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WORKERS' MEMORIAL DAY

Saturday, April 26, 2008

Estimated Start Time: 8:30 am

Southern California - Downtown Los Angeles

Northern California - Contra Costa County

More details will be available as planning for this event proceeds

Workers' Memorial Day is our opportunity to remember victims of workplace injuries and disease. It is also our opportunity to bring together workers, their families, community-based worker centers, unions, environmentalists, and other health and safety advocates in a unified effort to alert the public and the government to our outrage and our demands for action that leads to better workplace health and safety.

Nationally, over the course of 2006, more than 4.1 million workers were injured and 5,703 workers were killed due to job hazards. Another 50,000 died due to occupational diseases from sources such as toxic chemicals in the workplace.

Each year in California, 23,000 workers are diagnosed with a chronic, deadly disease attributed to chemical exposure in the workplace, and approximately 6,500 California workers die due to chronic diseases associated with workplace exposures. In an effort to address the issue of chemical exposures in the workplace, a key focus for this year's observance of Workers Memorial Day is to build political support for AB515. This bill would close a loophole that currently permits workers to be exposed to toxic chemicals in the workplace in amounts that cause cancer or reproductive harm or other chronic health effects. Workers are at the front line when it comes to exposure to toxic chemicals. We must do what we can to convince our elected officials in Sacramento to demonstrate their political will to protect workers and pass AB 515.