airstreams for lounging and drinking at a property bought in 2017.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The county contends that Hoopes’ introduction of what are functionally tastings and tours requires a use permit and said in its lawsuit that the winery failed to seek one.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The previous owners of the vineyard land had purchased a Small Winery Certificate of Exemption in 1984. The short-lived county program, which issued exemptions from 1982 to 1986, still allows certificate holders to make wine on their land without going through an arduous, and expensive, permitting process. Napa’s county code requires larger wineries to apply for use permits in order to host tastings, weddings, tours and other non-agriculture-related activities on land in Napa’s extensive — and \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/forum/2010101870749/forum-on-the-road-land-use-battles-continue-as-napa-county-passes-controversial-tree-water-ordinance\">highly protected\u003c/a> — agricultural preserve.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>According to Arthur Hartinger, who is representing the county in its lawsuit against Hoopes, the program was designed so that low-impact vineyards could “continue to have a small family farm, grow grapes, produce wine, and sell it in a retail fashion” despite the land’s preservation requirements.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“They just can’t do these other kinds of things that bring more people onto the property and create impacts that have very serious potential consequences,” he continued.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Bringing more people onto the property or expanding its footprint would require a use permit because it could have environmental consequences for the preserve land, such as wastewater impacts, increased water use or traffic in the surrounding area, Hartinger said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>While Hoopes’ exemption allows for two employees and no visitors on-site daily, Lindsay Hoopes testified that the winery welcomes around 60 guests to the grounds per day, along with a number of employees. To qualify for a use permit, it would need to make updates to its wastewater, freshwater and fire protection systems, along with its road and parking. According to the county’s complaint, this could cost the winery between $500,000 and $1 million.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Hoopes, meanwhile, has joined with two other small wineries to allege in a federal lawsuit that some of Napa County’s applicable ordinances are unconstitutionally vague and that the county’s interpretation of these ordinances has changed over the years unfairly.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I have an email [from the county] that says ‘visitor’ means a liquor store owner, but then, two years ago when they sued Hoopes, [the county] said ‘No, visitor means a customer,’” said Joseph Infante, a lawyer representing the wineries in the federal case. “That’s two different things, and so that violates your constitutional right to engage in your business without arbitrary governmental interference.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The suit follows a similar one in Michigan, in which a federal court found that local municipalities’ vague ordinances were out of line with state law. Infante worked on that 2020 case and said similarly that the goal of the Hoopes federal case is to “enjoin enforcement of ordinances that are affecting and violating the constitutional rights of wineries.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The county said in a recent federal court filing that it plans to file a motion to dismiss the case and asked the court to stop litigation from proceeding in the interim. U.S. District Judge Charles Breyer ruled Monday that the case would continue to move forward and required that the county turn over discovery to the plaintiffs’ legal team in the coming weeks, but it’s possible that the county could ask the court to dismiss the case entirely.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The trial is currently set to begin at the end of the month.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>If the county’s ordinances are allowed to stand, and the court grants its injunction next month, it could affect far more than just Hoopes — other similar small wineries could have to change the way they function in Napa Valley.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"content": "\u003cp>The Media Guild of the West is calling for an overhaul of last year’s \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/12001227/newsom-strikes-deal-with-google-and-openai-to-support-california-newsrooms\">agreement with Google\u003c/a> to fund California newsrooms.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The $250 million deal reached in August promised to provide funding over the next five years to newsrooms and launch a “National AI Innovation Accelerator.” The accelerator would have supplied financial resources “and other support” to enable newsrooms to experiment with AI to bolster their work.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>However, in a\u003ca href=\"https://static1.squarespace.com/static/5dc4d9a691d92155f36cba0d/t/677bf06e33d1ab24cf430c2d/1736175726789/1-6-24+MGW+Google+fund+letter.pdf\"> letter addressed to Gov. Gavin Newsom and legislative leaders\u003c/a>, the union representing local journalists in Southern California, Arizona and Texas explained that it sees the upcoming budget process as an opportunity to rework the first-of-its-kind settlement.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Union President Matt Pearce wrote that the “meager” contributions of the deal will not be enough to “correct” the market and stimulate job growth across California’s collapsing news sector.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Our guild believes the draft settlement cannot achieve Governor Newsom’s stated aim of creating a program that ‘helps rebuild a robust and dynamic California press corps for years to come, reinforcing the vital role of journalism in our democracy,’” Pearce wrote.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The agreement tabled the California Journalism Preservation Act, a bill Google fiercely objected to. \u003ca href=\"https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billNavClient.xhtml?bill_id=202320240AB886\">The bill\u003c/a> from Assemblymember Buffy Wicks, D-Oakland, would have forced large tech platforms to pay California newsrooms a portion of their online advertising revenues in exchange for using their content.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postID=news_12018788 hero='https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/GoogleQuantumAI_WillowChip_Closeup04-1020x680.jpg']\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The deal also shelved a\u003ca href=\"https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billNavClient.xhtml?bill_id=202320240SB1327\"> bill\u003c/a> by state Sen. Steve Glazer, D-Orinda, that would have levied a 7.25% tax on digital advertising revenue to create a tax credit for newsrooms.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Pearce told KQED he is also concerned about the public funding provisions in the agreement.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“There’s a real risk of news publishers in California doing unsavory things that would make their own journalists uncomfortable if we create a system where [news publishers are] incentivized to hire lobbyists instead of hiring more reporters to go back to the Legislature and ask for more money,” Pearce said. “We need a law, not lobbying mayhem.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Pearce supports a different funding model, similar to stricter laws passed in\u003ca href=\"https://www.canada.ca/en/canadian-heritage/services/online-news.html\"> Canada\u003c/a> and\u003ca href=\"https://www.accc.gov.au/by-industry/digital-platforms-and-services/news-media-bargaining-code/news-media-bargaining-code#:~:text=The%20Treasury%20Laws%20Amendment%20(News,a%20significant%20bargaining%20power%20imbalance.\"> Australia\u003c/a> that apply to more tech companies than just Google.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Media Guild of the West proposed six recommendations to improve the settlement, including imposing a contribution incentive encouraging multiple Big Tech companies to donate to the Journalism Fund instead of relying on public dollars; requiring fair-labor standards for public funds allocated to large, corporate-owned news employers via the Journalism Fund; and removing California and the Journalism Fund from involvement with Google’s National AI Accelerator.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“These companies, whether through banning hyperlinks or degrading them on their services — which almost all platforms are doing now — to using generative AI to create their own content … they’re still extracting and benefiting from journalism,” Pearce said. “The old rules of copyright don’t quite make sense in this new era of AI-powered factory farming.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“There need to be compensation systems set up because somebody’s doing the work, whether you realize it or not, and these companies are just free-riding.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The governor’s office and Google did not respond to KQED’s request for comment. However, in a press conference on Monday, Newsom said details about the current deal would be unveiled Friday.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>The Media Guild of the West is calling for an overhaul of last year’s \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/12001227/newsom-strikes-deal-with-google-and-openai-to-support-california-newsrooms\">agreement with Google\u003c/a> to fund California newsrooms.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The $250 million deal reached in August promised to provide funding over the next five years to newsrooms and launch a “National AI Innovation Accelerator.” The accelerator would have supplied financial resources “and other support” to enable newsrooms to experiment with AI to bolster their work.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>However, in a\u003ca href=\"https://static1.squarespace.com/static/5dc4d9a691d92155f36cba0d/t/677bf06e33d1ab24cf430c2d/1736175726789/1-6-24+MGW+Google+fund+letter.pdf\"> letter addressed to Gov. Gavin Newsom and legislative leaders\u003c/a>, the union representing local journalists in Southern California, Arizona and Texas explained that it sees the upcoming budget process as an opportunity to rework the first-of-its-kind settlement.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Union President Matt Pearce wrote that the “meager” contributions of the deal will not be enough to “correct” the market and stimulate job growth across California’s collapsing news sector.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Our guild believes the draft settlement cannot achieve Governor Newsom’s stated aim of creating a program that ‘helps rebuild a robust and dynamic California press corps for years to come, reinforcing the vital role of journalism in our democracy,’” Pearce wrote.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The agreement tabled the California Journalism Preservation Act, a bill Google fiercely objected to. \u003ca href=\"https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billNavClient.xhtml?bill_id=202320240AB886\">The bill\u003c/a> from Assemblymember Buffy Wicks, D-Oakland, would have forced large tech platforms to pay California newsrooms a portion of their online advertising revenues in exchange for using their content.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The deal also shelved a\u003ca href=\"https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billNavClient.xhtml?bill_id=202320240SB1327\"> bill\u003c/a> by state Sen. Steve Glazer, D-Orinda, that would have levied a 7.25% tax on digital advertising revenue to create a tax credit for newsrooms.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Pearce told KQED he is also concerned about the public funding provisions in the agreement.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“There’s a real risk of news publishers in California doing unsavory things that would make their own journalists uncomfortable if we create a system where [news publishers are] incentivized to hire lobbyists instead of hiring more reporters to go back to the Legislature and ask for more money,” Pearce said. “We need a law, not lobbying mayhem.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Pearce supports a different funding model, similar to stricter laws passed in\u003ca href=\"https://www.canada.ca/en/canadian-heritage/services/online-news.html\"> Canada\u003c/a> and\u003ca href=\"https://www.accc.gov.au/by-industry/digital-platforms-and-services/news-media-bargaining-code/news-media-bargaining-code#:~:text=The%20Treasury%20Laws%20Amendment%20(News,a%20significant%20bargaining%20power%20imbalance.\"> Australia\u003c/a> that apply to more tech companies than just Google.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Media Guild of the West proposed six recommendations to improve the settlement, including imposing a contribution incentive encouraging multiple Big Tech companies to donate to the Journalism Fund instead of relying on public dollars; requiring fair-labor standards for public funds allocated to large, corporate-owned news employers via the Journalism Fund; and removing California and the Journalism Fund from involvement with Google’s National AI Accelerator.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“These companies, whether through banning hyperlinks or degrading them on their services — which almost all platforms are doing now — to using generative AI to create their own content … they’re still extracting and benefiting from journalism,” Pearce said. “The old rules of copyright don’t quite make sense in this new era of AI-powered factory farming.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“There need to be compensation systems set up because somebody’s doing the work, whether you realize it or not, and these companies are just free-riding.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The governor’s office and Google did not respond to KQED’s request for comment. However, in a press conference on Monday, Newsom said details about the current deal would be unveiled Friday.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"content": "\u003cp>It’s an experience that feels familiar for many freelancers in California: chasing after clients once you’ve turned in the work, to make sure you actually get paid for it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But starting on Jan. 1, 2025, \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11998844/many-freelancers-dont-get-paid-on-time-this-california-bill-aims-to-fix-that\">the Freelance Worker Protection Act — or State Bill 988 — comes into effect in California\u003c/a>, which could transform not just how freelancers and their clients negotiate compensation, but also give independent workers more protections if they don’t receive payment on time.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Lots of companies and clients don’t have the same pressure to pay independent workers and freelancers on time — or at all,” said Meredith Tannor, policy director with the Freelancers Union, a New York-based group that advocates for freelancers nationwide. According to its own surveys, 74% of Freelancers Union members have experienced a client either paying them late or not paying at all.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>California’s new Freelance Worker Protection Act will require freelancers and their clients to have a contract in place that clearly defines who is doing what work, how much the client will pay for that work — and allows the California Attorney General to investigate clients who repeatedly breach contracts.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>You don’t need to be a California resident for SB 988 to protect you, as the new law includes freelancers who don’t live in California but are working with clients who do. However, if your freelancing business is based somewhere else, say Colorado, for example, and you’re dealing with a client in Montana, SB 988 does not apply in those situations — the client needs to be based in California.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Keep reading to learn how to best prepare for the state’s new laws for freelancers and their clients in 2025 and how this law SB 988 could impact you and your business.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Talking to freelance clients about a contract\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>It might feel unusual asking clients to sign a contract, especially if you’ve worked with them for a while.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But starting Jan. 1, California law will require freelancers and clients to establish some sort of contract that clearly establishes what work is being done and when it will be compensated. Contracts won’t be required in every situation: only if you’re offering professional service equal to or greater than $250. If you’re charging a client a lesser amount than that — let’s say for a single photo headshot — there’s no need to draft up a contract.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Your contract doesn’t need to be super complicated, either. According to \u003ca href=\"https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billNavClient.xhtml?bill_id=202320240SB988\">the text of SB 988,\u003c/a> a contract needs to include four things:\u003c/p>\n\u003cul>\n\u003cli>The name and mailing address of both the freelancer and the client.\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>An itemized list of all services provided by the freelancer, including the value of those services and how the client will make payment.\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>The date when the client will pay the freelancer.\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>The date when the freelance worker will submit a list of all the services they provided the client (e.g., an invoice).\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003cp>“Freelancers should always have a contract,” said Tannor of the Freelancers Union, adding that having a contract isn’t just required by law — it also helps protect the freelancer’s labor and time. The Freelancers Union even has \u003ca href=\"https://freelancersunion.org/contract/\">an online tool where you can easily create a contract\u003c/a> that includes all the information required by SB 988.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Another option for a contract could be agreeing on the terms with your client over text message or email, but Tannor stresses that having an actual contract document — that both parties keep — can avoid any confusion in the future.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“At least in the beginning, a lot of people won’t know that this is the law,” she said — so Tannor recommends you raise SB 988 with your client first. For example, “you could say that you saw that this new law got passed, and that you want to make sure you’re dotting your I’s and crossing your T’s,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Once you have a contract signed by both your client and yourself, your client can still make additional requests from you — but make sure you document these new requests and how much more you will charge. “Make sure to keep records of all communication,” Tannor said. “If you’re taking a lot of Zoom meetings with the client, just reiterate what was stated over the call in an email to the client after.”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Making sure your client pays you\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>SB 988 requires that your client pays you the full agreed amount on the date you’ve both established on the contract. And if for whatever reason you and your client did not agree on a date while writing a contract, the law requires that you get paid no later than 30 days after completing your services.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But what if pay day comes and goes, and your client has still not paid you? You have two options:\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>1. Take your client to small claims or civil court\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In small claims or civil court, you can demand up to double what your client owes you. To file a case, you’ll have to do so with your county courthouse. You don’t need an attorney for this process but a lawyer can provide insight unique to your case, especially if you have little documentation available from the work you provided.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Learn more about filing a small claims case in each Bay Area county:\u003c/p>\n\u003cul>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"https://www.alameda.courts.ca.gov/divisions/small-claims\">Filing in Alameda County\u003c/a>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"https://www.cc-courts.org/small-claims/small-claims.aspx\">Filing in Contra Costa County\u003c/a>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"https://www.marin.courts.ca.gov/divisions/small-claims\">Filing in Marin County\u003c/a>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"https://www.napa.courts.ca.gov/divisions/small-claims\">Filing in Napa County\u003c/a>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"https://sanmateo.courts.ca.gov/divisions/small-claims-division\">Filing in San Mateo County\u003c/a>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"https://sf.courts.ca.gov/divisions/small-claims\">Filing in San Francisco\u003c/a>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"https://santaclara.courts.ca.gov/divisions/small-claims-division\">Filing in Santa Clara County\u003c/a>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"https://solano.courts.ca.gov/divisions/small-claims\">Filing in Solano County\u003c/a>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"https://sonoma.courts.ca.gov/divisions/small-claims\">Filing in Sonoma County\u003c/a>\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003cp>Some counties, like Alameda, limit the amount a business can claim ($5,000) and the amount of claims filed per year. If the amount you’re owed exceeds what your county allows for in small claims court, you can consider talking to an attorney to explore other options, like a lawsuit against your client.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>2. Report your client to the California Department of Justice\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>According to the office of State Sen. Scott Wiener, the author of SB 988, this new law makes it possible for freelancers to file a complaint directly with California Attorney General Rob Bonta — who can then investigate and initiate civil action proceedings.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>However, the Attorney General’s Office would most likely step in when the situation involves a large employer that has repeatedly failed to properly pay its clients, Wiener’s office told KQED. \u003ca href=\"https://oag.ca.gov/contact/general-contact-form\">You can reach out to the Attorney General’s Office using an online form.\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Keep in mind that as a freelancer, you don’t have the option to file a complaint with other state watchdog agencies, like the Labor Commissioner’s Office, because as a freelancer, you’re not considered an “employee.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Whichever option you choose, this is when you want to have easy access to the paper trail you’ve built with this client, including the contract, any invoices, emails and texts related to the work you’ve provided.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>It’s an experience that feels familiar for many freelancers in California: chasing after clients once you’ve turned in the work, to make sure you actually get paid for it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But starting on Jan. 1, 2025, \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11998844/many-freelancers-dont-get-paid-on-time-this-california-bill-aims-to-fix-that\">the Freelance Worker Protection Act — or State Bill 988 — comes into effect in California\u003c/a>, which could transform not just how freelancers and their clients negotiate compensation, but also give independent workers more protections if they don’t receive payment on time.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Lots of companies and clients don’t have the same pressure to pay independent workers and freelancers on time — or at all,” said Meredith Tannor, policy director with the Freelancers Union, a New York-based group that advocates for freelancers nationwide. According to its own surveys, 74% of Freelancers Union members have experienced a client either paying them late or not paying at all.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>California’s new Freelance Worker Protection Act will require freelancers and their clients to have a contract in place that clearly defines who is doing what work, how much the client will pay for that work — and allows the California Attorney General to investigate clients who repeatedly breach contracts.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>You don’t need to be a California resident for SB 988 to protect you, as the new law includes freelancers who don’t live in California but are working with clients who do. However, if your freelancing business is based somewhere else, say Colorado, for example, and you’re dealing with a client in Montana, SB 988 does not apply in those situations — the client needs to be based in California.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Keep reading to learn how to best prepare for the state’s new laws for freelancers and their clients in 2025 and how this law SB 988 could impact you and your business.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Talking to freelance clients about a contract\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>It might feel unusual asking clients to sign a contract, especially if you’ve worked with them for a while.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But starting Jan. 1, California law will require freelancers and clients to establish some sort of contract that clearly establishes what work is being done and when it will be compensated. Contracts won’t be required in every situation: only if you’re offering professional service equal to or greater than $250. If you’re charging a client a lesser amount than that — let’s say for a single photo headshot — there’s no need to draft up a contract.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Your contract doesn’t need to be super complicated, either. According to \u003ca href=\"https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billNavClient.xhtml?bill_id=202320240SB988\">the text of SB 988,\u003c/a> a contract needs to include four things:\u003c/p>\n\u003cul>\n\u003cli>The name and mailing address of both the freelancer and the client.\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>An itemized list of all services provided by the freelancer, including the value of those services and how the client will make payment.\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>The date when the client will pay the freelancer.\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>The date when the freelance worker will submit a list of all the services they provided the client (e.g., an invoice).\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003cp>“Freelancers should always have a contract,” said Tannor of the Freelancers Union, adding that having a contract isn’t just required by law — it also helps protect the freelancer’s labor and time. The Freelancers Union even has \u003ca href=\"https://freelancersunion.org/contract/\">an online tool where you can easily create a contract\u003c/a> that includes all the information required by SB 988.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Another option for a contract could be agreeing on the terms with your client over text message or email, but Tannor stresses that having an actual contract document — that both parties keep — can avoid any confusion in the future.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“At least in the beginning, a lot of people won’t know that this is the law,” she said — so Tannor recommends you raise SB 988 with your client first. For example, “you could say that you saw that this new law got passed, and that you want to make sure you’re dotting your I’s and crossing your T’s,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Once you have a contract signed by both your client and yourself, your client can still make additional requests from you — but make sure you document these new requests and how much more you will charge. “Make sure to keep records of all communication,” Tannor said. “If you’re taking a lot of Zoom meetings with the client, just reiterate what was stated over the call in an email to the client after.”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Making sure your client pays you\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>SB 988 requires that your client pays you the full agreed amount on the date you’ve both established on the contract. And if for whatever reason you and your client did not agree on a date while writing a contract, the law requires that you get paid no later than 30 days after completing your services.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But what if pay day comes and goes, and your client has still not paid you? You have two options:\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>1. Take your client to small claims or civil court\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In small claims or civil court, you can demand up to double what your client owes you. To file a case, you’ll have to do so with your county courthouse. You don’t need an attorney for this process but a lawyer can provide insight unique to your case, especially if you have little documentation available from the work you provided.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Learn more about filing a small claims case in each Bay Area county:\u003c/p>\n\u003cul>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"https://www.alameda.courts.ca.gov/divisions/small-claims\">Filing in Alameda County\u003c/a>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"https://www.cc-courts.org/small-claims/small-claims.aspx\">Filing in Contra Costa County\u003c/a>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"https://www.marin.courts.ca.gov/divisions/small-claims\">Filing in Marin County\u003c/a>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"https://www.napa.courts.ca.gov/divisions/small-claims\">Filing in Napa County\u003c/a>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"https://sanmateo.courts.ca.gov/divisions/small-claims-division\">Filing in San Mateo County\u003c/a>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"https://sf.courts.ca.gov/divisions/small-claims\">Filing in San Francisco\u003c/a>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"https://santaclara.courts.ca.gov/divisions/small-claims-division\">Filing in Santa Clara County\u003c/a>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"https://solano.courts.ca.gov/divisions/small-claims\">Filing in Solano County\u003c/a>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"https://sonoma.courts.ca.gov/divisions/small-claims\">Filing in Sonoma County\u003c/a>\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003cp>Some counties, like Alameda, limit the amount a business can claim ($5,000) and the amount of claims filed per year. If the amount you’re owed exceeds what your county allows for in small claims court, you can consider talking to an attorney to explore other options, like a lawsuit against your client.