Mining Firm Wins a Ruling, but Loses a Town

An almost Erin Brockovich type story from the Washington Post where a town's main business "helped create the nation's nuclear age," but poisoned the town in the process. But this story doesn't have a happy ending yet.

How Do Republicans Spell "Diversity?"

More on Chemical Plant Security

The NY Times is rather upset about the Administration's weak attempt to address the chemical plant security issue. Reprinted below is an editorial from today's paper. (For an extensive review of the chemical plant security debate, scroll down to Sunday, May 4, 12:10 AM.)


New York Times Editorial: Chemical Security

A draft bill setting forth the administration's ideas for protecting thousands of vulnerable chemical facilities against terrorist attack is now circulating among members of the Senate's Environment and Public Works Committee. The bill is a weak response to an urgent need. The Environmental Protection Agency has identified 15,000 chemical plants, refineries or other sites that store large quantities of hazardous materials. Most of these sites are in relatively unpopulated areas. However, the agency has also identified 123 sites where toxic gases released in a terrorist attack could kill or injure more than one million people in or near each plant, as well as 700 other sites where the death and injury toll could reach 100,000.

The administration bill would require all plants to conduct a "vulnerability" assessment and prepare plans for reducing the likelihood of a terrorist attack and minimizing the damage should one occur. That's a useful first step. But the bill muddies the question of accountability. It does not, for example, require even the most dangerous plants to submit their plans to the Department of Homeland Security for review. The administration says it doesn't have the resources. But without such reviews, the public can never be sure whether company plans meet federal standards.

In addition, the bill asks nothing particularly creative of industry. An alternative measure offered by Senator Jon Corzine of New Jersey would have industry explore new technologies - less volatile chemicals, for example - and require their use where "practical." But even exploring safer technologies appears offensive to the administration, whose bill seems tailored more to industry needs than to those of public safety.

-- May 5, 2003, Copyright 2003, The New York Times Company

Labels: Chemical Plant Security

ASBESTOS NEWS

As Congress debates what to do about compensation for thousands of victims of asbestos who have still not received compensation, it is useful to remember that the arguments are not really about statistics, or even money, but real people. It's also hopeful to know that we may finally be approaching the day when the use of asbestos will finally be banned in this country.

A Poisonous Legacy

April 29, 2003
By Steve Clark,
Business Report staff

Two sides face off over solutions to 'endless wave' of asbestos litigation
Nobody told Ronald Leleaux the dust he was breathing could hurt him, but it wasn't because nobody knew.

Leleaux, a 68-year-old Coast Guard veteran, worked a variety of industrial jobs from 1954 until 1971, the last six years spent at Baton Rouge's ExxonMobil refinery.

Like countless workers in industrial trades in the decades following World War II, he was routinely exposed to high levels of asbestos while on the job.

Leleaux remembers one of his worst experiences: an 18-month stint working inside a sprawling on-site rubber manufacturing facility dubbed the "finishing building." The corrugated-asbestos roof sheltered massive machines called extruders, which also were covered in asbestos.

"They would be running those big extruders in there, and they also had vibrators, and they had presses," Leleaux says. "That whole building would just tremble and it would be kind of smoky in there. That was nothing but that asbestos. You were breathing all that. We weren't told anything about what it would do."

Scarred and scared

Today, Leleaux, a lifelong nonsmoker, spends most of his day in a La-Z-boy recliner, an oxygen tank by his side, at the Livingston Parish home he shares with Leona Leleaux, his wife of 34 years.

Ronald Leleaux was diagnosed with asbestosis in 1997 after suffering steadily worsening breathing problems for years. Non-malignant yet debilitating, asbestosis is a scarring of the lungs caused by long-term exposure to the fibers from asbestos, a mineral used in thousands of household and industrial applications until being phased out in the 1970s and 1980s.

Eventually Leleaux's breathing got so bad he could sleep only two or three hours a night and some nights awoke in a panic after his breathing stopped altogether.

Leona remembers those nights. She put cold rags on her husband's face, turned on the fan and stayed up with him until he was breathing again. Read more

Panel urges U.S. to ban asbestos imports

BY ANDREW SCHNEIDER
St. Louis Post-Dispatch
Posted on Sun, May. 04, 2003

WASHINGTON - (KRT) - A blue-ribbon panel funded by the Environmental Protection Agency has issued a surprising recommendation calling on Congress to ban the import, production and distribution of products containing asbestos.
The deadly mineral is no longer mined in the United States, yet the government says about 30 millions pounds of the lethal fibers are being imported into the country each year.

