Leadership development strategies to engage nail salon workers in policy advocacy to improve their health, safety and rights

For long hours a day on a daily basis, nail salon workers use many products and are exposed to a variety of toxic chemicals present in their workplace environment. Workers have reported health issues linked to chemicals in their environmental workplace, including respiratory illness, allergies, cancer, and neurological and reproductive harm. Despite the increasing documentation of environmental health and justice issues that workers face, federal and state regulatory oversight of the ingredients in nail products continues to be weak and largely ineffective. As a result, the burden of toxic environmental exposure and poor health outcomes falls upon those who are exposed to the most – low-income immigrant salon workers, owners, their families, and communities. With up to 80% of California nail salon workers being Vietnamese low-income immigrant women who are of reproductive age, lack access to health care, and with limited English proficiency, there has been a clear need to develop the community's leadership to address the systematic and institutional inequalities impacting their environmental health. To promote environmental health and justice among the nail salon workforce, the California Healthy Nail Salon Collaborative established an innovative culturally appropriate leadership development program focused on empowering nail salon workers and owners to: 1) Implement health and safety best practice strategies in the workplace, 2) Develop their organizing and leadership skills, and 3) Advocate for federal and state policy solutions that positively impact their environment. This session will describe how developing a leadership program that supports behavior change while empowering workers to advocate for their communities is a powerful tool to address the root causes of the environmental injustices that they experience.