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>2. Report your client to the California Department of Justice\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>According to the office of State Sen. Scott Wiener, the author of SB 988, this new law makes it possible for freelancers to file a complaint directly with California Attorney General Rob Bonta — who can then investigate and initiate civil action proceedings.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>However, the Attorney General’s Office would most likely step in when the situation involves a large employer that has repeatedly failed to properly pay its clients, Wiener’s office told KQED. \u003ca href=\"https://oag.ca.gov/contact/general-contact-form\">You can reach out to the Attorney General’s Office using an online form.\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Keep in mind that as a freelancer, you don’t have the option to file a complaint with other state watchdog agencies, like the Labor Commissioner’s Office, because as a freelancer, you’re not considered an “employee.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Whichever option you choose, this is when you want to have easy access to the paper trail you’ve built with this client, including the contract, any invoices, emails and texts related to the work you’ve provided.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cp>Striking Amazon and Starbucks workers are on picket lines instead of delivering last-minute presents or handing customers Christmas-themed drinks, as their unions pressure the companies during the holidays — and before a less union-friendly president is sworn into office.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The workers accuse their employers of refusing to recognize their unions or to bargain in good faith. They have been organizing for more than four years but have yet to land a contract. Some have filed complaints with the National Labor Relations Board, alleging union-busting behavior by the companies, including coercion, threats, discipline and firings. Amazon and Starbucks have also filed complaints against the unions, accusing them of coercion, violence and illegal strikes.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Soon, the board will likely be less sympathetic to unions after the Senate \u003ca href=\"https://www.cbsnews.com/news/senate-nlrb-vote-repbulicans-lauren-mcferran/\">earlier this month failed\u003c/a> to extend the term of then-Chairperson Lauren McFerran. The five-member board had three Democratic members including McFerran. President-elect Donald Trump will have the chance to appoint two more Republicans.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The Trump NLRB the first time around was the most right-wing, anti-labor NLRB in the entire nearly 90-year history of the board,” said William Gould, a former chairperson of the National Labor Relations Board during President Bill Clinton’s administration and a professor emeritus at Stanford University.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Gould said he doesn’t remember “any board so eager and activist to reverse what had gone on before.” Because of that, he expects that “most of what the Biden board has done will be overturned by the Trump board,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Karoline Leavitt, a spokesperson for the Trump transition team, did not respond to specific questions about the board. In an email, she instead described the president-elect as a champion of workers, writing, “The working men and women of America have been left behind, which is why President Trump and Republicans saw historic support from working class voters. President Trump will keep his promise to the hardworking men and women of America by bringing jobs back home, restoring American manufacturing, slashing inflation, and cutting taxes.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>An \u003ca href=\"https://taxfoundation.org/research/all/federal/donald-trump-tax-plan-2024/\">analysis of Trump’s policies\u003c/a> by the nonpartisan Tax Foundation found his proposed tax cuts would disproportionately benefit higher-income taxpayers, while his planned \u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/economy/2024/11/trump-tariffs-california-impact/\">tariffs\u003c/a> would fall hardest on the middle and working class.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Labor leaders said a reversal of Biden-era labor board decisions does not bode well for their unionizing efforts — many of them \u003ca href=\"https://perfectunion.us/map-where-are-starbucks-workers-unionizing/\">in, or started in, California\u003c/a> — though they added that they do not expect workers and unions to quit trying.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>California unions are preparing to ask state legislators and Gov. Gavin Newsom to toughen up the state’s own policies as “insurance” against potentially weaker federal rules. The California Labor Federation plans to revive a long-shot bill Newsom vetoed last year that would have allowed workers to receive unemployment benefits if they strike. They also will push state lawmakers to protect private-sector unionization, in the event that right is eroded in federal law.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We want to make sure we can preserve what we have,” said Labor Federation leader Lorena Gonzalez.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Under the Biden administration, the NLRB’s director has taken more aggressive action to enforce laws that require employers to bargain in good faith and prohibit retaliation, and taken a series of legal positions favorable to organizing workers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>They include what John Logan, professor and chairperson of Labor and Employment Studies at San Francisco State University, said was “the most important action” of the board in the Biden years: \u003ca href=\"https://www.nlrb.gov/news-outreach/news-story/board-issues-decision-announcing-new-framework-for-union-representation\">a 2023 decision that established a new standard\u003c/a> on when employers must bargain with unions without a representation election. If a majority of employees vote to unionize, employers must recognize and bargain with the union, or else seek an election within 14 days. If employers engage in unfair labor practices during the process, the board could order them to bargain with the union.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He expects the board to reverse that ruling under Trump.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Issues at Amazon\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Already, companies have been resisting that decision.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Amazon workers are striking in part to try to force the company to bargain with some of its subcontracted workers. They cite a Los Angeles regional NLRB director’s August 2024 finding that the e-commerce giant was a “joint employer” of a group of delivery drivers, who work for a nationwide network of contractors the company calls “delivery service partners.” That means the finding holds Amazon legally responsible for the wages, working conditions and treatment of the subcontracted workers. If the determination withstands lengthy legal challenges, that could open the door for the workers to bargain directly with Amazon.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The regional director’s finding stemmed from a group of Palmdale drivers who worked for the contractor Battle-Tested Strategies and who became \u003ca href=\"https://www.latimes.com/business/story/2024-09-24/amazon-demands-a-lot-from-its-drivers-now-its-a-two-way-street\">the first Amazon delivery drivers\u003c/a> in the country to unionize in April 2023. Amazon ended its contract with Battle Tested — retaliation, the Teamsters claimed, for the union drive. Amazon denied that, saying it cut the contract over “repeated” breaches by the delivery company, and the regional director dismissed the retaliation claim.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But \u003ca href=\"https://apnews.com/article/amazon-nlrb-delivery-drivers-3214680ef8c8b060184964412f378128\">the regulator \u003c/a>said both Amazon and Battle Tested failed to negotiate with the drivers’ union on working conditions, including the effects of the contract termination on the drivers’ jobs. In September, the agency \u003ca href=\"https://www.nlrb.gov/case/31-CA-317349\">filed a complaint \u003c/a>before the labor board trying to force Amazon to bargain; the larger company in turn sued the NLRB director and the board in federal court, seeking to halt any order to bargain and arguing the board itself is unconstitutional.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12019707\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1568px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12019707\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/121924_Amazon_Strike_SF-28-CM-copy.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1568\" height=\"1045\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/121924_Amazon_Strike_SF-28-CM-copy.jpg 1568w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/121924_Amazon_Strike_SF-28-CM-copy-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/121924_Amazon_Strike_SF-28-CM-copy-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/121924_Amazon_Strike_SF-28-CM-copy-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/121924_Amazon_Strike_SF-28-CM-copy-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1568px) 100vw, 1568px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Striking workers temporarily block Amazon delivery vehicles from exiting an Amazon warehouse in the Bayview District in San Francisco on Dec. 19. Amazon workers at multiple facilities across the United States went on strike to fight for a union contract. \u003ccite>(Jungho Kim for CalMatters)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Whether larger companies should be considered employers of the workers of their contractors is an unsettled area of federal labor law that has been repeatedly reversed by different labor relations boards since the Obama administration. It’s another instance in which the current board made it easier to unionize workers but a new board under Trump could very well reverse the decision.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Amazon warehouse worker Leah Pensler, 26, helped organize her coworkers at a delivery facility in San Francisco. Pensler, who walked the picket line Thursday, told CalMatters that since more than 100 workers at the facility signed union cards and joined the Teamsters in October, the company has denied they formed a union.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Pensler also said “Amazon has worked hard to scare workers by (saying) that with union representation, people may not receive the same working conditions and pay we currently have.” The labor board’s regulators made similar charges in its complaint against Amazon in the Palmdale case.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Eileen Hards, a spokesperson for Amazon, said “the Teamsters promise a lot of things that they can’t guarantee.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Hards also called the strikes by the Teamsters illegal. For one thing, she said, Amazon does not consider the delivery drivers on strike to be its employees. And she said the San Francisco facility did not hold a vote, and that “in order to be recognized they have to file with the NLRB,” which those workers did not.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But Emily Orlach, a spokesperson for the Teamsters, said that under the new standard established in 2023, Amazon is legally required to negotiate with the workers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Also, Amazon, SpaceX and a few other major corporations that have been accused by the labor board of violating workplace rights have in recent years \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/2024/11/18/nx-s1-5192918/spacex-amazon-nlrb-labor-board-elon-musk\">argued before the federal courts\u003c/a> that the board itself is unconstitutional.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Amazon strike is ongoing.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Issues at Starbucks\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Starbucks Workers United member baristas at several stores in different states walked off the job beginning Friday. The union says the strikes are now in 13 states and will spread to more than 300 stores Tuesday, continuing through Christmas Eve.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>JJ Dizon, a barista in Yuba City, said during a virtual announcement Thursday that she was proud of the progress the union has made in bargaining with Starbucks — that the union was in “the home stretch” of months of negotiations for a contract on behalf of 537 union stores and more than 10,000 workers. The company employed about 211,000 workers in the United States as of September, according to its latest annual financial report.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12019708\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1568px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12019708\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/122024-Starbucks-Strike-DD-AP-01-CM-copy.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1568\" height=\"1045\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/122024-Starbucks-Strike-DD-AP-01-CM-copy.jpg 1568w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/122024-Starbucks-Strike-DD-AP-01-CM-copy-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/122024-Starbucks-Strike-DD-AP-01-CM-copy-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/122024-Starbucks-Strike-DD-AP-01-CM-copy-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/122024-Starbucks-Strike-DD-AP-01-CM-copy-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1568px) 100vw, 1568px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Starbucks workers picket outside of a closed Starbucks in Burbank on Dec. 20, 2024. \u003ccite>(Damian Dovarganes/AP Photo)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>But other workers who spoke on the call said the company’s new chief executive, Brian Niccol, took the reins in September and “started to chill bargaining.” They characterized Starbucks’ proposed 2% raises as “insulting.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The labor movement has reached a tipping point while the CEOs remain in their towers,” Dizon said.[aside label=\"Related Stories\" postID=\"forum_2010101907450,news_12019254,news_12007450\"]Starbucks spokesperson Phil Gee said in an emailed statement ahead of the strike announcement that it was “disappointing” that the union was thinking of striking, considering that the two sides had “reached 30 meaningful agreements on dozens of topics Workers United delegates told us were important to them, including many economic issues.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“If the delegates want to serve the partners they represent, they need to continue the work of negotiating an agreement,” Gee said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Logan, the SF State professor, said that for both the Starbucks and Amazon workers, “this might be their last, best chance to pressure the companies in public before Trump comes into office.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Brandon Dawkins is an officer with Service Employees International Union Local 1021, which has been organizing Starbucks stores in Northern California, 22 of which have voted to unionize so far. Fifty-three stores in the state have taken union-authorization votes since 2022, 37 of which have voted to unionize. He said Starbucks workers have lived through a previous Trump NLRB before, but acknowledged there could be more changes this time around.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We have to continue to organize no matter what,” Dawkins said.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>The future of organizing\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Among the other things Gould, the former labor board chairperson, said the Trump board will likely reverse is the \u003ca href=\"https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2021/03/15/labor-board-withdraws-planned-rule-against-student-employee-unions\">2021 decision\u003c/a> requiring colleges to treat graduate students as employees, which \u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/education/higher-education/college-beat/2023/10/student-workers/\">gives them the right to bargain collectively\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“That won’t eliminate collective bargaining at the universities,” he said. “But it will be a signal to universities to exploit any advantage they have, and to weaken unions that are already there.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Gonzalez of the California Labor Federation said she doesn’t expect a tougher legal landscape to stem a rising tide of union activity.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She said the current labor board’s rulings have been “nice to have,” but even under a more worker-friendly administration, it’s been hard for regulators to force large employers such as Amazon and Starbucks to the bargaining table.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s not like we had a magic bullet,” she said. The companies “will continue to fight, and yet, workers are still coming together and demanding their rights.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n",
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"excerpt": "Striking Amazon and Starbucks workers in California and elsewhere have long pushed for union contracts. The Trump administration is unlikely to be on their side.",
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"headline": "Why Amazon and Starbucks Workers Are Striking Now, and What It Means for Labor Under Trump",
"datePublished": "2024-12-24T04:00:19-08:00",
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"nprByline": "\u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/author/levi-sumagaysay/\">Levi Sumagaysay\u003c/a> and \u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/author/jeanne-kuang/\">Jeanne Kuang\u003c/a>, CalMatters",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>Striking Amazon and Starbucks workers are on picket lines instead of delivering last-minute presents or handing customers Christmas-themed drinks, as their unions pressure the companies during the holidays — and before a less union-friendly president is sworn into office.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The workers accuse their employers of refusing to recognize their unions or to bargain in good faith. They have been organizing for more than four years but have yet to land a contract. Some have filed complaints with the National Labor Relations Board, alleging union-busting behavior by the companies, including coercion, threats, discipline and firings. Amazon and Starbucks have also filed complaints against the unions, accusing them of coercion, violence and illegal strikes.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Soon, the board will likely be less sympathetic to unions after the Senate \u003ca href=\"https://www.cbsnews.com/news/senate-nlrb-vote-repbulicans-lauren-mcferran/\">earlier this month failed\u003c/a> to extend the term of then-Chairperson Lauren McFerran. The five-member board had three Democratic members including McFerran. President-elect Donald Trump will have the chance to appoint two more Republicans.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The Trump NLRB the first time around was the most right-wing, anti-labor NLRB in the entire nearly 90-year history of the board,” said William Gould, a former chairperson of the National Labor Relations Board during President Bill Clinton’s administration and a professor emeritus at Stanford University.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Gould said he doesn’t remember “any board so eager and activist to reverse what had gone on before.” Because of that, he expects that “most of what the Biden board has done will be overturned by the Trump board,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Karoline Leavitt, a spokesperson for the Trump transition team, did not respond to specific questions about the board. In an email, she instead described the president-elect as a champion of workers, writing, “The working men and women of America have been left behind, which is why President Trump and Republicans saw historic support from working class voters. President Trump will keep his promise to the hardworking men and women of America by bringing jobs back home, restoring American manufacturing, slashing inflation, and cutting taxes.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>An \u003ca href=\"https://taxfoundation.org/research/all/federal/donald-trump-tax-plan-2024/\">analysis of Trump’s policies\u003c/a> by the nonpartisan Tax Foundation found his proposed tax cuts would disproportionately benefit higher-income taxpayers, while his planned \u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/economy/2024/11/trump-tariffs-california-impact/\">tariffs\u003c/a> would fall hardest on the middle and working class.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Labor leaders said a reversal of Biden-era labor board decisions does not bode well for their unionizing efforts — many of them \u003ca href=\"https://perfectunion.us/map-where-are-starbucks-workers-unionizing/\">in, or started in, California\u003c/a> — though they added that they do not expect workers and unions to quit trying.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>California unions are preparing to ask state legislators and Gov. Gavin Newsom to toughen up the state’s own policies as “insurance” against potentially weaker federal rules. The California Labor Federation plans to revive a long-shot bill Newsom vetoed last year that would have allowed workers to receive unemployment benefits if they strike. They also will push state lawmakers to protect private-sector unionization, in the event that right is eroded in federal law.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We want to make sure we can preserve what we have,” said Labor Federation leader Lorena Gonzalez.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Under the Biden administration, the NLRB’s director has taken more aggressive action to enforce laws that require employers to bargain in good faith and prohibit retaliation, and taken a series of legal positions favorable to organizing workers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>They include what John Logan, professor and chairperson of Labor and Employment Studies at San Francisco State University, said was “the most important action” of the board in the Biden years: \u003ca href=\"https://www.nlrb.gov/news-outreach/news-story/board-issues-decision-announcing-new-framework-for-union-representation\">a 2023 decision that established a new standard\u003c/a> on when employers must bargain with unions without a representation election. If a majority of employees vote to unionize, employers must recognize and bargain with the union, or else seek an election within 14 days. If employers engage in unfair labor practices during the process, the board could order them to bargain with the union.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He expects the board to reverse that ruling under Trump.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Issues at Amazon\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Already, companies have been resisting that decision.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Amazon workers are striking in part to try to force the company to bargain with some of its subcontracted workers. They cite a Los Angeles regional NLRB director’s August 2024 finding that the e-commerce giant was a “joint employer” of a group of delivery drivers, who work for a nationwide network of contractors the company calls “delivery service partners.” That means the finding holds Amazon legally responsible for the wages, working conditions and treatment of the subcontracted workers. If the determination withstands lengthy legal challenges, that could open the door for the workers to bargain directly with Amazon.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The regional director’s finding stemmed from a group of Palmdale drivers who worked for the contractor Battle-Tested Strategies and who became \u003ca href=\"https://www.latimes.com/business/story/2024-09-24/amazon-demands-a-lot-from-its-drivers-now-its-a-two-way-street\">the first Amazon delivery drivers\u003c/a> in the country to unionize in April 2023. Amazon ended its contract with Battle Tested — retaliation, the Teamsters claimed, for the union drive. Amazon denied that, saying it cut the contract over “repeated” breaches by the delivery company, and the regional director dismissed the retaliation claim.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But \u003ca href=\"https://apnews.com/article/amazon-nlrb-delivery-drivers-3214680ef8c8b060184964412f378128\">the regulator \u003c/a>said both Amazon and Battle Tested failed to negotiate with the drivers’ union on working conditions, including the effects of the contract termination on the drivers’ jobs. In September, the agency \u003ca href=\"https://www.nlrb.gov/case/31-CA-317349\">filed a complaint \u003c/a>before the labor board trying to force Amazon to bargain; the larger company in turn sued the NLRB director and the board in federal court, seeking to halt any order to bargain and arguing the board itself is unconstitutional.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12019707\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1568px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12019707\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/121924_Amazon_Strike_SF-28-CM-copy.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1568\" height=\"1045\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/121924_Amazon_Strike_SF-28-CM-copy.jpg 1568w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/121924_Amazon_Strike_SF-28-CM-copy-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/121924_Amazon_Strike_SF-28-CM-copy-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/121924_Amazon_Strike_SF-28-CM-copy-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/121924_Amazon_Strike_SF-28-CM-copy-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1568px) 100vw, 1568px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Striking workers temporarily block Amazon delivery vehicles from exiting an Amazon warehouse in the Bayview District in San Francisco on Dec. 19. Amazon workers at multiple facilities across the United States went on strike to fight for a union contract. \u003ccite>(Jungho Kim for CalMatters)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Whether larger companies should be considered employers of the workers of their contractors is an unsettled area of federal labor law that has been repeatedly reversed by different labor relations boards since the Obama administration. It’s another instance in which the current board made it easier to unionize workers but a new board under Trump could very well reverse the decision.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Amazon warehouse worker Leah Pensler, 26, helped organize her coworkers at a delivery facility in San Francisco. Pensler, who walked the picket line Thursday, told CalMatters that since more than 100 workers at the facility signed union cards and joined the Teamsters in October, the company has denied they formed a union.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Pensler also said “Amazon has worked hard to scare workers by (saying) that with union representation, people may not receive the same working conditions and pay we currently have.” The labor board’s regulators made similar charges in its complaint against Amazon in the Palmdale case.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Eileen Hards, a spokesperson for Amazon, said “the Teamsters promise a lot of things that they can’t guarantee.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Hards also called the strikes by the Teamsters illegal. For one thing, she said, Amazon does not consider the delivery drivers on strike to be its employees. And she said the San Francisco facility did not hold a vote, and that “in order to be recognized they have to file with the NLRB,” which those workers did not.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But Emily Orlach, a spokesperson for the Teamsters, said that under the new standard established in 2023, Amazon is legally required to negotiate with the workers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Also, Amazon, SpaceX and a few other major corporations that have been accused by the labor board of violating workplace rights have in recent years \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/2024/11/18/nx-s1-5192918/spacex-amazon-nlrb-labor-board-elon-musk\">argued before the federal courts\u003c/a> that the board itself is unconstitutional.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Amazon strike is ongoing.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Issues at Starbucks\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Starbucks Workers United member baristas at several stores in different states walked off the job beginning Friday. The union says the strikes are now in 13 states and will spread to more than 300 stores Tuesday, continuing through Christmas Eve.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>JJ Dizon, a barista in Yuba City, said during a virtual announcement Thursday that she was proud of the progress the union has made in bargaining with Starbucks — that the union was in “the home stretch” of months of negotiations for a contract on behalf of 537 union stores and more than 10,000 workers. The company employed about 211,000 workers in the United States as of September, according to its latest annual financial report.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12019708\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1568px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12019708\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/122024-Starbucks-Strike-DD-AP-01-CM-copy.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1568\" height=\"1045\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/122024-Starbucks-Strike-DD-AP-01-CM-copy.jpg 1568w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/122024-Starbucks-Strike-DD-AP-01-CM-copy-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/122024-Starbucks-Strike-DD-AP-01-CM-copy-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/122024-Starbucks-Strike-DD-AP-01-CM-copy-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/122024-Starbucks-Strike-DD-AP-01-CM-copy-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1568px) 100vw, 1568px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Starbucks workers picket outside of a closed Starbucks in Burbank on Dec. 20, 2024. \u003ccite>(Damian Dovarganes/AP Photo)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>But other workers who spoke on the call said the company’s new chief executive, Brian Niccol, took the reins in September and “started to chill bargaining.” They characterized Starbucks’ proposed 2% raises as “insulting.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The labor movement has reached a tipping point while the CEOs remain in their towers,” Dizon said.\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>Starbucks spokesperson Phil Gee said in an emailed statement ahead of the strike announcement that it was “disappointing” that the union was thinking of striking, considering that the two sides had “reached 30 meaningful agreements on dozens of topics Workers United delegates told us were important to them, including many economic issues.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“If the delegates want to serve the partners they represent, they need to continue the work of negotiating an agreement,” Gee said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Logan, the SF State professor, said that for both the Starbucks and Amazon workers, “this might be their last, best chance to pressure the companies in public before Trump comes into office.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Brandon Dawkins is an officer with Service Employees International Union Local 1021, which has been organizing Starbucks stores in Northern California, 22 of which have voted to unionize so far. Fifty-three stores in the state have taken union-authorization votes since 2022, 37 of which have voted to unionize. He said Starbucks workers have lived through a previous Trump NLRB before, but acknowledged there could be more changes this time around.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We have to continue to organize no matter what,” Dawkins said.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>The future of organizing\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Among the other things Gould, the former labor board chairperson, said the Trump board will likely reverse is the \u003ca href=\"https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2021/03/15/labor-board-withdraws-planned-rule-against-student-employee-unions\">2021 decision\u003c/a> requiring colleges to treat graduate students as employees, which \u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/education/higher-education/college-beat/2023/10/student-workers/\">gives them the right to bargain collectively\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“That won’t eliminate collective bargaining at the universities,” he said. “But it will be a signal to universities to exploit any advantage they have, and to weaken unions that are already there.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Gonzalez of the California Labor Federation said she doesn’t expect a tougher legal landscape to stem a rising tide of union activity.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She said the current labor board’s rulings have been “nice to have,” but even under a more worker-friendly administration, it’s been hard for regulators to force large employers such as Amazon and Starbucks to the bargaining table.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s not like we had a magic bullet,” she said. The companies “will continue to fight, and yet, workers are still coming together and demanding their rights.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"slug": "its-living-hell-nurses-say-a-california-addiction-recovery-program-ended-their-careers",
