Workers' compensation: payments: public safety employees.

Existing law establishes a workers' compensation system, administered by the Administrative Director of the Division of Workers' Compensation, to compensate an employee for injuries sustained in the course of his or her employment. Existing law requires that whenever an eligible sworn member of the Department of the California Highway Patrol is disabled by a single injury, excluding disabilities that are the result of cumulative trauma or cumulative injuries, arising out of and in the course of his or her duties, he or she is entitled, regardless of his or her period of service with the department, to a leave of absence while disabled without loss of salary, in lieu of disability payments, for a period not exceeding one year. Benefits payable for eligible sworn members of the department whose disability is solely the result of cumulative trauma or injury are limited to the actual period of temporary disability or entitlement to a vocational rehabilitation maintenance allowance, or for one year, whichever is less. This bill would delete all references to the entitlement to a vocational rehabilitation maintenance allowance as an alternative to temporary disability. Existing law provides that, whenever a person in one of specified categories of local public safety employees, who is employed on a regular, full-time basis, is disabled, whether temporarily or permanently, by injury or illness arising out of and in the course of his or her duties, that person is entitled, regardless of his or her period of service, to a leave of absence while so disabled without a loss of salary in lieu of disability payments, or to a vocational rehabilitation maintenance allowance payments, if any, for the period of the disability, not exceeding one year. This bill would specify that the above provisions apply with respect to a single injury only, and would delete the above reference to the entitlement to a vocational rehabilitation maintenance allowance as an alternative to temporary disability.