retaliation

Occupational Health News Roundup

kkrisberg — Tue, 21 Feb 2017 16:45:38 +0000

Occupational Health News Roundup

At Reveal, Jennifer Gollan reports on how the Navy and other federal agencies give lucrative contracts to shipbuilders with troublesome worker safety records. In fact, Gollan reports that since 2008, the Navy and Coast Guard’s seven major shipbuilders have received more than $100 billion in public funds despite serious — and sometimes fatal — safety gaps. She noted that in his first days in office, President Trump announced plans for a massive Navy fleet expansion, which could mean even more workers will be at risk.

Gollan writes:

With extra business comes more risks for workers. But there is no increase in oversight. In fact, there’s nothing precluding the Navy from handing out contracts to shipbuilders with safety violations. The Navy and OSHA have no formal system for sharing information on accidents. It’s unclear whether Navy officials are even aware of the safety lapses. However, they could easily look up the information on the public database OSHA keeps on its website.

Confronted by Reveal about their apparent lack of interest in worker safety, Navy and Coast Guard officials said it wasn’t their job.

“We are not the overlords of private shipyards when it comes to workplace safety,” said Dale Eng, a spokesman for the Navy’s Naval Sea Systems Command, which oversees ship construction.

The uncomfortable truth is that the Navy has few alternatives when it comes to who builds its ships. It can work only with U.S.-based companies in large part because of national security concerns and because shipbuilding provides a large number of relatively high-paying jobs in regions where shipyards are the major employers.

That creates an unhealthy codependency: Just a handful of companies are equipped to build the massive boats the government needs, and the shipbuilding industry relies on the military for the majority of its revenue.

But while the military and the shipyards each get something out of it, workers remain at a deadly disadvantage. Under a 90-year-old federal law, shipyard workers generally can’t sue their employers, which leaves the shipyards accountable only to OSHA.

Read the full investigation at Reveal. Also, read the response to Reveal’s investigation from former OSHA chief David Michaels here.

In other news:

Baltimore Sun: Michael Dresser reports that OSHA made a preliminary finding that current chief executive at Baltimore-Washington International (BWI) Airport, Ricky D. Smith Sr., illegally retaliated against an employee while serving as an executive at Cleveland Hopkins International Airport. The Cleveland employee was demoted after complaining to a federal aviation inspector about a lack of de-icing chemicals and inadequate staffing to keep runways clear of snow. In examining the case, OSHA said the worker’s whistleblowing was a contributing factor in the airport’s decision to assign him to “derogatory work” and accuse him of being intoxicated. Dresser writes: “The job safety agency's finding follows a determination by the FAA in 2015, shortly after Smith was hired by the administration of Republican (Maryland) Gov. Larry Hogan to run BWI, that Hopkins had failed to keep its runways safe.”

PBS Newshour: Barbara Feder Ostrov reports that more than 6,000 California workers in munitions, manufacturing and other industries have potentially harmful blood lead levels, according to the California Department of Public Health. More than half of the workers with higher lead exposures worked for companies that make batteries, aircrafts and aircraft parts, ships, plumbing and pipefitting fixtures, and metal valves. Those with the highest blood lead levels worked at shooting ranges or in the gun industry. Ostrov writes: “The report, containing the results of tests conducted between 2012 and 2014, comes as the state’s workplace health and safety agency, Cal/OSHA, is considering a major update of its safety standards for workplace lead exposure for the first time in decades. The current standards are based on 35-year-old medical findings, which at the time did not recognize the dangers of even low-level exposure to lead. More recent science shows chronic, low-level lead exposure can cause lasting harm.”

NBC News: Avalon Zoppo reports that dozens of immigrant workers lost their jobs after participating in the nationwide “Day Without Immigrants” protests. For example, 18 workers from Bradley Coatings Inc. in Nolensville, Tennessee, were fired after joining the demonstrations, as were 21 workers from Encore Boat Builders in Lexington, South Carolina, and 30 workers from JVS Masonry in Denver. The story lists many other employers as well. Zoppo writes: That same day in Florida, several staff members at Grace Community School in Bonita Springs told NBC2 they planned participate in Thursday's protest. Two employees claimed they were fired as a result, though the head of the school insists no one was terminated. Asked by a reporter why the cause was important, Brenda Botello, who quit on Friday because she was afraid of being fired, said: ‘Because we are Mexicans... We need to find another job.’”

BuzzFeed News: Venessa Wong talks with economist Jeffrey Sachs about Trump’s promise to bring manufacturing jobs back to America. In the interview, Sachs comments on a range of issues, from job automation to a guaranteed minimum income to the pitfalls of the gig economy. On rebuilding American manufacturing, Sachs said: “What Trump has done is basically sold a lie to these American workers. It’s a convenient lie because it takes the attention away from our domestic situation, which is we have income inequality run wild. All of this is the continued inability of the United States to talk about taxes, income redistribution, basic minimum income, and other kinds of policy that are rather natural in other countries. The solutions being proposed aren’t real solutions.”

Kim Krisberg is a freelance public health writer living in Austin, Texas, and has been writing about public health for 15 years.

kkrisberg Tue, 02/21/2017 - 11:45

Occupational Health News Roundup

kkrisberg — Wed, 26 Oct 2016 16:33:03 +0000

Occupational Health News Roundup

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 Agent Orange funded some of Young’s research.

Ornstein and Hixenbaugh write:

Decades after the last of the military’s Agent Orange was supposedly incinerated aboard a ship in the Pacific Ocean, Army vet Steve House went public in 2011 with a surprising claim: He and five others had been ordered in 1978 to dig a large ditch at a U.S. base in South Korea and dump leaky 55-gallon drums, some labeled “Compound Orange,” in it. One broke open, splashing him with its contents. More than three decades later, House was suffering from diabetes and nerve damage in his hands and feet — ailments that researchers have associated with dioxin exposure.

Around the same time House came forward, other ailing vets recounted that they, too, had been exposed to Agent Orange on military bases in Okinawa, Japan.

The Pentagon turned to a familiar ally.

“I just heard back from Korea and the situation has ‘re-heated’ and they do want to get Dr. Young on contract,” one defense department official wrote to others in June 2011, according to internal correspondence obtained by ProPublica and The Virginian-Pilot through the Freedom of Information Act.

By then, Young had established a second career. From his home in Cheyenne, Wyoming, he and his son ran a sort of Agent Orange crisis management firm. His clients: the federal government and the herbicide’s makers — both worried about a new wave of claims.

Read the entire investigation at ProPublica.