"title": "'It's Living Hell': Nurses Say a California Addiction Recovery Program Ended Their Careers",
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"headTitle": "‘It’s Living Hell’: Nurses Say a California Addiction Recovery Program Ended Their Careers | KQED",
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"content": "\u003cp>Bobbie Sage thought nursing would be her salvation. She was trapped in an abusive relationship with four kids and looking for a steady income. The day she graduated vocational nursing school, she took the kids and left their father.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Five years later, a DUI ruined her carefully crafted stability. Sage was waiting for a taxi outside a bar with another partner when he began hitting her, she said. She fled in her own car. A mistake with enduring consequences.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sage was charged with a misdemeanor for driving under the influence of alcohol in 2014. She paid a fine and completed three years of criminal probation without incident, according to court documents. She thought that tumultuous period of her life was over until her state licensing board ordered her to complete an additional probation program for health professionals with substance use problems.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sage couldn’t afford the drug tests at $300 a month or a fine of $3,140. She dropped out. She surrendered her vocational nursing license in 2019 and blames the program for ending her career.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Now, Sage is among dozens of health care workers who allege they’ve been mistreated under a California law governing workers with addiction and mental health problems. They say state regulations are needlessly punitive, overly bureaucratic and based on faulty addiction science. They call it a trap that prevents them from working and leaves many of them with thousands of dollars of debt.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“One misdemeanor is costing my entire life,” Sage said. “Punish me for something with my (nursing) license that I’ve done with my license.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The 2008 law was supposed to protect patients after a series of audits and legislative hearings suggested licensing boards were doing a poor job of keeping impaired health workers off the job. It created uniform regulations for each board to follow that stipulate exactly how to deal with these workers, including extensive drug testing, travel restrictions and psychiatric evaluations meant to catch anyone who relapsed.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Some boards created recovery programs as an alternative to discipline. Workers could volunteer to join as a step toward their recovery or be asked to join by their licensing board as a substitute for public punishment. Others, including Sage, were ordered into a parallel probation program after an incident such as a DUI or other licensing violation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Nurses say those provisions have become so burdensome and expensive that health care workers avoid the recovery program outright unless a licensing board asks them to join. As a result, the state is monitoring fewer workers than ever. Fewer than 400 people are enrolled, down from a peak of more than 900 in 2010.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The recovery program \u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/health/2024/12/medical-board-addiction-recovery/\">has never included doctors\u003c/a>, whose lobby resisted it because members believed it was too punitive, according to Gail Jara, executive director of \u003ca href=\"https://cppph.org/\">California Public Protection and Physician Health\u003c/a>, an organization dedicated to creating a new recovery program for doctors. The California Medical Board, which licenses most doctors, plans to push for an alternative program in the Legislature in the coming year.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s living hell,” said an emergency room nurse interviewed by CalMatters who joined voluntarily. The nurse asked for confidentiality because she could lose her license for speaking out under the terms of her contract.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The nurse has been unable to find a job that meets the program’s strict work limitations for nearly two years despite clean tests. She has spent more than $8,000 on drug tests, according to receipts, several thousand more on medical and psychological evaluations, and more than $20,000 paying for health insurance because she lost her work insurance.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Dentists, physical therapists, veterinarians and other health workers whose professional licensing boards are overseen by the California Department of Consumer Affairs are subject to the state law. Nurses make up the majority of the participants, and complaints about the program have erupted at recent Board of Registered Nurses meetings.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Many say they’ve followed all the rules and still see no way out, even after years of demonstrated sobriety.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Officials at those meetings faulted minor changes they made to increase oversight, suggesting they went too far. Participants and addiction experts interviewed by CalMatters, however, say the law itself is the root of the issue.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We’ve built systems that are completely onerous and agnostic of the value of a human life,” said \u003ca href=\"https://bouve.northeastern.edu/directory/amanda-choflet/\">Amanda Choflet\u003c/a>, dean of nursing at Northeastern University in Boston and an expert in nursing addiction programs. “It’s not even that the systems themselves are actively trying to keep people from being able to recover. It’s that the systems aren’t built for humans. They’re built in order to enact legislation.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A group of consumer advocates that pushed for the law argues that it is doing exactly what it is meant to do — impose consequences on workers who can’t stay sober. Michele Monserratt-Ramos, a patient advocate with Consumer Watchdog, said licensing boards’ first duty is to protect the public, not shield health workers with substance use or mental health disorders.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Many of the requirements that nurses and other workers say are intolerable, such as work prohibitions, were designed to protect patients, said Monserratt-Ramos, whose fiancé died after an operation with a doctor who had a history of substance abuse. If health workers know addictive behaviors and other impairments will be scrutinized by their licensing boards, they’ll be less likely to do something harmful, she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The safety net now is the consequences,” Monserratt-Ramos said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Department of Consumer Affairs did not make anyone available for an interview, stating that the regulations governing the program were written by a committee years ago and no experts were available. In a statement, the department said each health care board is independently responsible for implementing the program, and eight boards contract with an outside vendor, Maximus Inc., to do so.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Board of Registered Nursing refused several times to make executive staff or board members available for an interview to address participants’ complaints. Individual board members also failed to return calls or emails from CalMatters. In a statement to CalMatters, board staff said they have already addressed such complaints and are working to address more.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Maximus, a publicly traded company worth $4.5 billion, did not respond to several interview requests. The vendor’s $12.4 million state contract expires at the end of December. The company did not bid for a new contract, and the Department of Consumer Affairs did not provide a reason why.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sage says she worked hard to transform her life and move on from past abuse. She’s a licensed esthetician now and runs a successful studio in the Bay Area. Family and colleagues describe her as a hard worker, a natural caregiver and someone who doesn’t complain.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12019194\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1568px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12019194\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/103124-Nursing-Rehab-MO-CM-13-copy.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1568\" height=\"1045\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/103124-Nursing-Rehab-MO-CM-13-copy.jpg 1568w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/103124-Nursing-Rehab-MO-CM-13-copy-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/103124-Nursing-Rehab-MO-CM-13-copy-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/103124-Nursing-Rehab-MO-CM-13-copy-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/103124-Nursing-Rehab-MO-CM-13-copy-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1568px) 100vw, 1568px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Former vocational nurse Bobbie Sage reviews her case files in the lobby of her aesthetics studio in Pleasanton. Sage has kept the files after years of trying to navigate a disciplinary program for nurses with addictions that she was forced to attend. \u003ccite>(Manuel Orbegozo for CalMatters)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>She admits she made a mistake but says she never had an addiction problem. CalMatters reviewed a letter Sage provided from a doctor confirming that she did not meet the criteria for alcoholism and has never been diagnosed as an alcoholic. Under state law, any medical professional with a DUI is presumed to have a \u003ca href=\"https://casetext.com/regulation/california-code-of-regulations/title-16-professional-and-vocational-regulations/division-25-board-of-vocational-nurse-and-psychiatric-technician-examiners-of-the-state-of-california/chapter-1-vocational-nurses/article-4-licenses/section-2524-disciplinary-guidelines-and-uniform-standards-regarding-substance-abusing-licensees\">substance abuse\u003c/a> problem, even if it is a one-time offense. The Department of Consumer Affairs said the Board of Vocational Nursing and Psychiatric Technicians, which oversees Sage’s license, does not offer a recovery program, only a disciplinary track.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I haven’t been a perfect person in my life, but I’ve been a good person,” Sage said. “I’ve taken full responsibility, and I don’t believe we should keep punishing someone for a misdemeanor that happened 10 years ago.”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Nurse demand changes at board meetings\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>CalMatters spoke with six nurses in the recovery program, all of whom asked not to be named for fear of retaliation from their case managers and the Board of Registered Nursing, which authorizes their licenses. The nurses said while some of the policies they regarded as arbitrary have been rolled back — including a requirement to administer narcotics to patients — many of the problems are longstanding and systemic.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The nurses provided documents that supported their descriptions, including their contract agreements, medical records, and recordings of individual meetings with enforcement committees.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Common problems outlined by interviewed nurses include:\u003c/p>\n\u003cul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n\u003cli>Moving goal posts — All of the nurses interviewed by CalMatters said the requirements to complete the program kept changing, including work requirements and the need for clinical evaluations that could take months for the board to review, prolonging their time in the program. “I felt like I was going to be in this program indefinitely,” said a former acute care nurse who dropped out with what she says were five years of sobriety.\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003cul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n\u003cli>Retaliation — Nurses said they felt like they were constantly in trouble and forced to stay silent for fear of losing their licenses. They were not allowed to travel to see family or attend their children’s sports games without approval from case managers. They would be held liable if no testing centers were open, even on holidays and weekends, and the inability to pay for a drug test counted as a positive result. “I felt so small. I didn’t feel supported. Every time I saw my case manager calling me, I felt like I was going to throw up,” a second nurse interviewed by CalMatters said.\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003cul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n\u003cli>Forced attendance at religious recovery meetings — A third nurse who started using drugs after escaping a religious cult said her case manager made her go to a faith-based 12-step meeting despite state law prohibiting such a requirement. “I go. I sit on a church pew. I feel like I’m back in my church, and I have palpitations,” she said.\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003cul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n\u003cli>Interference with personal medical decisions — A fourth nurse who was admitted to the program for alcohol and mental health struggles said she was prohibited from taking prescribed medication for attention-deficit disorder despite demonstrated sobriety and a medical evaluation showing her cognitive performance improved with medication. Another who was prescribed suboxone, a drug commonly used to treat people with opioid dependency, said she was forced to stop by program officials against the advice of her doctor.\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003cul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n\u003cli>“Cookie-cutter” requirements — A sixth nurse who was addicted to opiates said it took two and a half years for a complaint about her drug use to be processed by the nursing board. In the meantime, she put herself through rehab and stayed sober. The board told her to “voluntarily” join the recovery program or be stripped of her license despite letters from her addiction specialist, the nurse said. According to documents reviewed by CalMatters, the frequency of her random drug testing and other restrictions were substantially similar to requirements imposed on nurses who were not sober at the time of joining the program.\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003cp>In May, when nurses began flooding board meetings with sweeping allegations of mistreatment, Executive Director Loretta Melby said, “What you heard from Maximus today is there’s, you know, about 250 participants in that program. We don’t have 250 people in public comment.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But as more nurses called in to raise issues, other board members registered concern. “It sounds like collectively, we the board made, and this program made some errors,” board member Alison Cormack said during a June meeting. In August, the nursing board voted to rescind program changes made by Melby and chief enforcement officer Shannon Johnson, including a requirement that nurses work directly with patients and administer narcotics.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In response to what nurses told CalMatters about ongoing problems with enforcement committees and employees of Maximus, the board’s staff sent this unsigned statement: “Board staff actively works with the vendor to address all concerns that are brought forth by participants.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The statement added that “each participant is individually evaluated on a case-by-case basis” to determine the requirements of their recovery contracts, however the unsigned statement also acknowledged that previous participant contracts may not have accounted for an individual’s case history. Case managers and enforcement committee members must now examine each individual participant’s compliance with the program before making changes to their contracts, the statement said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12019196\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1568px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12019196\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/103124-Nursing-Rehab-MO-CM-12-copy.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1568\" height=\"1045\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/103124-Nursing-Rehab-MO-CM-12-copy.jpg 1568w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/103124-Nursing-Rehab-MO-CM-12-copy-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/103124-Nursing-Rehab-MO-CM-12-copy-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/103124-Nursing-Rehab-MO-CM-12-copy-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/103124-Nursing-Rehab-MO-CM-12-copy-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1568px) 100vw, 1568px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Former vocational nurse Bobbie Sage reviews a requirement plan that she was forced to complete while part of a disciplinary program designed for nurses with addiction, in Pleasanton, on Oct. 31, 2024. \u003ccite>(Manuel Orbegozo for CalMatters)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>During a board meeting, Maximus, the program vendor, denied that its staff forced participants to attend religiously based meetings, an objection raised by several people during public comment. In a statement to CalMatters, board staff also denied there was such a requirement.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>However, the nursing board’s \u003ca href=\"https://www.rn.ca.gov/intervention/intreq.shtml\">own website\u003c/a> denotes “12-Step Group Attendance” as a program requirement. The 12-step structure was created by Alcoholics Anonymous, and several steps reference God. Recovery agreements provided to CalMatters by participants say they can attend groups other than Alcoholics Anonymous, but program participants say they can’t find non-religious or non-spiritual alternatives that meet the board’s requirements, which also include finding a sponsor, another Alcoholics Anonymous rule.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Program regulations also stipulate that positive drug tests are not dismissed even if they are the result of a valid prescription. Regulations mandate that an approved physician submit monitoring plans for participants to take prescription medication even for chronic conditions such as high blood pressure and diabetes. Some nurses said they avoid medical care outright because of the bureaucratic hoops they are required to jump through.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Workers with addiction avoid program\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>The majority of recovery program participants, 250, are nurses, Maximus Director of Clinical Services Ginny Matthews testified during a recent nursing board meeting. That means the state nursing board is monitoring less than 0.05% of its roughly 537,000 nurses. Other licensing boards are tracking far less.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The state does not track how many health professionals are disciplined and ordered to probation like Sage because of a drug or mental health impairment, but only 0.1% of the health care workforce is disciplined annually for any reason. Research shows between 10% to 12% of medical professionals will develop a substance use disorder during their lifetime.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That means the vast majority of health workers with addictions are flying under the radar, multiple addiction experts interviewed by CalMatters said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Where are all of the people who we know should be getting into these programs, and why aren’t they turning to our programs for help?” said Choflet, the Northeastern dean of nursing. “That’s the thing that should be the most concerning to these state boards.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Dr. Karen Miotto, a long-time specialist in substance use disorders and treatment for physicians, said protecting patients should be everyone’s primary concern, but programs that lean heavily on punishment rather than recovery tend to discourage participation. When that happens, regulators are left in the dark.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“If you create it so that no one will come … then you can’t argue we’re doing the safest thing,” Miotto said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In a 2018 presentation to the nursing board, Matthews of Maximus attributed the decline in participation, which began in 2010, to a drastic drop in self-referrals after the state implemented the current law designed to increase oversight of professionals struggling with addiction or mental health issues.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In a statement to CalMatters, Board of Registered Nursing staff said it “cannot speculate as to the reason(s) that enrollment is low,” but some nurses “may not want to participate in this specific program because it is overseen by their licensing agency, entails worksite monitoring, and there are costs associated with it.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Nurses say the reason why numbers are dropping is obvious — the program is so intolerable that current participants tell their colleagues with addiction to stay invisible.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We’re only the tip of the iceberg. When you become an addict, you recognize other people,” a nurse who spent three years in the program told CalMatters.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>What does evidence-based recovery look like?\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Rigorous monitoring and drug testing can be effective even if they are intrusive and inconvenient, experts on health care worker addiction told CalMatters.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Research shows that daily check-ins, random drug tests, attending recovery meetings, and years of monitoring all help health workers stay sober and care for patients safely. Requiring a professional to adhere to these conditions in exchange for keeping their license is known as leveraged treatment — the point being to balance recovery with public safety.[aside label=\"Related Stories\" postID=\"news_11983752,news_11987204,news_11957005\"]“Leveraged treatment, we know, is enormously successful,” Miotto said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Some studies suggest more than 90% of health workers who complete recovery and monitoring programs are sober and working five years later. In comparison, about 75% of the general population will recover from addiction. Success among health workers corresponds with random drug tests and lengthier program requirements.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But there are limits to what is effective.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Participants are the most successful with daily check-ins, weekly group meetings such as those held by Alcoholics Anonymous, twice monthly drug testing and nurse support meetings, and at least three years of monitoring, according to the \u003ca href=\"https://www.ncsbn.org/public-files/OutcomesofSubstanceUseDisorderMonitoringProgramsforNursesJNR.pdf\">only study to assess nurse monitoring program characteristics\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Requiring nurses to do more did not yield better results, according to the study, which assessed 14 state programs, not including California.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In comparison, California’s requirements are far more stringent.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://www.dca.ca.gov/enforcement/uniform_standards_4_2021.pdf\">State law\u003c/a> requires all health care professionals to be tested once per week the first year in the program. Minimum test requirements drop in ensuing years but still average three times per month.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Regulations allow an average annual maximum of two tests per week, and many nurses interviewed by CalMatters said they had been subject to two or three tests within a 10-day period despite spending years in the program without violations.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Recovery agreements reviewed by CalMatters also showed that they required nurses to attend chemical dependency support groups several times per week, as often as daily, even after years of proven sobriety.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>‘One paycheck away from disaster’\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Shortly after receiving the terms of her probation, which included random drug testing and daily check-ins, Sage was injured in a car accident that prevented her from working for a year. She had three kids at home, and her disability checks didn’t stretch far enough to cover the drug tests. In an email to her probation officer, Sage wrote that she wanted to comply and asked if there were other options available.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s either put a roof over my head or pee for a drug test for something that happened four years ago,” Sage wrote to her probation officer in 2018.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It didn’t matter.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Failure to submit biological fluid testing will be considered the same as a positive test and will be a violation of probation. There are no other options,” the probation officer responded via email.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12019197\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1568px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12019197\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/103124-Nursing-Rehab-MO-CM-04-copy.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1568\" height=\"1045\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/103124-Nursing-Rehab-MO-CM-04-copy.jpg 1568w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/103124-Nursing-Rehab-MO-CM-04-copy-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/103124-Nursing-Rehab-MO-CM-04-copy-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/103124-Nursing-Rehab-MO-CM-04-copy-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/103124-Nursing-Rehab-MO-CM-04-copy-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1568px) 100vw, 1568px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Former vocational nurse Bobbie Sage is petitioning the state to regain her professional license. \u003ccite>(Manuel Orbegozo for CalMatters)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Sage testified under oath at an administrative hearing that her probation officer verbally told her to give up her house and live in her car if that was the only way to pay for the terms of her probation. During the eight months she was in the program, Sage said she became suicidal.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I called my own family and wanted them to take my kids because I didn’t feel like I could take care of them,” she said. “I felt so horribly defeated and desperate by how I was treated.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Her probation officer listed 148 failures to check in and 15 missed drug tests as part of the reason to revoke Sage’s license. Emails show that all of the violations on Sage’s record happened after she notified her probation officer that she couldn’t afford the costs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Most American families are one paycheck away from disaster. The board was perfectly fine to tell me to live out of my car, which I find disgusting,” Sage said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This year, Sage petitioned to have her license reinstated. During a reinstatement hearing, Sage testified that she did not have a pattern of substance abuse, and instead, the 2014 DUI represented the worst of two very difficult years of her life as she tried to escape an abusive relationship.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I just want to say that I have spent my life trying to change since that day,” Sage testified.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>On Monday, the Board of Vocational Nursing and Psychiatric Technicians notified Sage that her license could be reinstated only if she resumed probation for three years and paid an additional $600 processing fee.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I wish that somebody who has the ability to make a change will look at the whole program and say it’s time to revisit this and make some changes,” Sage said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Supported by the California Health Care Foundation (CHCF), which works to ensure that people have access to the care they need, when they need it, at a price they can afford. Visit www.chcf.org to learn more.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n",
