New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy (D) is tasking several state agencies with enforcing new COVID-19 workplace-safety mandates, a response to OSHA’s refusal to craft a binding standard for the virus and a model for other states that lack delegated OSH Act worker safety program authority to nonetheless enact binding pandemic rules.
OSHA has issued new COVID-19 guidance for long-term care workers that outlines protective steps employers should take in order to avoid enforcement under the agency’s respiratory protection standard, the latest example of the agency’s use of existing rules and sector-specific guides to shape firms’ responses to the pandemic.
Unions plan to urge Democratic nominee Joe Biden to quickly strengthen OSHA’s enforcement program if he wins the Nov. 3 presidential election by arguing that it would be the most effective way to boost worker safety, while bracing for “an all-out assault on worker protections” if President Donald Trump wins re-election.
Employers’ attorneys are expecting the COVID-19 pandemic to remain OSHA’s top issue regardless of how the Nov. 3 presidential election ends, but are weighing the potential for a shift in the agency’s approach if Democratic nominee Joe Biden wins and orders the creation of an emergency temporary standard (ETS) for the virus.
The Department of Labor (DOL) is curtailing OSHA and other agencies’ public announcements of enforcement actions, directing them not to publicize violations or fines until a case is resolved in court, despite findings that press releases are more effective than inspections at deterring future violations.
California Chamber of Commerce representatives are raising concerns over the state OSHA’s (Cal/OSHA) plan to adopt next month an emergency temporary standard (ETS) for COVID-19, charging that regulators will release the proposed text of the rule for public review only five days before the standards board votes on it.
Employer liability remains a major unresolved issue in the ongoing talks between Democrats, Republicans and the White House over a potential new COVID-19 stimulus bill, with many in the GOP caucus demanding its inclusion in such a bill despite long-running Democratic opposition to any such waiver for companies.
OSHA has issued guidance aimed at boosting use of N95 respirator masks to limit the spread of COVID-19, an effort to combat what it says is unfounded controversy over whether the masks and other face coverings provide adequate protections from the virus and reinforcing what some attorneys say is effectively a mandate to use them.
Michigan has enacted the second binding set of state-issued workplace standards in the United States for COVID-19 after the state’s high court struck down Gov. Gretchen Whitmer’s (D) executive orders aimed at curbing the pandemic, with the new rule setting broad mandates for employers as well as sector-specific requirements.
The California Chamber of Commerce is warning its members the state’s newly enacted law mandating notices and other responses to workplace COVID-19 infections will be onerous and confusing to implement, while revealing that “cleanup” legislation is in the works to address what the group says are some of its most problematic provisions.