High Court to Review Cal/OSHA Challenge

The state Supreme Court, in a victory for Gov. George Deukmejian, agreed Thursday to hear the governor’s challenge to a lower court ruling that he acted illegally in dismantling the Cal/OSHA worker safety program.

With votes from all five Deukmejian appointees on the court, the justices said they would review a decision by a state Court of Appeal last October that Deukmejian must restore the program. Cal/OSHA’s existence has been at the center of a heated partisan dispute between the Republican governor and Democratic legislators and labor leaders for nearly a year.

The appeal court said Deukmejian had usurped the authority of the Legislature in using his veto authority to trim funds for the agency from the state budget.

Opens the Way

Thursday’s action opens the way for a potentially far-reaching test of the constitutional separation of powers and focuses renewed political attention on the court, which has undergone a marked shift to the right after the defeat of former Chief Justice Rose Elizabeth Bird and two other justices in the Nov. 4, 1986, election.

The agreement to hear Deukmejian’s appeal rules out any immediate prospect of a court-ordered restoration of Cal/OSHA funding. Under normal court procedures, it would be at least several months before the case is set for hearing and then decided. Meanwhile, the state job safety program remains severely curtailed.

In July, at Deukmejian’s request, federal authorities took over the job of protecting the estimated 10 million workers in private industry in California, while the state agency retained jurisdiction over several hundred thousand state and local government employees.

On another front, the court’s move Thursday was seen as adding new momentum to recent calls by labor leaders to put an initiative on the November ballot to reinstate the program.

Deukmejian, speaking to reporters in Sacramento, said he was “certainly pleased” that the court had agreed to review the appellate decision.

Asked if he regretted his decision to eliminate the program, the governor responded: “No, not at all. I don’t regret it one bit. The only reason it’s become a brouhaha is that some of the critics are trying to exploit an issue that is going to be politically advantageous to them.”

Deukmejian said the critics who now oppose his action were “the same ones who for four years were complaining that Cal/OSHA wasn’t doing a good job.”

Ralph Santiago Abascal of California Rural Legal Assistance, an attorney representing a group of workers who fought the governor’s veto of the program, expressed some disappointment with the high court’s action. But he discounted any speculation that the justices were acting on ideological grounds.

“I don’t think this is an ideological issue,” Abascal said. “This case deals with the fundamental relationship between the Legislature and the governor. It’s not at all surprising that the Supreme Court wants to be the last word on that . . . and it doesn’t mean the court ultimately will adopt a position contrary to the Court of Appeal.”

Separation of Powers

The order granting a hearing in the case was signed by Chief Justice Malcolm M. Lucas and Justices Edward A. Panelli, John A. Arguelles, David N. Eagleson and Marcus M. Kaufman, all Deukmejian appointees, and Justice Allen E. Broussard, an appointee of Gov. Edmund G. Brown Jr. Justice Stanley Mosk, an appointee of Gov. Edmund G. (Pat) Brown, did not sign the order.

The separation of powers question in the case centers on the governor’s long-held authority to use a line-item veto to reduce or eliminate appropriations made by the Legislature.

By using the device, a governor is able to decrease the amount of money in a bill without vetoing the entire legislation.

Deukmejian began his effort to dismantle the Cal/OSHA program last January when he refused to include money for the agency in his proposed state budget. The Legislature refused to kill the program.

But in July, Deukmejian vetoed $8 million from the $140-million aggregate budget of the Department of Industrial Relations for the announced purpose of eliminating the funds that would have been used to finance the program of its Division of Occupational Safety and Health, as Cal/OSHA is formally known.

The governor sought to join about 26 other states that rely on the federal Occupational Safety and Health Administration program to protect their workers, contending that his economy move would save the state up to $50 million in the next four years.

The effort to dismantle the state program set off widespread protests and a series of court challenges to the action. Critics argued that the state agency did a much better job of protecting workers, and several suits were filed charging the governor had acted illegally.

The suit the justices acted on Thursday was initially brought before a state Court of Appeal in Sacramento by lawyers for four farm workers and two garment workers.

The plaintiffs in the suit conceded that Deukmejian was empowered to reduce the department’s aggregate budget but said that in doing so, he did not have authority to specifically eliminate any money for Cal/OSHA. Such an action would intrude on the authority of the Legislature, they said.

State Program

In October, the three-member appeal panel unanimously agreed that the governor had no authority to terminate the state program, concluding that he had violated the constitutional separation of powers.

The panel based its decision in part on a ruling earlier that month by the state Supreme Court striking down an attempt by Deukmejian to veto part of a budget “trailer bill”--a measure that implements appropriations listed in the budget--that increased welfare benefits to families with dependent children.

In that case, the high court said that while the governor could reduce the $1.5-billion AFDC budget, he could not eliminate the plan for expanded welfare benefits by vetoing part of the trailer bill.