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"excerpt": "California nurses say an addiction recovery program managed by their licensing board has become a trap that drives them out of their careers and leaves them in debt.",
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"title": "'It's Living Hell': Nurses Say a California Addiction Recovery Program Ended Their Careers | KQED",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>Bobbie Sage thought nursing would be her salvation. She was trapped in an abusive relationship with four kids and looking for a steady income. The day she graduated vocational nursing school, she took the kids and left their father.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Five years later, a DUI ruined her carefully crafted stability. Sage was waiting for a taxi outside a bar with another partner when he began hitting her, she said. She fled in her own car. A mistake with enduring consequences.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sage was charged with a misdemeanor for driving under the influence of alcohol in 2014. She paid a fine and completed three years of criminal probation without incident, according to court documents. She thought that tumultuous period of her life was over until her state licensing board ordered her to complete an additional probation program for health professionals with substance use problems.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sage couldn’t afford the drug tests at $300 a month or a fine of $3,140. She dropped out. She surrendered her vocational nursing license in 2019 and blames the program for ending her career.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Now, Sage is among dozens of health care workers who allege they’ve been mistreated under a California law governing workers with addiction and mental health problems. They say state regulations are needlessly punitive, overly bureaucratic and based on faulty addiction science. They call it a trap that prevents them from working and leaves many of them with thousands of dollars of debt.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“One misdemeanor is costing my entire life,” Sage said. “Punish me for something with my (nursing) license that I’ve done with my license.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The 2008 law was supposed to protect patients after a series of audits and legislative hearings suggested licensing boards were doing a poor job of keeping impaired health workers off the job. It created uniform regulations for each board to follow that stipulate exactly how to deal with these workers, including extensive drug testing, travel restrictions and psychiatric evaluations meant to catch anyone who relapsed.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Some boards created recovery programs as an alternative to discipline. Workers could volunteer to join as a step toward their recovery or be asked to join by their licensing board as a substitute for public punishment. Others, including Sage, were ordered into a parallel probation program after an incident such as a DUI or other licensing violation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Nurses say those provisions have become so burdensome and expensive that health care workers avoid the recovery program outright unless a licensing board asks them to join. As a result, the state is monitoring fewer workers than ever. Fewer than 400 people are enrolled, down from a peak of more than 900 in 2010.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The recovery program \u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/health/2024/12/medical-board-addiction-recovery/\">has never included doctors\u003c/a>, whose lobby resisted it because members believed it was too punitive, according to Gail Jara, executive director of \u003ca href=\"https://cppph.org/\">California Public Protection and Physician Health\u003c/a>, an organization dedicated to creating a new recovery program for doctors. The California Medical Board, which licenses most doctors, plans to push for an alternative program in the Legislature in the coming year.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s living hell,” said an emergency room nurse interviewed by CalMatters who joined voluntarily. The nurse asked for confidentiality because she could lose her license for speaking out under the terms of her contract.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The nurse has been unable to find a job that meets the program’s strict work limitations for nearly two years despite clean tests. She has spent more than $8,000 on drug tests, according to receipts, several thousand more on medical and psychological evaluations, and more than $20,000 paying for health insurance because she lost her work insurance.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Dentists, physical therapists, veterinarians and other health workers whose professional licensing boards are overseen by the California Department of Consumer Affairs are subject to the state law. Nurses make up the majority of the participants, and complaints about the program have erupted at recent Board of Registered Nurses meetings.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Many say they’ve followed all the rules and still see no way out, even after years of demonstrated sobriety.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Officials at those meetings faulted minor changes they made to increase oversight, suggesting they went too far. Participants and addiction experts interviewed by CalMatters, however, say the law itself is the root of the issue.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We’ve built systems that are completely onerous and agnostic of the value of a human life,” said \u003ca href=\"https://bouve.northeastern.edu/directory/amanda-choflet/\">Amanda Choflet\u003c/a>, dean of nursing at Northeastern University in Boston and an expert in nursing addiction programs. “It’s not even that the systems themselves are actively trying to keep people from being able to recover. It’s that the systems aren’t built for humans. They’re built in order to enact legislation.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A group of consumer advocates that pushed for the law argues that it is doing exactly what it is meant to do — impose consequences on workers who can’t stay sober. Michele Monserratt-Ramos, a patient advocate with Consumer Watchdog, said licensing boards’ first duty is to protect the public, not shield health workers with substance use or mental health disorders.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Many of the requirements that nurses and other workers say are intolerable, such as work prohibitions, were designed to protect patients, said Monserratt-Ramos, whose fiancé died after an operation with a doctor who had a history of substance abuse. If health workers know addictive behaviors and other impairments will be scrutinized by their licensing boards, they’ll be less likely to do something harmful, she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The safety net now is the consequences,” Monserratt-Ramos said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Department of Consumer Affairs did not make anyone available for an interview, stating that the regulations governing the program were written by a committee years ago and no experts were available. In a statement, the department said each health care board is independently responsible for implementing the program, and eight boards contract with an outside vendor, Maximus Inc., to do so.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Board of Registered Nursing refused several times to make executive staff or board members available for an interview to address participants’ complaints. Individual board members also failed to return calls or emails from CalMatters. In a statement to CalMatters, board staff said they have already addressed such complaints and are working to address more.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Maximus, a publicly traded company worth $4.5 billion, did not respond to several interview requests. The vendor’s $12.4 million state contract expires at the end of December. The company did not bid for a new contract, and the Department of Consumer Affairs did not provide a reason why.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sage says she worked hard to transform her life and move on from past abuse. She’s a licensed esthetician now and runs a successful studio in the Bay Area. Family and colleagues describe her as a hard worker, a natural caregiver and someone who doesn’t complain.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12019194\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1568px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12019194\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/103124-Nursing-Rehab-MO-CM-13-copy.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1568\" height=\"1045\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/103124-Nursing-Rehab-MO-CM-13-copy.jpg 1568w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/103124-Nursing-Rehab-MO-CM-13-copy-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/103124-Nursing-Rehab-MO-CM-13-copy-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/103124-Nursing-Rehab-MO-CM-13-copy-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/103124-Nursing-Rehab-MO-CM-13-copy-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1568px) 100vw, 1568px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Former vocational nurse Bobbie Sage reviews her case files in the lobby of her aesthetics studio in Pleasanton. Sage has kept the files after years of trying to navigate a disciplinary program for nurses with addictions that she was forced to attend. \u003ccite>(Manuel Orbegozo for CalMatters)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>She admits she made a mistake but says she never had an addiction problem. CalMatters reviewed a letter Sage provided from a doctor confirming that she did not meet the criteria for alcoholism and has never been diagnosed as an alcoholic. Under state law, any medical professional with a DUI is presumed to have a \u003ca href=\"https://casetext.com/regulation/california-code-of-regulations/title-16-professional-and-vocational-regulations/division-25-board-of-vocational-nurse-and-psychiatric-technician-examiners-of-the-state-of-california/chapter-1-vocational-nurses/article-4-licenses/section-2524-disciplinary-guidelines-and-uniform-standards-regarding-substance-abusing-licensees\">substance abuse\u003c/a> problem, even if it is a one-time offense. The Department of Consumer Affairs said the Board of Vocational Nursing and Psychiatric Technicians, which oversees Sage’s license, does not offer a recovery program, only a disciplinary track.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I haven’t been a perfect person in my life, but I’ve been a good person,” Sage said. “I’ve taken full responsibility, and I don’t believe we should keep punishing someone for a misdemeanor that happened 10 years ago.”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Nurse demand changes at board meetings\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>CalMatters spoke with six nurses in the recovery program, all of whom asked not to be named for fear of retaliation from their case managers and the Board of Registered Nursing, which authorizes their licenses. The nurses said while some of the policies they regarded as arbitrary have been rolled back — including a requirement to administer narcotics to patients — many of the problems are longstanding and systemic.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The nurses provided documents that supported their descriptions, including their contract agreements, medical records, and recordings of individual meetings with enforcement committees.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Common problems outlined by interviewed nurses include:\u003c/p>\n\u003cul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n\u003cli>Moving goal posts — All of the nurses interviewed by CalMatters said the requirements to complete the program kept changing, including work requirements and the need for clinical evaluations that could take months for the board to review, prolonging their time in the program. “I felt like I was going to be in this program indefinitely,” said a former acute care nurse who dropped out with what she says were five years of sobriety.\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003cul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n\u003cli>Retaliation — Nurses said they felt like they were constantly in trouble and forced to stay silent for fear of losing their licenses. They were not allowed to travel to see family or attend their children’s sports games without approval from case managers. They would be held liable if no testing centers were open, even on holidays and weekends, and the inability to pay for a drug test counted as a positive result. “I felt so small. I didn’t feel supported. Every time I saw my case manager calling me, I felt like I was going to throw up,” a second nurse interviewed by CalMatters said.\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003cul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n\u003cli>Forced attendance at religious recovery meetings — A third nurse who started using drugs after escaping a religious cult said her case manager made her go to a faith-based 12-step meeting despite state law prohibiting such a requirement. “I go. I sit on a church pew. I feel like I’m back in my church, and I have palpitations,” she said.\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003cul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n\u003cli>Interference with personal medical decisions — A fourth nurse who was admitted to the program for alcohol and mental health struggles said she was prohibited from taking prescribed medication for attention-deficit disorder despite demonstrated sobriety and a medical evaluation showing her cognitive performance improved with medication. Another who was prescribed suboxone, a drug commonly used to treat people with opioid dependency, said she was forced to stop by program officials against the advice of her doctor.\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003cul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n\u003cli>“Cookie-cutter” requirements — A sixth nurse who was addicted to opiates said it took two and a half years for a complaint about her drug use to be processed by the nursing board. In the meantime, she put herself through rehab and stayed sober. The board told her to “voluntarily” join the recovery program or be stripped of her license despite letters from her addiction specialist, the nurse said. According to documents reviewed by CalMatters, the frequency of her random drug testing and other restrictions were substantially similar to requirements imposed on nurses who were not sober at the time of joining the program.\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003cp>In May, when nurses began flooding board meetings with sweeping allegations of mistreatment, Executive Director Loretta Melby said, “What you heard from Maximus today is there’s, you know, about 250 participants in that program. We don’t have 250 people in public comment.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But as more nurses called in to raise issues, other board members registered concern. “It sounds like collectively, we the board made, and this program made some errors,” board member Alison Cormack said during a June meeting. In August, the nursing board voted to rescind program changes made by Melby and chief enforcement officer Shannon Johnson, including a requirement that nurses work directly with patients and administer narcotics.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In response to what nurses told CalMatters about ongoing problems with enforcement committees and employees of Maximus, the board’s staff sent this unsigned statement: “Board staff actively works with the vendor to address all concerns that are brought forth by participants.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The statement added that “each participant is individually evaluated on a case-by-case basis” to determine the requirements of their recovery contracts, however the unsigned statement also acknowledged that previous participant contracts may not have accounted for an individual’s case history. Case managers and enforcement committee members must now examine each individual participant’s compliance with the program before making changes to their contracts, the statement said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12019196\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1568px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12019196\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/103124-Nursing-Rehab-MO-CM-12-copy.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1568\" height=\"1045\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/103124-Nursing-Rehab-MO-CM-12-copy.jpg 1568w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/103124-Nursing-Rehab-MO-CM-12-copy-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/103124-Nursing-Rehab-MO-CM-12-copy-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/103124-Nursing-Rehab-MO-CM-12-copy-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/103124-Nursing-Rehab-MO-CM-12-copy-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1568px) 100vw, 1568px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Former vocational nurse Bobbie Sage reviews a requirement plan that she was forced to complete while part of a disciplinary program designed for nurses with addiction, in Pleasanton, on Oct. 31, 2024. \u003ccite>(Manuel Orbegozo for CalMatters)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>During a board meeting, Maximus, the program vendor, denied that its staff forced participants to attend religiously based meetings, an objection raised by several people during public comment. In a statement to CalMatters, board staff also denied there was such a requirement.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>However, the nursing board’s \u003ca href=\"https://www.rn.ca.gov/intervention/intreq.shtml\">own website\u003c/a> denotes “12-Step Group Attendance” as a program requirement. The 12-step structure was created by Alcoholics Anonymous, and several steps reference God. Recovery agreements provided to CalMatters by participants say they can attend groups other than Alcoholics Anonymous, but program participants say they can’t find non-religious or non-spiritual alternatives that meet the board’s requirements, which also include finding a sponsor, another Alcoholics Anonymous rule.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Program regulations also stipulate that positive drug tests are not dismissed even if they are the result of a valid prescription. Regulations mandate that an approved physician submit monitoring plans for participants to take prescription medication even for chronic conditions such as high blood pressure and diabetes. Some nurses said they avoid medical care outright because of the bureaucratic hoops they are required to jump through.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Workers with addiction avoid program\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>The majority of recovery program participants, 250, are nurses, Maximus Director of Clinical Services Ginny Matthews testified during a recent nursing board meeting. That means the state nursing board is monitoring less than 0.05% of its roughly 537,000 nurses. Other licensing boards are tracking far less.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The state does not track how many health professionals are disciplined and ordered to probation like Sage because of a drug or mental health impairment, but only 0.1% of the health care workforce is disciplined annually for any reason. Research shows between 10% to 12% of medical professionals will develop a substance use disorder during their lifetime.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That means the vast majority of health workers with addictions are flying under the radar, multiple addiction experts interviewed by CalMatters said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Where are all of the people who we know should be getting into these programs, and why aren’t they turning to our programs for help?” said Choflet, the Northeastern dean of nursing. “That’s the thing that should be the most concerning to these state boards.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Dr. Karen Miotto, a long-time specialist in substance use disorders and treatment for physicians, said protecting patients should be everyone’s primary concern, but programs that lean heavily on punishment rather than recovery tend to discourage participation. When that happens, regulators are left in the dark.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“If you create it so that no one will come … then you can’t argue we’re doing the safest thing,” Miotto said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In a 2018 presentation to the nursing board, Matthews of Maximus attributed the decline in participation, which began in 2010, to a drastic drop in self-referrals after the state implemented the current law designed to increase oversight of professionals struggling with addiction or mental health issues.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In a statement to CalMatters, Board of Registered Nursing staff said it “cannot speculate as to the reason(s) that enrollment is low,” but some nurses “may not want to participate in this specific program because it is overseen by their licensing agency, entails worksite monitoring, and there are costs associated with it.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Nurses say the reason why numbers are dropping is obvious — the program is so intolerable that current participants tell their colleagues with addiction to stay invisible.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We’re only the tip of the iceberg. When you become an addict, you recognize other people,” a nurse who spent three years in the program told CalMatters.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>What does evidence-based recovery look like?\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Rigorous monitoring and drug testing can be effective even if they are intrusive and inconvenient, experts on health care worker addiction told CalMatters.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Research shows that daily check-ins, random drug tests, attending recovery meetings, and years of monitoring all help health workers stay sober and care for patients safely. Requiring a professional to adhere to these conditions in exchange for keeping their license is known as leveraged treatment — the point being to balance recovery with public safety.\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>“Leveraged treatment, we know, is enormously successful,” Miotto said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Some studies suggest more than 90% of health workers who complete recovery and monitoring programs are sober and working five years later. In comparison, about 75% of the general population will recover from addiction. Success among health workers corresponds with random drug tests and lengthier program requirements.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But there are limits to what is effective.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Participants are the most successful with daily check-ins, weekly group meetings such as those held by Alcoholics Anonymous, twice monthly drug testing and nurse support meetings, and at least three years of monitoring, according to the \u003ca href=\"https://www.ncsbn.org/public-files/OutcomesofSubstanceUseDisorderMonitoringProgramsforNursesJNR.pdf\">only study to assess nurse monitoring program characteristics\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Requiring nurses to do more did not yield better results, according to the study, which assessed 14 state programs, not including California.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In comparison, California’s requirements are far more stringent.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://www.dca.ca.gov/enforcement/uniform_standards_4_2021.pdf\">State law\u003c/a> requires all health care professionals to be tested once per week the first year in the program. Minimum test requirements drop in ensuing years but still average three times per month.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Regulations allow an average annual maximum of two tests per week, and many nurses interviewed by CalMatters said they had been subject to two or three tests within a 10-day period despite spending years in the program without violations.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Recovery agreements reviewed by CalMatters also showed that they required nurses to attend chemical dependency support groups several times per week, as often as daily, even after years of proven sobriety.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>‘One paycheck away from disaster’\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Shortly after receiving the terms of her probation, which included random drug testing and daily check-ins, Sage was injured in a car accident that prevented her from working for a year. She had three kids at home, and her disability checks didn’t stretch far enough to cover the drug tests. In an email to her probation officer, Sage wrote that she wanted to comply and asked if there were other options available.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s either put a roof over my head or pee for a drug test for something that happened four years ago,” Sage wrote to her probation officer in 2018.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It didn’t matter.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Failure to submit biological fluid testing will be considered the same as a positive test and will be a violation of probation. There are no other options,” the probation officer responded via email.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12019197\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1568px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12019197\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/103124-Nursing-Rehab-MO-CM-04-copy.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1568\" height=\"1045\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/103124-Nursing-Rehab-MO-CM-04-copy.jpg 1568w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/103124-Nursing-Rehab-MO-CM-04-copy-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/103124-Nursing-Rehab-MO-CM-04-copy-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/103124-Nursing-Rehab-MO-CM-04-copy-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/103124-Nursing-Rehab-MO-CM-04-copy-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1568px) 100vw, 1568px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Former vocational nurse Bobbie Sage is petitioning the state to regain her professional license. \u003ccite>(Manuel Orbegozo for CalMatters)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Sage testified under oath at an administrative hearing that her probation officer verbally told her to give up her house and live in her car if that was the only way to pay for the terms of her probation. During the eight months she was in the program, Sage said she became suicidal.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I called my own family and wanted them to take my kids because I didn’t feel like I could take care of them,” she said. “I felt so horribly defeated and desperate by how I was treated.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Her probation officer listed 148 failures to check in and 15 missed drug tests as part of the reason to revoke Sage’s license. Emails show that all of the violations on Sage’s record happened after she notified her probation officer that she couldn’t afford the costs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Most American families are one paycheck away from disaster. The board was perfectly fine to tell me to live out of my car, which I find disgusting,” Sage said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This year, Sage petitioned to have her license reinstated. During a reinstatement hearing, Sage testified that she did not have a pattern of substance abuse, and instead, the 2014 DUI represented the worst of two very difficult years of her life as she tried to escape an abusive relationship.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I just want to say that I have spent my life trying to change since that day,” Sage testified.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>On Monday, the Board of Vocational Nursing and Psychiatric Technicians notified Sage that her license could be reinstated only if she resumed probation for three years and paid an additional $600 processing fee.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I wish that somebody who has the ability to make a change will look at the whole program and say it’s time to revisit this and make some changes,” Sage said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Supported by the California Health Care Foundation (CHCF), which works to ensure that people have access to the care they need, when they need it, at a price they can afford. Visit www.chcf.org to learn more.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"slug": "striking-sf-hotel-workers-reach-a-deal-with-marriott",
"title": "Striking SF Hotel Workers Reach a Deal with Marriott",
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"headTitle": "Striking SF Hotel Workers Reach a Deal with Marriott | KQED",
