California Issues Draft of Proposed Regulations Implementing Hospital Violence Standards

California’s Senate Bill 1299, enacted in the fall of 2014, requires the State’s Occupational Safety and Health Standards Board to adopt standards requiring certain hospitals to implement a workplace violence prevention plan by July 1, 2016. On February 5, 2015, the Division of Occupational Safety and Health (the “Division”) issued a draft regulatory proposal that would require healthcare employers (including hospitals, clinics, drug-treatment facilities, home health care, and other healthcare operations) to develop workplace violence prevention plans specific to the hazards and corrective measures for each unit, service or operation of the employer. Covered employers could incorporate their workplace violence prevention plans into an existing injury and illness prevention program or maintain the plan as a separate document.