DENVER — From smaller risks faced by those working in retail outlets to those risks experienced in construction, warehousing and food-processing enterprises, among the Occupational Safety and Health Administration’s priorities are repeat safety noncompliance and encouraging workers to speak out.
Assistant Secretary of Labor for Occupational Safety and Health Doug Parker spoke Friday at Safety ’24, the American Society of Safety Professional’s annual conference, giving attendees a bird’s eye view of the agency’s priorities in recent years. In addition to more formalized and ongoing rule-making, such as that addressing heat risks and infectious diseases, the agency has expanded enforcement targets.
One area of concern has been zeroing in on businesses with repeat safety issues — such as workers experiencing amputations due to unguarded machinery — and aiming to work with employers to reduce risks to workers, Mr. Parker said.
“We are taking a more comprehensive approach where we are seeing the same issues over and over again, and in planning we’re taking more aggressive interventions to ensure maintenance and improve safety,” he said.
With falls from height among the most dangerous risks faced by construction workers in particular, accounting for a lion’s share of worker deaths annually, “we are really hoping that we can finally bend the curve on what is really an epidemic of noncompliance (with fall protection) and that is the problem that we have year in and year out with workers dying needlessly because their employer has not properly implemented fall protection,” he said.
Trenching — another deadly hazard causing hundreds of deaths annually — is another concern that has led the agency to seek criminal prosecutions for repeat offenders, he said.
The agency in recent years also expanded its Severe Violator Program, targeting not just high-hazard industries, he said. “And there was some criticism of that initially, that we were not really allocating our resources properly.”
The move to look at all industries with multiple and similar citations has led to progress, he said, citing the example of Dollar Tree and Family Dollar stores, which have faced more than a million in fines overall for such issues as warehousing materials.
“As a result, those companies may have made significant safety investments or will,” he said. “They are reviewing their logistics and inventory controls. They’re implementing more worker participation and rapid response programs.”
Whistleblower protections are another focus. Over the past year and a half, the agency has reduced investigation timeframes from a high of more than 300 days to now under 200 days on average, he said.
He says employers must have a “system in place where workers can speak up,” he said.
“You cannot assume that they will (speak up) even if you have no intention of ever retaliating against someone,” he said. “They may very well not speak out because they’re afraid about their job. …You have to make it clear to them, again and again and again. And you have to have procedures and processes that ensure that they cannot only speak up, but that it is your expectation that they will.”