In other news:

Charleston Gazette-Mail: Ken Ward Jr. reports that this week, a panel of federal judges grilled attorneys for former Massey Energy CEO Don Blankenship, who’s attempting to have his conviction for willfully violating federal mine safety laws overturned. An April 2010 explosion at the Massey-owned Upper Big Branch Mine resulted in the death of 29 miners. According to Ward, judges were especially tough on arguments Blankenship’s lawyer made that jurors were wrongly instructed on what constitutes a “willful” violation. He writes: “Several family members of miners who died at Upper Big Branch made the trip to watch, and a couple of rows of seats were filled with students on a tour to see the appeals court in action. Almost all of the argument was about the willfulness jury instruction, which was one of four issues Blankenship raised on appeal. …There was a very brief exchange toward the end of the hearing about a separate jury instruction that Blankenship’s lawyers argue wrongly defined 'reasonable doubt' for the jurors.”

PBS NewsHour (Associated Press): Kristin Wyatt reports that five more states will vote on raising the minimum wage in November: Arizona, Colorado, Maine, Washington and South Dakota. Arizona, Colorado and Maine measures would phase in a $12 hourly wage by 2020; Washington voters will consider a $13.50 wage by 2020; and South Dakota will vote on keeping a newly lowered minimum wage of $7.50 for workers younger than 18 or requiring higher wages for all working teens. Arizona and Washington voters will also be casting ballots on paid sick leave. Wyatt writes: “Is it a slam dunk that this year’s measures will pass, too? Maybe. Even the classic opponents to a higher minimum wage — restaurant associations and small-business groups — are running muted campaigns to oppose the wage measures.”

Atlantic Monthly: James Hamblin writes about the role of night shift work in perpetuating health inequities, reporting on the health risks that studies have connected to night work as well as the risks that come with rotating shifts between day and night. His article was in response to a letter from a police officer who asked about the health risks of rotating night-day schedules verus working a consistent night schedule. Hamblin writes: “The actual best solution is to make a gradual transition between day shifts and nights shifts — like if you could start and finish ten minutes earlier every day. That would just be a nightmare for scheduling. And it’s a reminder that most people who have to work frequent night shifts aren’t in a position to be making demands like that. Night-shift jobs and their associated health risks tend to fall to people of lower socioeconomic status, so the risks of shift work tend to go ignored.”

EHS Today: Sandy Smith reports that provisions within OSHA’s new injury reporting rule that prohibit employers from discouraging such reporting have been delayed until Dec. 1. The anti-retaliation rules were originally supposed to go into effect in August. According to Smith, the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas requested OSHA delay implementation to allow time for a motion challenging the rules. She writes: “Under the anti-retaliation protections in the rule, employers are required to inform workers of their right to report work-related injuries and illnesses without fear of retaliation; implement procedures for reporting injuries and illnesses that are reasonable and do not deter workers from reporting; and incorporate the existing statutory prohibition on retaliating against workers for reporting injuries and illnesses.”

Kim Krisberg is a freelance public health writer living in Austin, Texas, and has been writing about public health for nearly 15 years.

kkrisberg Wed, 10/26/2016 - 12:33

Tags

Occup Health News Roundup

Occupational Health & Safety

OSHA

paid leave

Public Health - General

Toxics

War/Veterans

workers' compensation

workers' compensation

New York farmworker, worker centers sue for organizing rights: ‘This would be a huge victory’

kkrisberg — Fri, 21 Oct 2016 20:07:11 +0000

New York farmworker, worker centers sue for organizing rights: ‘This would be a huge victory’

In September 2015, New York farmworker Crispin Hernandez was fired after his employers saw him talking with local workers’ rights advocates. But instead of backing down, Hernandez filed suit against the state. And if he prevails, it could help transform the often dangerous and unjust workplace conditions that farmworkers face to put food on all of our tables.

Officially filed May 10, 2016, Hernandez v. State of New York demands that the state provide the same constitutional protections to farmworkers as it does for other workers. Right now, according to the New York state constitution, all employees have the right to organize and bargain collectively via representatives of their own choosing. However, the state’s worker retaliation protections specifically exempt farmworkers — in other words, it’s currently not illegal for employers to retaliate against farmworkers who attempt to organize for better working conditions. And that lack of protection against retaliation is in clear opposition to farmworkers’ constitutional organizing rights.

Fortunately, just hours after the New York Civil Liberties Union (NYCLU) filed Hernandez’s lawsuit, New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo announced that his administration would not fight the suit, saying in a statement: “I agree with the NYCLU that the exclusion of farm workers from the labor relations act is inconsistent with our constitutional principles, and my administration will not be defending the act in court. We will not tolerate the abuse or exploitation of workers in any industry. This clear and undeniable injustice must be corrected.” Cuomo’s statement is an encouraging sign in and of itself, said Aadhithi Padmanabhan, the NYCLU lawyer representing Hernandez and his co-plaintiffs, the Workers’ Center of Central New York and Worker Justice Center of New York.

However, this summer, the New York Farm Bureau, a lobbying group (not a state or public agency despite the official-sounding name) officially filed to intervene on the case and argue on behalf of the farmworker exemption. A decision on whether the bureau will be allowed to do so is still pending.

“This would be a huge victory,” Padmanabhan told me, referring to the possibility of the court ruling for Hernandez and the worker centers. “It would mean that New York is recognizing these workers who’ve been invisible for so long. …People like Crispin are so brave to put themselves on the line like this — it’s a huge leap for workers like him to take this kind of risk and fight for their rights. This is their victory.”

‘It was the perfect case of worker retaliation for organizing’

Hernandez’s lawsuit stems back to an incident involving one of his co-workers at Marks Farms in Lowville, New York, a large dairy farm that produces about 340,000 pounds of milk every day and generates an annual gross income of $28 million.

According to Rebecca Fuentes, lead organizer at the Workers’ Center of Central New York, which has been spearheading farmworker outreach on New York dairy farms for years, one of Hernandez’s co-workers was enjoying his day off in March 2015 when his employer asked that he report to work because the farm was short-staffed. The worker wanted his day off but he couldn’t afford to risk his employment and went in. Later that same day, an altercation between the worker and his supervisor occurred in which the worker was physically assaulted. Hernandez was working in the milking parlor that day and could hear the commotion — he ended up waiting with the injured worker while arrangements were made to get him to a hospital.

In the aftermath, Fuentes said, the workers' center helped the injured worker file official complaints with local police and OSHA. (Not surprisingly, she said, the farm blamed the worker for the incident.) A little more than a month after the incident, the Workers’ Center of Central New York as well as the Worker Justice Center of New York, along with farmworkers, organized a protest outside of Marks Farms that attracted dozens of participants and called for an end to abusive workplace conditions.

Not long after the protest, Hernandez, who had joined the Workers’ Center of Central New York in 2014, became actively involved in an effort to organize a workers committee at Marks Farms. In the meantime, however, Hernandez’s involvement with the worker center began attracting negative attention from his employers.

