Occup Health News Roundup

At the Center for Public Integrity, Jim Morris reports on working conditions at the nation’s oil refineries, writing that more than 500 refinery incidents have been reported to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency since 1994, calling into question the adequacy of EPA and federal labor rules designed to protect workers as well as the public. Morris begins the story with John Moore, who in 2010 was working at a Tesoro Corporation oil refinery north of Seattle — he writes: Up the hill from Moore, in the Naphtha Hydrotreater unit, seven workers were restoring to service a bank of heat…
At Stat, Eric Boodman reports on whether a Trump administration might deprive miners of compensation for disabilities related to black lung disease. In particular, Boodman examines a little-known provision in the Affordable Care Act (ACA) that shifted the burden of proof from miners and onto mining companies. In other words, if miners had spent at least 15 years underground and can prove a respiratory disability, it’s assumed to be an occupational illness. However, if the ACA is repealed in full — as candidate Trump promised on the campaign trail — that provision would go away as well, making…
At In These Times, Elizabeth Grossman writes about whether workplace safety will survive a Trump presidency, noting that “Trump’s transition team has said he will introduce a moratorium on new regulations and cancel executive orders and regulations ‘that kill jobs and bloat government.’” In interviewing labor, health and safety advocates, Grossman writes that a number of federal protections could land on the chopping block, including the new overtime rule, proposed beryllium rule and fall protections. Grossman writes: How does Trump’s promise to reduce and eliminate regulations square with…
At The New York Times, Dan Barry reports on the Hispanic hotel workers who are becoming a powerful political force in Las Vegas. In particular, the story focuses on the 56,000-member Culinary Union, whose membership is more than half Hispanic. The story is told through the eyes of Celia Vargas, 57, a guest room attendant at a hotel along the famous Vegas Strip — Barry writes: Despite their name tags, guest room attendants are anonymous. They go unnoticed by many as they push their 300-pound carts to the next room, and the next. A glimpse of what is expected of these attendants can be found at…
Charles Ornstein at ProPublica and Mike Hixenbaugh at the Virginian-Pilot investigate the man known as Dr. Orange for his “fervent” defense against claims that exposures to Agent Orange sickened American veterans. A part of their long-running investigation “Reliving Agent Orange,” this most recent article reports that the Veterans Administration has repeatedly cited Dr. Orange’s (real name: Alvin Young) work to deny compensation to veterans, even though many argue Young’s work is compromised by inaccuracies, inconsistencies and omissions. In addition, the very chemical companies that make…
At the Denver Post, John Ingold and Monte Whaley authored a year-long investigative series into the dangerous conditions facing Colorado’s oil and gas workers, the role of subcontracting in heightening worker safety risks, and the lack of employer accountability and oversight. The series, “Drilling through danger,” noted that 1,333 workers died in the nation’s oil and gas fields between 2003 and 2014, with 2014 being the second-most lethal year for oil and gas workers in Colorado in a decade. According to the newspaper’s analysis, there was about one oil and gas worker death per every 12 rigs…
In “The Invisible Workforce: Death, discrimination and despair in N.J.'s temp industry,” NJ Advance Media reporter Kelly Heyboer investigated conditions facing temp workers in New Jersey, which now has one of the largest concentrations of temp workers in the nation. She reports that growing demand for temp workers has led to the proliferation of “temp towns” — places with dozens of temp agencies and neighborhoods full of temp workers, many of whom report low pay, wage theft, racial and sexual discrimination, and unsafe workplaces. Heyboer writes: The temp agencies in New Brunswick are easy to…
In a big win for workers, Oklahoma’s Supreme Court has ruled that state law allowing businesses to opt out of traditional workers’ compensation is unconstitutional. At ProPublica, Michael Grabell writes that the ruling now leaves Texas as the only state that lets employers pull out of workers’ comp in favor of creating their own alternative plans. Last year, Grabell, along with Howard Berkes at NPR, investigated the new opt-out trend, finding that such workers’ comp alternatives typically come with fewer employee benefits, more restrictions and no independent oversight. In reporting on the…
At KCRW (an NPR member station), Karen Foshay reports on occupational injuries among low-wage restaurant workers in California and the retaliatory barriers that often keep them from speaking up. She cited a 2011 Restaurant Opportunities Center survey of Los Angeles restaurant workers that found 42 percent experienced cuts, 43 percent experienced burns and more than half reported working while sick. Foshay writes: At a recent meeting in Azusa (in eastern Los Angeles County), several workers showed off their appointment cards for clinics like Santa Adelina. Three men lifted their pant legs to…
At NPR, John Burnett reports on the conditions facing farmworkers in south Texas 50 years after a landmark strike in which farmworkers walked 400 miles to the capital city of Austin to demand fair working conditions. He writes: A lot has changed since 1966, when watermelon workers in the South Texas borderlands walked out of the melon fields in a historic strike to protest poor wages and appalling working conditions. They marched 400 miles to the state capital of Austin; California labor activist and union leader Cesar Chavez joined them. The farmworkers succeeded in publicizing their cause…
