Goatherding companies say the state’s farmworker overtime law is making it more expensive to provide grazing services and threaten to put them out of business.
California is investing heavily in wildfire prevention after the state was ravaged by several years of destructive flames that scorched millions of acres, destroyed thousands of homes and killed dozens of people. Goats have been used to clear fuels around Lake Oroville, along Highway 101, and“My phone rings off the hook this time of year,” said Tim Arrowsmith, owner of Western Grazers, which is providing grazing services to West Sacramento. “The demand has grown year after year after year.
Companies have historically been allowed to pay goat and sheepherders a monthly minimum salary rather than an hourly minimum wage, because their jobs require them to be on-call 24 hours a day, seven days a week. But legislation signed in 2016 also entitles them to overtime pay. It effectively boosted the herders’ minimum monthly pay from $1,955 in 2019 to $3,730 this year. It’s set to hit $4,381 in 2025, according to the California Department of Industrial Relations.
But in January, those labor costs are set to jump sharply again. Goatherders and sheepherders have always followed the same set of labor rules last year. But a state agency has ruled that’s no longer allowed, meaning goatherders would be subject to the same labor laws as other farmworkers.
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