According to the lawsuit, Hernandez first began working at Marks Farms in April 2012 and rented housing that was also owned by his employers. At the time of the spring 2015 worker assault, Hernandez was working typical 12-hour shifts, six days a week. The lawsuit reads:

The work he performed as a milker was very intense and physically demanding. Although he was supposed to have a thirty minute meal-break during his 12-hour shift, Mr. Hernandez, like other milkers, often had less time because of the constant pressure he was under not to fall behind or damage the quality of the milk product. He also would often go the entire shift without taking a break for water or using the bathroom because he wanted to do a good job and he worried he would not be able to complete all that was required of him during his shift if he took a break that lasted even a few minutes.

In July 2015, for the very first time, Hernandez asked for an unscheduled day off. His request was granted and he used the time off to attend a workers’ center meeting. Immediately following, according to the lawsuit, Hernandez was shifted to a less desirable work assignment as a “relief” worker, filling in when fellow workers were off or on break. Then in August 2015, Fuentes traveled to the farm at the request of Hernandez and fellow workers who wanted to form a workers committee. During that meeting, workers discussed the health and safety risks they faced on the job, such as the failure of their employer to provide them with personal protective equipment.

That meeting was cut short when a Marks Farms supervisor showed up, demanding that Fuentes leave and calling the police. According to the lawsuit, the police began interrogating the workers about why Fuentes was there and if they had invited her. (Keep in mind that while the workers live in housing owned by the farm, they pay rent and have the right as tenants to invite guests into their homes.) Eventually, the police left, the meeting with Fuentes resumed and workers agreed to continue their efforts to create a workers committee at the farm. Shortly after, some of the workers dropped out of the organizing effort, but Hernandez stuck with it.

On Sept. 1, 2015, Hernandez was fired and told to move out of his home within the week. After the firing, the lawsuit states, Hernandez’s former co-workers were asked to sign a form stating they did not want Fuentes to visit their homes and were told that Fuentes was working to put the farm out of business.

“It was retaliation,” Carly Fox, a worker rights advocate with the Worker Justice Center of New York, told me. “It was the perfect case of worker retaliation for organizing.”

‘The bigger point here is building worker power’

“Without farmworkers there would not be milk, fruits or vegetables, but we are treated like slaves and worse than the cows. We want to be able to improve our working conditions without fear or intimidation. We believe our lives are important and that all human beings deserve to be treated with dignity and respect.”

That’s a quote from Hernandez, whose lawsuit might finally give New York farmworkers a real opportunity to organize without fear for safer working conditions, fair wages and dignity on the job.

“It’s a huge victory for workers like Crispin,” Fuentes said of the worker-led lawsuit. “It’s been a lot of work for him — just imagine the pressure with his name on a lawsuit like this.”

According to OSHA, farm work is among the most dangerous occupations in the nation, with nearly 6,000 agricultural workers dying from work-related injuries between 2003 and 2011. That’s a fatality rate that’s seven times higher than for all other private-sector workers. About half of the country’s farmworkers are Hispanic and many are undocumented, which easily opens the door to abuse, exploitation and wage theft. New York, in particular, is home to about 80,000 to 100,000 seasonal and dairy farmworkers.

For years, Fox told me, advocates such as herself as well as workers have been calling on New York policymakers to pass the Farm Workers Fair Labor Practices Act, which would reverse farmworkers’ exemption from state labor laws and give farmworkers the right to overtime pay, guaranteed time off, and expand employer contributions to workers’ compensation and unemployment. State lawmakers have yet to enact the legislation, though both Fuentes and Fox said their organizations are continuing to push for its passage. However, if Hernandez wins his case in court and farmworkers gain formal protection from retaliation, organizing efforts may have a much better chance at securing such worker benefits directly from employers.

In particular, the lawsuit is asking the court to rule that farmworker exclusions from retaliation protections are unconstitutional — “this exemption discriminates against a historically disenfranchised group of people and violates their right to equal protection,” Padmanabhan said. If that exemption is eventually struck down, it will mean farmworkers can begin filing retaliation complaints with state oversight officials, she said.

“It’s a big deal that the governor has said he will not defend (the exemption) in court, but the real victory will be when workers like Crispin actually have access to their rights,” Padmanabhan told me.

In the event that the New York Farm Bureau is allowed to intervene in the lawsuit, she said “we’ll have a live case and we’ll have to take it from there.” The possible benefit to allowing such an intervention is that the bureau will be forced to defend the discriminatory exemption before a judge and the final ruling would be binding on the bureau, she noted.

“(The bureau) voiced its opposition to the lawsuit when we filed it, so it’s not surprising that they would try to fight it,” Padmanabhan said.

But even if Hernandez wins in court, both Fox and Fuentes said farmworkers still face an uphill battle toward safer, fairer workplaces.

“The bigger point here is building worker power — they are at the front and center of these actions,” Fox told me. “Whether there’s a union or not, workers are going to organize. So if we gain these protections, it’ll be another tool that we can use. But what’s really important is holding government accountable, pushing for new laws, pushing for new strategies. This lawsuit isn’t the end.”

To learn more about the farmworker lawsuit against New York, visit NYCLU or the Workers’ Center of Central New York. And for more on the conditions facing New York dairy farmworkers and their efforts to improve workplace conditions, read our previous coverage here.

Story update: As of Monday, Oct. 24, the New York Farm Bureau was granted permission to intervene in the Hernandez lawsuit. In a statement, the bureau said it would be filing a motion to dismiss the case.

Kim Krisberg is a freelance public health writer living in Austin, Texas, and has been writing about public health for nearly 15 years.

kkrisberg Fri, 10/21/2016 - 16:07

Occupational Health News Roundup

kkrisberg — Tue, 05 Jul 2016 09:53:31 +0000

Occupational Health News Roundup

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:

The Clinton Township woman died in February 2014 of blunt force trauma to her head. According to a police report, Potter was assaulted — unprovoked — by a 54-year-old man with Down syndrome.

Eric Smith, Macomb County prosecutor, said the man was charged with second-degree murder but a court dismissed the case after he was found to be permanently incompetent.

MIOSHA cited Macomb Family Services, which operates the Macomb Township home for adults with developmental disabilities, for two record-keeping violations: failing to report the death within eight hours and failing to keep a log of work-related injuries. It proposed $7,000 in penalties and settled for $1,680.

It did not cite the agency for failing to provide a safe workplace, which might have resulted in a willful violation with penalties of up to $70,000 and a referral to the Michigan attorney general for possible criminal prosecution.

MIOSHA said the case didn't meet federal OSHA criteria for such a citation.

Macomb Family Services officials did not return repeated phone calls seeking comment.

In contrast, Alaska proposed $75,000 in penalties against an assisted living facility where an employee was beaten and strangled by a resident — a $70,000 willful violation for failing to provide a safe workplace and a $5,000 serious violation for failing to promptly notify the department of the death.