At Slate, Gabriel Thompson writes about a little-used legal provision that could go far in helping farmworkers fight wage theft and other labor abuses. A part of the Great Depression-era Fair Labor Standards Act, the statute is known as the “hot goods provision” and it gives the U.S. Department of Labor the authority block products made in violation of labor laws from being shipped across state lines. Thompson’s story begins with Felix Vasquez, who works in the strawberry fields of Oxnard, California, and had successfully worked with legal advocates to recover owed wages from his employer,…
At Mary Review, Mary Pilon writes about the experiences of women in the trucking industry, highlighting stories of sexual harassment and threats of violence that often get brushed to the wayside by industry employers and supervisors. The article notes that many women who seek out trucking jobs are in their 40s and 50s, are re-entering the workforce after a period away, and are attracted to a career that doesn’t require a higher education but can potentially yield a six-figure salary. Pilon begins the story with Cathy Sellars, who sought out a trucking job at age 55 after her divorce: Cathy…
At the Detroit Free Press, Jennifer Dixon and Kristi Tanner investigate Michigan’s workplace safety and oversight system and talk to the families of victims who say there’s no justice for workers who’ve been injured or killed on the job. During the year-long investigation, the reporters looked into more than 400 workplace deaths across the state, finding “a flawed system of oversight with penalties against employers so low they're not a deterrent.” The article began with the story of Mary Potter, who worked at a group home for people with developmental disabilities. Dixon and Tanner write:…
At Reveal, Will Evans investigates how lobbyists for the temporary staffing industry squashed a legislative effort in Illinois to reform the industry’s widespread discriminatory hiring practices. Evans has previously reported on how the temp industry discriminates against workers of color, particularly black workers, using code words, symbols and gestures to illegally hire workers according to sex, race and age. In Illinois, the Chicago Workers’ Collaborative developed legislation to confront such hiring practices. Illinois Senate Bill 47 would have required temp agencies to track the race…
At Reveal, Jennifer LaFleur writes about the U.S. veterans who witnessed the country’s many nuclear weapon tests, the health problems they’ve encountered in the decades since their service, and their fight for compensation. One of the “atomic veterans” LeFleur interviewed — Wayne Brooks — said: “We were used as guinea pigs – every one of us. They didn’t tell us what it was gonna do to us. They didn’t tell us that we were gonna have problems later on in life with cancers and multiple cancers.” LaFleur writes: All of the atomic vets were sworn to secrecy. Until the secrecy was lifted decades…
At San Jose Mercury News, Louis Hansen reports on the “hidden” workforce of foreign workers that helped expand a Fremont plant for car manufacturer Tesla. The story begins with Gregor Lesnik, an unemployed electrician from Slovenia, who, according to his visa application, was supposed to work in South Carolina. Hansen writes: The companies that arranged his questionable visa instead sent Lesnik to a menial job in Silicon Valley. He earned the equivalent of $5 an hour to expand the plant for one of the world’s most sophisticated companies, Tesla Motors. Lesnik’s three-month tenure ended a year…
At the Guardian, reporters Oliver Laughland and Mae Ryan report on working conditions inside Donald Trump’s Las Vegas hotel. Right away, the article notes that while the presidential candidate tours the country selling his job-creating skills, workers in his hotel say they get paid about $3 less an hour than many of Las Vegas’ unionized hotel workers, who also enjoy better health and retirement benefits. They write: Earlier this month, following a protracted dispute with Trump and his co-owner, casino billionaire Phil Ruffin, the National Labor Relations Board officially certified a union for…
At the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, reporter Raquel Rutledge follows up her in-depth investigation into diacetyl exposure among coffee plant workers with news that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is looking into the hazardous exposures that some 600,000 people face as they work to roast, grind, package and serve coffee. Rutledge reports that in the wake of newspaper’s 2015 investigation, CDC is now conducting tests at facilities across the nation — in fact, the first test results from a coffee roasting facility in Wisconsin found very high levels of chemicals that have the…
At Reveal, Christina Jewett investigates the gaping holes in California’s workers’ compensation system that make it so vulnerable to fraud and leave workers in the dark about the bogus care being charged in their names. She begins the article comparing the workers’ comp system to Medicare: When Medicare makes rules, it has a strong incentive to encourage doctors, pharmacists and others to follow them: money. The purse strings are not held nearly as tightly in California’s workers’ compensation system, in which a division of power creates the first major hurdle. Lawmakers make rules. The state…
At Slate, Michelle Chen writes about the experiences of hotel housekeepers in Miami during spring break. The story starts with Adelle Sile, a housekeeper at the four-star Fontainebleau Miami Beach: Around this time of year, thanks to the influx of spring break and Easter break vacationers, the time (Sile) has to clean each room during her eight-hour shift gets squeezed as guests stretch their mornings to the final minutes before checkout. When she does finally get in, she sometimes opens the door to find vomit, empty bottles, crack pipes, marijuana buds, and makeshift mattresses of cushions…