Apartment Association of Michigan

Written by HBA and AAM CEO, Forrest M. Wall, CAE

LGBTQ Expansion of Elliott-Larson Act Signed Into Law

After legislative passage by both the Michigan House and Senate, Governor Whitmer signed an expansion of Michigan’s Elliott-Larson Civil Rights Act to include LGBTQ individuals. Public Act 6 of 2023 amends all relevant sections of the act (title, scope, employment, real estate, etc.) to include sexual orientation, gender identity or expression among the protected classes under the law. Prior to PA 6, Michigan’s civil rights law prohibited discrimination on the basis of religion, race, color, national origin, age, sex, familial status, and marital status.

Housing Inspection Notification
Legislation Introduced

Legislation has been introduced in the Michigan House of Representatives which increases notification requirements under rental inspection law. House Bill 4273 would require an enforcing agency to notify the property owner as well as each rental unit occupant of any inspection violations. Currently, the owner must be notified of a violation but occupant notification is discretionary. The legislation also proposes to expand what is in the notice, to include a reference to the specific section of act that was violated and whether the violation constitutes a serious and imminent hazard to the health or safety of the occupants.

Have A Builder’s License? Don’t Forget Your Continuing Competency

Some AAM Members hold a Michigan Residential Builder License even though they may not be currently building. If you wish to maintain your license, please remember that the State of Michigan requires you to complete three hours of “continuing competency” by your license renewal deadline of May 31, 2023. AAM and HBA are holding three hour classes (covering each of the required categories – one hour codes, one hour legal and one hour safety) which will provide you what you need to comply.  Visit www.builders.org for details and online registration.

Written by Daniel Aday, CompOne Administrators Safety & Loss Prevention Specialist

A common contributing factor that can be seen in a significant number of injury reports is employee burnout. Employee burnout can be described as the inability to completely recover between shifts and where one is unable to fully perform their job duties in either physical or mental capacities.

When employees experience this type of stress, they may become less aware of their surroundings or find it more difficult to comply with safety policies and practices. This can be seen directly or indirectly. Employee burnout can be attributed to the job being overly demanding without enough time allotted for employees to fully compress before the next exposure of stressing work. Or, employees may not take their personal time to actually reset, relax or restore for any reason. While burnout can be “seen” mostly through physical labor, burnout does not discriminate for any role, level of responsibility, level of activity or level of mental stressors. Someone who does an entry level job may experience the same temperature of burnout through mental stress as a CEO of a large organization. Knowing how to recognize burnout is a must . . . before you get burned.

There are certain environments that are suitable to grow burnout. These environments tend to be ones with time constraints, pressure to get a job done, constant pressure to improve customer service, high stress or hostile environments, long work days or long work weeks, and areas in which employees and/or employers do not maintain good working relationships. People are capable of great things, but when employees are stretched too thin, burnout starts to make appearances, and the consequences are a lack of quality work, employee turnover and a significant increase in injuries and accidents. Many companies may have seen a notable increase in accidents in the last couple years, and if your company is one of them, addressing burnout could be an important decision in reducing your rates.

It wouldn’t be fair to speak on employee burnout without addressing that a lot of what contributes to it takes place off-the-clock. Obviously, an employee working more than one job can experience burnout faster than an individual working only one, but it doesn’t take two jobs to experience off the clock burnout. When someone is off the clock, this time is entirely to do whatever they please without control by their employer. This means lunch breaks, after hours, weekends, vacations, holidays and PTO. This needs to be well established if you may feel employees are experiencing burnout. If a job is mentally strenuous, after work activities that are also mentally demanding may not allow someone to fully decompress before their next work shift. Additionally, physically demanding jobs require one to rest fully before starting work the next day. Someone who is not prepared for their job is inherently at greater risk for injury, incidents or accidents.

Burnout may look different from one company to another and from one job category to the next, but addressing it can be the same. Taking note of increased turnover, employee satisfaction, employee participation, and of course, incident rates should trigger the need to begin addressing burnout. Ensure available resources are made to employees, such as employee assistance programs for all contributions of stressors. Additionally, do not allow an environment where it is known that employees are overly stressed. Addressing things such as production or work schedules, PTO allowance, wages and work/life balance policies are not easy things to do, but most of the time these are what is needed. Ensuring that employers minimize stressors that they have control over is ultimately one of the best ways to minimize turnover, increase employee happiness (which in return can improve everything from service to quality) and reduce risks – making working environments safer for all.