Daily News

Florida leaders are coming under harsh criticism from U.S. Chemical Safety Board (CSB) officials who want the state to establish a public-sector occupational safety and health plan that meets OSHA requirements, in response to a 2006 accident at a wastewater treatment plant that killed two city workers and seriously burned a third.

The upcoming rule updating OSHA's hazard communication standard is estimated to create annualized savings for employers of at least $585 million, the agency says.

OSHA plans to issue a final rule -- which aligns the hazcom requirements with the Globally Harmonized System of Classification and Labeling of Chemicals -- in September, just a month after an earlier deadline for the rule in the regulatory agenda. An OSHA official said the standard is delayed for a few weeks due to “extensive review.”

A key senator engaged in government-wide efforts to study the benefits, as well as potential health and safety drawbacks, of nanotechnology said Thursday he fully expects Congress to renew the inter-agency initiative, which is up shortly for reauthorization. Congress has failed to reauthorize NNI in recent years, but since the program is funded through numerous agency budgets, the lack of a renewal has not hampered the initiative.

Congressional Democrats are eying a Republican-backed bid to codify voluntary protection programs (VPP) as a possible legislative vehicle to get at least a few of their long-sought OSHA reforms through the divided Congress, the ranking member of the House workforce protections subcommittee told Inside OSHA Online in an exclusive interview.

A cluster of House Democrats are pushing a bill that would make it easier for OSHA to assert concurrent jurisdiction over a state plan but also provide a formal window of opportunity for states to correct program gaps identified by federal OSHA before the agency steps in, as it has considered doing recently with Hawaii.

A source said the bill, which has six Democratic cosponsors, provides an interim step where states can make immediate improvements to avert OSHA asserting concurrent jurisdiction.

The new owners of the Upper Big Branch coal mine -- where a deadly explosion last year spurred a renewed push for mine safety measures and with it pressure from some congressional Democrats to roll sweeping OSHA reform into the same legislative package -- signaled they are willing to work with lawmakers on a mine safety measure, but apparently stopped short of endorsing any specific changes proposed on Capitol Hill.

OSHA says it delayed the start of a small business review process for its lead regulatory initiative -- injury and illness prevention programs (I2P2) -- because the agency needed to gather more stakeholder input as well as complete economic and feasibility analyses of the planned rule. But OSHA maintains that the process, which was to begin in June, will get under way shortly.

OSHA's new regulatory agenda slightly slips the timetable for key rulemaking efforts -- including a short delay in issuing a new hazard communication standard set for final publication in the next few months -- but says others, such as the controversial injury and illness prevention programs (I2P2), remain on track as earlier scheduled.

OSHA has scrapped its bid to seize authority from the Hawaii state OSHA plan, dropping a proposal conceived last year to exercise a rarely invoked power to assert limited concurrent enforcement jurisdiction over state plans. OSHA cited assurances by the state's new governor that substantial improvements to the program are under way, deferring to the state's own blueprint for addressing performance gaps outlined by the federal agency in critical audit findings.

Six demonstration projects spearheaded by NIOSH researchers have found examples of how ergonomically designed manual materials handling equipment could be used to reduce the physical burden of manual lifting in wholesale and retail jobs, agency officials said.

Three occupational safety and health advocacy groups are joining forces to create a new center dedicated to advancing the role of OSH efforts in global sustainability and social responsibility efforts -- a collaboration that is expected not only to focus on research but to provide input on government policies and regulations.

Construction employers are asking the Obama administration to split apart a proposed rule updating OSHA's crystalline silica standard so it would exempt construction, arguing that the fluid nature of the construction industry requires more time to evaluate how to address silica exposure in that sector. The employers would like to see OSHA issue a new standard applicable only to general industry for the time being, and formally proposed the idea to the White House after meeting with the Office of Management and Budget, OSHA and Small Business Administration (SBA).

Key advisers to OSHA are staking out a broad position backing initiatives to increase both the volume of data on occupational injuries and illnesses recorded and reported to the agency, as well as employer compliance with recordkeeping mandates, in a sweeping set of recommendations to OSHA.

The move to pressure the agency on recordkeeping comes just as OSHA has published a proposed rule mandating stricter reporting requirements for worker hospitalizations and amputations, as well as making major changes to the classification of industry sectors to which recordkeeping rules apply.

OSHA is facing pressure from its top advisory panel to step up efforts to oversee oil rig safety, carcinogens, injury and illness prevention programs (I2P2), recordkeeping, musculoskeletal disorder recording, and silica. The National Advisory Committee on Occupational Safety and Health (NACOSH) touched on all of these issues, as well as NIOSH funding cuts, in votes last week.

Safety and health stakeholders are pressuring OSHA to move ahead as quickly as possible to issue a proposed rule updating the standard on workplace exposures to crystalline silica as the White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB) continues its extended review of the agency's proposal.

The National Advisory Committee on Occupational Safety and Health (NACOSH) voted at its June 22 meeting in Washington to recommend that OSHA move swiftly on its crystalline silica rulemaking, which has been the subject of talks among the agency, OMB, industry and organized labor officials.

A key OSHA advisory panel is calling for continued funding of two NIOSH programs -- Education and Research Centers (ERCs), and the Agriculture, Forestry, and Fishing Program (AFF) -- that have come under the budget ax in President Obama's fiscal 2012 spending proposal.

A key advisory panel is urging OSHA to move ahead with its controversial plan to add a musculoskeletal disorders (MSD) column to employer recordkeeping logs, contending that small businesses have now been given ample opportunity to comment on the proposal and OSHA should proceed with a final rule.

OSHA says it expects to release draft regulatory text for its planned injury and illness prevention program (I2P2) rule by roughly mid-August as part of the statutorily required small business input process, which the agency also says is likely on track to begin by the end of June -- or if not, as soon as possible in July. The agency also indicated to stakeholders in an advisory panel that the controversial rulemaking would take at least two and a half years to complete.

OSHA unveiled a proposal Wednesday to make two major changes to injury and illness reporting and recordkeeping rules, including requiring employers to report within eight hours any hospitalization and within 24 hours any amputation. An industry attorney says the proposal already appears to be drawing opposition.

Both a public interest advocacy group and industry interests are drawing on the input from small businesses to bolster their opposing views on whether OSHA should proceed with its highly controversial rulemaking effort to add a column for musculoskeletal disorders (MSD) to recordkeeping logs.