Labor Applauds LA County Board of Supervisors for Approving Establishment of Public Health Councils

Statement from the Los Angeles County Federation of Labor on the Board of Supervisors’ vote to establish Public Health Councils: 

“We would like to commend Supervisors Sheila Kuel and Mark Ridley-Thomas for taking on the challenge and championing Public Health Councils throughout this process. This innovative program is a common sense approach to one of the greatest challenges of our time. 

Public Health Councils address the problem at the source by utilizing our most powerful and extensive resource — our workers — as our eyes and ears in the workplace, ensuring that public health orders are followed to prevent new outbreaks. 

We are happy an anti-retaliation ordinance will be included in the policy and look forward to seeing it. An anti-retaliation ordinance is crucial to the success of this program and we hope the language is strong as the pandemic has disproportionately impacted low-income industries, mostly composed of workers of color.

It’s simple: when workers are protected, the public is safe and our communities are safe. When our communities are safe, our businesses can stay open and our economy can move forward.  

While Los Angeles enters its third wave of the pandemic, surpassing 324,000 confirmed cases, we must not lose sight of what is at stake. As of yesterday, 7,177 people have died from COVID-19. Those are 7,177 family, friends, and loved ones lost; 7,177 empty chairs at the dinner table; and 7,177 futures ended too soon. 

This is a great first step in a much longer fight for a solution to protect the health of our communities. We look forward to collaborating with the Board of Supervisors to continue building on Public Health Councils to protect Angelenos, as Los Angeles serves as an example for other communities across the nation.”