Worker occupational safety and health training and education program.

Existing law requires the Commission on Health and Safety and Workers' Compensation to establish and maintain a worker and occupational safety and health training and education program and requires the Director of Industrial Relations to establish an insurance loss control services coordinator position, to be funded from the Workers' Occupational Safety and Health Education Fund. Existing law requires the director to levy and collect fees from workers' compensation insurers for purposes of the program, with the fees to be deposited in the fund. Existing law prohibits the fee assessed against any insurer from exceeding the greater of $100 or a specified percentage of paid workers' compensation indemnity amounts for claims reported in the previous year, as specified. Moneys in the fund are available for expenditure for the above purposes upon appropriation by the Legislature. This bill would revise the calculation of the fee described above to also include a specified percentage of paid workers' compensation medical amounts for claims reported in the previous year and would deposit those additional moneys in the Workers' Occupational Safety and Health Education Fund. The bill would authorize specified collaborative work by the commission in connection with its training and education program. The bill would expand the list of purposes of the training and education program, which would be referred to as the Worker Occupational Safety and Health Training and Education Program, or WOSHTEP, to increase the number of, and assure continued capacity of, specified organizations to train workers and provide services. The bill would require, as part of WOSHTEP, that the commission collaborate with the Occupational Health Branch of the State Department of Public Health and the University of California occupational health centers, as specified. The bill would repeal duplicative provisions. This bill would include a change in state statute that would result in a taxpayer paying a higher tax within the meaning of Section 3 of Article XIIIA of the California Constitution, and thus would require for passage the approval of 23 of the membership of each house of the Legislature.