California’s Governor has signed Senate Bill 606 (SB 606), which authorizes Cal/OSHA to issue a citation for egregious violation of an occupational safety or health standard, order, special order, or regulation for each willful violation determined by Cal/OSHA, and count each employee affected by the violation as a separate violation for purposes of the issuance of fines and penalties. This would mean that the maximum penalty would be per violation, per employee.

A violation is deemed egregious under the bill if one or more of the following is true:

• The employer, intentionally through voluntary action or inaction, made no reasonable effort to eliminate the known violation.

• The violations resulted in worker fatalities, a worksite catastrophe, or a large number of injuries or illnesses.

• The violations resulted in persistently high rates of worker injuries or illnesses.

• The employer has an extensive history of prior violations of this section of the labor code.

• The employer has intentionally disregarded their health and safety responsibilities.

• The employer’s conduct, taken as a whole, amounts to clear bad faith in the performance of their duties to provide occupational safety to their employees.

• The employer has committed a large number of violations to undermine the effectiveness of any safety and health program that might be in place.

This bill takes effect on January 1, 2022.