This week the Cal/OSHA Standards Board approved the “Indoor Heat Illness” Standard.  However, they did so in defiance of direction from the Department of Finance who notified the Standards Board Wednesday that the regulation would not be approved due to significant costs to its own states agencies, supposedly the state prison system.  After notifying the public at its hearing in San Diego, activists ran wild chanting and protesting and eventually shutting the hear down.  Later, the Standards Board reconvened and adopted the standard anyway, allegedly as a sign of protest the last-minute direction from the state.  The Association has actively been engaged in opposition to the proposed standard stating it would cost millions to retrofit ag buildings, such as cotton gins, nut hullers and processors and farm shops.    The Association even made a standalone presentation to the Standards Board last June on the matter.  Unfortunately, those concerns went largely unnoticed until the State’s own agencies determined how costly compliance would be.  So now we wait to see what the state will do.  The Department of Finance must approve the regulation for it to go into effect, so we are in uncharted territory here.  Stay tuned to hear the latest.