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Texas rules requiring water breaks for construction workers will be nullified

texastribune.org

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Re: Texas rules requiring water breaks for construction workers will be nullified

#51

Post by dbg31415 »

technofiend wrote: post #34
dbg31415 wrote: post #20

[flagged]

A rapper named Big Pokey died today [1] after two outdoor concert performances: one in Baytown and the second in Beaumont. I'd cite the source but the original Twitter post of him collapsing on stage was taken down. He was a pretty big guy, so I doubt that helped. But in contrast even fit and healthy people being forced to work construction with no break is inhuman. There's no excuse for such brutality. [1] https://o…

Yeah, damn. The video just shows him collapsing while walking down a rope line. Wasn't even the middle of the day.

The heat puts a lot of stress on the body. Any existing issues are bound to come out as the heart circulates blood to try and cool down.

American Heart Association has some advice for staying alive in the heat... seems like doctors should be able to help write these into law.

https://newsroom.heart.org/news/protect-your-heart-in-the-he...

Re: Texas rules requiring water breaks for construction workers will be nullified

#52

Post by freeone3000 »

fwlr wrote: post #28

Those mandatory water break laws confuse me. Is it because businesses are refusing to let their workers take water breaks? Or because workers don’t realize when they need a water break? I find it hard to believe either of those things are generally true*. *: Perhaps there are some outliers - businesses that genuinely slavedrive their workers, or workers that genuinely can’t tell when they’re about to die. But are tho…

If people do not pay attention to laws requiring workers to take water breaks, we use state-backed violence until they do.

Re: Texas rules requiring water breaks for construction workers will be nullified

#53

Post by mustacheemperor »

fwlr wrote: post #28

Those mandatory water break laws confuse me. Is it because businesses are refusing to let their workers take water breaks? Or because workers don’t realize when they need a water break? I find it hard to believe either of those things are generally true*. *: Perhaps there are some outliers - businesses that genuinely slavedrive their workers, or workers that genuinely can’t tell when they’re about to die. But are tho…

Folks on site often just want to get the job done and can view stuff like regular breaks for water as an obstacle if they feel they don’t need it, whether that’s an individual working through their break or a crew chief who grumbles about people setting tools down for it. Unfortunately people aren’t very good judges of when they need a break for water working in hot conditions. Cal-OSHA has an entire additional training module on heat related illness because it’s such a risk to workers on site. Making it a requirement helps everyone gets the breaks they need and reduces the rate of heat related injury and death on site, that’s it.

Re: Texas rules requiring water breaks for construction workers will be nullified

#54

Post by denimnerd42 »

ta1243 wrote: post #41
denimnerd42 wrote: post #29

Is this specific regulation really an issue? I understand heat related deaths do occur but is it because they are not allowed water breaks every 4!! hours? If you're working out there in 115+ heat index like June, July, August, September bring you're going to need a water break every 20-40 minutes, especially decked out in full PPE. I don't see overseers out there driving these Hispanic laborers to work 8 hours strai…

Do employers always pay for these breaks, or do they garnish wages?

I'm not some construction expert here in Texas but from what I observe most laborers are working under a sub contractor or levels of sub contractor and are usually paid a daily rate.

Re: Texas rules requiring water breaks for construction workers will be nullified

#55

Post by avgcorrection »

rightbyte wrote: post #42
fwlr wrote: post #28

Those mandatory water break laws confuse me. Is it because businesses are refusing to let their workers take water breaks? Or because workers don’t realize when they need a water break? I find it hard to believe either of those things are generally true*. *: Perhaps there are some outliers - businesses that genuinely slavedrive their workers, or workers that genuinely can’t tell when they’re about to die. But are tho…

In my experience many safety rules are there to force workers to do stuff they don't want to do. Like wear helmets or whatever. Management has to be quite bad before they are the weak link.

And this applies to drinking water?

Re: Texas rules requiring water breaks for construction workers will be nullified

#56

Post by frob »

dbg31415 wrote: post #49

Also... can we talk about how f'd it is that someone who wants smaller government would go out of his way to ban small local government from governing? "You're doing it wrong at the local level, let me run things at the state level... but that same logic doesn't apply to the federal government!" It takes some real mental hoolahooping to make that work.

It's almost as if that whole "small goverment" line has been a canard the entire time

Re: Texas rules requiring water breaks for construction workers will be nullified

#57

Post by Timon3 »

yostrovs wrote: post #6
nonstopdev wrote: post #4

This would be interesting to see how it plays out and if the market solves this on its own. While a regulation and mandates usually requires an employer to keep extra records, cause confusion for a lot of smaller companies trying to comply based on each different governments rules, as well as generate more government costs to enforce, the Texas heat is nothing to mess with just as in many states in the south. I would…

Here where I live we don't have mandated by government bathroom breaks, yet my employer lets me go whenever I want.

Does that hold for everyone in your area? Or is it okay for you if other people aren't allowed to take a bathroom break when they want as long as you are allowed to?

Re: Texas rules requiring water breaks for construction workers will be nullified

#58

Post by klyrs »

tootallgavin wrote: post #40

The bill in question https://capitol.texas.gov/tlodocs/88R/billtext/pdf/HB02127F.... Maybe I didn't read it properly but water breaks are not under attack

The bill imposes novel limitations on what regulations municipalities are allowed to enact/enforce. You won't find the impact of the bill in its text -- to find that, you'd need to read the municipal regulations that would be superceded. Mandatory water breaks (a paltry 10 minutes each 4 hours) are but one example.

Re: Texas rules requiring water breaks for construction workers will be nullified

#59

Post by BaculumMeumEst »

nonstopdev wrote: post #4

This would be interesting to see how it plays out and if the market solves this on its own. While a regulation and mandates usually requires an employer to keep extra records, cause confusion for a lot of smaller companies trying to comply based on each different governments rules, as well as generate more government costs to enforce, the Texas heat is nothing to mess with just as in many states in the south. I would…

I've seen landscapers working outside at a time when the air quality was >300 AQI. The employer required their workers to show up that day and provided no protective equipment, and the customers couldn't reschedule without forfeiting a large down payment.

Safety need to be regulated.

Re: Texas rules requiring water breaks for construction workers will be nullified

#60

Post by bequanna »

bobthepanda wrote: post #21
bequanna wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is pretty strong conjecture that is the exact opposite of what is currently happening. If Texas is such a terrible place to live, why are so many people moving there?

Wet bulb temperature would be when the climate gets so hot that perspiration will not cool the body down. It’s a real risk in coming years that will result in death, particularly if it combines with peak AC load to black out a grid for several days. Texas is not there yet, but IIRC this has already happened in India and parts of the Middle East. https://www.kxan.com/news/national-news/what-is-a-wet-bulb-t...

Sure, I follow you but why would this start killing people in mass?

Wet bulb temp is technically “deadly” in Houston every year with relatively few deaths.

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