The findings come as a shock to some of those who have long advocated a ban because so many of the panel's members have ties to industries involved with asbestos. That gives the panel's recommendations extraordinary weight, those involved with the asbestos issue say, and could aid efforts already under way in the Senate to outlaw the importation of the deadly fibers. Read more

Labels: Asbestos

How’s My Driving?

There was an interesting article in Sunday’s Washington Post about the high number of lives saved in the Iraq war due to the increased use and effectiveness of body armor which almost eliminated deaths due to bullet or shrapnel injuries to the chest or abdomen. Buried in the article were a couple of paragraphs that could provide valuable insight into a major workplace hazard: highway accidents.

Highway accidents are the leading cause of workplace fatalities, making up almost 29% of the almost 6,000 workplace fatalities in 2001, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

These figures have been used by anti-OSHA activists to try to minimize the workplace death toll in the U.S, using the excuse that highway accidents are allegedly the result of bad personal driving habits (or drugs or alcohol or whatever), and therefore there driver's fault and clearly not under the control of the employer.

The U.S. military, however, apparently sees it differently. There are measures that can be taken to reduce traffic accidents, and they saved lives in the recent war in Iraq:

Twelve years ago, 50 percent more soldiers died in accidents (235) than in battle (147). In the recent war, there were only a third as many noncombat fatalities (36) as deaths in battle (101). The same pattern appears to hold for nonfatal injuries, with the data on evacuated Army troops showing that 107 had noncombat injuries, compared with 118 who had combat wounds.

[Col. Terry J. Walters, the physician who is chief of health policy in the office of the Army's surgeon general] attributed the steep drop in noncombat deaths and injuries, in part, to the Army's effort to improve driver safety and to ensure that soldiers were well-rested when operating vehicles. In the first Gulf War, motor vehicle accidents alone accounted for about half of all serious injuries. "Because this was such a motorized effort, we expected many more accidents than we actually saw. I think this is a definitive success story," she said.

Perhaps the Department of Transportation should consult with the Pentagon before issuing new rules concerning how long truckers are allowed to drive.

Playing It Safe

The only thing Don Croff and Dan Rotar would like to see climbing in the Ford Van Dyke plant is the facility’s safety score.

That’s why, as the UAW’s health and safety representatives at the Sterling Heights, Mich., plant, they want work brought down to ground level, instead of having skilled-trades workers climb on top of machinery or use harnesses to get the job done. Check out the UAW’s Health and Safety Page

What's good for the goose....

Groups Want 3 Strikes Law for Businesses

Updated: Sunday, May. 4, 2003 - 2:18 PM EST.
By STEVE LAWRENCE
Associated Press Writer

SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) - Borrowing from a popular punishment for multiple street crimes, California consumer activists are trying to create a three-strikes-and-you're-out law for corporations.

"If this is good enough for individual felons in California, it's certainly appropriate for the Enrons of the world," says Carmen Balber, a consumer advocate for the Foundation for Taxpayer and Consumer Rights.

The foundation and several other consumer groups, as well as organizations representing environmentalists, labor unions, seniors and trial lawyers, are backing a bill that would bar a corporation from doing business in California if it's convicted of three felonies in a 10-year period.

The measure, by Sen. Gloria Romero, D-Los Angeles, takes its name from the state's three strikes law, which provides sentences of 25 years to life in prison for individuals with two prior violent or serious felonies who are convicted of a third felony. Read more

Meet the New SOL, (Almost) The Same As The Old SOL

Staying to the Right at Labor

From the Washington Post

Liberals and union folks shouldn't look for much change at the Labor Department because Eugene Scalia left after failing to be confirmed as solicitor. The White House said last week it will nominate deputy solicitor Howard Radzely for the post. He has been a law clerk for Scalia's dad, Antonin, who sits on the U.S. Supreme Court, and before that for conservative appeals court Judge J. Michael Luttig. (here Scroll Down)

TOXIC WATER NUMBERS DAYS OF A TRAILER PARK

By Rick Bragg
May 5, 2003
The New York Times

LAQUEMINE, La., May 1 — Before the water went bad, most people in the trailer park never thought of their aluminum-skinned houses as a mobile home, only home. Hard against the rows of sugar cane, not far from the big chemical plants that light up the evening sky, the trailers in the Myrtle Grove park were dented but decent, and the tires rotted in the grass.