Dixon and Tanner also found that Michigan Occupational Safety and Health Administration (MIOSHA) penalties are relatively low compared to other states that run their own workplace safety agencies and that criminal prosecutions related to workplace deaths are rare. For example, of the 418 workplace deaths that MIOSHA has investigated since 2004, just 14 were referred for prosecution. And of the 322 closed cases in which a worker died and MIOSHA determined that violations occurred, the median penalty was just $2,800. Dixon and Tanner write:

Michigan is one of 21 states that operate their own workplace safety agency for public and private sectors. Some of the other states are much tougher than Michigan in levying penalties when a worker is killed.

Minnesota sets minimum penalties when a violation causes or contributes to a death: $25,000 per serious violation and $50,000 per willful violation. In contrast, Michigan has a $200 minimum penalty for a serious violation and a $5,000 minimum penalty for a willful.

Willful violations are issued when an employer is plainly indifferent to employee safety — for example, excavating a trench without protection against a cave-in.

Serious violations are issued when an employer fails to protect against workplace hazards that could cause an injury or illness most likely to result in death or serious harm. Examples include no eye protection for flying particles and corrosive liquids or welding near flammable liquids.

"I can't think of a more insulting thing than to tell someone, 'Your spouse's life was worth $1,500 in fines. It's offensive," said Minnesota Sen. John Marty, who sponsored the legislation setting the minimum penalties more than a decade ago.

To read the full investigation, visit the Detroit Free Press.

In other news:

Slate: Kathleen McLaughlin and Noy Thrupkaew investigate the dangerous, often life-threatening conditions inside China’s fireworks factories, which produce about 90 percent of the world’s fireworks. The story begins with Huang Mingwei, who worked in the Nanyang Export Fireworks Factory in China’s Hunan province and was left with burns over 70 percent of her body after an explosion in the factory. The authors write: “For decades, China’s fireworks industry has been plagued by deadly accidents. By 2009, the government began scaling back production and ramping up safety checks in Hunan and surrounding areas. But as late as 2014, the same year as the Nanyang explosion, Wang Haoshui, chief engineer with China’s State Administration of Workplace Safety, told a Chinese newspaper that fireworks continued to be the country’s second-most dangerous industry, right behind coal mining. Between 1986 and 2005, an average of 400 people were killed every year making fireworks in China, according to official data published in Chinese media. But coal mines, where 931 workers were killed in 2014 according to Chinese government data, get far more attention.”

Santa Fe New Mexican: Andrew Oxford reports that the New Mexico Supreme Court ruled last week that farm and ranch employers must provide workers’ compensation insurance, striking down a state law that had exempted such employers from offering workplace injury coverage. The case was brought by two workers who had been injuried on the job: Maria Angelica Aguirre, who was working as a chile picker when she slipped and broke her wrist; and Noe Rodriguez, a dairy farm worker who sustained a brain injury after being hit by a cow. Oxford writes: “In the majority decision, (Justice Edward) Chavez noted state law requires employers to provide workers’ compensation coverage for laborers who process and package agricultural products but not for laborers who harvest those products in the field. The distinction, he wrote, amounts to discrimination and violates a section of the New Mexico Constitution guaranteeing ‘equal protection of the laws.’”

The Hill: In a blog post, Debbie Berkowitz, a senior fellow with the National Employment Law Project, writes about the new increase in OSHA penalties — previously, the agency’s penalties had been among the lowest across federal regulatory agencies. For example, she writes that the Federal Communications Commission can fine a TV station up to $325,000 for indecent content; in contrast, the maximum fine OSHA could levy against an employer for serious violations that could result in physical harm or death was just $7,000. But with the recent change, maximum OSHA fines will increase by about 80 percent. It’s the first hike in OSHA penalties in more than two decades. Berkowitz writes: “Even with today’s increase, the fines are still low in comparison to other federal agencies. But it is a step in the right direction.”

Detroit Free Press: Jennifer Dixon reports that OSHA has awarded Theresa Ely, a school janitor, more than $193,000 in damages and lost wages after determining that her employer had retaliated against her for complaining about asbestos exposure in Michigan’s Dearborn Heights School District No. 7. Dixon reports that Ely and another janitor were told to dry-sand tiles and only learned that the tiles contained asbestos afterward. Also, the workers said they had never received proper training on dealing with asbestos. Dixon writes: “Federal OSHA ordered the district to pay her $8,139 in lost wages and $185,000 for emotional distress, future medical bills and loss of her reputation and humiliation stemming from the district ‘deliberately labeling her a troublemaker’ in district-wide emails and ‘subsequently refusing to retract this statement when in possession of multiple reports indicating her concerns were legitimate,’ OSHA said in its report.”

Kim Krisberg is a freelance public health writer living in Austin, Texas, and has been writing about public health for nearly 15 years.

kkrisberg Tue, 07/05/2016 - 05:53

Tags

Occupational Health News Roundup

kkrisberg — Tue, 12 Apr 2016 16:28:35 +0000

Occupational Health News Roundup

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’s Department of Industrial Relations administers workers’ compensation. Judges issue orders in workers’ compensation courts. Medical boards and commissions oversee doctors, pharmacists and chiropractors. And a market of more than 300 insurers and self-insured employers do the day-to-day job of deciding which medical bills to pay and which claims to fight.

“When everyone is responsible, no one is,” said Kate Zimmermann, a Kern County prosecutor who has combated workers’ compensation fraud for eight years. “He who has the gold can write the rules. … If you have one checkbook, you can say, ‘If you want the check, this is how.’”

And because workers never see a summary of services and charges related to their workers’ comp care, they don’t have the information they need to flag fraudulent care, the article states. For instance, Jewett interviewed a worker who had requested her medical records only to find that her provider had billed for transportation and language interpretation — services the worker hadn’t used.

Throughout the article, Jewett looks to Medicare to illustrate how that health care system has prevented fraud. An example: the Medicare program bans providers who’ve been convicted of defrauding a health care program. California’s workers’ comp system, on the other hand, does not. She writes:

But those banned providers have no problem starting a second career in California’s workers’ compensation system.

Medicare banned Dr. Thomas Heric in 2006 after he pleaded guilty to charges related to writing reports based on diagnostic tests that turned out to be fraudulent. In his letter to the judge who sentenced him, Heric pledged that going forward, he would use “whatever talents I may have in service to the community.”

Heric then found a new line of work in the workers’ compensation medical system. His job was to review data on injured workers’ sleep patterns and issue reports needed to bill insurers.

Five years later, prosecutors accused Heric of fraud again. They say he was writing virtually identical reports that gave rise to sham billing. One expert testified in court that Heric’s sleep-study reports were so bad that they failed to address one worker’s serious breathing problems for months, a lapse that he said could harm “the general public.”

To read the full article, visit Reveal.

