CPUC Reasonable Accommodations Meet and Discuss

On Wednesday, July 7, SEIU Local 1000 met with the CPUC to discuss their Reasonable Accommodations Policy. We brought up several concerns and asked about the inclusion of the Disability Advisory Committee (DAC) in the process. CPUC stated that while they are open to feedback and suggestion from the DAC, it is management’s policy, and are the CPUC is not required to consult the DAC in their its decision-making process.

We raised several suggestions to make the policy clearer and more employee friendly, and we were able to get the CPUC to confirm they it will make an effort to send the options letter sooner in the process moving forward. We also raised concerns over a lack of training for management on their role in the reasonable accommodations process, protecting employee’s medical privacy, and the overall perception and culture of the program as being difficult and not employee friendly. Management did confirm employees are not required to disclose their full medical records and will review that language to make it clearer in the policy.

Finally, we presented that if the CPUC wants to live up to their goal of creating a working environment that is committed to “inclusion, equity, and diversity,” we highly encourage them to review the policy again with our feedback and suggestions. The CPUC was receptive to our feedback for future review, however, they did confirm the policy is implemented, and they have no current plans to update it.