OSHA is touting the Biden administration’s focus on increased enforcement as a key factor in a decrease in fatal occupational injuries in 2023, noting especially the administration’s focus on recognizing the disproportionate impact of work hazards on workers of color.
OSHA and EPA have released an agreement months in the making that outlines how the two agencies will share information and coordinate when EPA is reviewing workers’ safety in its TSCA existing chemical evaluations and enforcing risk management rules, while reiterating the two agencies’ unique authorities and responsibilities.
The Department of Labor (DOL) is announcing a 2.6 percent increase to the minimum and maximum OSH Act penalties for violations cited in 2025, reflecting an annual inflation adjustment that is less than the previous year and triggering a regulatory mandate for state plans to apply a matching adjustment to their own penalties.
Federal appellate judges are ordering the Mining Safety and Health Administration (MSHA) and an employer to explain why their bid to overturn an administrative law judge’s (ALJ) decision blocking an enforcement settlement should not be dismissed, while signaling that the ALJ body may be allowed to defend its ruling directly if the case proceeds.
An agriculture firm is arguing that OSHA’s long-standing guidance on how it divides enforcement authority over “rolling stock” with the Department of Transportation is too “vague” to support a 2021 citation that claims the employer “willfully” failed to comply with fall safety standards during railcar loading operations.
OSHA has reached a settlement with Amazon over working conditions at its warehouses nationwide, requiring ergonomics improvements across the e-commerce giant’s operations following a years-long enforcement push by the agency -- and just days after Senate Democrats accused the company of unlawfully concealing injuries at the facilities.
California OSHA (Cal/OSHA) is touting what it says is the state’s first citation for a “willful” violation of outdoor heat safety standards, targeting a landscape maintenance company with a fine of more than $276,000 and underscoring the agency’s renewed commitment to bolster enforcement efforts.
Employer-focused attorneys are saying they expect California OSHA (Cal/OSHA) inspectors to focus primarily on “enterprise-wide” and less on “egregious” violations as part of an agency initiative to toughen enforcement policies by establishing those new categories of citations as required by a 2021 state law.
OSHA and the steel company claiming that Occupational Safety and Health Review Commission (OSHRC) review of enforcement actions is unconstitutional have agreed to push the agency’s deadline to answer the novel litigation until February, leaving it to the incoming Trump administration to decide how -- or whether -- the government will contest those arguments.
OSHA is touting recent Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) data showing decreases in nonfatal injury and illness rates in 2023 as well as its own findings of a decline in fatal injuries that year as evidence its enforcement programs and collaboration with labor and industry are succeeding -- even as the incoming Trump administration could soon upend those policies.