Return to office: State workers ordered back this summer — read Gov. Gavin Newsom’s memo

Gov. Gavin Newsom’s administration on Wednesday announced plans to require state workers to return to the office for at least two days a week beginning this summer, ending the possibility of full-time telework.

A memo from Cabinet Secretary Ann Patterson said state agencies and departments would need to implement a hybrid telework policy with mandatory in-office days starting June 17. Patterson said requests for more than three telework days per week “should continue to be considered on a case-by-case basis.”

Several state agencies and departments have already enacted similar return-to-office policies, frustrating workers who prefer telework due to concerns about commuting, lost family time, child care arrangements and more. Some workers living with disabilities say their health and safety are at risk if they must report to an office.

The Newsom administration has previously denied allegations of mandates ordering workers back to the office, which Patterson’s letter reiterated. However, she cited the “varied approaches” as one of the reasons for the requirement, saying different policies “have created confusion around expectations and are likely to exacerbate inconsistencies across agencies and departments.”

Patterson said the administration believes in-office work provides benefits in the form of “enhanced collaboration, cohesion and communication, better opportunities for mentorship, particularly for workers newer to the workforce, and improved supervision and accountability.”

But this “one-size-fits-all” approach is impractical for some state workers, said Tim O’Connor, president of the California Attorneys Administrative Law Judges and Hearing Officers in State Employment, or CASE.

CASE is a labor union representing about 5,000 state legal workers. O’Connor said his profession has “transformed itself and become more high-tech and has really accommodated telework and virtual proceedings” since the COVID-19 pandemic.

He said members can get more done when they do not have to waste “windshield time” driving to work-related events. The new requirement would be a “huge hit on productivity for our particular members,” O’Connor said.

Some legal workers already must attend certain court hearings in person, he said.

“For those members, they need to be there in person on those days that they’re having hearings,” O’Connor said. “If they’re not having a hearing, they can probably ... use the time better to prepare for the hearing working remotely.”

He said his union would continue to fight against “arbitrary telework policies.”

“I think that that argument of confusion, that really fails when it comes to our members,” O’Connor said. “I think that’s looking at it very myopically. And you’re not really looking at the legal profession and what our what our members do.”