OSHA is marking the 50th anniversary of its 1971 founding by touting its imminent emergency temporary standard (ETS) for COVID-19 and its plans to boost enforcement related to the pandemic, while Democratic lawmakers are using the occasion to ready their latest push to overhaul and tighten the OSH Act.
OSHA has sent its COVID-19 emergency temporary standard (ETS) rule for White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB) review, more than six weeks after President Joe Biden’s deadline for the ETS that observers expect will take effect within weeks and could include tiered mandates for specific industries.
Congress is stepping up its focus on the Biden administration’s worker protection policies, with senators advancing the nomination of Julie Su to be Deputy Labor Secretary while members of a key House subcommittee plan a hearing on OSHA’s development of an emergency temporary standard (ETS) for COVID-19.
OSHA says employees’ negative reactions to the COVID-19 vaccine are “work-related” and thus subject to recordkeeping and reporting mandates if an employer “requires” the vaccination, a definition the agency says it will read broadly to include any workplace where unvaccinated workers face “adverse action.”
Even as OSHA ramps up its COVID-19 enforcement, employers’ attorneys say the more than 300 already filed pandemic citations are facing an extraordinary level of legal push-back, with appeals pending for almost half of the cases -- potentially teeing up pivotal rulings on the agency’s authority to require infection-control measures.
In the highest-profile enforcement action so far under OSHA’s new COVID-19 national emphasis program (NEP), the agency is proposing to levy $136,532 in penalties, the largest in a pandemic-related case, against a tax preparation firm it says barred employees from taking infection-control measures.
Unions and worker safety groups are praising President Joe Biden’s selection of California OSHA (Cal/OSHA) chief Doug Parker to lead the federal OSHA and are urging him to swiftly enact a COVID-19 emergency temporary standard (ETS), which employers’ attorneys fear Parker could model on Cal/OSHA’s strict virus policy.
Worker safety groups are urging OSHA to issue “within the next few weeks” an emergency temporary standard (ETS) for COVID-19, arguing the already-delayed rulemaking is urgently needed, following reports that new Labor Secretary Marty Walsh has directed the agency to update the ETS to reflect new research on the virus.
Former Occupational Safety and Health Review Commission (OSHRC) Chairman James Sullivan says the Biden OSHA’s plan to step up enforcement, particularly on COVID-19 worker exposures, poses an “interesting” test for OSHRC and its precedent setting a high bar for the agency to sustain penalties in some enforcement cases.
A federal district court judge has dismissed a suit filed by Pennsylvania meat-packing plant workers that aimed to force OSHA to take action against their employer for inadequate protections against COVID-19, finding the OSH Act does not allow such suits unless an inspector makes a formal finding of “imminent danger” at the site.