In other news:

Fair Warning: Brian Joseph investigates the dangerous conditions that workers face in the recycling industry, beginning the story with worker Erik Hilario, 19, who died in a fire at Newell Recycling in Georgia. The article notes that an analysis of OSHA records found that scrap yards and sorting facilities receive about 80 percent more citations per inspection than the average inspected workplace. In addition, recycling drop-off centers have become somewhat notorious for wage violations — for instance, labor officials in California compared wage theft problems in the industry to those typically found in garment sweatshops and in the agricultural industry. Joseph writes: “One of the largest sectors in recycling, scrap yards, has long had high fatality and injury rates. In 2014 its fatality rate was 20.8 deaths per 100,000 full-time workers, more than nine times higher than manufacturing workers overall. The same year, garbage and recycling collectors had the fifth-highest fatality rate among the dozens of occupations analyzed by the Bureau of Labor Statistics. No one tracks how many workers die across all recycling sectors. But at scrap yards and sorting facilities, at least 313 recycling workers were killed on the job from 2003 to 2014, according to the BLS.”

Los Angeles Times: Peter Jamison explores the impact of union exemptions included in a number of local minimum wage hikes across California. He starts the story with bellhop Bill Martinez, who could have seen a 71 percent boost in his paycheck after Los Angeles passed a law raising the minimum hourly wage at large hotels to $15.37. But because the law included an exemption for union hotels, Martinez is now making less than nonunion workers. The exemptions are drawing a good bit of outrage, Jamison reports, including criticism from fellow unions. Supporters say the exemptions could make employers more amenable to unionization and enables unions to negotiate better packages and benefits for members. Jamison reports: “Even union workers exempted by the ordinances of L.A. and other cities will see their pay gradually rise under the state minimum wage increase. However, because of the law's incremental rollout — the statewide minimum will not reach $15 until 2022 — they are still positioned to miss out on tens of thousands of dollars compared with their non-union counterparts.”

Chicago Tribune: Alexia Elejalde-Ruiz reports that Chicago is poised to join the growing number of cities nationwide that now require paid sick leave for workers. The city’s Working Families Task Force released a report earlier this month recommending that Chicago workers be able to accrue at least five paid sick days every year. The report, which is intended to serve as a blueprint toward an eventual city ordinance, also found that offering paid sick leave would add about 0.7 to 1.5 percent in labor costs for most employers. Not surprisingly, the local Chamber of Commerce is opposing a sick leave ordinance. Elejalde-Ruiz writes: “A report from Women Employed estimated 460,000 private-sector workers in Chicago don't have access to paid sick days. Another report, from the National Partnership for Women & Families, put the number at 2.1 million people in Illinois.”

Huffington Post: Dave Jamieson reports that a judge has ordered that two coal miners be reinstated after being fired for insulting Bob Murray, CEO of Murray Energy. The cases involves a bonus program at one of Murray Energy’s coal mines in West Virginia in which miners could earn extra pay if they avoided safety violations and achieved production goals. United Mine Workers of America opposed the program, arguing that it conflicted with safety goals and could discourage workers from reporting safety problems. Two miners made their opposition to the bonus program well known, writing on their voided bonus checks: “Kiss My Ass Bob” and “Eat Shit Bob.” Fortunately, a judge sided with the fired miners. Jamieson reports: “And as far as the judge is concerned, the miners had a legal right to say as much. Not because they’re entitled to free speech — but because they have a right under the law to band together to improve their working conditions.”

Kim Krisberg is a freelance public health writer living in Austin, Texas, and has been writing about public health for nearly 15 years.

kkrisberg Tue, 04/12/2016 - 12:28

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Occup Health News Roundup

Occupational Health & Safety

paid leave

Public Health - General

safety

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workers' compensation

Occupational Health News Roundup

kkrisberg — Tue, 10 Nov 2015 16:43:18 +0000

Occupational Health News Roundup

Workers who get injured on the job already face significant challenges when trying to access the workers’ compensation system. But for workers who suffer from occupational illnesses related to chemical exposures — illnesses that can develop over long periods of time — the workers’ comp system is nearly useless, according to reporter Jamie Smith Hopkins at the Center for Public Integrity.

In another installment of the center’s eye-opening investigative series “Unequal Risk,” Hopkins explores the often insurmountable barriers that sick workers face — barriers so insurmountable that most people with occupational diseases never even bother filing a claim. In addressing insurers’ assertions that strict rules are needed to prevent workers’ comp fraud, Hopkins reports:

But J. Paul Leigh, a professor of health economics at the University of California, Davis, found major costing-shifting in the other direction. A study he co-wrote in 2004, partially funded with a federal grant and cited in a 2015 report by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration about how the system fails workers, estimated that more than 95 percent of ultimately-fatal occupational diseases are never covered by workers’ comp.

“It was remarkable — unfortunate, actually — the huge disparity between what workers’ compensation paid for and what epidemiological estimates consider are the true deaths attributed to occupational exposure,” Leigh said.

Taxpayers picked up nearly $27 billion in expenses from work injuries and illnesses in 2007 alone through federal programs such as Medicare, Leigh and a co-author estimated in a separate 2012 study. The biggest share of the burden fell on the workers and their families: an estimated $125 billion, or half the cost.

Among the workers Hopkins writes about is Gene Cooper, who in 2003 helped clean up a spill at the flooring plant where he worked. Seven months following the spill, he was so sick he could no longer work. He eventually succumbed to his illness in 2014. Hopkins writes:

By 2006, (Gene Cooper) was in a nursing home, not speaking, his family unable to tell whether he recognized them or not. As his body deteriorated and Parkinson’s symptoms set in, he lost the ability to swallow, and that was how he died in 2014 — choking on the aspirated contents of his stomach. It’s an image his wife cannot get out of her head.

The bills to care for him were so massive — hundreds of thousands of dollars’ worth — that they gobbled up his retirement fund, his investments and his Social Security disability payments. Sandra Cooper had to tap their son’s college fund, the inheritance her late mother left her and lines of credit to keep going.

Her initial efforts to find out if work could be the cause of his illness went nowhere. The occupational medicine specialist who saw him in 2005 couldn’t help because Sandra Cooper had no idea what substances were in the spill. Her lawyer did request her husband’s medical and exposure records that year from his employer, Lancaster-based Armstrong World Industries, and came away empty-handed. Armstrong spokeswoman Jennifer Johnson said in an email that the company needed a request in writing and did not get one. Sandra Cooper said the company refused to turn over records at all unless she filed a workers’ compensation claim.

To read the full story, visit the Center for Public Integrity.