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"content": "\u003cp>Workers at several Marriott hotels in \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/tag/san-francisco\">San Francisco\u003c/a> overwhelmingly ratified a new contract deal on Thursday night to end a \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/12011319/sf-hotel-worker-strike-enters-sixth-week-no-deal-in-sight\">monthslong strike\u003c/a>, a hopeful sign for employees at other city hotel brands who remain at the picket line.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The four-year agreement with San Francisco’s largest hotel employer includes wage and pension increases, protections against understaffing and no additional health care benefit costs for about 2,000 employees at seven Marriott hotels, according to Anand Singh, lead negotiator for Unite Here Local 2.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“This is a home run on all fronts. It’s a fantastic deal, workers are elated,” Singh said. “To achieve that kind of contract in this market —in this economy at this time — is remarkable.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>San Francisco’s hospitality industry is struggling to fully rebound from the pandemic and perceptions of homelessness, drug use and crime on the streets. More visitors and convention business is expected next year, though not as much as in 2019.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Singh said the deal with Marriott sets a standard for Hilton and Hyatt, which operate hotels where about 1,000 workers remain at the picket line before the holidays.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12019121\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12019121\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241219-HotelStrikeAgreement-23-BL.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1332\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241219-HotelStrikeAgreement-23-BL.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241219-HotelStrikeAgreement-23-BL-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241219-HotelStrikeAgreement-23-BL-1020x679.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241219-HotelStrikeAgreement-23-BL-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241219-HotelStrikeAgreement-23-BL-1536x1023.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241219-HotelStrikeAgreement-23-BL-1920x1279.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Hotel workers with UNITE HERE Local 2 union gather before a vote on whether to end their strike and ratify an agreement for a new contract at the Moscone Center South in San Francisco on Dec. 19, 2024. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“This makes it a very clear thing for those companies,” he said. “It’s now a binary choice for them. It’s up or down. There is a contract in this city. There is no negotiating below that contract.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A Marriott spokesperson said in a statement only that the company is “pleased to have reached a new labor agreement for our valued associates in San Francisco.” This comes as thousands of hotel workers in Honolulu, San Diego and other cities who walked off the job in recent months have succeeded in signing contracts with similar worker demands.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Representatives with Hilton and Hyatt have said throughout the strike in San Francisco that the companies remain committed to negotiating fair contracts.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Our colleagues are the heart of our business, and Hyatt has a long history of cooperation with the unions that represent our employees, including UNITE HERE Local 2,” Michael D’Angelo, Hyatt’s head of labor relations in the Americas, said in a statement. “We have offered competitive wages, health care and retirement benefits at the hotel, including an economic package that maintains no-cost health care for our colleagues, providing an alternative to the current health fund that is affected by escalating costs.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At the Moscone Center on Thursday, Marriott employees who had voted to approve the contract deal congratulated each other. Fernando Martinez, a doorman at the Marriott Union Square for 31 years, was relieved he would start working and getting his paycheck again after about two months on strike.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postID=news_12017488 hero='https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/10/241030-DOWNTOWNHOTELSTRIKERSMARCH-10-BL-KQED.jpg']\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I’m very happy right now because I want to go back to work. I need money to pay the rent,” he said. “So I’ve been praying every night for this.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Dawa Chokey, a 52-year-old housekeeping supervisor decked in a Santa hat, said she and other strikers danced and sang outside the hotel when they first got news of the resolution earlier in the day.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It was very hard, but we fought for the benefits for us and our families and any new union members to come on board,” said Chokey, a Richmond resident who has worked at the Marriott Union Square for 27 years. “Finally, today is a victory.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The strike began on Sept. 22 and grew to include 2,500 housekeepers, bellhops, bartenders and other workers at six downtown hotels run by Marriott, Hilton and Hyatt.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Several clients and convention organizers \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/12017253/slow-san-francisco-tourism-complicates-hotel-strike-resolution\">pulled their business\u003c/a> from hotels where workers had walked off the job — or threatened to strike. The reputation of the hotel brands may suffer as guests face potential service disruptions, along with picketers banging on drums and chanting through megaphones outside the hotels every day.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>John Logan, who chairs San Francisco State University’s labor and employment studies department, said the new contract with Marriott will likely put pressure on other hotel brands facing strikes to agree to a deal.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The workers at the other hotels will not settle for a worse deal than the union has gotten at Marriott, so they will likely want to settle quickly so as not to suffer even more losses and disruption, especially with several big conventions coming up in the new year,” Logan said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n",
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"excerpt": "The four-year agreement between Marriott and Unite Here Local 2 could set a standard for Hyatt and Hilton, where 1,000 workers remain on strike.",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>Workers at several Marriott hotels in \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/tag/san-francisco\">San Francisco\u003c/a> overwhelmingly ratified a new contract deal on Thursday night to end a \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/12011319/sf-hotel-worker-strike-enters-sixth-week-no-deal-in-sight\">monthslong strike\u003c/a>, a hopeful sign for employees at other city hotel brands who remain at the picket line.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The four-year agreement with San Francisco’s largest hotel employer includes wage and pension increases, protections against understaffing and no additional health care benefit costs for about 2,000 employees at seven Marriott hotels, according to Anand Singh, lead negotiator for Unite Here Local 2.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“This is a home run on all fronts. It’s a fantastic deal, workers are elated,” Singh said. “To achieve that kind of contract in this market —in this economy at this time — is remarkable.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>San Francisco’s hospitality industry is struggling to fully rebound from the pandemic and perceptions of homelessness, drug use and crime on the streets. More visitors and convention business is expected next year, though not as much as in 2019.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Singh said the deal with Marriott sets a standard for Hilton and Hyatt, which operate hotels where about 1,000 workers remain at the picket line before the holidays.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12019121\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12019121\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241219-HotelStrikeAgreement-23-BL.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1332\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241219-HotelStrikeAgreement-23-BL.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241219-HotelStrikeAgreement-23-BL-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241219-HotelStrikeAgreement-23-BL-1020x679.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241219-HotelStrikeAgreement-23-BL-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241219-HotelStrikeAgreement-23-BL-1536x1023.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241219-HotelStrikeAgreement-23-BL-1920x1279.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Hotel workers with UNITE HERE Local 2 union gather before a vote on whether to end their strike and ratify an agreement for a new contract at the Moscone Center South in San Francisco on Dec. 19, 2024. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“This makes it a very clear thing for those companies,” he said. “It’s now a binary choice for them. It’s up or down. There is a contract in this city. There is no negotiating below that contract.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A Marriott spokesperson said in a statement only that the company is “pleased to have reached a new labor agreement for our valued associates in San Francisco.” This comes as thousands of hotel workers in Honolulu, San Diego and other cities who walked off the job in recent months have succeeded in signing contracts with similar worker demands.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Representatives with Hilton and Hyatt have said throughout the strike in San Francisco that the companies remain committed to negotiating fair contracts.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Our colleagues are the heart of our business, and Hyatt has a long history of cooperation with the unions that represent our employees, including UNITE HERE Local 2,” Michael D’Angelo, Hyatt’s head of labor relations in the Americas, said in a statement. “We have offered competitive wages, health care and retirement benefits at the hotel, including an economic package that maintains no-cost health care for our colleagues, providing an alternative to the current health fund that is affected by escalating costs.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At the Moscone Center on Thursday, Marriott employees who had voted to approve the contract deal congratulated each other. Fernando Martinez, a doorman at the Marriott Union Square for 31 years, was relieved he would start working and getting his paycheck again after about two months on strike.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I’m very happy right now because I want to go back to work. I need money to pay the rent,” he said. “So I’ve been praying every night for this.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Dawa Chokey, a 52-year-old housekeeping supervisor decked in a Santa hat, said she and other strikers danced and sang outside the hotel when they first got news of the resolution earlier in the day.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It was very hard, but we fought for the benefits for us and our families and any new union members to come on board,” said Chokey, a Richmond resident who has worked at the Marriott Union Square for 27 years. “Finally, today is a victory.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The strike began on Sept. 22 and grew to include 2,500 housekeepers, bellhops, bartenders and other workers at six downtown hotels run by Marriott, Hilton and Hyatt.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Several clients and convention organizers \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/12017253/slow-san-francisco-tourism-complicates-hotel-strike-resolution\">pulled their business\u003c/a> from hotels where workers had walked off the job — or threatened to strike. The reputation of the hotel brands may suffer as guests face potential service disruptions, along with picketers banging on drums and chanting through megaphones outside the hotels every day.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>John Logan, who chairs San Francisco State University’s labor and employment studies department, said the new contract with Marriott will likely put pressure on other hotel brands facing strikes to agree to a deal.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The workers at the other hotels will not settle for a worse deal than the union has gotten at Marriott, so they will likely want to settle quickly so as not to suffer even more losses and disruption, especially with several big conventions coming up in the new year,” Logan said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"content": "\u003cp>Workers at an Amazon warehouse facility in San Francisco on Thursday joined a nationwide strike at one of the busiest shopping times of the year for the company.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Teamsters union members at the Bayview District facility voted this week to authorize the walkout, joining workers in six other facilities nationwide, after saying Amazon ignored their deadline to meet at the bargaining table.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The action comes more than two months \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/12007450/san-francisco-amazon-warehouse-workers-join-growing-union-drive-with-teamsters\">after roughly 100 warehouse workers\u003c/a> at the facility asked the company to voluntarily recognize their union, which they have been organizing with since last year.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Workers say they’re prepared to strike until Amazon agrees to negotiate a fair contract and recognize the union.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Around 50 workers and union organizers gathered outside the Bayview facility Thursday morning, many of them wearing Teamsters beanies and hoodies, as part of what the union called the largest strike against Amazon in U.S. history.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12019224\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12019224\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241219-AmazonUnion-39-BL.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241219-AmazonUnion-39-BL.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241219-AmazonUnion-39-BL-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241219-AmazonUnion-39-BL-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241219-AmazonUnion-39-BL-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241219-AmazonUnion-39-BL-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241219-AmazonUnion-39-BL-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Supervisor Shamann Walton joins Amazon workers and Teamsters officials during a nationwide strike led by the union at an Amazon warehouse on Toland Street in the Bayview neighborhood of San Francisco on Dec. 19, 2024, demanding improved working conditions for warehouse employees and drivers. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The International Brotherhood of Teamsters has in the past successfully argued that Amazon essentially controls those third-party drivers’ duties and thus owes them the same courtesy that they do their employees — which eventually culminated in Amazon boosting their pay.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The packages don’t move without us,” said Josh Black, a part-time worker. “They’re a $2 trillion company, and we think they can afford to give us a living wage, to give us fair benefits, to give us safe working conditions.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Because part-time workers don’t receive health benefits, Black said he has to pay for his diabetes medication and treatment out of pocket.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Another part-time worker, Leah Pensler, called Amazon “one of the greediest companies in human history.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12019223\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12019223\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241219-AmazonUnion-20-BL.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241219-AmazonUnion-20-BL.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241219-AmazonUnion-20-BL-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241219-AmazonUnion-20-BL-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241219-AmazonUnion-20-BL-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241219-AmazonUnion-20-BL-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241219-AmazonUnion-20-BL-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Amazon workers join a nationwide strike led by the Teamsters union at an Amazon warehouse on Toland Street in the Bayview neighborhood of San Francisco on Dec. 19, 2024. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“They hope that we come in, we work here for a few weeks or maybe a month or two, and that we leave,” she said. “We know this company has the resources to give us what we deserve.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Pensler also said that seeing her “union siblings at UPS” receive good benefits and health care only further aggravated and motivated the union to go on strike.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Amazon is pushing its workers closer to the picket line by failing to show them the respect they have earned,” Teamsters General President Sean O’Brien said in a statement.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For its part, Amazon has accused the union of harassment and intimidation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12019225\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12019225\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241219-AmazonUnion-44-BL.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241219-AmazonUnion-44-BL.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241219-AmazonUnion-44-BL-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241219-AmazonUnion-44-BL-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241219-AmazonUnion-44-BL-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241219-AmazonUnion-44-BL-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241219-AmazonUnion-44-BL-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Amazon workers join a nationwide strike led by the Teamsters union at an Amazon warehouse on Toland Street in the Bayview neighborhood of San Francisco on Dec. 19, 2024, temporarily blocking access to the warehouse. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“The truth is that the Teamsters have actively threatened, intimidated, and attempted to coerce Amazon employees and third-party drivers to join them, which is illegal and is the subject of multiple pending unfair labor practice charges against the union,” Kelly Nantel, an Amazon spokesperson, said in an email.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Nantel accused the Teamsters of “intentionally misleading the public” with the “false narrative” that they represent some 10,000 workers at 10 Amazon facilities, a claim she adamantly denied.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Another spokesperson denounced the strike as a “PR play” and insisted there has been no discernible impact on its operations.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Amazon has filed unfair labor practice \u003ca href=\"https://www.nlrb.gov/case/20-CB-356768\">charges \u003c/a>with the NLRB against the Teamsters, both on a national and local level, in several different locations across the country, including San Francisco and San Bernardino.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Ren Fitzgerald, a sophomore at UC Berkeley, attended Thursday’s walkout to support the workers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We are entering a workforce that is not fair to workers. It’s only fair to the billionaires,” Fitzgerald said. “But class solidarity has always been more powerful. So good luck, Amazon. We’re going to win this one.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>Workers at an Amazon warehouse facility in San Francisco on Thursday joined a nationwide strike at one of the busiest shopping times of the year for the company.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Teamsters union members at the Bayview District facility voted this week to authorize the walkout, joining workers in six other facilities nationwide, after saying Amazon ignored their deadline to meet at the bargaining table.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The action comes more than two months \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/12007450/san-francisco-amazon-warehouse-workers-join-growing-union-drive-with-teamsters\">after roughly 100 warehouse workers\u003c/a> at the facility asked the company to voluntarily recognize their union, which they have been organizing with since last year.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Workers say they’re prepared to strike until Amazon agrees to negotiate a fair contract and recognize the union.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Around 50 workers and union organizers gathered outside the Bayview facility Thursday morning, many of them wearing Teamsters beanies and hoodies, as part of what the union called the largest strike against Amazon in U.S. history.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12019224\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12019224\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241219-AmazonUnion-39-BL.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241219-AmazonUnion-39-BL.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241219-AmazonUnion-39-BL-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241219-AmazonUnion-39-BL-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241219-AmazonUnion-39-BL-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241219-AmazonUnion-39-BL-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241219-AmazonUnion-39-BL-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Supervisor Shamann Walton joins Amazon workers and Teamsters officials during a nationwide strike led by the union at an Amazon warehouse on Toland Street in the Bayview neighborhood of San Francisco on Dec. 19, 2024, demanding improved working conditions for warehouse employees and drivers. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The International Brotherhood of Teamsters has in the past successfully argued that Amazon essentially controls those third-party drivers’ duties and thus owes them the same courtesy that they do their employees — which eventually culminated in Amazon boosting their pay.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The packages don’t move without us,” said Josh Black, a part-time worker. “They’re a $2 trillion company, and we think they can afford to give us a living wage, to give us fair benefits, to give us safe working conditions.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Because part-time workers don’t receive health benefits, Black said he has to pay for his diabetes medication and treatment out of pocket.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Another part-time worker, Leah Pensler, called Amazon “one of the greediest companies in human history.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12019223\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12019223\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241219-AmazonUnion-20-BL.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241219-AmazonUnion-20-BL.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241219-AmazonUnion-20-BL-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241219-AmazonUnion-20-BL-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241219-AmazonUnion-20-BL-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241219-AmazonUnion-20-BL-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241219-AmazonUnion-20-BL-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Amazon workers join a nationwide strike led by the Teamsters union at an Amazon warehouse on Toland Street in the Bayview neighborhood of San Francisco on Dec. 19, 2024. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“They hope that we come in, we work here for a few weeks or maybe a month or two, and that we leave,” she said. “We know this company has the resources to give us what we deserve.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Pensler also said that seeing her “union siblings at UPS” receive good benefits and health care only further aggravated and motivated the union to go on strike.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Amazon is pushing its workers closer to the picket line by failing to show them the respect they have earned,” Teamsters General President Sean O’Brien said in a statement.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For its part, Amazon has accused the union of harassment and intimidation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12019225\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12019225\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241219-AmazonUnion-44-BL.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241219-AmazonUnion-44-BL.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241219-AmazonUnion-44-BL-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241219-AmazonUnion-44-BL-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241219-AmazonUnion-44-BL-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241219-AmazonUnion-44-BL-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241219-AmazonUnion-44-BL-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Amazon workers join a nationwide strike led by the Teamsters union at an Amazon warehouse on Toland Street in the Bayview neighborhood of San Francisco on Dec. 19, 2024, temporarily blocking access to the warehouse. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“The truth is that the Teamsters have actively threatened, intimidated, and attempted to coerce Amazon employees and third-party drivers to join them, which is illegal and is the subject of multiple pending unfair labor practice charges against the union,” Kelly Nantel, an Amazon spokesperson, said in an email.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Nantel accused the Teamsters of “intentionally misleading the public” with the “false narrative” that they represent some 10,000 workers at 10 Amazon facilities, a claim she adamantly denied.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Another spokesperson denounced the strike as a “PR play” and insisted there has been no discernible impact on its operations.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Amazon has filed unfair labor practice \u003ca href=\"https://www.nlrb.gov/case/20-CB-356768\">charges \u003c/a>with the NLRB against the Teamsters, both on a national and local level, in several different locations across the country, including San Francisco and San Bernardino.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Ren Fitzgerald, a sophomore at UC Berkeley, attended Thursday’s walkout to support the workers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We are entering a workforce that is not fair to workers. It’s only fair to the billionaires,” Fitzgerald said. “But class solidarity has always been more powerful. So good luck, Amazon. We’re going to win this one.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"title": "San Francisco State Students and Faculty Mourn Job Cuts With a Funeral March",
