San Diego Possible Location for May Hearing on New Cal/OSHA Porn Regs

Cal/OSHA has once again put off the public hearing on its new proposed regulations for adult production.

The agency has still not officially published the new draft regs, and a 45-day public comment period is required between the release of proposed regs and a hearing at which testimony for and against the draft may be presented.

The proposal was not placed on the agenda for the next Occupational Safety & Health Standards Board meeting, slated for March 19, or the April 19 meeting in Walnut Creek, CA, according to the most recent schedule of Public Hearings published by Cal/OSHA.

This means that a public hearing on the measure will not occur until May at the earliest.

The Board will conduct its May 21st meeting in San Diego at the County Administration Center on Pacific Highway.

If enacted, porn would be all but unproducible in California, as the requirements of the proposed regs are jaw-droppingly draconian:

• “Sexual activity” requiring “condoms or other protective barriers” is defined as as vaginal, anal, and oral sex;
• “Post Exposure” medical follow-up, at employer expense, in the event a performer has “eye, mouth, other mucous membrane, non-intact skin, or parenteral contact” with “potentiallyinfectious materials” such as “pre-ejaculate, ejaculate, semen, vaginal secretions, fecal matter and rectal secretions, … and any other bodily fluid when visibly contaminated with blood or all bodily fluids in situations where it is difficult or impossible to differentiate between bodily fluids.”
• an array of mandatory vaccinations;
• garments or sheets touched by ejaculate or other fluids to be treated as hazardous waste;
• “Personal Protective Equipment” required for performances such as squirting scenes, which prevent bodily fluids “from passing through to or reaching the employee’s eyes, mouth, or other mucous membranes” (think goggles and face shields).
• performer and employer training, and mandatory safety meetings prior to a scene;
• producers (“employers”) pay for performer testing;
• a plethora of burdensome medical record-keeping requirements (such as the maintaining of medical records for “at least the duration of employment plus 30 years”) that are likely to raise privacy concerns among performers.

Due to the forced vaccination requirements, 26-year olds might become the new MILFs (as explained here).

Cal/OSHA’s proposed regulations are intended to supercede those currently in effect, embodied in California Code of Regulations Title 8 Sec. 5193. Those regs were written for medical clinics and mortuaries back in the 1990s, and mandate “barrier protections” for healthcare workers exposed to blood or infectious materials.

Under Sec. 5193, anything you wouldn’t want to happen to you in the course of your duties in a clinic (such as having someone ejaculate or squirt on you, or penetrate you), became a forbidden “exposure event” in the context of adult film sets — even though such “exposure” was the job itself.

As TRPWL reported on Feb. 3,

Egged on by AIDS Healthcare Foundation (AHF), Cal/OSHA has undertaken to create a brand new code section, Sec. 5193.1, and the latest draft, dated 12-1-2014, makes it crystal clear that what you or I call “porn”, Cal/OSHA calls impermissible “exposure”, requiring detailed documentation and record-keeping, medical follow-up, etc…

FSC and APAC are expected to vigorously oppose the draft regs, and expert medical and epidemiological testimony is anticipated.

If San Diego is indeed the venue, expect a large carpooling effort by adult performers and industry stakeholders.