In other news:

International Business Times: Reporter Cole Stangler writes that federal regulators are accusing Murray Energy, a mining operator, of trying to silence and retaliate against workers who speak out about mine safety violations. For example, Stangler reported, official records note that Murray Energy “chided” 3,500 workers for making too many confidential safety complaints and threatened to close down operations in retaliation. Officials with the U.S. Department of Labor have accused the company of creating an “atmosphere of intimidation.” Stangler writes about a mandatory meeting that workers had to attend with CEO Bob Murray: “The CEO told the gathering that the coal industry is under siege and said workers should be grateful for their jobs. Another section of his presentation was more pointed: The company, which has come under fire for its safety record, is committed to working together, but miners are filing too many anonymous safety complaints with the federal government.”

Wall Street Journal: Alexandra Berzon reports that even though OSHA is increasing its penalties for the first time since the 1990s, the agency’s fines are still pretty tiny when compared to fines levied by other agencies, such as the Environmental Protection Agency. The penalty hike was part of the recently signed budget bill and brings OSHA’s fines in line with 25 years of inflation. (Berzon noted that OSHA was one of only a small group of agencies that was exempted from a 1990 bill the required federal agencies to ensure fines kept pace with inflation.) Not surprisingly, industry is opposed to the fine hike. Berzon reports: “Workplace-safety experts from both industry and labor said they were caught by surprise by the new mandate, which they say will likely increase maximum fines for the most severe citations to $125,000 from $70,000 and for other serious violations to $12,500 from $7,000.”

BuzzFeed News: Sapna Maheshwari reports that Urban Outfitters is the latest retailer to get rid of on-call scheduling, in which employees are required to call in before they report to work. If they’re not needed, they simply go unpaid for the time they’ve set aside in case they were called into work. BuzzFeed News got a copy of an Urban Outfitters employee handbook, which instructed workers to call in three hours before the start of on-call shifts. In a Philadelphia Daily News column about the retailer’s use of on-call scheduling, columnist Ronnie Polaneczky writes: “The unpredictability means employees can't schedule classes, if they're in school. Or go to a second job, so they can cobble together a full-time salary. Or reliably arrange child care or pay their bills, since their cost to do both remains fixed even though their working hours don't. Their only compensation, if I read the handbook correctly, is that they get to keep their jobs so you can continue to exploit their need to make a living.”

The New York Times: New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo is planning to create a $15 minimum wage for all state workers, which would make the state the first to set such a wage for such a large group of public workers, reported Jesse McKinley. McKinley writes that Cuomo would use his executive authority to gradually increase the hourly wage, which would reach $15 by the end of 2018. In a statement, Cuomo said: “I believe that if you work hard and work full time, you should not be condemned to live in poverty.” In related news, fast food workers went on strike across the country today to demand livable wages and the right to organize. According to USA Today reporter Paul Davidson, today’s walk-outs were the largest so far in the fast food worker movement. Davidson writes: “Already an influential political force, the workers plan to use their new-found muscle to sway local, state and national elections exactly 12 months from now and say they'll back any candidate of any party who supports their cause. The Fight for $15 group says it will hold voter registration drives and neighborhood parties to coax the workers to the polls.”

Kim Krisberg is a freelance public health writer living in Austin, Texas, and has been writing about public health for more than a decade.

kkrisberg Tue, 11/10/2015 - 11:43

Tags

black lung

Chemical facility safety

Occup Health News Roundup

occupational fatalities

Occupational Health & Safety

OSHA

Public Health - General

workers' compensation

Wayne Farms and Employer Solutions Staffing subject of Alabama poultry workers’ safety complaints

cmonforton — Tue, 29 Apr 2014 10:20:00 +0000

Wayne Farms and Employer Solutions Staffing subject of Alabama poultry workers’ safety complaints

“When workers get hurt in poultry plants, many employers try to just throw them away,” explained Tom Fritzsche a staff attorney with the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC). “Companies assume workers won’t stand up for themselves. We are proud to represent a group of brave workers who want to keep these dangerous conditions from harming even more people.”

Fritzsche’s comment came after SPLC filed a complaint last week with the Labor Department on behalf of nine poultry workers from Wayne Farms’ facility in Jack, Alabama. The complaint alleges the firm violated a slew of OSHA standards---from requiring workers to pay for their own personal protective equipment, failing to provide training, and denying access to bathrooms, to withholding workers’ access to their medical records and falsifying injury reports. The complaint notes that the workers initially brought their concerns to their supervisors, but it did no good. Some of the workers were later fired for raising their safety concerns, and they have filed separate complaints regarding retaliation for exercising their safety rights. Wayne Farms is the nation’s fifth largest poultry production firm. They produce 2.5 billion pounds of poultry annually which is sold under the brand names Wayne Farms, Dutch Quality House, and Platinum Harvest.

This complaint should have particular resonance with OSHA because some of the workers are employed by a temporary staffing agency. It notes that some of the workers are employed by “Employer Solutions Staffing Group II (also known as East Coast Labor Solutions, as Labor Solutions of Alabama, LLC, and as Lane Transportation.)” Last year the agency directed its field staff to pay particular attention to worksites where temp workers are assigned. OSHA chief David Michaels, PhD, MPH said:

"Host employers need to treat temporary workers as they treat existing employees. Temporary staffing agencies and host employers share control over the employee, and are therefore jointly responsible for temp employee's safety and health. It is essential that both employers comply with all relevant OSHA requirements."

The growth of the temporary staffing industry in the U.S. was profiled last year in an investigation by ProPublica’s Michael Grabbel. His series “The Expendables: How the Temps Who Power Corporate Giants Are Getting Crushed,” explained how “temporary work has become a mainstay of the economy,” with “almost one-fifth of the total job growth since the recession ended in mid-2009 has been in the temp sector, federal data shows.”

The workers’ complaint indicates that ESSG:

“recruited the workers from Puerto Rico, deducts money from their paychecks, and assumes status as the workers nominal employer, though their working conditions are primarily controlled by Wayne Farms.”

We might learn from OSHA's investigation what percentage of the workforce at this Wayne Farms' facility are supplied by the temp agency.

Employer Solutions Staffing Group (ESSG) boasts the benefit to firms of using outside labor rather than having their own employees:

“What if you never had to secure or pay for workers' comp or have another workers' compensation audit? One of the biggest challenges of workers’ compensation is the ability to maintain competitive rates. ESSG workers’ compensation is based on the principle that it’s better to work together than alone.”

Translation: we pay a low premium for workers’ compensation because we place workers in a range of industries. Some of them may have high injury rates, but those are offset by placements in other industries. Our work comp premium will be lower than your’s and we’ll pass those cost savings onto you.

Why is that? Because the work-related injury rate in the poultry processing industry (based on employer reports to the Bureau of Labor Statistics) is 4.9 per 100 full-time employees (FTEs.) That's pretty steep compared to the rate reported by BLS for the temporary help industry: 1.6 per FTE.

