President-elect Joe Biden’s planned COVID-19 stimulus bill would allow OSHA to extend its expected emergency temporary standard (ETS) for the virus to industries the agency does not currently regulate, including several categories of government work, alongside boosts to OSHA’s enforcement and training budgets.
Attorneys representing employers say President-elect Joe Biden could return Obama-era OSHA chief David Michaels to the agency on a short-term basis to lead its COVID-19 response, including possible development of an emergency temporary standard (ETS), ahead of Biden nominating a permanent OSHA secretary.
California OSHA (Cal/OSHA) is further clarifying its recently adopted COVID-19 worker safety emergency temporary standard (ETS) for a variety of issues and situations, amid ongoing opposition from hundreds of employer and industry groups that are urging state leaders to delay enforcement of the rules and provide related relief.
OSHA is agreeing to strengthen its involvement in EPA’s program for reviewing new chemicals’ potential hazards before they enter the marketplace, but the new memorandum of understanding (MOU) seems to exclude evaluations of existing chemicals even though EPA has faced calls to boost its consideration of worker safety in its risk reviews.
A federal district judge has rejected a lawsuit by public health groups and Democratic states aimed at reversing OSHA’s rollback of an Obama-era rule setting electronic reporting and recordkeeping mandates for employers, ruling that the reversal was within regulators’ discretion and that the groups lacked standing to sue.
A federal appellate court is slated to hear arguments in March in the long-running suits brought by industry, labor and environmental groups seeking to reverse EPA’s first-time TSCA rule banning consumer uses of paint strippers containing methylene chloride, marking an early legal marker for how the Biden administration may address such rules.
Local unions are welcoming President-elect Joe Biden’s selection of Boston Mayor Marty Walsh as Labor Secretary, praising Walsh both for his overall stance on worker safety and his administration’s imposition of comprehensive workplace protections from COVID-19 -- previewing a top priority for the Biden OSHA.
President-elect Joe Biden has selected Boston Mayor Marty Walsh (D), a former president of the city’s building union, as his nominee for Secretary of Labor, following through on campaign promises to give unions a strong voice in labor policy and putting Walsh in charge of an expected push to ramp up OSHA’s enforcement efforts.
A coalition of agriculture industry groups is suing the California OSHA (Cal/OSHA) in a bid to overturn the state’s recently adopted COVID-19 emergency temporary standard (ETS) for workplace safety, charging the new rules exceed the agency’s authority and threaten to cripple food production and distribution chains.
The Occupational Safety and Health Review Commission (OSHRC) has issued a new decision raising the bar for OSHA to enforce its rule that requires safe storage of material in tiers to prevent it from falling on workers, the latest in a series of decisions limiting use of existing standards on the eve of the Biden administration.
As the average age of workers rises due to delayed retirements, the economic recession and other factors, employers’ attorneys are warning companies that OSHA could step up enforcement related to ergonomics hazards that can pose a greater risk to older workers even though the agency lacks an explicit ergonomics standard.
The United Auto Workers (UAW) is pushing EPA to tighten its assessment of workplace risks from pigment violet 29 (PV29), arguing that the agency’s draft evaluation of the chemical underestimates the dangers of worker exposures, especially amid a respirator shortage caused by the COVID-19 pandemic.
For OSHA’s 50th anniversary, President-elect Joe Biden is renewing his pledge to quickly direct the agency to consider whether to issue an emergency temporary standard (ETS) that would mandate workplace COVID-19 protections for employees, while also vowing to ramp up OSHA’s enforcement efforts and staffing levels.
National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) Director John Howard is warning employers against strictly applying guidance NIOSH issued with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) on reducing workplace COVID-19 infections, saying new research on the virus can render such guides “stale.”
OSHA is facing calls from public commenters to adopt a “prevention through design” (PtD) approach for its powered truck safety standard and incorporate several related data-gathering requirements in the rule based on an existing federal program that so far has focused mainly on building safety.
OSHA is seeking nominees to its Advisory Committee on Construction Safety and Health (ACCSH) as 14 of the panel’s 15 members near the expiration of their two-year terms, opening the possibility that the agency’s current leaders could appoint ACCSH’s new membership ahead of the transition to the Biden administration.
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.
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.