Colorado Center on Law and Policy

03/23/2026 | Press release | Distributed by Public on 03/23/2026 17:59

CCLP testifies on overtime pay for farmworkers

CCLP testifies on overtime pay for farmworkers

by Charles Brennan| Mar 23, 2026

On Thursday, March 19, 2026, Charles Brennan, Income and Housing Policy Director at CCLP, provided testimony in opposition to Senate Bill 26-121, Overtime Threshold for Agricultural Employees and in support of Senate Bill 26-081, Increase Agricultural Employee Overtime Protections. SB26-121 would require farmworkers to work a minimum of 60 hours per week to receive overtime pay, whereas SB26-081 would have increased overtime protections for farmworkers after 40 hours per week, ensuring consistency with other workers in Colorado for overtime pay. Unfortunately, SB26-081 was postponed indefinitely.

Chair and members of the committee, my name is Charles Brennan, Director of Income and Housing Policy at the Colorado Center on Law and Policy, an antipoverty organization advancing the rights of every Coloradan. I am here today in opposition to SB26-121 and in support of SB26-081.

Congress excluded farmworkers from the 1938 Fair Labor Standards Act, an inequity Colorado has still not fully corrected. We took an important step in 2021, and after a five-year implementation period, agricultural workers now receive overtime after 48 hours per week. That threshold is already a compromise. SB26-121 would move it to 60 hours across the board, requiring farmworkers to put in 20 hours more than any other Colorado worker each week before overtime kicks in.

Overtime protections exist for good reason. Agricultural work involves extreme heat, chemical exposure, and heavy lifting-conditions that make long hours particularly dangerous. The fatal injury rate in agriculture in Colorado was 17.6 per 1,000 workers in 2024, nearly six times the rate for all industries in the state.[1] Research shows workers who log 60 or more hours per week face a 23% greater risk of on-the-job injury.[2] SB26-121 would raise the threshold at which those protections apply in an already dangerous industry.

We also question whether this bill targets the right problem. Fewer than one in five Colorado farm operations reported paying wages to hired workers in the 2022 Census of Agriculture.[3] Even among those that do, workers at highly seasonal operations currently receive overtime after 56 hours during peak weeks-meaning this bill would raise the overtime threshold for some of the most heavily worked farmworkers in the state by just 4 hours.[4]

Meanwhile, over half of all farms reported costs for property taxes, fuel, repairs, and animal feed-and between 2017 and 2022, fertilizer costs alone rose nearly 10% per year due to disruptions in the market from the war in Ukraine[5]-disruptions we are starting to see again due to our conflict with Iran.[6] The conflict's upward pressures on fuel prices are also a growing expense to farmers. These are the costs affecting the majority of operations, and none of them have anything to do with overtime pay.

We urge the committee to oppose SB26-121 and support SB26-081, and we encourage the sponsors to pursue relief for Colorado's agricultural industry through approaches that do not come at the expense of its workers. Thank you.

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[1] https://www.bls.gov/iif/state-data/fatal-injury-rates-by-state-and-industry-2024.htm

[2] https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC1741083/

[3]https://www.nass.usda.gov/Publications/AgCensus/2022/Full_Report/Volume_1,_Chapter_2_County_Level/Colorado/st08_2_007_007.pdf

[4]https://cdle.colorado.gov/sites/cdle/files/info_%2312a_overtime_and_minimum_wage_for_agricultural_employment_2026%29_12.18.2025.pdf

[5]https://www.nass.usda.gov/Publications/AgCensus/2022/Full_Report/Volume_1,_Chapter_1_State_Level/Colorado/st08_1_004_004.pdf

[6] https://www.fb.org/market-intel/middle-east-tensions-raise-spring-planting-concerns

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Colorado Center on Law and Policy published this content on March 23, 2026, and is solely responsible for the information contained herein. Distributed via Public Technologies (PUBT), unedited and unaltered, on March 23, 2026 at 23:59 UTC. If you believe the information included in the content is inaccurate or outdated and requires editing or removal, please contact us at [email protected]