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"content": "\u003cp>Ryan Moore, a \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/tag/san-francisco-state-university\">San Francisco State University\u003c/a> lecturer, hoisted an empty wooden coffin to his shoulders with the help of five other people. They carried the heavy prop, loaned from the school’s drama department, in a jazz funeral. Hundreds joined the procession through campus, with a brass band in tow.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The protest on the last day of the university’s fall semester mourned the loss of nontenured faculty — known as lecturers — who were let go to reduce costs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Our friends have taught here at SF State for five, 10, 15 or 20 years,” Moore, who teaches sociology, told the crowd. “And yet, we are gathering here in ceremony because they have been so unceremoniously dismissed and tossed away without so much as a pink slip\u003cem>.\u003c/em>”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Students and faculty marked the \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/12016316/sf-state-lecturers-rattled-by-looming-job-cuts-enrollment-slides\">latest round of academic job cuts\u003c/a> at San Francisco State, which administrators attributed to shrinking enrollment. The campus, which is part of the California State University system, faces ongoing financial woes that are expected to deepen next year due to state budget cuts.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Other CSU campuses, such as Sonoma State University, Cal State East Bay and Cal Poly Humboldt, are also experiencing enrollment declines. Administrators at San Francisco State said the city’s high cost of housing contributed to the \u003ca href=\"https://adminfin.sfsu.edu/sites/default/files/documents/UBC%20Presentation%20Oct.%202024%20FINAL3.pdf\">school’s challenges\u003c/a> in competing with CSUs in Southern California that meet or exceed their enrollment targets, as well as other colleges with more elite reputations.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12017838\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12017838\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241211-SFStateFacultyLosingJobs-16-BL.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1332\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241211-SFStateFacultyLosingJobs-16-BL.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241211-SFStateFacultyLosingJobs-16-BL-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241211-SFStateFacultyLosingJobs-16-BL-1020x679.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241211-SFStateFacultyLosingJobs-16-BL-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241211-SFStateFacultyLosingJobs-16-BL-1536x1023.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241211-SFStateFacultyLosingJobs-16-BL-1920x1279.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Faculty, staff and students protest against potential staff layoffs and cuts to classes at San Francisco State University in San Francisco on Dec. 11, 2024. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Moore said that as \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/12017889/sf-state-limits-investments-weapons-manufacturers-after-student-activists-push\">SF State\u003c/a> becomes smaller, the course and job cuts are disproportionately hitting certain academic departments, such as the humanities and liberal arts. He believes those reductions threaten the state’s vision of higher public education for all, regardless of ability to pay.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We are losing this vision, the idea that everybody deserves access to not just some kind of vocational training, but like a full, well-rounded education in the humanities and in the social sciences,” Moore, 54, said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>SF State enrollment hovered \u003ca href=\"https://sfstandard.com/2022/09/16/college-student-population-in-sf-drops-by-10000/\">around 30,000\u003c/a> throughout much of the 2010s, but since the fall of 2019, it has been declining quickly. In the fall 2024 semester, the college had just over 22,300 registered students. That enrollment drop has led to less money from tuition and state allocations, the two \u003ca href=\"https://budget.sfsu.edu/node/10\">main sources of revenue\u003c/a> for SF State.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Campus administrators eliminated 1,080 course sections between the fall of 2019 and 2024, letting go of 155 lecturers whose positions were dependent on the availability of classes to teach.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That figure does not include current job cuts. SF State won’t know how many lecturers are losing their positions until it finalizes its course schedule in January, according to a spokesperson.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“This is a political decision that politicians and administrators are making. They’ve chosen this response, and it’s the wrong response,” said Sean Connelly, a lecturer who was told he would not be rehired next semester.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12017839\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12017839\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241211-SFStateFacultyLosingJobs-35-BL.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1332\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241211-SFStateFacultyLosingJobs-35-BL.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241211-SFStateFacultyLosingJobs-35-BL-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241211-SFStateFacultyLosingJobs-35-BL-1020x679.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241211-SFStateFacultyLosingJobs-35-BL-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241211-SFStateFacultyLosingJobs-35-BL-1536x1023.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241211-SFStateFacultyLosingJobs-35-BL-1920x1279.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Faculty, staff and students rally against potential staff layoffs and cuts to classes at San Francisco State University in San Francisco on Dec. 11, 2024. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>After 17 years teaching in the school’s humanities and comparative literature department, Connelly’s last day is Dec. 30. He likened the loss of his job to the “death of a friend.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“This is my vocation. This is the thing that I studied for years and went into debt to do,” said Connelly, 57, who is applying to positions at high schools and other universities. He even put in an application with the U.S. Postal Service.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I was very depressed, anxious about the future,” he said. “Angry, though, too, because public education is a fundamental right, in my view, and the state of California needs to fund it.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As a public institution, CSU has served as an avenue for upward mobility, especially for young people from lower-income backgrounds. Nearly one-third of students at SF State are the first in their families to attend college, and \u003ca href=\"https://marcomm.sfsu.edu/sf-state-facts\">70% receive financial aid\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postID=news_12017253 hero='https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241022-HOTEL-STRIKE-ONE-MONTH-MD-02_qed-1020x680.jpg']\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Moore, a close friend of Connelly, is teaching at San Francisco State next semester, but is applying to other jobs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I’m proud to teach here, and if I had it my way, I would be here for the rest of my teaching career,” he said. “That’s what I really would like, but that seems increasingly unrealistic.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In an October letter sent to university staff, Lynn Mahoney, SF State’s president, asked employees to reaffirm to students that the university is committed to preserving the quality of their education and the support they receive.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But at the funeral march, many students said they had already been impacted by fewer course options and the departure of beloved lecturers at a time when student \u003ca href=\"https://www.calstate.edu/csu-system/news/Pages/CSU-Board-of-Trustees-Approves-Multi-Year-Tuition-Proposal.aspx\">tuition is increasing\u003c/a> by about 26% over the next four years. Brie Flowers, a sociology major who had just taken her last class with Connelly, had a message for the university’s administration.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Do better. Figure it out. We need more teachers. If you are going to cut courses, your enrollment is going to continue to decline,” said Flowers, a junior who transferred from community college in Los Altos Hills, California, and is minoring in counseling. “No one wants to come to a college where they won’t be able to graduate on time and get the courses that they need to graduate.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>San Francisco State must reduce its budget by about $25 million, according to Mahoney. In addition, the school is expecting state budget cuts next year. Mahoney declared a financial emergency in an email to faculty on Dec. 5, adding that every university unit will need to make “hard reductions.” She urged staff to advocate for SF State to lawmakers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We need to make it clear how important it is to fund the CSU and SF State. Cuts will inevitably have negative impacts on our students and the state’s workforce,” she wrote.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>Ryan Moore, a \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/tag/san-francisco-state-university\">San Francisco State University\u003c/a> lecturer, hoisted an empty wooden coffin to his shoulders with the help of five other people. They carried the heavy prop, loaned from the school’s drama department, in a jazz funeral. Hundreds joined the procession through campus, with a brass band in tow.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The protest on the last day of the university’s fall semester mourned the loss of nontenured faculty — known as lecturers — who were let go to reduce costs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Our friends have taught here at SF State for five, 10, 15 or 20 years,” Moore, who teaches sociology, told the crowd. “And yet, we are gathering here in ceremony because they have been so unceremoniously dismissed and tossed away without so much as a pink slip\u003cem>.\u003c/em>”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Students and faculty marked the \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/12016316/sf-state-lecturers-rattled-by-looming-job-cuts-enrollment-slides\">latest round of academic job cuts\u003c/a> at San Francisco State, which administrators attributed to shrinking enrollment. The campus, which is part of the California State University system, faces ongoing financial woes that are expected to deepen next year due to state budget cuts.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Other CSU campuses, such as Sonoma State University, Cal State East Bay and Cal Poly Humboldt, are also experiencing enrollment declines. Administrators at San Francisco State said the city’s high cost of housing contributed to the \u003ca href=\"https://adminfin.sfsu.edu/sites/default/files/documents/UBC%20Presentation%20Oct.%202024%20FINAL3.pdf\">school’s challenges\u003c/a> in competing with CSUs in Southern California that meet or exceed their enrollment targets, as well as other colleges with more elite reputations.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12017838\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12017838\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241211-SFStateFacultyLosingJobs-16-BL.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1332\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241211-SFStateFacultyLosingJobs-16-BL.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241211-SFStateFacultyLosingJobs-16-BL-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241211-SFStateFacultyLosingJobs-16-BL-1020x679.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241211-SFStateFacultyLosingJobs-16-BL-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241211-SFStateFacultyLosingJobs-16-BL-1536x1023.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241211-SFStateFacultyLosingJobs-16-BL-1920x1279.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Faculty, staff and students protest against potential staff layoffs and cuts to classes at San Francisco State University in San Francisco on Dec. 11, 2024. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Moore said that as \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/12017889/sf-state-limits-investments-weapons-manufacturers-after-student-activists-push\">SF State\u003c/a> becomes smaller, the course and job cuts are disproportionately hitting certain academic departments, such as the humanities and liberal arts. He believes those reductions threaten the state’s vision of higher public education for all, regardless of ability to pay.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We are losing this vision, the idea that everybody deserves access to not just some kind of vocational training, but like a full, well-rounded education in the humanities and in the social sciences,” Moore, 54, said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>SF State enrollment hovered \u003ca href=\"https://sfstandard.com/2022/09/16/college-student-population-in-sf-drops-by-10000/\">around 30,000\u003c/a> throughout much of the 2010s, but since the fall of 2019, it has been declining quickly. In the fall 2024 semester, the college had just over 22,300 registered students. That enrollment drop has led to less money from tuition and state allocations, the two \u003ca href=\"https://budget.sfsu.edu/node/10\">main sources of revenue\u003c/a> for SF State.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Campus administrators eliminated 1,080 course sections between the fall of 2019 and 2024, letting go of 155 lecturers whose positions were dependent on the availability of classes to teach.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That figure does not include current job cuts. SF State won’t know how many lecturers are losing their positions until it finalizes its course schedule in January, according to a spokesperson.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“This is a political decision that politicians and administrators are making. They’ve chosen this response, and it’s the wrong response,” said Sean Connelly, a lecturer who was told he would not be rehired next semester.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12017839\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12017839\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241211-SFStateFacultyLosingJobs-35-BL.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1332\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241211-SFStateFacultyLosingJobs-35-BL.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241211-SFStateFacultyLosingJobs-35-BL-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241211-SFStateFacultyLosingJobs-35-BL-1020x679.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241211-SFStateFacultyLosingJobs-35-BL-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241211-SFStateFacultyLosingJobs-35-BL-1536x1023.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/241211-SFStateFacultyLosingJobs-35-BL-1920x1279.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Faculty, staff and students rally against potential staff layoffs and cuts to classes at San Francisco State University in San Francisco on Dec. 11, 2024. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>After 17 years teaching in the school’s humanities and comparative literature department, Connelly’s last day is Dec. 30. He likened the loss of his job to the “death of a friend.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“This is my vocation. This is the thing that I studied for years and went into debt to do,” said Connelly, 57, who is applying to positions at high schools and other universities. He even put in an application with the U.S. Postal Service.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I was very depressed, anxious about the future,” he said. “Angry, though, too, because public education is a fundamental right, in my view, and the state of California needs to fund it.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As a public institution, CSU has served as an avenue for upward mobility, especially for young people from lower-income backgrounds. Nearly one-third of students at SF State are the first in their families to attend college, and \u003ca href=\"https://marcomm.sfsu.edu/sf-state-facts\">70% receive financial aid\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Moore, a close friend of Connelly, is teaching at San Francisco State next semester, but is applying to other jobs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I’m proud to teach here, and if I had it my way, I would be here for the rest of my teaching career,” he said. “That’s what I really would like, but that seems increasingly unrealistic.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In an October letter sent to university staff, Lynn Mahoney, SF State’s president, asked employees to reaffirm to students that the university is committed to preserving the quality of their education and the support they receive.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But at the funeral march, many students said they had already been impacted by fewer course options and the departure of beloved lecturers at a time when student \u003ca href=\"https://www.calstate.edu/csu-system/news/Pages/CSU-Board-of-Trustees-Approves-Multi-Year-Tuition-Proposal.aspx\">tuition is increasing\u003c/a> by about 26% over the next four years. Brie Flowers, a sociology major who had just taken her last class with Connelly, had a message for the university’s administration.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Do better. Figure it out. We need more teachers. If you are going to cut courses, your enrollment is going to continue to decline,” said Flowers, a junior who transferred from community college in Los Altos Hills, California, and is minoring in counseling. “No one wants to come to a college where they won’t be able to graduate on time and get the courses that they need to graduate.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>San Francisco State must reduce its budget by about $25 million, according to Mahoney. In addition, the school is expecting state budget cuts next year. Mahoney declared a financial emergency in an email to faculty on Dec. 5, adding that every university unit will need to make “hard reductions.” She urged staff to advocate for SF State to lawmakers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We need to make it clear how important it is to fund the CSU and SF State. Cuts will inevitably have negative impacts on our students and the state’s workforce,” she wrote.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"slug": "california-got-millions-to-train-workers-in-disaster-relief-but-its-leaving-money-on-table",
"title": "California Got Millions to Train Workers in Disaster Relief, but It’s Leaving Money on Table",
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"headTitle": "California Got Millions to Train Workers in Disaster Relief, but It’s Leaving Money on Table | KQED",
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"content": "\u003cp>In January 2023, and continuing throughout the spring, rain swelled many of California’s reservoirs and creeks, engulfing homes and businesses and killing 21 people. One federal estimate says it cost the state nearly \u003ca href=\"https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/access/billions/state-summary/CA#:~:text=California%20Flooding,2022%20%2D%20March%202023\">$5 billion\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Now, nearly two years later, it’s Alexis Ramirez’s job to help pick up the pieces, clearing debris from a damaged park. For him, and hundreds of others across the state, the disaster isn’t just about loss — it’s also an opportunity for temporary work. But these cleanup jobs are precarious and difficult, often requiring physical, back-breaking labor in remote areas under extreme conditions. Some government agencies struggle to manage these workers because of administrative hurdles, shifts in the weather that complicate disaster relief, and delays in the grant awards that make this cleanup possible, according to a CalMatters analysis of eight federal grants and interviews with agencies across the state.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Ramirez is part of one federal program, known as the National Dislocated Worker Grants, that has pumped over $210 million into California since 2015 to provide temporary, disaster-relief jobs to lower-income and unemployed workers. The money came from 12 grants, each one in response to drought, floods, wildfires, or the COVID-19 pandemic.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Of these disaster-relief grants, the state failed to use about 20% of the money that was available, according to a CalMatters analysis of public records. That’s in part because of “bureaucratic hoops,” such as delays in receiving grant money, said Michael Cross, executive director of the Northern Rural Training and Employment Consortium. He said his 11-county program in Northern California has sometimes had to delay or “stop work” on relief projects related to the wildfires and floods because the money was slow to arrive.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12018387\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2500px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12018387\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/Copy-of-KQED-side-by-side-downpage-image-3.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2500\" height=\"833\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/Copy-of-KQED-side-by-side-downpage-image-3.jpg 2500w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/Copy-of-KQED-side-by-side-downpage-image-3-800x267.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/Copy-of-KQED-side-by-side-downpage-image-3-1020x340.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/Copy-of-KQED-side-by-side-downpage-image-3-160x53.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/Copy-of-KQED-side-by-side-downpage-image-3-1536x512.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/Copy-of-KQED-side-by-side-downpage-image-3-2048x682.jpg 2048w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/Copy-of-KQED-side-by-side-downpage-image-3-1920x640.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2500px) 100vw, 2500px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Left: A temporary worker, Alexis Ramirez, walks through his work site with pruning shears under his arm. Right: Ramirez piles tree branches and trunks in Bartlett Park in Porterville on Dec. 4, 2024. \u003ccite>(Larry Valenzuela/CalMatters/CatchLight Local)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Around the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, Ramirez said he got sick and was unable to find steady work that could support himself and his 4-year-old daughter. “I was really in need of a job.” Now, he said he’s making about $21 an hour, almost twice what he made picking blueberries and grapes before the pandemic. But his current job, which began in September, ends in the next few weeks, and he said he has yet to find other work.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Temporary work provides a new start\u003cstrong> \u003c/strong>\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>California’s Central Valley saw some of the worst flooding during the 2023 winter storms, and small agricultural towns \u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/california-divide/2023/08/california-storm-damage/\">were hard hit\u003c/a>. In Tulare County, a local river overflowed its banks in March 2023, washing over homes, roads, and parks near the town of Porterville, population 62,000.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Two months later the county received money to hire temporary relief workers, but it was too early, said Priscilla Gonzales-Gray, a career services coordinator with the Tulare County Workforce Investment Board. The initial proposal was to clear debris from Porterville’s waterways, but by the time the money had arrived, winter snowmelt had filled the sloughs with fast-running, deep water. “It was not a safe working environment for employees,” said Gonzales-Gray.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The county decided to send workers to a Porterville park instead, which had flooded around the same time as the waterway, leaving a playground completely submerged.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It was September 2023 before the waters had receded enough to allow workers to begin clearing out the park. Since work began, Gonzales-Gray said the county has hired 23 people, including Ramirez, all for temporary jobs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12018388\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2500px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12018388\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/Copy-of-KQED-side-by-side-downpage-image-1-1.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2500\" height=\"833\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/Copy-of-KQED-side-by-side-downpage-image-1-1.jpg 2500w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/Copy-of-KQED-side-by-side-downpage-image-1-1-800x267.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/Copy-of-KQED-side-by-side-downpage-image-1-1-1020x340.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/Copy-of-KQED-side-by-side-downpage-image-1-1-160x53.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/Copy-of-KQED-side-by-side-downpage-image-1-1-1536x512.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/Copy-of-KQED-side-by-side-downpage-image-1-1-2048x682.jpg 2048w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/Copy-of-KQED-side-by-side-downpage-image-1-1-1920x640.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2500px) 100vw, 2500px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Left: Temporary worker Demetrius Ensign uses a chainsaw to cut tree branches and trunks. Right: Temporary workers pile up tree branches and trunks to clean up Bartlett Park in Porterville on Dec. 4, 2024. \u003ccite>(Larry Valenzuela/CalMatters/CatchLight Local)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Ramirez said he arrives at the park at 6 a.m. and works until 2:30 p.m., four days a week, using hand-tools like shovels and rakes to gather broken branches, tree trunks, and rocks. “It’s not a ton of hours,” he said in Spanish, “but it’s helping me start over.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The program’s insurance doesn’t allow workers like Ramirez to use power tools, said Gonzales-Gray, so the county puts workers on a team with the parks department, which is authorized to to use wood-chippers and chainsaws. “That does make the work go a little slower,” she said. “However, it does provide longer opportunities for these temporary employments.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The park is scheduled to open in January, and the county is preparing to hire a new round of temporary workers to repair another park. By the time both parks are complete and open to the public, Gonzales-Gray said the county will have hired about 60 workers from a roughly $1.5 million grant.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Why Merced left money on the table\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Like Porterville, the town of Planada in Merced County revolves around agriculture and most residents are Latino. Many are undocumented.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In January 2023, floods tore through the town, and Anastacio Rosales, who has lived in Planada for 60 years, was one of many residents whose homes were destroyed. “I have lost all of my most valuable possessions, including family photos and precious keepsakes from my parents,” he wrote in \u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/commentary/2023/06/keep-promises-after-planada-flooded/\">an Op-Ed to CalMatters\u003c/a> a few months after the storm. “Sadly, the same can be said for many of my neighbors.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12018389\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1568px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12018389\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/102723-Planada-Residents-LV_CM_15-copy.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1568\" height=\"1045\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/102723-Planada-Residents-LV_CM_15-copy.jpg 1568w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/102723-Planada-Residents-LV_CM_15-copy-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/102723-Planada-Residents-LV_CM_15-copy-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/102723-Planada-Residents-LV_CM_15-copy-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/102723-Planada-Residents-LV_CM_15-copy-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1568px) 100vw, 1568px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Anastacio Rosales in front of his home, which he renovated after the flood in Planada earlier this year. \u003ccite>(Larry Valenzuela/CalMatters/CatchLight Local)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>One study by the University of California, Merced found that more than 80% of Planada’s roughly 4,000 residents \u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/california-divide/2023/06/california-flooding-3/\">suffered financial losses\u003c/a> as a result of the storms, such as missed work or property damage.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Erick Serrato, Merced County’s director of workforce investment, said the county won’t claim most of the federal money available for temporary disaster-relief jobs. Initially, the county workforce agency planned to hire workers to assist in the town’s reconstruction, such as repairing its community center. But once money arrived in Merced County in May 2023 — five months after the initial flooding — waters had receded and others had already repaired the parks that temporary workers were supposed to fix, Serrato said. “When you have to wait five months to receive the support you need right in the aftermath, it makes it difficult to put those resources to work.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The grant money also comes with restrictions, Serrato said. Temporary workers can’t repair private property, such as homes or businesses; they can only work on public lands, such as parks or waterways. The repairs can only return public lands to their prior conditions — workers can’t make any improvements that weren’t there before the flood.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Instead of repairing parks or waterways, which Serrato said were in good condition by May, the workforce board repurposed some of the federal grant money to hire workers to perform other services, such as helping homeowners navigate the state’s reimbursement process. This spring, for instance, the state gave the town of Planada $20 million to support recovery, including reimbursements for homeowners and businesses. That money remains \u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/california-divide/2024/11/california-flooding-aid-delay/\">largely unspent\u003c/a> due to the county’s planning process and state rules requiring residents to verify their damages.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Rosales acknowledged that the community center is functional again but in a recent interview, he said that other public lands still need repairs. “Around the creeks and canals, they haven’t cleaned them up like they’re supposed to.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He said debris is gathering in the storm drains and waterways once again, and if another storm comes, they could flood.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Moving money around\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Following floods in 2017 and dangerous, deadly wildfires in 2018, California’s workforce agencies spent over $80 million in federal funds to hire temporary workers to clean debris. In both cases, the state used more than 90% of the money it was allocated. But after wildfires in 2020 and 2021, the state left around $20 million — about 55% — in federal funds unclaimed.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12018391\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1568px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12018391\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/020823-Planada-Feb-8-LV_CM_11-copy.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1568\" height=\"1045\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/020823-Planada-Feb-8-LV_CM_11-copy.jpg 1568w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/020823-Planada-Feb-8-LV_CM_11-copy-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/020823-Planada-Feb-8-LV_CM_11-copy-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/020823-Planada-Feb-8-LV_CM_11-copy-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/020823-Planada-Feb-8-LV_CM_11-copy-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1568px) 100vw, 1568px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Debris and water damaged furniture on the side of a road in Planada on Feb. 8, 2023. The town was hit by flooding in January after heavy rainstorms rolled through the area. \u003ccite>(Larry Valenzuela/CalMatters/Catchlight Local)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>If California doesn’t use all of the money, then the federal government reallocates it to other places that need it, said Monica Vereen, a spokesperson for the U.S. Department of Labor, which provides these disaster relief grants to states. She said it’s common for states not to claim all of the money, but that every dollar ultimately gets used.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Greg Lawson, a spokesperson for California’s Employment Development Department, said there are various reasons why federal money goes unclaimed. “The cleanup may not take as much time as initially estimated, the impact on jobs in the area may not end up as big, or people may be able to return to their jobs more quickly,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“These funds weren’t as critical to us as maybe other parts of the state,” Serrato said about the workforce money that Merced County never claimed.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Of the federal workforce grant, the county ultimately spent $165,000 — about 16%. Because the state awards the dollars in installments, Merced never had to return any money; it just never asked for the remaining cash.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>CalMatters reporter Levi Sumagaysay contributed to this story. \u003c/em>\u003cem>Financial support for this story was provided by the Smidt Foundation and The James Irvine Foundation.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n",
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"excerpt": "When disaster strikes, California gets federal funding to hire temporary workers to clean debris. But the jobs are tough, and some agencies struggle to manage the grants.",
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"title": "California Got Millions to Train Workers in Disaster Relief, but It’s Leaving Money on Table | KQED",
