Opposition to VDT Proposal Taking Shape : City Council: Yaroslavsky’s measure to regulate workplace use of video display terminals could put L.A. in forefront of national debate. But business leaders say the cost could be astronomical.

In a move that promises to thrust Los Angeles into a rancorous national debate, a city councilman has proposed that the city vigorously regulate the use of workplace video display terminals to protect employees from VDT-related injury and illness.

Following the lead of San Francisco, Councilman Zev Yaroslavsky proposed “the strongest ordinance possible” to protect municipal and private industry computer users from real and suspected dangers of using the ubiquitous computer terminals.

Prolonged use of VDTs has been blamed for a variety of ailments--including eye strain, headaches, and wrist, arm, neck and back injuries--that affect as many as 25 million people nationwide, according to government officials and occupational health experts. Some preliminary evidence from private health studies also indicates a possible correlation between use of computers and an increased incidence of cancer, birth defects and miscarriages.

So far, however, San Francisco is the only city in the nation to pass a local law regulating VDT use in the workplace. Similar efforts elsewhere have failed, as have efforts to enact state legislation in Sacramento.

Yaroslavsky has not yet framed the specifics of his proposal. But opposition from the business community already has emerged. Business leaders assert that such an ordinance could be unnecessary, expensive and ineffective. They say evidence is sketchy that repeated use of the terminals causes many of the maladies that fall under the generic term “computeritis.”

Nevertheless, Yaroslavsky believes the effort should be made.

“There are certain laws that command a moral high ground. One of them is worker safety,” Yaroslavsky said in an interview. “If the state and federal government are going to be slow in legislating protection to workers . . . we should.”

Yaroslavsky said he plans to make his proposal more specific after the City Council’s Human Resources and Labor Relations Committee holds several fact-finding hearings. City officials and business leaders said they do not know how many workers would be affected, or at what cost, but that they are attempting to find out.

City Councilwoman Joy Picus, chairwoman of the committee, said Friday that she had not taken a position on the measure. The committee will hold a public hearing on the proposal, possibly as early as next month, she said.

Picus said she is awaiting analyses from the city’s Personnel Department, City Administrative Officer Keith Comrie, and City Atty. James K. Hahn.

“I need to know more about it,” Picus said, adding that she suspects her colleagues on the council are in the same position.

Yaroslavsky hopes to model his proposal after the landmark San Francisco measure, which became the center of a national debate over how to regulate the use of computer terminals. The ordinance, approved last month, requires companies with 15 or more employees to provide computer users with “state of the art” chairs, keyboards, lighting, anti-glare screens and terminals.

The San Francisco measure was approved in a compromise with business leaders. The mandatory compliance period was extended from two to four years, and the cost to companies was limited to $250 per work station in the first 30 months.

Some Los Angeles business leaders say that the cost of the ordinance would be astronomical, possibly in the hundreds of millions of dollars. The cost of the San Francisco ordinance has been estimated at between $31.5 million and $76.5 million for private industry, and as much as $3.4 million for the city, said Janice Behny of the Los Angeles Area Chamber of Commerce.

“We think mandatory guidelines is not the way to go,” Behny said.

Businesses also will balk because there is “very little conclusive evidence” to demonstrate that specially designed chairs, desks and lighting prevent many ailments linked to overuse of computers, said James R. Hunter, president of the Central City Assn., which represents 250 Los Angeles businesses.

He said the ordinance could cost firms thousands of dollars and cause problems for an already cash-poor city government.

Many firms with employees hit hard by computer-related ailments have taken steps to safeguard workers. Pacific Bell and the Los Angeles Times have spent more than $8 million and $1 million, respectively, although problems remain, the companies said.

Hunter said Yaroslavsky failed to consult with business leaders before introducing the measure, therefore setting up “an adversarial debate, rather than a search for consensus . . . and that’s too bad.”

In the meantime, organized labor has vowed to fight hard for such a measure.

“Companies have had plenty of time, and they have done nothing,” said Jerry Morris, coordinator of the Los Angeles Committee on Occupational Safety and Health, a panel of union officials and health professionals representing 20,000 telephone operators and other computer users in the city.

T Santora, legislative chairman of the Communications Workers of America regional union council, said current safety laws are inadequate to prevent serious ailments linked to overuse of computers. He said a Los Angeles ordinance would prompt other municipalities and state government to approve similar legislation.

Yaroslavsky said he expected a challenge from local businesses. But he believes business leaders would support an ordinance once they realized it could save them millions of dollars in reduced worker injury costs.

“If we can remove asbestos from our buildings at tremendous expense, why not protect the muscles and heads and eyes of tens of thousands, probably hundreds of thousands of our workers, at minimal expense?” he asked.

Steve Morgan, a city labor negotiator, said Los Angeles spent $172,000 in the last two years to improve conditions for municipal computer users. Union representatives, however, said more needs to be done.

Computer-related problems are among the most frequently reported on-the-job ailments, and have risen sharply since 1981, said Samantha Greenberg, director of the Los Angeles-based Computer Injury Network. She said such disorders now affect 5 million people in the United States each year, at a cost to industry of as much as $10 billion. No statistics are available for Los Angeles, she said.

Assemblyman Tom Hayden (D-Santa Monica) and U.S. Rep. Tom Lantos (D-San Mateo) have criticized state and federal officials, saying they have not done enough to protect workers. Hayden has tried to get legislation passed, but the bill was vetoed by then-Gov. George Deukmejian.

The state Division of Occupational Safety and Health has cited some companies for exposing workers to hazardous working conditions. But a Cal/OSHA committee spent two years studying the problem, only to have its recommendations rejected by Cal/OSHA’s independent board, said agency chief R. W. Stranberg.

The U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration is considering whether to recommend guidelines or issue mandatory requirements, said OSHA spokesman Ed Bowers. He said OSHA “is aware of a growing concern” about computer-related ailments, and has increased its staff of ergonomists, or specialists in designing comfortable work areas.