Now, staying in the tree-shaded neighborhood just outside the river city of Plaquemine is unthinkable. There is poison in the well water that they used to drink, a chemical used to make plastic called vinyl chloride. The state knew this years ago, but residents were not told. They wonder what it will do to them someday, and what it has done to them already. More

The War for Chemical Plant Safety

One of my well-traveled colleagues dragged into my office the other day and asked (rhetorically), why does the federal government have mandatory regulations requiring grandmothers to take off their orthopedic shoes before they can get through airport security, and yet our whole system of keeping millions of people safe from terrorism targeted at chemical plants is totally voluntary?

Since then I’d been meaning to write something about the debate over chemical plant safety and terrorism. Last Friday's outrageous Wall St. Journal editorial, seemingly written by the American Chemical Council, has finally gotten me off of my butt. You can’t read it online, because you have to be a subscriber. So either go through the garbage of a nearby office building or trust me.

Question: What does chlorine have to do with terrorism? Answer: Nothing much, but that isn’t stopping new Jersey Democrat and world-class nuisance Jon Corzine from trying to ban it under the guise of homeland security….

Actually, the legislation introduced by Corzine has everything to do with chlorine, other highly hazardous chemical and terrorism. As the Journal itself points out,

The U.S. has at least 15,000 chemical plants refineries or other sites that use or store significant amounts of potentially hazardous chemicals, but no one has fully assessed their security.

Indeed, according to the National Environmental Trust, out of these 15,000 facilities,

in the EPA’s Risk Management Program, of these 110 plants hold enough chemicals that, if released through explosions or other mishaps, could form deadly vapor clouds put more than one million people in danger each. EPA found that each of 700 facilities could put at least 100,000 people at risk, and each of 3,000 facilities could put 10,000 people at risk

Corzine, whom the Journal accuses of “using terror fears to sneak through an environmental agenda that has nothing to do with safety” has introduced a bill for the second year in a row that requires the government to identify facilities that pose the greatest risk, assess their vulnerability to attack, and enforce safety upgrades. Plants would get credit for any voluntary measures already taken, and sensitive information would remain secret.

It would require sites to do a hazard assessment and consider the introduction of inherently safer technologies. Substituting a less hazardous chemical for a more hazardous chemical is one type of inherently safer technology. There are several ways to do this, listed in the Corzine Bill:

(i) use less hazardous substances or benign substances;
(ii) use a smaller quantity of highly hazardous chemicals;
(iii) reduce hazardous pressures or temperatures;
(iv) reduce the possibility and potential consequences of equipment failure and human error;
(v) improve inventory control and chemical use efficiency; and
(vi) reduce or eliminate storage, transportation, handling, disposal, and discharge of highly hazardous chemicals.

Senator Corzines’ bill is about getting rid of chemicals, period. He’d give half of the responsibilities for coming up with new security regulations to the highly trained, highly motivated anti-al Queda special forces at ---the Environmental Protection Agency.

The Journal clearly doesn’t like the idea of Inherently Safety Technologies.

In practice, this means the federal government could require sites to replace chemical it doesn’t like with ones it does – no matter how much more expensive, or less effective.

But as any first-year chemistry student knows, you can’t just willy-nilly substitute compounds…. Even when there is a substitute, the cost would be prohibitive. The millions of dollars that small communities would be forced to spend on a chlorine substitute for water purification is money they wouldn’t use on new fire engines or other first-response equipment.

Well, clearly the Wall St. Journal editors failed first-year chemistry. Replacing highly hazardous chemicals with equally effective less hazardous chemicals is not pie in the sky, either technically or financially. Immediately after September 11, Washington D.C.’s Blue Plains Wastewater Treatment Plant changed from chlorine to sodium hypochlorite, which is a strong version of bleach, but much safer. The change cost about $1 million, which translates into about 50 cents per customer more annually for sewage treatment.

"Needless to say, our neighbors were very pleased that we discontinued that practice," said Libby Lawson, a spokeswoman for the District of Columbia Water and Sewer Authority. "We had to rearrange a few of our economic priorities, but, obviously, it can be done."