"description": "When disaster strikes, California gets federal funding to hire temporary workers to clean debris. But the jobs are tough, and some agencies struggle to manage the grants.",
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"headline": "California Got Millions to Train Workers in Disaster Relief, but It’s Leaving Money on Table",
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"nprByline": "\u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/author/adam-echelman/\">Adam Echelman\u003c/a>, CalMatters",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>In January 2023, and continuing throughout the spring, rain swelled many of California’s reservoirs and creeks, engulfing homes and businesses and killing 21 people. One federal estimate says it cost the state nearly \u003ca href=\"https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/access/billions/state-summary/CA#:~:text=California%20Flooding,2022%20%2D%20March%202023\">$5 billion\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Now, nearly two years later, it’s Alexis Ramirez’s job to help pick up the pieces, clearing debris from a damaged park. For him, and hundreds of others across the state, the disaster isn’t just about loss — it’s also an opportunity for temporary work. But these cleanup jobs are precarious and difficult, often requiring physical, back-breaking labor in remote areas under extreme conditions. Some government agencies struggle to manage these workers because of administrative hurdles, shifts in the weather that complicate disaster relief, and delays in the grant awards that make this cleanup possible, according to a CalMatters analysis of eight federal grants and interviews with agencies across the state.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Ramirez is part of one federal program, known as the National Dislocated Worker Grants, that has pumped over $210 million into California since 2015 to provide temporary, disaster-relief jobs to lower-income and unemployed workers. The money came from 12 grants, each one in response to drought, floods, wildfires, or the COVID-19 pandemic.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Of these disaster-relief grants, the state failed to use about 20% of the money that was available, according to a CalMatters analysis of public records. That’s in part because of “bureaucratic hoops,” such as delays in receiving grant money, said Michael Cross, executive director of the Northern Rural Training and Employment Consortium. He said his 11-county program in Northern California has sometimes had to delay or “stop work” on relief projects related to the wildfires and floods because the money was slow to arrive.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12018387\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2500px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12018387\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/Copy-of-KQED-side-by-side-downpage-image-3.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2500\" height=\"833\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/Copy-of-KQED-side-by-side-downpage-image-3.jpg 2500w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/Copy-of-KQED-side-by-side-downpage-image-3-800x267.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/Copy-of-KQED-side-by-side-downpage-image-3-1020x340.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/Copy-of-KQED-side-by-side-downpage-image-3-160x53.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/Copy-of-KQED-side-by-side-downpage-image-3-1536x512.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/Copy-of-KQED-side-by-side-downpage-image-3-2048x682.jpg 2048w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/Copy-of-KQED-side-by-side-downpage-image-3-1920x640.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2500px) 100vw, 2500px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Left: A temporary worker, Alexis Ramirez, walks through his work site with pruning shears under his arm. Right: Ramirez piles tree branches and trunks in Bartlett Park in Porterville on Dec. 4, 2024. \u003ccite>(Larry Valenzuela/CalMatters/CatchLight Local)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Around the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, Ramirez said he got sick and was unable to find steady work that could support himself and his 4-year-old daughter. “I was really in need of a job.” Now, he said he’s making about $21 an hour, almost twice what he made picking blueberries and grapes before the pandemic. But his current job, which began in September, ends in the next few weeks, and he said he has yet to find other work.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Temporary work provides a new start\u003cstrong> \u003c/strong>\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>California’s Central Valley saw some of the worst flooding during the 2023 winter storms, and small agricultural towns \u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/california-divide/2023/08/california-storm-damage/\">were hard hit\u003c/a>. In Tulare County, a local river overflowed its banks in March 2023, washing over homes, roads, and parks near the town of Porterville, population 62,000.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Two months later the county received money to hire temporary relief workers, but it was too early, said Priscilla Gonzales-Gray, a career services coordinator with the Tulare County Workforce Investment Board. The initial proposal was to clear debris from Porterville’s waterways, but by the time the money had arrived, winter snowmelt had filled the sloughs with fast-running, deep water. “It was not a safe working environment for employees,” said Gonzales-Gray.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The county decided to send workers to a Porterville park instead, which had flooded around the same time as the waterway, leaving a playground completely submerged.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It was September 2023 before the waters had receded enough to allow workers to begin clearing out the park. Since work began, Gonzales-Gray said the county has hired 23 people, including Ramirez, all for temporary jobs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12018388\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2500px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12018388\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/Copy-of-KQED-side-by-side-downpage-image-1-1.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2500\" height=\"833\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/Copy-of-KQED-side-by-side-downpage-image-1-1.jpg 2500w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/Copy-of-KQED-side-by-side-downpage-image-1-1-800x267.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/Copy-of-KQED-side-by-side-downpage-image-1-1-1020x340.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/Copy-of-KQED-side-by-side-downpage-image-1-1-160x53.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/Copy-of-KQED-side-by-side-downpage-image-1-1-1536x512.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/Copy-of-KQED-side-by-side-downpage-image-1-1-2048x682.jpg 2048w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/Copy-of-KQED-side-by-side-downpage-image-1-1-1920x640.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2500px) 100vw, 2500px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Left: Temporary worker Demetrius Ensign uses a chainsaw to cut tree branches and trunks. Right: Temporary workers pile up tree branches and trunks to clean up Bartlett Park in Porterville on Dec. 4, 2024. \u003ccite>(Larry Valenzuela/CalMatters/CatchLight Local)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Ramirez said he arrives at the park at 6 a.m. and works until 2:30 p.m., four days a week, using hand-tools like shovels and rakes to gather broken branches, tree trunks, and rocks. “It’s not a ton of hours,” he said in Spanish, “but it’s helping me start over.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The program’s insurance doesn’t allow workers like Ramirez to use power tools, said Gonzales-Gray, so the county puts workers on a team with the parks department, which is authorized to to use wood-chippers and chainsaws. “That does make the work go a little slower,” she said. “However, it does provide longer opportunities for these temporary employments.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The park is scheduled to open in January, and the county is preparing to hire a new round of temporary workers to repair another park. By the time both parks are complete and open to the public, Gonzales-Gray said the county will have hired about 60 workers from a roughly $1.5 million grant.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Why Merced left money on the table\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Like Porterville, the town of Planada in Merced County revolves around agriculture and most residents are Latino. Many are undocumented.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In January 2023, floods tore through the town, and Anastacio Rosales, who has lived in Planada for 60 years, was one of many residents whose homes were destroyed. “I have lost all of my most valuable possessions, including family photos and precious keepsakes from my parents,” he wrote in \u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/commentary/2023/06/keep-promises-after-planada-flooded/\">an Op-Ed to CalMatters\u003c/a> a few months after the storm. “Sadly, the same can be said for many of my neighbors.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12018389\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1568px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12018389\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/102723-Planada-Residents-LV_CM_15-copy.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1568\" height=\"1045\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/102723-Planada-Residents-LV_CM_15-copy.jpg 1568w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/102723-Planada-Residents-LV_CM_15-copy-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/102723-Planada-Residents-LV_CM_15-copy-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/102723-Planada-Residents-LV_CM_15-copy-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/102723-Planada-Residents-LV_CM_15-copy-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1568px) 100vw, 1568px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Anastacio Rosales in front of his home, which he renovated after the flood in Planada earlier this year. \u003ccite>(Larry Valenzuela/CalMatters/CatchLight Local)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>One study by the University of California, Merced found that more than 80% of Planada’s roughly 4,000 residents \u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/california-divide/2023/06/california-flooding-3/\">suffered financial losses\u003c/a> as a result of the storms, such as missed work or property damage.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Erick Serrato, Merced County’s director of workforce investment, said the county won’t claim most of the federal money available for temporary disaster-relief jobs. Initially, the county workforce agency planned to hire workers to assist in the town’s reconstruction, such as repairing its community center. But once money arrived in Merced County in May 2023 — five months after the initial flooding — waters had receded and others had already repaired the parks that temporary workers were supposed to fix, Serrato said. “When you have to wait five months to receive the support you need right in the aftermath, it makes it difficult to put those resources to work.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The grant money also comes with restrictions, Serrato said. Temporary workers can’t repair private property, such as homes or businesses; they can only work on public lands, such as parks or waterways. The repairs can only return public lands to their prior conditions — workers can’t make any improvements that weren’t there before the flood.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Instead of repairing parks or waterways, which Serrato said were in good condition by May, the workforce board repurposed some of the federal grant money to hire workers to perform other services, such as helping homeowners navigate the state’s reimbursement process. This spring, for instance, the state gave the town of Planada $20 million to support recovery, including reimbursements for homeowners and businesses. That money remains \u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/california-divide/2024/11/california-flooding-aid-delay/\">largely unspent\u003c/a> due to the county’s planning process and state rules requiring residents to verify their damages.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Rosales acknowledged that the community center is functional again but in a recent interview, he said that other public lands still need repairs. “Around the creeks and canals, they haven’t cleaned them up like they’re supposed to.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He said debris is gathering in the storm drains and waterways once again, and if another storm comes, they could flood.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Moving money around\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Following floods in 2017 and dangerous, deadly wildfires in 2018, California’s workforce agencies spent over $80 million in federal funds to hire temporary workers to clean debris. In both cases, the state used more than 90% of the money it was allocated. But after wildfires in 2020 and 2021, the state left around $20 million — about 55% — in federal funds unclaimed.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12018391\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1568px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12018391\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/020823-Planada-Feb-8-LV_CM_11-copy.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1568\" height=\"1045\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/020823-Planada-Feb-8-LV_CM_11-copy.jpg 1568w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/020823-Planada-Feb-8-LV_CM_11-copy-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/020823-Planada-Feb-8-LV_CM_11-copy-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/020823-Planada-Feb-8-LV_CM_11-copy-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/020823-Planada-Feb-8-LV_CM_11-copy-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1568px) 100vw, 1568px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Debris and water damaged furniture on the side of a road in Planada on Feb. 8, 2023. The town was hit by flooding in January after heavy rainstorms rolled through the area. \u003ccite>(Larry Valenzuela/CalMatters/Catchlight Local)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>If California doesn’t use all of the money, then the federal government reallocates it to other places that need it, said Monica Vereen, a spokesperson for the U.S. Department of Labor, which provides these disaster relief grants to states. She said it’s common for states not to claim all of the money, but that every dollar ultimately gets used.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Greg Lawson, a spokesperson for California’s Employment Development Department, said there are various reasons why federal money goes unclaimed. “The cleanup may not take as much time as initially estimated, the impact on jobs in the area may not end up as big, or people may be able to return to their jobs more quickly,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“These funds weren’t as critical to us as maybe other parts of the state,” Serrato said about the workforce money that Merced County never claimed.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Of the federal workforce grant, the county ultimately spent $165,000 — about 16%. Because the state awards the dollars in installments, Merced never had to return any money; it just never asked for the remaining cash.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>CalMatters reporter Levi Sumagaysay contributed to this story. \u003c/em>\u003cem>Financial support for this story was provided by the Smidt Foundation and The James Irvine Foundation.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"slug": "fentanyl-overdoses-are-causing-a-surge-in-workplace-deaths-in-california",
"title": "Fentanyl Overdoses Are Causing a Surge in Workplace Deaths in California",
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"headTitle": "Fentanyl Overdoses Are Causing a Surge in Workplace Deaths in California | KQED",
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"content": "\u003cp>As the nation continues to struggle with an opioid crisis now supercharged by fentanyl, overdoses have become one of the leading causes of workplace deaths.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>California is no different: Workplace overdose deaths have risen so dramatically that in 2021 and 2022, they caused more fatalities than falls at construction sites or being hit by machinery, and in 2022, were second only to car crashes and other transportation incidents.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That year, the toll surpassed 110 workers, accounting for 18% of the state’s workplace deaths, compared to 11% nationwide.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Federal and state government experts have \u003ca href=\"https://www.bls.gov/opub/ted/2024/unintentional-overdoses-rose-for-the-tenth-straight-year-in-2022.htm\">raised the alarm\u003c/a> over this trend, which has puzzled some policymakers because drug use is not a hazard created directly by the job. After all, those who die of an overdose at work represent a small share of thousands of Californians who overdose each year.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Still, business owners and union officials alike are increasingly having to grapple with one of the nation’s most prominent public health challenges.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“When fentanyl came around, we started having a huge uptick in overdoses and deaths — even suicides,” said Paul Moreno, president of Ironworkers Local 433 in Southern California.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In 2022, his local began holding recovery meetings for members that now draw as many as a dozen attendees a month. Moreno, who said he’s been sober 19 years, visits worksites and the union hall, passing around the 988 \u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/health/2021/09/988-911-funding-crisis-hotline-suicide-california/\">mental health crisis hotline number\u003c/a>, giving out his own personal phone number and distributing doses of the overdose reversal drug naloxone (commonly sold as Narcan).\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I took Narcan classes. I passed out Narcan on the job sites. I never thought I’d be doing that,” he said. “The phone calls from the members, sometimes I don’t know what to say besides listen. We still need more training.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A new California law directs the state’s workplace safety agencies to require worksites to stock Narcan in their first aid kits, but the regulations haven’t been issued yet. A spokesperson said Cal/OSHA is “in the early stages of rulemaking,” a process that \u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/politics/capitol/2024/02/workplace-safety-california-indoor-heat/\">could take years\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Not much is publicly known about overdose deaths at California worksites. A small office in Cal/OSHA that compiles workplace fatality data has, for at least the past two years, noted the rise in overdoses in its \u003ca href=\"https://www.dir.ca.gov/dosh/CFOI/California-Occupational-Fatalities.pdf\">annual reports\u003c/a>. However, the office said it cannot release details due to privacy restrictions.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The agency has not responded to a public records request CalMatters filed in September for all overdose incidents, fatal or nonfatal, that have been reported at worksites.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>State won’t release details on deaths\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>County coroners’ offices, which investigate some deaths, vary widely in whether they can identify incidents based on whether a person died at their job. Death records from the past three years obtained from Alameda, San Bernardino and Riverside counties provide glimpses into the grim trend.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In 2021, a flooring installer stepped out for a smoke break at a construction site in Temecula and was found by coworkers on the side of the house, dead from a fentanyl overdose. A packing plant worker in Corona went to the bathroom and did not return; coworkers found him bent over with a straw, lighter and piece of foil nearby, having overdosed on methamphetamine, fentanyl and heroin. In Fremont, a manager found a night-shift janitor in the bathroom with a white powdery substance, overdosed on fentanyl. In Livermore this year, a driver was found in his parked semi-truck as he waited to make a scheduled delivery, also dead from fentanyl.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12017660\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1200px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12017660\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/04222LA-Homeless-Court_TS_CM_27.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1200\" height=\"800\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/04222LA-Homeless-Court_TS_CM_27.jpg 1200w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/04222LA-Homeless-Court_TS_CM_27-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/04222LA-Homeless-Court_TS_CM_27-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/04222LA-Homeless-Court_TS_CM_27-160x107.jpg 160w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1200px) 100vw, 1200px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Narcan nasal spray containers available at a rally at the First Street U.S. Courthouse in Los Angeles on April 22, 2024. \u003ccite>(Ted Soqui for CalMatters)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>California officials have little to say about the rising death toll. Cal/OSHA refused to make an official available for an interview and would not explain why overdoses account for a much higher share of the state’s workplace deaths compared to the rest of the nation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Instead, the agency cited the \u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/explainers/california-opioid-crisis/\">broader national opioid crisis\u003c/a>. “California had more than 7,000 people die from opioid-related overdose deaths in 2022,” spokesperson Erika Monterroza wrote in an email. “Unfortunately, these deaths happen all over our state, including in our workplaces.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The state Department of Public Health said it is considering conducting a study. That agency’s occupational health branch is “aware of this issue and is considering a project to examine all opioid overdoses by industry and occupation,” a spokesperson said. In October, the department said staff are in the “initial stages of preparing for an analysis” but did not provide a completion date.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Studies in other states indicate the problem is worse in certain industries. In Massachusetts, where overdoses are the top cause of workplace deaths, researchers with the state public health agency examined all overdose deaths — whether at work or not — and found deaths occurred disproportionately among those working in manual-labor, high-injury industries.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Those jobs, said Emily Sparer-Fine, director of the Massachusetts public health agency’s \u003ca href=\"https://www.mass.gov/orgs/occupational-health-surveillance-program\">Occupational Health Surveillance Program\u003c/a>, are often seasonal or unstable, and workers may be financially strained and pressured to work through pain.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Certain industries and occupations, (such as) construction, fishing had a much higher rate of overdose,” Sparer-Fine said in an interview. “But it was also jobs that had lower access to paid sick leave, higher rates of job insecurity, higher rates of overall workplace injury.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In a new study this year, Sparer-Fine’s team also dug into \u003ca href=\"https://www.mass.gov/doc/opioid-related-overdose-deaths-among-injured-workers-in-massachusetts-findings-from-the-public-health-data-warehouse/download\">workers’ compensation data\u003c/a> and found that working-age Massachusetts residents were 35% more likely to have died of an overdose if they were previously injured on the job.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Workers in similar industries are overrepresented in the California workplace overdose deaths, including in trucking and warehousing, according to federal data.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>So are workers in construction, where unions and employers are confronting a mental health and addiction crisis. Nationwide, construction workers are \u003ca href=\"https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/nvsr/nvsr72/nvsr72-07.pdf\">more likely than workers in any other profession\u003c/a> to overdose and also have one of the \u003ca href=\"https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/72/wr/mm7250a2.htm?s_cid=mm7250a2_w\">highest rates of suicide\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Chris Trahan Cain, executive director of the National Center for Construction Research and Training, has since 2018 led the response to the industry’s opioid crisis. She has focused on a longtime reliance on painkillers to deal with injuries involving the muscles and bones, which \u003ca href=\"https://www.cpwr.com/wp-content/uploads/KF2020-MSDs-Opioids-US-workers.pdf\">nearly a third of construction workers\u003c/a> report experiencing. Studies like the ones in Massachusetts were among the first to reveal the toll.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The center, formed by the nation’s construction unions, has recommended stocking naloxone in union halls, requiring apprentices be taught about opioid abuse and ensuring members have coverage of drug treatment programs. They’re also providing tips on talking to doctors about how to treat injuries without long-term opioids prescriptions. The goal, Cain said, is to avoid blaming individual workers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“When this information first came to light, what I heard was, ‘Oh, it’s just the macho culture, it’s the type of people who go into construction,’” she said. “We can’t tell you how many of these deaths are because somebody started on a prescription, but we know that some of them are. We know a lot of these deaths are also from illicit drug use that have nothing to do with workplaces, but where we can (make) changes as an industry to impact these numbers is what we’re trying to do.”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Businesses respond to crisis\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Employers, too, are trying to break the stigma of seeking help. Since 2021, the Associated General Contractors of California has provided materials to hold jobsite meetings about mental health.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Not all employers know how to raise the issue and some fear reprisal for appearing to pry into employees’ personal lives, said Frank Nunes, CEO of the Wall and Ceiling Alliance, a Pleasanton-based specialty contractors’ group. Some, Nunes said, are advised by attorneys to avoid talking about it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s still very sensitive,” he said. “You’ve got to be very careful how you ask somebody how (they’re) doing and not offend them.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Still, Nunes joined officials of District Council 16 of the International Union of Painters and Allied Trades at a recovery event in San Leandro in October, promoting treatment programs covered by their contracts and encouraging workers to use them.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We have to address these things in the field,” he told about 100 union members. “There’s a cultural change we all need to work on.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In a cavernous training hall where apprentices learn how to install drywall, union members told their peers how they had recovered from addiction. The union invited former Raiders tight end Darren Waller to talk about his own experiences with addiction and depression.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Reflecting on union officials’ numbers on construction worker deaths by overdose or suicide, Waller told the crowd: “Those are lives that still deserve to be among us.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Robert Williams, the local’s business manager and secretary-treasurer, described what he called a familiar scenario: A worker experiences a job site injury or persistent soreness, feels pressure to work through it, then escalates from an over-the-counter pill to a prescription painkiller to an illicit opioid addiction.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We’re only with our families a small portion of the day,” he said. “The people we work with, we’re with 80% of the time. We’ve got to be open on those job sites.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12017662\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1200px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12017662\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/110624_Construction-Unions_LA_CM_06.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1200\" height=\"800\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/110624_Construction-Unions_LA_CM_06.jpg 1200w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/110624_Construction-Unions_LA_CM_06-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/110624_Construction-Unions_LA_CM_06-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/110624_Construction-Unions_LA_CM_06-160x107.jpg 160w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1200px) 100vw, 1200px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Robert Williams, left, business manager and secretary-treasurer, and James Boster, right, director of mental health and addiction, with District Council 16 of the International Union of Painters and Allied Trades, at their union office in Livermore on Nov. 6, 2024. \u003ccite>(Laure Andrillon for CalMatters)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The union and local employers realized they had a problem on their hands last summer. After sifting through their health plan records, they found 91 members had died of overdose or suicide (not necessarily at work) in 18 months.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The revelation forced union officials to rethink their roles in workers’ lives, Williams said in an interview.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We look out for safety on the jobs, so if there’s a death on a job site because of a safety hazard, it’s front-page news,” he said. “But if there’s death by an overdose or death by suicide of a construction worker when they go home, nobody talks about that. So instead of thinking about just the safety side, it’s that holistic side of, how do we make somebody better for themselves and their families?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Williams quickly appointed a director of addiction and mental health. James Boster, himself in recovery from a painkiller addiction he said he developed after a non-work injury, speaks at apprenticeship programs and worksites, helps workers get into recovery programs and acts as a crisis counselor.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In the past year, Boster said he’s helped place 51 union members into residential or outpatient treatment programs. During a recent interview at the union’s headquarters in Livermore, he said he was anxious: He had secured a “scholarship” for one member who hadn’t logged enough hours in recent months to have full health coverage, but the worker had chosen to postpone treatment.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I can never walk away from a member, and something happens, and not hold that personally,” Boster said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Boster and Williams are eager to expand their program. Ideas include installing someone with Boster’s role across the district’s 20 local unions and establishing a fund to help members who haven’t worked enough hours to afford treatment.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Other advocates, meanwhile, have pushed the state to require naloxone at worksites as part of an overall strategy to reduce overdoses.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Earlier this year, the National Safety Council, an advocacy group, petitioned California labor agencies to do just that. Proponents said the medication, which can temporarily reverse an overdose by blocking the brain’s opioid receptors, is easy to administer and not harmful.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside tag='fentanyl' label='More on Fentanyl']\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Citing its workplace death data, Cal/OSHA supported the proposal before the independent Occupational Safety & Health Standards Board, which decides whether to approve such regulations.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s in the top two or three killers of workers now, and just a few years ago, it was a very small number,” Eric Berg, Cal/OSHA deputy chief of health and research and standards, said at a June 20 board meeting. “So it’s just become a really serious problem for workers, and it’s killing workers. I think we have an obligation to act.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But board members hesitated. Chairperson David Alioto called the proposal an “odd request.” While addiction is a legitimate public health concern, it’s not a workplace hazard like wildfire smoke for employees who must work outside, he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I have not seen a regulation where an employer is providing a remedy for a risk that the employer did not create,” Alioto said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Board members also said they worried about whether all businesses would be able to store the medication at the right temperature and whether employers would bear liability over the medication’s use.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The standards board ultimately voted for the agency to discuss the matter before an advisory committee. In September, Gov. Gavin Newsom signed a law directing Cal/OSHA to draft a workplace naloxone rule by December 2027 and giving the board until December 2028 to consider it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>So far, no advisory committee has met.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>\u003cstrong>Share your story\u003c/strong>: We want to hear from workers, family members and employers. If you have experience with addiction, mental health or overdose on a job site, and you’re willing to share your story with a CalMatters reporter, please reach out to jeanne@calmatters.org.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"excerpt": "Employers and unions are grappling with the opioid crisis, while the state inches toward requiring Narcan in workplaces.",
