OSHA is rolling out a new enforcement initiative that will automatically ramp up inspections of employers that fail to pay monetary penalties for past violations, as part of a broader Department of Labor (DOL) push to bolster its debt collection programs.
The agency announced the inspection-targeting plan in a Dec. 22 release that frames it as one of several ways DOL is tightening its responses to unpaid debts and penalties across a range of offices.
OSHA has announced its latest sector-specific partnership program, targeting worker safety conditions at wireless infrastructure like cellular towers in a bid to “eliminate” injuries and fatalities from a host of hazards just as many communications companies are looking to build new infrastructure that supports 5G cellular service.
Lawmakers have agreed to a short-term COVID-19 recovery package that drops both Republicans’ demand for employer liability waivers and Democrats’ proposed aid to state and local governments, teeing up a potential return to that long-running battle in the early days of President-elect Joe Biden’s term.
Several employers and national business groups are suing California OSHA (Cal/OSHA) over its recently adopted COVID-19 emergency temporary standard (ETS), claiming in part that a mandate to provide paid leave for sick or exposed workers exceeds the agency’s authority, and that the rulemaking sidestepped key procedural requirements.
OSHA is updating its Site-Specific Targeting (SST) workplace inspection program to add new criteria for inspecting employers based on increases in days away, restricted or transferred (DART) among their employees, and to allow inspectors to make a case-by-case decision to switch site inspections to records reviews “in limited situations.”
Worker safety groups say there is no guarantee the Biden administration will drop an upcoming Department of Agriculture (USDA) proposal that would allow poultry slaughterhouses to raise line speeds to what they say are unsafe levels, especially since it is based on a plan first floated by incoming Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack.
California Attorney General Xavier Becerra (D), selected to be President-elect Joe Biden’s health services chief, is petitioning a state court to order Amazon to respond to several subpoenas seeking information about the company’s COVID-19 worker safety protocols and the status of COVID infections at its facilities across the state.
A bipartisan group of senators that has been seeking to negotiate a compromise COVID-19 relief bill has failed to find common ground on combining funding provisions with employer liability relief and OSHA enforcement, and has split the workplace issues into a separate measure that employee safety advocates strongly oppose.
At press time, the legislators had not released their promised bills, which would devote about $908 billion to stimulus, unemployment aid, vaccine distribution and state and local governments, among other measures.
The Occupational Safety and Health Review Commission (OSHRC) will hear a case testing the standard of evidence OSHA must meet to prove violations of the OSH Act’s general duty clause, after an administrative law judge (ALJ) rejected an enforcement action over a utility worker’s 2018 death near Jacksonville, FL.
Employers’ attorneys expect the Biden OSHA to step up a long list of enforcement activities, including conducting more inspections, filing more claims of “egregious” safety violations, seeking higher penalties and invoking the multi-employer doctrine more frequently, alongside a binding COVID-19 standard and other new rules.
Workers at a Pennsylvania meat-packing plant suing OSHA to force enforcement action over alleged COVID-19 hazards are attacking the agency’s formal decision not to cite the facility, arguing that the Trump administration is ignoring its own guidance to employers and allowing them to impose unsafe working conditions without penalty.
Virginia is readying a permanent version of its first-in-the-nation COVID-19 emergency temporary standard (ETS) that will apply to a range of infectious diseases rather than only the current pandemic -- potentially providing a model for the Biden OSHA if it follows a similar rulemaking track.
Amazon workers are appealing a federal district judge’s decision that said courts should defer to OSHA on workplace standards for COVID-19 even when states have their own policies in place that establish broader infection-control mandates for the pandemic, setting up a novel appellate hearing on the subject.
The California Chamber of Commerce is advising employers to be aware of several new COVID-19 worker safety laws that will take effect in the state on Jan. 1, including sweeping legislation that mandates companies issue varying notices and carry out other responses for workplace COVID-19 infections.
OSHA is standing behind its refusal to classify cloth face coverings as personal protective equipment (PPE) subject to the same standards as medical gowns, respirators and other protective gear for workers, but is leaving the door open to reconsidering that decision if future research warrants it.
House and Senate Democrats say a bipartisan plan for short-term COVID-19 economic relief that includes a temporary federal liability waiver for employers against coronavirus-related lawsuits could help restart talks with the GOP, but the bill’s fate is in doubt as the White House and Senate Republican leadership are resisting the effort.
California employers and their attorneys are looking to a pending advisory panel to secure eased mandates in an emergency temporary standard (ETS) to protect workers from COVID-19 recently adopted by the state’s OSHA (Cal/OSHA) standards board, arguing that numerous provisions appear impossible to comply with and potentially illegal.
President-elect Joe Biden has named Obama-era OSHA chief David Michaels to his COVID-19 task force, drawing praise from labor and worker safety groups that say Michaels’ appointment shows that the new administration will focus on workplace protections in its pandemic response.
The family of an Iowa meat-packing worker who died of COVID-19 is claiming that the company violated OSHA standards and several laws by failing to mandate face coverings, social distancing and other protective measures, in addition to allegations that mangers bet money on how many employees would contract the disease.
Five Democratic senators are pushing the Mine Safety and Health Administration (MSHA) to quickly craft a long-pending update to its silica standard in response to a recent Office of Inspector General (OIG) report that found its current policies to be “out of date” and insufficiently protective of workers’ health.