This approach makes sense on a number of levels. There clearly may be a terrorist threat to chemical plants. A year ago, the CIA warned of the potential for an al-Queda attack on U.S. chemical facilities. But even if the only threat we had to worry about was terrorism, how much sense does it make to only commit resources to guard a target (with questionable effectiveness) when in most cases it’s entirely possible to shrink or even remove the target completely? As outlaw Willie Sutton explained, they robbed banks because that’s where the money was. Terrorists would be tempted to attack chemical plants because that’s where the greatest potential for terror is. Take the money out of the banks - -or the catastrophic potential out of chemical plants -- and no one cares.

But in reality, terrorism is not the only thing we have to worry about when it comes to chemical plant safety – in fact it’s probably not even the primary concern. Ever since the Bhopal catastrophe at a Union Carbide plant in India that released a toxic cloud of methyl isocyanate, killing more than 3,000 people and injuring 600,000, the American public has been concerned about similar catastrophic incidents happening here—and with good reason.

The legislation passed in the wake of Bhopal set up a process that identified the 15,000 plants of highest concern and created the U.S. Chemical Safety and Hazard Investigation board that investigates chemical accidents, identifies the root causes and recommends measures to prevent future incidents. The CSB's database and a perusal of any news database reveal hundreds of incidents each year, many of which were only kept from becoming large-scale disasters by luck. In other words, if one is concerned about catastrophic chemical accidents, one need not just dwell on terrorism; there’s enough concern with management system and equipment failures.

It’s no accident, therefore that Greenpeace hailed as a “breakthrough” the original Corzine Bill that died last year

The Journal seems to perceive a grand enviro-socialist conspiracy to take over control of the chemical industry, noting that the idea of inherently safer technologies (and for some groups, even phasing out chlorine completely) was on the environmentalists’ agenda prior to 9/11. Given the hazards inherent in chemical plants that use highly hazardous materials, concern about chemical plant safety and interest in inherently safer technologies has, in fact, understandably been on the agenda of environmentalists and communities living near chemical plants ever since Bhopal. The only difference is that they make more sense in this post-9/11 world. In fact, before 9/11 and since that day, we have seen many chemical plant explosion stemming from management system errors and equipment failures, and none related to terrorism.

Another small quibble with the Journal’s word selection. The Corzine bill didn’t exactly “die” last year. It would be more accurate to say that it was assassinated by the American Chemistry Council after the bill passed the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, unanimously, 19-0. According to the National Journal, “Then the council ramped up its opposition arguing that the bill’s regulatory regime was overzealous and so potentially costly that it risked driving American companies out of business. By the time the full Senate took up the bill in September, most of the committee’s Republicans agreed with the industry’s message. The GOP members backtracked on their earlier vote and the measure died.” (National Journal 4/26/03, p. 1310-1311)

The ACC is concerned that the Corzine bill would “Drive American companies out of business?" Now where have we heard that before? Hint: Check industry testimony on every environmental or health and safety regulation proposed over the past 30 years.

Indeed, one would have that that after 9/11 laws requiring the safety of chemical plants would have been hot on the heals of laws requiring enhanced airport security. But that was not to be. While some chemicals users, such as the Washington D.C. sewer authority, cited above, got the idea quickly, others remaining frighteningly lax. An article in Government Executive magazine reviews a number of reports of lax security at highly hazardous chemical plants.

After 9/11 the ACC assured us that the association and its members were voluntarily taking care of the problem. In June 2002, the ACC announced that it had “made enhanced security activities mandatory for its members, to help assure the public that all member facilities are involved in making their neighbors and America more secure”

According to Government Executive Magazine, however:

The industry’s largest trade group, the American Chemistry Council, now requires member companies to assess their vulnerabilities. Those analyses were completed at the end of last year. By the end of 2003, member companies must develop security plans. The association eventually will require companies to get verification of their assessments and plans from an independent third party, according to Chris VandenHeuvel, an association spokesman.

Results from the assessments are being kept secret. Not even the association sees them. VandenHeuvel says the association does not have a secure location to keep the reports, nor does it have security experts on staff. The association requires that chief executive officers at member companies certify compliance with the mandate to assess vulnerabilities. But an association executive, speaking on the condition of anonymity, acknowledges that the group has no way to verify company results.

Newspapers across the nation are filled with frightening stories of the potential damage that a terrorist attack on nearby chemical plants could do. (Examples here and here and here and here)

The Bush Administration, which was considering having EPA issue chemical security regulations under its existing Clean Air Act authority, last October “abandoned efforts to impose tough new security regulations on the chemical industry to protect against possible terrorist attacks, following months of intense internal fighting within the administration and resistance from the industry....The decision marks a victory for major chemical manufacturers who have argued they can improve security without regulatory intervention.” Instead, the Administration has decided to opt for new legislation that would give all authority for chemical plant security to the Department of Homeland Security.

