Cal/OSHA Proposes Rules to Multiply Penalties for Egregious and Enterprise-Wide Violations
Egregious penalties would be assessed for each exposed employee and enterprise-wide penalties for each location, with written comments due Nov. 30 ahead of a Dec. 3 hearing.
- By Danielle Naidu
- Oct 19, 2026
California employers cited for certain willful violations, or for violations that span more than one worksite, could face larger penalties under regulations Cal/OSHA has proposed to carry out a 2021 state law.
The proposal adds two citation classifications, egregious and enterprise-wide, created when Senate Bill 606 amended Labor Code section 6317 and added section 6317.8. The law requires the agency to issue these citations when violations meet the definitions, but it includes no enforcement mechanism. According to the notice, regulations are needed to fit the new citations into how the agency classifies violations and calculates penalties.
Under the law, an egregious violation is a willful violation that also meets one or more of seven criteria listed in section 6317.8. The proposal would calculate the penalty separately for every employee exposure. In an example in the notice, a $10,000 penalty involving 10 exposed employees would become $100,000.
Enterprise-wide violations apply to employers with more than one worksite. They occur when a written policy or procedure violates safety and health standards, or when evidence shows a pattern or practice of the same violation at more than one of its worksites. Penalties would be assessed for each location. Certain violations are presumed to be enterprise-wide, according to the notice, so an employer could be cited for every location without the agency inspecting each one.
The proposal also corrects the lookback period for an employer's violation history from three years to five, matching the period used for repeat violations. It changes a 10-calendar-day abatement reference to 10 working days to match Labor Code section 6320.
The notice puts the statewide compliance cost at $0 because the proposal adds no new compliance requirements. Based on 2023 and 2024 citations, agency staff estimated $1,181,532 a year in additional penalties.
Written comments are due Nov. 30. Comments can also be submitted at a Dec. 3 public hearing in Oakland, which people can join by Zoom.
About the Author
Danielle Naidu is assistant editor for Occupational Health & Safety and Environmental Protection Online.