Artisans and GC’s working in the California Burn Areas – Information Sources – CSLB, CA Division of Industrial Relations, and L.A. County Health Officer


By Ross Driscoll Sr.

I am starting to receive inquiries from our California broker partners regarding their insureds who want to do clean-up and reconstruction on fire damaged homes in the major burn areas. 

As a California General Contractor myself, I started getting info from the CSLB which directed me to the California Department of Industrial Relations.  The links below discuss Worker Safety and Health in the affected burn areas.  Licensed contractors in California are getting this info sent to them and may end up calling you with questions.

I have called the local landfills near the burn areas asking them about their priorities for handling hazardous waste from the burn areas.  It looks like the contractor will need to have the materials tested before the landfills take them.  It appears Sunshine Canyon may have some limited capacity for the initial trenches of hazardous building materials.  I will have more on that to share in the next few days.

The last link below from the L.A. County Health Officer is a must read for people who plan on working in burn areas.

We will be assembling more information to share as it becomes available. 

Needless to say, any trade or general contractors working in the burn areas should be carrying a combined GL and Contractor Pollution Liability combined policy form or at the very least buying monoline CPL along with their General Liability. Insureds do not need to wait until their expiration date to buy monoline pollution right now. Most contractors are unaware that they are around pollutants more than they think they are. They can consider changing to a combined form at their normal expiration date as well. The video to the right, highlights some of the hazards that homeowners and contractors need to be aware of and explains how they can protect themselves from these dangers.