ESSG describes another benefit:

“What if you were able to let your new client know that you are providing employee benefits? Over the years, we have put together an employee benefits plan that provides mini-medical, dental, STD, and life insurance. We have thousands of happy employees using this coverage every day. If you are looking for a way to distinguish yourself from the rest of the staffing companies, this is definitely a win for you.”

I can’t help but note the word “mini.” Some workers at the plant likely have better than the “mini” benefit packages offered by ESSG. They are represented by the Retail, Wholesale, and Department Stores Union, an affiliate of the United Food and Commercial Workers Union.

The workers’ complaint notes, however, that those

“who were recruited through ESSG were not permitted by their employer to join RWDSU, which is the collective bargaining representative of other non-supervisory employees at this worksite.”

OSHA has inspected portions of the plant in the last few years, but the violations found and penalties assessed have been modest. With the details of the workers’ written complaint and the involvement of the temporary staffing firm, we’ll see whether the brave workers’ decision to come forward will achieve their goal of keeping the “dangerous conditions from harming even more people.”

P.S. Check out the photos that Wayne Farms uses on its website. Not a worker, or chicken, or even a feather to be seen.

cmonforton Tue, 04/29/2014 - 06:20

Tags

food

government

Occupational Health & Safety

OSHA issues new whistleblower protections for food industry workers

kkrisberg — Wed, 12 Mar 2014 10:46:42 +0000

OSHA issues new whistleblower protections for food industry workers

When President Obama signed the Food Safety Modernization Act (FSMA) into law in 2011, it was described as the most sweeping reform of the nation’s food safety laws in nearly a century. Public health advocates hailed the law for shifting regulatory authority from reaction to prevention. What received less attention was a first-of-its-kind provision that protects workers who expose food safety lawbreakers.

The law’s whistleblower provision, also known as Section 402, amends the federal Food, Drug and Cosmetic Act to provide “protection to employees against retaliation by an entity engaged in the manufacture, processing, packing, transporting, distribution, reception, holding, or importation of food” for reporting or testifying to a violation of the Food, Drug and Cosmetic Act or for refusing to participate in activities the worker “reasonably” believes to be a violation. Just a few weeks ago, OSHA issued its final interim rule on the whistleblower provision, outlining the agency’s procedures for handling FSMA-related complaints of employers retaliating against employees who raise food safety concerns. The provision is the first food industry-specific law designed to protect whistleblowers.

“It’s the gold standard of whistleblower protections — the Cadillac version,” said Amanda Hitt, director of the Food Integrity Campaign at the Government Accountability Project, a whistleblower advocacy and protection organization. (Here’s an example of the new whistleblower provision in action.)

Previously, a patchwork of different state and federal laws might have protected some food industry whistleblowers, Hitt told me, but left others with little recourse if they were fired after speaking up. However, with the new FSMA provision, “we get a nice uniform exception for the safety of public health,” she said. In a very real way, the whistleblower provision creates “civilians who are deputized to oversee food safety, to become inspectors in real time on the floor,” Hitt noted.

“Any time you get a uniform statutory set-up, you’ll get a much better informed workforce,” Hitt said. “With a patchwork that varies from state to state, you won’t get that sort of education inoculation. …What we would love to have is a totally educated workforce, but that’s probably not going to happen. What usually happens is you get better trained (human resources) staff and better educated industries and you hope they have appropriate training around whistleblower activity.”

Even though one wouldn’t imagine that the food industry favors whistleblower protection, Hitt said that getting the whistleblower provision included in FSMA wasn’t particularly difficult. Hitt’s colleague Tom Devine, legal director at the Government Accountability Project, said FSMA was swept up in a wave of whistleblower rights that Congress routinely wrote into major regulatory legislation between 2006 and 2010. Devine said that not only was the Democratic majority at the time sympathetic to whistleblower rights, but the law also followed a “major paradigm shift in corporate speech” with passage of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, which was crafted in the wake of corporate frauds such as the Enron scandal. Sarbanes-Oxley puts in place criminal penalties for retaliating against whistleblowers.

While the FSMA provision is the first food industry-specific whistleblower protection, Devine noted that the industry’s workers had some prior protection “through the backdoor of other statutes.” For example, if the food company is publically traded, a whistleblower would be protected via Sarbanes-Oxley, though that worker would most likely be an accountant or bookkeeper, not someone who’d witness a food safety violation. Whistleblower protections written into environmental laws, such as the Clean Water Act and Clean Air Act, could also apply to food industry workers, depending on the violation being reported. Still, the FSMA provision is the first to specifically protect food industry workers and apply to food manufacturing practices.

“Whistleblower protection creates a safe channel for the free flow of information from the front lines where food safety breakdowns occur to all of society’s stakeholders who should be warned about them,” Devine told me. “(The FSMA) whistleblower provision reflects the current gold standard for free speech rights in the private sector. It was a landmark breakthrough for food safety.”

Gaps in protection

The provision isn’t perfect, though. First, it only applies to food industries that come under U.S. Food and Drug Administration authority. Whistleblowers in food industries regulated via the U.S. Department of Agriculture, such as beef and poultry producers, aren’t covered. Also, the complaint process, which is overseen by an OSHA investigator, has some gaps too, Devine said. For example, once OSHA makes its preliminary finding that a worker was a victim of retaliation, the agency gives the employer a chance to argue that finding. However, the worker doesn’t get the same chance to defend the preliminary finding. In other words, Devine said, once OSHA issues a preliminary finding, the worker is effectively shut out of the process.

Another big gap is that the provision doesn’t pin down who’s responsible for educating workers on the new whistleblower protections.

“The law should have had a provision that required every employer to post the rights and train its staff, both management and employees, in the new rules of the road for freedom of speech, but that didn’t happen,” Devine told me.

Devine said that retaliation is a “very significant barrier to exposing the truth,” noting that even employees with comfortable salaries can find themselves bankrupt due to legal expenses. During his career, Devine has worked with about 400 food industry workers, noting that whistleblower disclosures have been “indispensible” in stopping government attempts to deregulate meat and poultry inspection.

Hitt added that whistleblower protections not only help level the playing field between employer and employee, but between companies and consumers.

“Whatever rights consumers enjoy implies an ability for employees to speak up safely,” she said.

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, food-borne illness affects about 48 million Americans every year, of which 128,000 people are hospitalized and 3,000 die. Researchers estimate that food-borne illnesses cost the country between $14 billion and $16 billion every year in medical costs, lost productivity and premature death.

To learn more about whistleblower protections and the food industry, visit the Food Integrity Campaign.