The Government Accounting Office is not amused. A recent GAO report on chemical plant security found that “''Chemical facilities may be attractive targets for terrorists intent on causing massive damage,'' yet “despite all efforts since the events of Sept. 11, 2001, to protect the nation from terrorism, the extent of security preparedness at U.S. chemical facilities is unknown,"

The GAO report also went after the EPA, charging that the agency had backed off of regulating chemical plant security because of a threatened lawsuit by the ACC.

Even the chemical industry is finally resigned to some sort of legislation. But not the Corzine bill with its talk of inherently safer technology and giving the EPA any authority over chemical plant security.

The ACC has announced that it would favor legislation that will: “Require facilities to conduct vulnerability assessments and address deficiencies, provide oversight and inspection authority by the Department of Homeland Security, and create strong enforcement authority to ensure facilities are secure against the threat of terrorism.”

The Journal and the ACC think that a bill being drafted by Senator James Inhofe, (D-OK), chairman of the Senate Environment & Public Works Committee, is a “good start.” Inhofe’s bill subjects sites to oversight by the Department of Homeland Security (and not EPA) and gives Homeland Security (and not EPA) the power to set standards and then fine any site that doesn’t comply.

There are several problems with this. First, critics charge that it essentially lets the industry decide for itself what those standards will be and so far, the chemical industry’s strategy is confined to increased patrols, vehicle inspections and biochemical training for local emergency personnel. Second, of course, it ignores the whole concept of inherently safer technologies. Third, it ignores EPA, with its obvious expertise in making plants safer, as opposed to just guarding them. Finally, although the bill may require plants to conduct vulnerability assessments, it is unclear if anyone at Homeland Security would ever be looking at them. It is likely that they plan to trust the ACC to monitor compliance.

Inhofe's staff released a two-page memo explaining that Homeland Security should be solely responsible because

"security is separate and distinct from safety at chemical plants, which is the province of EPA and OSHA," the Labor Department's Occupational Safety & Health Administration.

Environmental activists had complained about being excluded from Inhofe's consultations with military experts in the administration and the private sector. "Whom would you trust to protect chemical plants against terrorists, former Navy Seals or Greenpeace?" Inhofe's staff said in the memo.

The bottom line, of course, is that ACC members don’t want anyone telling them how to run their businesses if they can get away with a few higher fences and a few more guards. But it is becoming increasingly clear that communities that live around these plants do not trust the chemical industry to patrol itself, nor do they necessarily have faith that more guards really mean more security. Nor, finally do they have faith that they would be safe even in the absence of terrorism. That's why, according to the National Journal, the ACC is preparing to spend at least $50 million on a "massive media campaign" this year to defeat the Corzine bill. And they'll try to keep it secret. As one chemical industry veteran told the National Journal In some ways, for the chemical industry to be recognized as a powerful lobby would be a disaster for relations with federal regulators and environmentalists."

The Wall St. Journal does finally get one thing right:

Nowadays the first refuge of political scoundrels is “homeland security.”

Hear that Mr. John “Who needs the Bill of Rights” Ashcroft, Mr. Tom “Unions are a Security Threat” Ridge and Mr. George W. “Let’s hold the Republican Convention as Close to September 11 as Possible” Bush?

Labels: Chemical Plant Security

The War At Home: Sighs Too Deep For Tears

Short weekend break from health and safety issues. I'm going to put the end of the Washington Post column about the gangs of Washington first:

Think of all the pistols tucked in waistbands across this city. And all the gunshot victims in wheelchairs, and the murders we rack up by the day. With some of the toughest gun control laws on the books and with gun-packing groups like 1-7 roving D.C. streets with the audacity of the 3rd Infantry Division, Washington has the unmitigated gall to demand that the Palestinian Authority disarm West Bank terrorists. Charity begins at home.

Speaking of sighs too deep for tears.

Aside from revealing the gross absurdities of our leaders' priorities -- both nationally and locally -- this article especially touched me because I lived on those blocks in 1980 -- it's where I met my wife. Depressing to see how much "progress" we've made in almost a quarter of a century. But hey, didn't he look great in that flyboy suit? Make's you darn proud.

