Doroteo Jimenez carries a coffin representing his 17-year-old niece, Maria Isabel Vasquez Jimenez - the latest worker in California to die from heat stress.  She was pregnant and died May 16 after collapsing while at work for Merced Farm Labor.  By the time she was taken to the hospital, her core body temperature was 108.4˚.  Her employer failed to provide water and shade in defiance of California law.

By Marcy Rein

The United Farm Workers organized a pilgrimage from Lodi to Sacramento to honor Vasquez-Jimenez and press for better enforcement of the Cal/OSHA rules that are supposed to protect workers from excess heat. Those rules didn’t take effect until 2005—and they only apply to people who work outdoors. 

Workers at Rite Aid’s distribution center in Lancaster, CA, who recently voted to join ILWU warehouse Local 26, want to see the rules on heat stress expanded to cover people who work indoors. Rite Aid workers suffer from blistering heat inside their high-desert warehouse each summer where there is no air conditioning in most work areas. One man died at the end of his shift in 2006, and many co-workers believe that the high-temperatures at work contributed to his death.

Former Rite Aid workers testified to the California legislature last year in support of a bill requiring Cal/OSHA to set rules on indoor heat. The legislature passed the bill, but Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger vetoed it.

The ILWU continues to organize on the issue and is working with Cal/OSHA on a community forum about indoor heat that will be held on Saturday, June 21 from 1 p.m. to 4p.m. at the IBEW hall, 1817 E. Q St., Suite A-16, in Palmdale.

For more information, call ILWU Organizer Carlos Cordon at 213.618.1765.