New Mexico still has no heat safety law for workers
New Mexico still has no heat safety law for workers, 18 months after the New Mexico Environment Department, Occupational Health and Safety Bureau, first asked for one. The Bureau filed a petition with the New Mexico Environmental Improvement Board, the panel that would adopt the rule, on March 13, 2025. The proposed rule would require water, shade, rest breaks and heat illness training once a workplace reaches a heat index of 80 degrees Fahrenheit, how hot the air feels once humidity is added in. New Mexico recorded more than 800 heat related emergency room visits in 2024, according to the state Department of Health. As of today, September 21, 2026, the board has never held a hearing on the merits of the rule, and has delayed it 4 times since the Bureau filed its petition.
New Mexico is both hotter and dryer than in years past due to the impacts of climate change.
Kristy Peck, then acting chief of the Occupational Health and Safety Bureau. Source 5.
Each reset pushed the hearing further out
The board first scheduled a hearing for July 16, 2025, 125 days after the Bureau filed its petition. Three more motions to vacate reset that date again, to January 2026, 305 days after filing, to May 2026, 417 days after filing, and to September 2026, 557 days after filing, the date this rule was supposed to finally get a hearing, today. A fourth motion, filed August 11, 2026, vacated that date too, pushing the hearing to March 2027, with no exact date yet. Those day counts are a calculation this site made from the filing date and the docket record, not a figure any single source states outright.
Elapsed days are a calculation this site made from the petition filing date, March 13, 2025, and the hearing dates in the docket record. The first 3 dates are stated in source 3. The final date, September 21, 2026, is confirmed by source 4 and source 1.
Show the numbers
| Hearing set July 2025 | 125 |
| Reset to January 2026 | 305 |
| Reset to May 2026 | 417 |
| Reset to September 2026 | 557 |
What the proposed rule would actually require
The proposed rule would require an employer to give each worker at least 1 quart of drinking water an hour, at no cost. Below a heat index of 100 degrees, it would require a paid 15 minute rest break for every 2 hours of work. The rule calls a heat index of 100 degrees or higher a high heat condition, and requires longer rest as it climbs. A new worker assigned to a heat index of 80 degrees or higher would need close supervision for the first 7 days on the job, on a schedule that lets the body adjust to heat, called acclimatization. Employers would have to keep heat illness training records for at least 5 years, and report any heat related illness or injury within 24 hours of learning of it. A worker diagnosed with a heat illness during a shift would count automatically as a violation, called a rebuttable presumption, and would require the employer to follow the rule for the next 3 years unless it proves otherwise.
Values are minutes of paid rest required per hour of work at each heat index level, read directly from Appendix I, Table 3, of the proposed rule text.
Show the numbers
| Heat index 100 | 15 |
| Heat index 104 | 25 |
| Heat index 106 | 30 |
| Heat index 112 | 35 |
| Heat index 116 | 45 |
Why the hearing keeps getting pushed back
In its own filing, the Bureau states it needed the third delay because the board lacked a quorum, enough members present to act, that hearing week, and because a newly seated bureau director, Doctor Graciela Perez, who started the role March 2, 2026, needed time to join stakeholder talks after a revised draft was published. Industry groups representing livestock, oil and gas and utilities have pushed back on parts of the draft, and the Bureau has told the board it has not reached consensus among labor, employer and public health interests. The board has now pushed the hearing to March 2027, about 2 years after the Bureau first asked for a rule.
As the state moves forward under a new administration, we hope we will see new standards for worker protections adopted.
Molly Taylor, chief operating officer of Conservation Voters New Mexico. Source 4.