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"title": "Fentanyl Overdoses Are Causing a Surge in Workplace Deaths in California | KQED",
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"nprByline": "\u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/author/jeanne-kuang/\">Jeanne Kuang\u003c/a> and \u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/author/jeremia-kimelman/\">Jeremia Kimelman\u003c/a>, CalMatters",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>As the nation continues to struggle with an opioid crisis now supercharged by fentanyl, overdoses have become one of the leading causes of workplace deaths.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>California is no different: Workplace overdose deaths have risen so dramatically that in 2021 and 2022, they caused more fatalities than falls at construction sites or being hit by machinery, and in 2022, were second only to car crashes and other transportation incidents.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That year, the toll surpassed 110 workers, accounting for 18% of the state’s workplace deaths, compared to 11% nationwide.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Federal and state government experts have \u003ca href=\"https://www.bls.gov/opub/ted/2024/unintentional-overdoses-rose-for-the-tenth-straight-year-in-2022.htm\">raised the alarm\u003c/a> over this trend, which has puzzled some policymakers because drug use is not a hazard created directly by the job. After all, those who die of an overdose at work represent a small share of thousands of Californians who overdose each year.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Still, business owners and union officials alike are increasingly having to grapple with one of the nation’s most prominent public health challenges.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“When fentanyl came around, we started having a huge uptick in overdoses and deaths — even suicides,” said Paul Moreno, president of Ironworkers Local 433 in Southern California.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In 2022, his local began holding recovery meetings for members that now draw as many as a dozen attendees a month. Moreno, who said he’s been sober 19 years, visits worksites and the union hall, passing around the 988 \u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/health/2021/09/988-911-funding-crisis-hotline-suicide-california/\">mental health crisis hotline number\u003c/a>, giving out his own personal phone number and distributing doses of the overdose reversal drug naloxone (commonly sold as Narcan).\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I took Narcan classes. I passed out Narcan on the job sites. I never thought I’d be doing that,” he said. “The phone calls from the members, sometimes I don’t know what to say besides listen. We still need more training.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A new California law directs the state’s workplace safety agencies to require worksites to stock Narcan in their first aid kits, but the regulations haven’t been issued yet. A spokesperson said Cal/OSHA is “in the early stages of rulemaking,” a process that \u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/politics/capitol/2024/02/workplace-safety-california-indoor-heat/\">could take years\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Not much is publicly known about overdose deaths at California worksites. A small office in Cal/OSHA that compiles workplace fatality data has, for at least the past two years, noted the rise in overdoses in its \u003ca href=\"https://www.dir.ca.gov/dosh/CFOI/California-Occupational-Fatalities.pdf\">annual reports\u003c/a>. However, the office said it cannot release details due to privacy restrictions.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The agency has not responded to a public records request CalMatters filed in September for all overdose incidents, fatal or nonfatal, that have been reported at worksites.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>State won’t release details on deaths\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>County coroners’ offices, which investigate some deaths, vary widely in whether they can identify incidents based on whether a person died at their job. Death records from the past three years obtained from Alameda, San Bernardino and Riverside counties provide glimpses into the grim trend.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In 2021, a flooring installer stepped out for a smoke break at a construction site in Temecula and was found by coworkers on the side of the house, dead from a fentanyl overdose. A packing plant worker in Corona went to the bathroom and did not return; coworkers found him bent over with a straw, lighter and piece of foil nearby, having overdosed on methamphetamine, fentanyl and heroin. In Fremont, a manager found a night-shift janitor in the bathroom with a white powdery substance, overdosed on fentanyl. In Livermore this year, a driver was found in his parked semi-truck as he waited to make a scheduled delivery, also dead from fentanyl.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12017660\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1200px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12017660\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/04222LA-Homeless-Court_TS_CM_27.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1200\" height=\"800\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/04222LA-Homeless-Court_TS_CM_27.jpg 1200w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/04222LA-Homeless-Court_TS_CM_27-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/04222LA-Homeless-Court_TS_CM_27-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/04222LA-Homeless-Court_TS_CM_27-160x107.jpg 160w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1200px) 100vw, 1200px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Narcan nasal spray containers available at a rally at the First Street U.S. Courthouse in Los Angeles on April 22, 2024. \u003ccite>(Ted Soqui for CalMatters)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>California officials have little to say about the rising death toll. Cal/OSHA refused to make an official available for an interview and would not explain why overdoses account for a much higher share of the state’s workplace deaths compared to the rest of the nation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Instead, the agency cited the \u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/explainers/california-opioid-crisis/\">broader national opioid crisis\u003c/a>. “California had more than 7,000 people die from opioid-related overdose deaths in 2022,” spokesperson Erika Monterroza wrote in an email. “Unfortunately, these deaths happen all over our state, including in our workplaces.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The state Department of Public Health said it is considering conducting a study. That agency’s occupational health branch is “aware of this issue and is considering a project to examine all opioid overdoses by industry and occupation,” a spokesperson said. In October, the department said staff are in the “initial stages of preparing for an analysis” but did not provide a completion date.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Studies in other states indicate the problem is worse in certain industries. In Massachusetts, where overdoses are the top cause of workplace deaths, researchers with the state public health agency examined all overdose deaths — whether at work or not — and found deaths occurred disproportionately among those working in manual-labor, high-injury industries.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Those jobs, said Emily Sparer-Fine, director of the Massachusetts public health agency’s \u003ca href=\"https://www.mass.gov/orgs/occupational-health-surveillance-program\">Occupational Health Surveillance Program\u003c/a>, are often seasonal or unstable, and workers may be financially strained and pressured to work through pain.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Certain industries and occupations, (such as) construction, fishing had a much higher rate of overdose,” Sparer-Fine said in an interview. “But it was also jobs that had lower access to paid sick leave, higher rates of job insecurity, higher rates of overall workplace injury.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In a new study this year, Sparer-Fine’s team also dug into \u003ca href=\"https://www.mass.gov/doc/opioid-related-overdose-deaths-among-injured-workers-in-massachusetts-findings-from-the-public-health-data-warehouse/download\">workers’ compensation data\u003c/a> and found that working-age Massachusetts residents were 35% more likely to have died of an overdose if they were previously injured on the job.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Workers in similar industries are overrepresented in the California workplace overdose deaths, including in trucking and warehousing, according to federal data.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>So are workers in construction, where unions and employers are confronting a mental health and addiction crisis. Nationwide, construction workers are \u003ca href=\"https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/nvsr/nvsr72/nvsr72-07.pdf\">more likely than workers in any other profession\u003c/a> to overdose and also have one of the \u003ca href=\"https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/72/wr/mm7250a2.htm?s_cid=mm7250a2_w\">highest rates of suicide\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Chris Trahan Cain, executive director of the National Center for Construction Research and Training, has since 2018 led the response to the industry’s opioid crisis. She has focused on a longtime reliance on painkillers to deal with injuries involving the muscles and bones, which \u003ca href=\"https://www.cpwr.com/wp-content/uploads/KF2020-MSDs-Opioids-US-workers.pdf\">nearly a third of construction workers\u003c/a> report experiencing. Studies like the ones in Massachusetts were among the first to reveal the toll.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The center, formed by the nation’s construction unions, has recommended stocking naloxone in union halls, requiring apprentices be taught about opioid abuse and ensuring members have coverage of drug treatment programs. They’re also providing tips on talking to doctors about how to treat injuries without long-term opioids prescriptions. The goal, Cain said, is to avoid blaming individual workers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“When this information first came to light, what I heard was, ‘Oh, it’s just the macho culture, it’s the type of people who go into construction,’” she said. “We can’t tell you how many of these deaths are because somebody started on a prescription, but we know that some of them are. We know a lot of these deaths are also from illicit drug use that have nothing to do with workplaces, but where we can (make) changes as an industry to impact these numbers is what we’re trying to do.”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Businesses respond to crisis\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Employers, too, are trying to break the stigma of seeking help. Since 2021, the Associated General Contractors of California has provided materials to hold jobsite meetings about mental health.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Not all employers know how to raise the issue and some fear reprisal for appearing to pry into employees’ personal lives, said Frank Nunes, CEO of the Wall and Ceiling Alliance, a Pleasanton-based specialty contractors’ group. Some, Nunes said, are advised by attorneys to avoid talking about it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s still very sensitive,” he said. “You’ve got to be very careful how you ask somebody how (they’re) doing and not offend them.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Still, Nunes joined officials of District Council 16 of the International Union of Painters and Allied Trades at a recovery event in San Leandro in October, promoting treatment programs covered by their contracts and encouraging workers to use them.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We have to address these things in the field,” he told about 100 union members. “There’s a cultural change we all need to work on.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In a cavernous training hall where apprentices learn how to install drywall, union members told their peers how they had recovered from addiction. The union invited former Raiders tight end Darren Waller to talk about his own experiences with addiction and depression.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Reflecting on union officials’ numbers on construction worker deaths by overdose or suicide, Waller told the crowd: “Those are lives that still deserve to be among us.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Robert Williams, the local’s business manager and secretary-treasurer, described what he called a familiar scenario: A worker experiences a job site injury or persistent soreness, feels pressure to work through it, then escalates from an over-the-counter pill to a prescription painkiller to an illicit opioid addiction.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We’re only with our families a small portion of the day,” he said. “The people we work with, we’re with 80% of the time. We’ve got to be open on those job sites.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12017662\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1200px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12017662\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/110624_Construction-Unions_LA_CM_06.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1200\" height=\"800\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/110624_Construction-Unions_LA_CM_06.jpg 1200w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/110624_Construction-Unions_LA_CM_06-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/110624_Construction-Unions_LA_CM_06-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/12/110624_Construction-Unions_LA_CM_06-160x107.jpg 160w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1200px) 100vw, 1200px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Robert Williams, left, business manager and secretary-treasurer, and James Boster, right, director of mental health and addiction, with District Council 16 of the International Union of Painters and Allied Trades, at their union office in Livermore on Nov. 6, 2024. \u003ccite>(Laure Andrillon for CalMatters)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The union and local employers realized they had a problem on their hands last summer. After sifting through their health plan records, they found 91 members had died of overdose or suicide (not necessarily at work) in 18 months.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The revelation forced union officials to rethink their roles in workers’ lives, Williams said in an interview.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We look out for safety on the jobs, so if there’s a death on a job site because of a safety hazard, it’s front-page news,” he said. “But if there’s death by an overdose or death by suicide of a construction worker when they go home, nobody talks about that. So instead of thinking about just the safety side, it’s that holistic side of, how do we make somebody better for themselves and their families?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Williams quickly appointed a director of addiction and mental health. James Boster, himself in recovery from a painkiller addiction he said he developed after a non-work injury, speaks at apprenticeship programs and worksites, helps workers get into recovery programs and acts as a crisis counselor.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In the past year, Boster said he’s helped place 51 union members into residential or outpatient treatment programs. During a recent interview at the union’s headquarters in Livermore, he said he was anxious: He had secured a “scholarship” for one member who hadn’t logged enough hours in recent months to have full health coverage, but the worker had chosen to postpone treatment.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I can never walk away from a member, and something happens, and not hold that personally,” Boster said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Boster and Williams are eager to expand their program. Ideas include installing someone with Boster’s role across the district’s 20 local unions and establishing a fund to help members who haven’t worked enough hours to afford treatment.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Other advocates, meanwhile, have pushed the state to require naloxone at worksites as part of an overall strategy to reduce overdoses.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Earlier this year, the National Safety Council, an advocacy group, petitioned California labor agencies to do just that. Proponents said the medication, which can temporarily reverse an overdose by blocking the brain’s opioid receptors, is easy to administer and not harmful.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Citing its workplace death data, Cal/OSHA supported the proposal before the independent Occupational Safety & Health Standards Board, which decides whether to approve such regulations.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s in the top two or three killers of workers now, and just a few years ago, it was a very small number,” Eric Berg, Cal/OSHA deputy chief of health and research and standards, said at a June 20 board meeting. “So it’s just become a really serious problem for workers, and it’s killing workers. I think we have an obligation to act.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But board members hesitated. Chairperson David Alioto called the proposal an “odd request.” While addiction is a legitimate public health concern, it’s not a workplace hazard like wildfire smoke for employees who must work outside, he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I have not seen a regulation where an employer is providing a remedy for a risk that the employer did not create,” Alioto said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Board members also said they worried about whether all businesses would be able to store the medication at the right temperature and whether employers would bear liability over the medication’s use.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The standards board ultimately voted for the agency to discuss the matter before an advisory committee. In September, Gov. Gavin Newsom signed a law directing Cal/OSHA to draft a workplace naloxone rule by December 2027 and giving the board until December 2028 to consider it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>So far, no advisory committee has met.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>\u003cstrong>Share your story\u003c/strong>: We want to hear from workers, family members and employers. If you have experience with addiction, mental health or overdose on a job site, and you’re willing to share your story with a CalMatters reporter, please reach out to jeanne@calmatters.org.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"info": "What kind of no sabo word is Hyphenación? For us, it’s about living within a hyphenation. Like being a third-gen Mexican-American from the Texas border now living that Bay Area Chicano life. Like Xorje! Each week we bring together a couple of hyphenated Latinos to talk all about personal life choices: family, careers, relationships, belonging … everything is on the table. ",
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"info": "The Political Mind of Jerry Brown brings listeners the wisdom of the former Governor, Mayor, and presidential candidate. Scott Shafer interviewed Brown for more than 40 hours, covering the former governor's life and half-century in the political game – and Brown has some lessons he'd like to share. ",
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"marketplace": {
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"info": "Our flagship program, helmed by Kai Ryssdal, examines what the day in money delivered, through stories, conversations, newsworthy numbers and more. Updated Monday through Friday at about 3:30 p.m. PT.",
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"info": "Masters of Scale is an original podcast in which LinkedIn co-founder and Greylock Partner Reid Hoffman sets out to describe and prove theories that explain how great entrepreneurs take their companies from zero to a gazillion in ingenious fashion.",
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"info": "The MindShift podcast explores the innovations in education that are shaping how kids learn. Hosts Ki Sung and Katrina Schwartz introduce listeners to educators, researchers, parents and students who are developing effective ways to improve how kids learn. We cover topics like how fed-up administrators are developing surprising tactics to deal with classroom disruptions; how listening to podcasts are helping kids develop reading skills; the consequences of overparenting; and why interdisciplinary learning can engage students on all ends of the traditional achievement spectrum. This podcast is part of the MindShift education site, a division of KQED News. KQED is an NPR/PBS member station based in San Francisco. You can also visit the MindShift website for episodes and supplemental blog posts or tweet us \u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/MindShiftKQED\">@MindShiftKQED\u003c/a> or visit us at \u003ca href=\"/mindshift\">MindShift.KQED.org\u003c/a>",
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"info": "For decades, the process for how police police themselves has been inconsistent – if not opaque. In some states, like California, these proceedings were completely hidden. After a new police transparency law unsealed scores of internal affairs files, our reporters set out to examine these cases and the shadow world of police discipline. On Our Watch brings listeners into the rooms where officers are questioned and witnesses are interrogated to find out who this system is really protecting. Is it the officers, or the public they've sworn to serve?",
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"tagline": "Politics from a personal perspective",
"info": "Political Breakdown is a new series that explores the political intersection of California and the nation. Each week hosts Scott Shafer and Marisa Lagos are joined with a new special guest to unpack politics -- with personality — and offer an insider’s glimpse at how politics happens.",
"airtime": "THU 6:30pm-7pm",
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"possible": {
"id": "possible",
"title": "Possible",
"info": "Possible is hosted by entrepreneur Reid Hoffman and writer Aria Finger. Together in Possible, Hoffman and Finger lead enlightening discussions about building a brighter collective future. The show features interviews with visionary guests like Trevor Noah, Sam Altman and Janette Sadik-Khan. Possible paints an optimistic portrait of the world we can create through science, policy, business, art and our shared humanity. It asks: What if everything goes right for once? How can we get there? Each episode also includes a short fiction story generated by advanced AI GPT-4, serving as a thought-provoking springboard to speculate how humanity could leverage technology for good.",
"airtime": "SUN 2pm",
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"pri-the-world": {
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"info": "Each weekday, host Marco Werman and his team of producers bring you the world's most interesting stories in an hour of radio that reminds us just how small our planet really is.",
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"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/The-World-Podcast-Tile-360x360-1.jpg",
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"radiolab": {
"id": "radiolab",
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"info": "A two-time Peabody Award-winner, Radiolab is an investigation told through sounds and stories, and centered around one big idea. In the Radiolab world, information sounds like music and science and culture collide. Hosted by Jad Abumrad and Robert Krulwich, the show is designed for listeners who demand skepticism, but appreciate wonder. WNYC Studios is the producer of other leading podcasts including Freakonomics Radio, Death, Sex & Money, On the Media and many more.",
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"reveal": {
"id": "reveal",
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"info": "Created by The Center for Investigative Reporting and PRX, Reveal is public radios first one-hour weekly radio show and podcast dedicated to investigative reporting. Credible, fact based and without a partisan agenda, Reveal combines the power and artistry of driveway moment storytelling with data-rich reporting on critically important issues. The result is stories that inform and inspire, arming our listeners with information to right injustices, hold the powerful accountable and improve lives.Reveal is hosted by Al Letson and showcases the award-winning work of CIR and newsrooms large and small across the nation. In a radio and podcast market crowded with choices, Reveal focuses on important and often surprising stories that illuminate the world for our listeners.",
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},
"rightnowish": {
"id": "rightnowish",
"title": "Rightnowish",
"tagline": "Art is where you find it",
"info": "Rightnowish digs into life in the Bay Area right now… ish. Journalist Pendarvis Harshaw takes us to galleries painted on the sides of liquor stores in West Oakland. We'll dance in warehouses in the Bayview, make smoothies with kids in South Berkeley, and listen to classical music in a 1984 Cutlass Supreme in Richmond. Every week, Pen talks to movers and shakers about how the Bay Area shapes what they create, and how they shape the place we call home.",
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},
"science-friday": {
"id": "science-friday",
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"info": "Science Friday is a weekly science talk show, broadcast live over public radio stations nationwide. Each week, the show focuses on science topics that are in the news and tries to bring an educated, balanced discussion to bear on the scientific issues at hand. Panels of expert guests join host Ira Flatow, a veteran science journalist, to discuss science and to take questions from listeners during the call-in portion of the program.",
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"snap-judgment": {
"id": "snap-judgment",
"title": "Snap Judgment",
"tagline": "Real stories with killer beats",
"info": "The Snap Judgment radio show and podcast mixes real stories with killer beats to produce cinematic, dramatic radio. Snap's musical brand of storytelling dares listeners to see the world through the eyes of another. This is storytelling... with a BEAT!! Snap first aired on public radio stations nationwide in July 2010. Today, Snap Judgment airs on over 450 public radio stations and is brought to the airwaves by KQED & PRX.",
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},
"soldout": {
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