Attention Farm Workers, Gardeners, Park Workers, Highway Workers, Groundskeepers

Pesticides Linked with Prostate Cancer
Thu May 1,12:03 AM ET Add Science - Reuters to My Yahoo!

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Farmers who use certain pesticides seem to have a high risk of prostate cancer (news - web sites), U.S. government researchers said on Thursday.

The researchers, who published their study in the American Journal of Epidemiology, confirmed other findings that show farmers have an unusually high risk of prostate cancer.

"Associations between pesticide use and prostate cancer risk among the farm population have been seen in previous studies; farming is the most consistent occupational risk factor for prostate cancer," Michael Alavanja of the National Cancer Institute (news - web sites), who helped lead the study, said in a statement.

Researchers at NCI and at the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences and the Environmental Protection Agency (news - web sites) studied 55,332 farmers or nursery workers who worked with pesticides.

Between 1993 and 1999, 566 new prostate cancers developed among the men, compared to 495 that would normally be expected in Iowa and North Carolina, the two states studied.

The risk of developing prostate cancer was 14 percent greater for the pesticide applicators compared to the general population.

One pesticide, methyl bromide, increased the risk of prostate cancer in all men.

Six others raised the risk in men with a family history of prostate cancer. They are chlorpyrifos, coumaphos, fonofos, phorate, permethrin, and butylate.

More than 220,000 U.S. men will be diagnosed with prostate cancer this year, according to the American Cancer Society (news - web sites), and 30,000 will die of it.

The biggest risk factors for prostate cancer are age and family history. Black men have higher rates of prostate cancer and men who eat lots of red meat and animal fat also appear to have a higher risk.

Thanks to Rory O'Neil for forwarding this.

And now for a little politics…

You political junkies may have noticed this article in the New York Times (which you can no longer read without paying because the idiotic Times charges for any article more than a week old!) last week:

National Desk | April 22, 2003, Tuesday
BUSH'S AIDES PLAN LATE SPRINT IN '04

By ADAM NAGOURNEY and RICHARD W. STEVENSON (NYT) 2049 words
Late Edition - Final , Section A , Page 1 , Column 1

President Bush's advisers have drafted a re-election strategy built around staging the latest nominating convention in the party's history, allowing Mr. Bush to begin his formal campaign near the third anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks and to enhance his fund-raising advantage, Republicans close to the White House say.

Michael Tomasky has an article on the American Prospect website contrasting the Democrats’ spirited condemnation of Senator Rick Santorum’s anti-gay remarks, with their feeble response to the Republicans’ decision break a “gentlemen’s agreement" and hold the latest convention in American history so that they can stage it (in New York) as close to September 11 as possible.

And they in essence acknowledge, discreetly but quite openly, that the purpose is to squeeze as much political gain out of the attacks, and the national-security issue, as they can.

This is a many-layered offense -- to the traditions and integrity (such that remains) of the American political process, to the firefighters and police officers who did not give their lives so that Bush could later use their deaths to get a bounce in the polls, to every American citizen who doesn't drink Karl Rove's Kool-Aid, and to plain decency.

Tomasky offers four possible Democratic responses: hell raising by Democratic Senators, rescheduling their Convention for late August, not doing a Convention at all (thereby saving the money for the campaign), and fourth:

Plan, or encourage others to plan, a serious, thoughtful, humble, dignified series of counter-events for the week the Republicans are in New York that show how real Americans -- Republicans who wish to participate included -- commemorate somber occasions.

The last suggestion sounds like a good role for Labor.

But Tomasky’s a pessimist – or a realist: “Of course, none of this will happen. The Republicans will have their way, and Bush will maul them on the security issue. But, by God, Democrats will have the gay vote.”

But if there’s any message we can take away from this, it’s that it’s never too early to start thinking of strategies for Regime Change ’04. After all, there’s only 629 days, 19 hours, 29 minutes, 12 seconds until Inauguration Day 2005.

OSHA Kills

Read it here.

If you check out OSHA's Website, you'll find a page entitled OSHA Saves Lives. "Not so," say "scholars" at the Mercatus Center. Despite OSHA's director John Henshaw's assertion that “Safety and health add value to businesses, workplaces and people's lives,” a recent study by two authors from the anti-government Mercatus Institute argues that, in fact, OSHA inspections actually cause more workplace fatalities.

