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OSHA contends that activity and performance measures are key to evaluating the effectiveness of state plans, but that exclusive reliance on outcome or impact measures would be “extremely problematic” in monitoring the states, in a detailed response to a recent Labor Department Office of Inspector General (OIG) report finding significant gaps in the agency's ability to audit state plans using such measures.

Roofing employers are turning their attention to working closely with OSHA to ensure compliance following an appeals court decision that will allow the agency to move forward with a new enforcement directive ending a longstanding policy of blanket exemptions to fall protection rules for some residential contractors.

A bipartisan group of lawmakers in the Senate and House filed legislation Wednesday to make OSHA's voluntary protection programs (VPP) a permanent part of the agency's mission, reviving efforts on the Hill from a year ago to shield the programs from now-abandoned administration plans to shift funding to enforcement instead.

Key Democrats on workplace health and safety issues on both sides of Capitol Hill are urging the White House to reconsider two NIOSH program cuts as part of spending reductions sought in President Obama's proposed fiscal year 2012 budget. But program advocates concede that it will be an uphill climb to save the funding given the lack of administration support.

OSHA no longer faces the prospect of a huge funding cut for the remainder of fiscal year 2011, as the new spending blueprint to fund agencies through the rest of the fiscal year maintains OSHA's fiscal 2010 funding level of $558.6 million. House Republicans unveiled the spending plan early Tuesday, formalizing the deal reached over the weekend among congressional and White House negotiators.

NIOSH could be required to conduct a study of work-related musculoskeletal disorders (MSD) rates as one piece of a legislative package to expand awareness and access to orthopaedic services, a bill that gained bipartisan backing in the last Congress and may be introduced again this year. The push for additional government research comes as OSHA renews its contentious regulatory efforts to gather more MSD data from work sites around the country.

Washington state lawmakers are directing the state's OSHA plan to issue new rules adopting NIOSH guidelines on safe drug handling in hospitals and health care settings, in what amounts to an unusual move by a legislature to compel use of the federal research agency's recommendations within state occupational safety and health regulations.

OSHA officials said the controversial proposal to reestablish a column on injury and illness recordkeeping logs to designate work-related musculoskeletal disorders (MSD) would help identify specific work sites that are experiencing patterns of MSD problems, and reiterated their stance that employers would simply be required to record injuries that they already track under existing reporting rules.

Most OSHA inspections, probably except for imminent danger and fatality investigations, would grind to a halt nationwide in the event of a shutdown of the federal government, according to sources familiar with the last shutdown in 1995. The impact on state plan grant funding would also be left in doubt, causing a wide ripple effect across many states and making even a short-term funding stoppage of great concern, a union official said. The agency might also hasten to issue citations in cases where it may run out of time under the statute, an industry lawyer predicted.

Several business groups named OSHA's planned regulation of combustible dust hazards as one of five major concerns about the agency's regulatory and enforcement agenda that they want to see House Republicans tackle through regulatory oversight, expressing broad concerns about the scope of the proposal, while one union closely watching the issue expressed surprise that the rulemaking has generated so much controversy early on.

OSHA's decision to contact city building inspection departments in all 10 of its regions in a bid to arrange partnerships and train inspectors on potential OSHA violations could help expand the agency's reach into the construction industry and build referral data. But industry is voicing skepticism about the possible costs and legal responsibilities of localities that get involved in the effort, sources say.

California Gov. Jerry Brown (D) has tapped Berkeley health and safety consultant Ellen Widess as the new chief of Cal/OSHA as part of a shakeup at the Division of Industrial Relations (DIR), but Widess still requires Senate confirmation for the job. Christine Baker, of Berkeley, has been appointed chief deputy director of the DIR, and Art Carter, of San Francisco, has been appointed member and chair of the Occupational Safety and Health Appeals Board.

Hawaii's new governor is pushing back against federal OSHA efforts to assert concurrent jurisdiction over the state OSHA plan, telling federal OSHA he will put more resources into the program and touting aspects of the state program's standards that he contends go beyond federal rules in protecting worker safety and health. Meanwhile the state's newly appointed director of labor and industrial relations told Inside OSHA Online that the state is “strongly committed” to rebuilding the program.

OSHA's enforcement activities across the country as well as its efforts in Washington to advance or wrap up rulemaking efforts in several key areas would be severely hobbled by House Republican proposals to slash the agency's budget by nearly 18 percent for the rest of this fiscal year, and the cuts would reduce staffing to 1970s levels, OSHA Deputy Assistant Secretary Jordan Barab told Inside OSHA Online in an exclusive interview.

OSHA has been reviewing whether any of its regulations duplicate efforts by the Environmental Protection Agency as part of an administration-wide regulatory review effort prompted by the White House, but has yet to identify any regulatory overlap even though some hazards -- such as asbestos, lead and noise -- are overseen by both agencies, a top OSHA official told Inside OSHA Online in an exclusive interview.

An administrative law judge (ALJ) has upheld an OSHA citation under the OSH Act general duty clause over an alleged crowd management hazard, possibly setting up a protracted legal battle over the agency's increased reliance on its broad authority in cases where the agency has no specific standards. The judge rejected arguments by Wal-Mart Stores Inc., against use of the clause, which was cited following a worker death in November 2008.

State OSHA plans are balking at provisions added to House Democrats' latest version of the Protecting America's Workers Act (PAWA) that would shift review powers to the secretary of Labor in cases where federal OSHA wants to assert concurrent jurisdiction over OSH Act enforcement, sources say.

OSHA is working behind the scenes with state public health officials to develop a formal arrangement under which state agencies would routinely share workplace data and make site referrals for use by federal OSHA in its inspection and standard-setting efforts, sources say. The concept, which an official involved called a “milestone,” emerged from a two-day meeting in Washington earlier this month.

The Labor Department's Office of Inspector General (OIG) is in the midst of completing an audit of federal OSHA's evaluations of state plans, an OIG spokesman confirmed to Inside OSHA Online. The study is planned for completion by the end of this month with a report due out by April.

Several Capitol Hill staffers have already voiced their support for maintaining funding levels for two NIOSH education and research programs that would be eliminated under the Obama administration's proposed budget for fiscal year 2012, a government affairs source closely following the issue told Inside OSHA Online.