OSHA reveals in an internal memo that it found violations in roughly 50 percent of the inspections conducted under an injury and illness recordkeeping National Emphasis Program, which the agency has since put on hold, but the agency has not released specific details about the number or type of violations uncovered. OSHA told regional administrators and state plans in the memo, obtained by Inside OSHA Online, that agency officials will present alternatives to OSHA chief David Michaels on criteria for sites to be inspected under a future, modified NEP directive.
OSHA has signaled it may hone in on a small number of chemicals as part of its reinvigorated effort to update decades-old permissible exposure limits (PELs), asking stakeholders to nominate those substances they think warrant the highest levels of priority.
Stakeholders say OSHA's new interim final rules on whistleblower protections provide advantages to employers by making burdens of proof more stringent on the complainant, but also offer whistleblowers an easier avenue to take their cases to court. OSHA published three rules Tuesday to implement provisions in statutes covering employer retaliation in the railroad, public transit, commercial motor carrier and consumer products industries.