Kim Krisberg is a freelance public health writer living in Austin, Texas, and has been writing about public health for more than a decade.

kkrisberg Wed, 03/12/2014 - 06:46

Obama Labor Department taking steps to improve whistleblower protections, but progress is slow

cmonforton — Tue, 09 Aug 2011 12:00:00 +0000

Obama Labor Department taking steps to improve whistleblower protections, but progress is slow

Individuals who "blow the whistle" have the courage to tell authorities about corruption, fraud or safety hazards in their organization, even when doing so may result in being demoted or reassigned, fired or passed over for promotion, or discriminated against in another way. Whistleblowers are truck drivers who refuse to drive unsafe vehicles, railroad workers who report work-related injuries, or a bank manager who alleged financial securities fraud. There are dozens of federal laws designed to protect whistleblowers from adverse action by their employers, including provisions in the Clean Air Act, the Pipeline Safety Improvement Act, and the Affordable Care Act. Twenty-one and of these whistleblower protection laws are enforced the Labor Department's Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA). The resource-strained OSHA has struggled for years to meet the challenge. Last week, OSHA's assistant secretary David Michaels, issued a statement announcing

"new measures [which] will significantly strengthen OSHA's enforcement of the 21 whistleblower laws that Congress charged OSHA with administering."

I thought the agency's announcement lacked a sense a urgency commensurate with the gravity of the problems identified by two recent reports by the Government Accountability Office (GAO), one by the Labor Department's Inspector General (OIG) and the agency's own internal review. Here's why I say that:

In January 2009, GAO identified serious discrepancies between the information contained in case files and that in the agency's administrative databases. As a result, GAO found that OSHA can't evaluate complaint processing times, how long it takes to investigate and close a case, or make decisions about appealled cases. OSHA reported at the time that it was in the midst of implementing a new information management system which would help to resolve these problems. A year and a half later, the new data system is not yet fully operational, and an OSHA internal review suggests that data from whistleblower cases are not part of the new system. OSHA's announcement last week provided no substantive details on how these internal control deficiencies have been addressed. The agency only said:

"The data collection system has been modified."

In the same 2009 GAO report and again in an August 2010 report, the auditors found that a majority of OSHA's whistleblower investigators had not received the mandatory training on the statutes they are expected to enforce. Those findings were consistent with OSHA's own internal review of the program. The staff reported being:

"...undervalued and overworked and that they don't receive adequate support, training and equipment to do their job."

In their reported dated December 2010, the internal review team urged OSHA leadership to:

"...take expedient action to correct systemic problems identified in this report."

The reviewers' call for expedient action came eight months ago, and reiterated what the GAO had urged nearly two years earlier. When OSHA announced it would be holding a training conference in September for all whistleblower investigators, my reaction was not "atta boy," but "it's about time."

There seems to be a disconnect between what senior officials say about the importance of the whistleblower program:

"whistleblowers play an essential role in protecting workers and the public," and

"without robust whistleblower protections, [workers'] voices may be silenced -- and this silence impacts far more than just the individual workers involved"

and the speed in which they implement improvements. The internal review team identified three unique organizational structures in place in OSHA's 10 Regional Offices, described the pros and cons of each, and provided guidance to senior officials on how to transition to a single model. Eight months later, the agency says it is still pilot testing different field structures.

There also seems to be a disconnect between what senior officials say and the reality for investigators. The front-line staff report:

"having difficulty managing their case loads and completing quality investigations," and "feeling demoralized because they can't keep up the pace."

I hope when the training conference takes place in September, a few senior OSHA officials participate in the entire event to be submerged into the world of these front-line staff.

Ultimately, the whistleblowers themselves suffer the consequence of the poorly managed program. As the Labor Department's Office of the Inspector General (OIG) noted in its September 2010 report, 77 percent of the complaints filed under OSHA's 11(c) provision, the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, and Surface Transportation Assistance Act were dismissed, but perhaps only because many of the cases were not appropriately investigated. The OIG estimated that 80 percent of investigations missed at least one or more of the eight key elements of the investigation process.

Certainly the curriculum at the scheduled training conference will help to address those procedural deficiencies, but OSHA has been silent on how it is addressing the serious morale problems among the ranks of whistleblower investigators. OSHA's announcement last week said nothing about these morale problems which are a direct reflection of how the program is managed. OSHA's own internal review reported on a survey of 86% conducted in 2010 of the non-managerial whistleblower staff:

"the whistleblower program is not a priority, that in virtually every area from staffing levels, training, access to funds, equipment and support the whistleblower program comes second to safety and health enforcement programs," and feeling "undervalued and overworked and that they don't receive adequate support, training and equipment to do their job."

The internal review report suggested more than 60 recommendations to improve the management, oversight and operations of the whistleblower program. A fair number of them address procedures and resources that likely influence employee morale. OSHA should consider providing the participants at its upcoming whistleblower training conference a progress report on the implementation of the recommendations. Imagine the morale boost for the staff if they see that in the eight months since the internal review was completed, top OSHA officials took the recommendations to heart and acted on them.

cmonforton Tue, 08/09/2011 - 08:00

Tags

Occupational Health & Safety

Your comment is actually too mild. What is involved in actually protecting individual employee whistleblowers is determining whether or not an employee was disciplined for a legitimate reason or for an illegal reason (blowing the whistle). In the end, the determination has nothing to do at all with whether the alleged whistleblowing involved occupational safety and health or transportation or the environment. What was an enforcement mechanism added to many laws is really now a national employment standard -- with gaps in coverage and somewhat better procedural rules for some rather than others. Multiple Administrations and Congresses have passed up the chance to pull things together into a single law; and since it isn't officially designated as an "employment standard", it hasn't been the basis of discussions with other countries in trade negotiations (enforcement mechanisms are left to each country). While moving responsibility to the OSHA front office is better than keeping it in OSHA enforcement, for the moment one can presume that the staff will probably report through the same civil service official who was responsible for all the problems you cited (who is now in the front office). DOL declined the opportunity, yet again, to move this whole activity into a separate office reporting to the Dep Sec (there is no longer an Employment Standards administration per se, which is where this employment standards issue belongs). In part the problem is from certain individuals organized labor, which has continued to insist that the MSHA wb program is critical to MSHA and the OSHA wb program is critical to OSHA -- as if they can't trust any other part of the Department. The Dep Sec took personal responsibility for resolving the problems you indentified two years ago. Too bad reinvention awards aren't around or he, David, Jordan and Richard could give one to themselves himself. Hasta la vista, baby.

Agreed. I was too mild in my critique. Look at the end of the top-to-bottom review and read the comments from stakeholders about the program. It will be interesting to get those same individuals together in a year or two and see if their views have changes substantially. That may tells us something about the effect of these changes.

It's particularly disheartening in economic times like these, when many dangerous industries (construction, manufacturing) are experiencing such high unemployment that the option of getting another job just doesn't exist for many people working in dangerous industries. They are stuck with the job they have, but can't even be legally protected when they try to improve the safety of the job they're have.
Its really disheartening, and people are probably getting injured because of this.

The Administration's sincerity in this matter seems doubtful given that it has launched more prosecutions of government whistleblowers than all previous Administrations combined.