California Worker Climate Bill of Rights
State Policy Platform
Winning a Worker-Led Transition to a Just and Climate-Safe Economy
In the midst of a rapidly changing economy and climate, our four priority areas outline a visionary plan to expand union careers, protect workers on the job and in the communities where they live, and build worker power.
Climate Hazard Protections
Safety Nets for Impacted Workers and Communities
Good Jobs in the Low Carbon Economy
Strong Public Sector Provides Climate-Adaptive Services
1. Climate Hazard Protections
Workers across the state are experiencing increasingly dangerous and unhealthy working conditions from extreme heat in agricultural fields and packing plants, to smoke-filled classrooms that lack adequate HVAC systems, to flooded commutes and fire-evacuated nursing facilities. We demand new safeguards that stand up to the escalating risks workers face. All workers deserve the resources and information needed to protect their well-being without fear of retaliation or economic hardship.
We demand the following policy solutions:
Strengthen statewide indoor and outdoor heat and smoke standards and enforcement
Refinery safety compliance – staffing minimums, including training and certification pathways – as companies aim to maximize profit by cutting safety staff
Strengthen workers’ rights in evacuation zones and during disasters
2. Safety Nets for Impacted Workers and Communities
Big corporations never have and never will stand by workers during times of transition–from car manufacturers in Detroit to mine owners in Appalachia to oil companies in California. We are calling for oil and gas companies – the same ones that are reaping record profits while laying off workers – to finance a worker-led transition that requires all displaced and affected workers receive comprehensive safety nets for a clear and sustainable pathway into family supporting careers.
We demand the following policy solutions:
Comprehensive safety nets for displaced workers including wage replacement, healthcare coverage, re-training and relocation support.
Community Transition Support Set Aside Fund to maintain local critical services and public sector jobs in oil and gas-dependent counties
Disaster insurance to protect workers’ pay when climate-fueled disaster makes working unsafe, as well as full unemployment benefits for all undocumented workers.
Training record access and certification pathways for all industrial oil and gas workers so that any displaced worker can transition with their experience, skills and training intact
3. Good Jobs in the Low Carbon Economy
Some say climate change is not an issue, but an era… and it is unleashing the biggest changes in our economy in over a century. The business-as-usual path pushes us towards a pollution and poverty economy that drives low-wage gig work, racialized wealth inequality and corporate-controlled democracy. With a united labor movement, our communities can seize the opportunities – one million new jobs, billions in federal and state investment, unprecedented public will to fight climate disaster – and usher in an equitable, worker-friendly and climate-safe economy.
We need strong labor standards in every emerging and shifting industry to ensure high-road jobs with family sustaining wages, good benefits, training and workforce development programs and the right to organize.
We demand the following policy solutions:
Secure labor standards and a strong unionized workforce for the Federal $7 billion investment in California’s equitable broadband
Expand oil well remediation work across the state while ensuring prioritized hire and strong labor standards for displaced oil and gas workers
Expand the Green Janitors Energy Efficiency Workforce Training and the In-home Healthcare Emergency Preparedness Training programs as pathways to higher wages in historically low-wage sectors
Attach labor, equity and climate standards to all state and federal climate funding
4. Strong Public Sector Provides Climate-Adaptive Services and Infrastructure for All
Californians rely on public services and infrastructure that makes life possible – water treatment, public transportation, public education, healthcare, and beyond. Economic crises and transitions have historically opened the door for privatization of our cherished public resources–causing the gap between the rich and poor to widen. The transition to a low-carbon economy must not repeat this mistake: the safest and most cost-effective way to meet the climate crises is through expanding and strengthening our public sector, and preventing outsourcing.
We must upgrade critical public infrastructure and services to both reduce greenhouse gas emissions and ensure the health and safety of vulnerable workers and communities.
Low income workers and communities of color are on the frontlines of disaster: they’re hit first and worse by climate chaos, both at work and at home as fence line, environmental justice community members. Protecting all communities from pollution, climate risks, and disasters requires increased funding for public health services, climate-safe schools, community resilience centers, and more expansive and affordable public transit.
We demand the following policy solutions:
Universal home care benefit so all Californians have access to in-home care as we face a care cliff, increasing climate-exacerbated health problems and weather emergencies
Direct federal funding toward expanded public transit and water services, including increased hiring in engineering, operations and maintenance
Electrify and modernize K-14 School HVAC systems to promote healthy, climate-resilient and climate smart schools
Invest in our public sector through hiring and training public employees with the skills necessary to plan, oversee, and maintain public infrastructure and services in the low carbon economy; prevent outsourcing of this work