How so, you ask? Well I can't begin to describe the statistical methods that the two authors, Jonathan Klick and Thomas Stratmann, both of George Mason University, used to come to this conclusion in their study. I'll leave the deconstruction to those who can understand statistics better than I. You can also read a simpler, abbreviated version of the study if visit your local newsstand and pick up the latest copy of Regulation magazine, published by the right-wing, libertarian Cato Institute. (It doesn't appear in electronic form.)

The most interesting part is their explanation of this phenomenon. From the Regulation article, here it is in a nutshell:

Surprisingly, we found that fines have no statistically significant effect on death rates and increasing inspections actually leads to significantly higher fatality rates. On average, we found that an additional 100 inspections in a given state-industry in a particular year leads to between 1 and 2.5 additional deaths in that industry

What accounts for such a surprising result?...When the firm increases its efforts because of OSHA enforcement, the worker rationally substitutes away from his own efforts. That is, if the firm is doing more to protect the worker, the worker has less incentive to protect himself. (emphases added)

So, let me get this straight. You have a bunch of employees in a dangerous workplace. OSHA inspects the workplace, finds violations and cites the company, which starts paying more attention to workplace safety. But, "increased worker safety measures induce riskier behaviors on the part of workers," according to the abstract of the study.

The typical "rational" worker, figuring that OSHA has forced his employer to be more responsible, now "has less incentive to protect himself." No sooner does the employer finally get serious about safety then workers suddenly start jumping down into unshored trenches, crawling down into unmonitored confined spaces, sticking themselves with HIV-contaminated needles and climbing tall buildings without fall protection. "Respirators? We don't need no stinking respirators!"

It must be so, because, according to its web page, Mercatus boasts that "We draw upon both real world experience and wide reading in multiple academic disciplines."

The report is almost not worth analyzing, but a few things stick out. Most glaring is the authors' assumption that injuries and fatalities are caused by workers' unsafe behaviors and actions.(For more on behavioralism, see here and here.) When management takes care of safety (under pressure from OSHA), workers somehow won't feel they have to "behave" safely. Well if the authors actually had an "real world experience" they'd know that the reason workers are injured and killed at work is because they are exposed to unsafe conditions and hazards.

One thing they did get right. If workers are not involved in the employer's safety program -- in identifying and controlling hazards -- the program is unlikely to be effective.

So who are these guys? Cato is a well endowed "libertarian" Washington D.C. think tank that "seeks to broaden the parameters of public policy debate to allow consideration of the traditional American principles of limited government, individual liberty, free markets and peace." They publish Regulation magazine, which regularly features anti-regulation and articles about the benefits of abolishing OSHA.

The Mercatus Center is part of George Mason University. They are known for coming out with annual reports on the (high) cost of regulations to American business , and other papers arguing for the abolition of OSHA. The director of the Mercatus Regulatory Studies Program is Wendy Gramm, George H.W. Bush's Administrator for Information and Regulatory Affairs at the Office of Management and Budget and Executive Director of the Presidential Task Force on Regulatory Relief.

Not appearing on Gramm's resume is the fact that she is the wife of former right-wing Senator Phil Gramm (R-TX) and a former member of the Enron Board of Directors. The George Mason/Mercatus campus also happened to be where the Secretary of Labor Elaine Chao decided to hold one of her three ergonomics "forums," after the Congress and Bush Administration repealed the ergonomics standard.

I am nominating this study as a future member of the Loony Right-Wing Theory Hall of Fame. It's reminiscent of a theory pushed by the Office of Management and Budget under George Bush I which postulated that health and safety regulations led to higher worker fatality rates because regulations cost businesses money, forcing them to pay workers less. The lower one's income, the worse their diet, leading to all kinds of bad health effects.

Oh, and the surprising conclusion of the Regulation article: "If workers effectively undo safety regulations, it is doubtful that OSHA can do much to "save lives, prevent injuries, and protect the health of American workers."

For this I stay up late at night?

Labels: Mindnumbingly Stupid Stuff

An Act of God?

Employers often blame "acts of God" or the "whims of Mother Nature" for workers' deaths in trench collapses or by asphyxiation in manholes or other confined spaces. In other words, despite OSHA regulations and general industry recognition, "nothing could have been done to prevent this tragedy." This article about the death of a tomato field worker, Immokalee farm worker killed by lightning strike, might actually come close to an act of God. Or?

When lightning and thunder threaten, my kids are rushed off their soccer and baseball fields and out of the public pool. I wonder if field workers are also given the opportunity to seek shelter from the storm as experts and federal government agencies recommend? It's not smart to try to fool Mother Nature.

Labels: Freak Accidents

Letters from Readers: Why Get Involved?

Jordan, My question is what can a group do to get the citizens to act after they learn about a situation ( like the ones you offer) ?

We can't get registered voters to vote !! Then they complain, whilke the city is taxing and spending us to death. The police were threatened by firing if they looked at AFSCME. So they did not organize..
-- J. K.

J.K: My "theory" is that people will vote if they think that voting matters -- or that not voting means that they will get screwed (even worse than they are now).

My small part in this struggle (and the reason for this Blog) is to try to show people that voting can directly determine how safe their workplaces will be (and those of their family and friends) and whether or not they will be coming home from work in the same shape they left the house that morning.

If even one more Democrat had been elected to the Senate (or a few more in the House of Representatives), we might have saved the ergonomics standard. If Democrats who voted wrong (even some moderate Republicans) had truly feared the wrath of millions of pissed off workers (and their families and friends) at next election time, maybe they wouldn't have voted the wrong way.

We lost the ergonomics standard and millions of workers pay the price every year because of it. If every worker with a musculoskeletal disorder voted -- and if they convinced a couple of their non-voting friends to vote, we might have a very different picture in this country.

My thoughts. Your comments?

-- Jordan

Screened Out

$2.95 will buy you the May 12, 2003 edition of the Nation which has an excellent article about "How 'fighting terrorism' became a bludgeon in Bush's Assault on Labor," by David Bacon.

Unfortunately, it's not on their website in a linkable electronic version. Some quotes from Bush Administration officials will give you a taste:

"Collective Bargaining would be incompatible with the nation's safety," Chris Rhatigan, spokesperson for the Transportation Security Administration (TSA.)

"Security is paramount and collective bargaining could cripple the system." Nico Melendez, TSA Representative.

What is linkable on their website, however, is William Greider insightful analysis the Bush "vision" in Rolling Back the 20th Century. Read them. (P.S. I receive no funding or support from The Nation for these plugs. Not even a free subscription or even a blurb about this Blog.)

Old OSHA Directors Don’t Die, (But They Make Sure They’re in God’s Good Graces When They Do.)

Some say that the problem with high government office – like Assistant Secretary of Labor for OSHA – is that it goes to your head; people treat you like God – or like the Devil. So it may not be surprising to look at Thorne Auchter’s current career choice. Auchter, you may remember if you’ve been in the OSHA game for long, was Ronald Reagan’s first OSHA Director and spearheaded Reagan’s attempt to dismantle OSHA.

Well, Thorne has apparently reversed the Reagan mantra: government is no longer the problem, it’s the solution to the problems of the U.S., Iraq, the Middle East, and Heaven itself.

Seems Auchter has become the CEO of Grace News Network, now the beneficiary of our tax dollars. What in heaven is Grace News Network? Read on:

The U.S. government this week launched its Arabic language satellite TV news station for Muslim Iraq.

It is being produced in a studio -- Grace Digital Media -- controlled by fundamentalist Christians who are rabidly pro-Israel.

That's Grace as in "by the Grace of God."

Grace Digital Media is controlled by a fundamentalist Christian millionaire, Cheryl Reagan, who last year wrested control of Federal News Service, a transcription news service, from its former owner, Cortes Randell.

***
Grace Digital Media and Federal News Service are housed in a downtown Washington, D.C. office building, along with Grace News Network.

When you call the number for Grace News Network, you get a person answering "Grace Digital Media/Federal News Service."

***
According to its web site, Grace News Network is "dedicated to transmitting the evidence of God's presence in the world today."

Sounds like a perfect fit for Radio Baghdad.

Labels: Ronald Reagan

More Workers Memorial Day Articles in Today’s Press

State honors workers who died (Salem, OR)

Workers remember fallen friends (Galveston, TX)

Workers remembered: Marker pays tribute to Ludlum employees (Pittsburgh, PA

Fallen workers remembered with march, memorial service (Peoria, IL)

Workers gather to recall 51 lost (Iowa City, IA)

Ceremonies Honor Workers Killed, Hurt on the Job (Lorain, OH)

What Is This?!

This is an article about a worker, Marty Nesbitt, who died after falling 30 feet off a grandstand roof at a raceway in Madison County, IL. The foreman "confirmed that Nesbitt was not wearing a safety harness at the time. Nesbitt had not been working close enough to the edge for the company to consider using a monitor who could have warned him when he got too close to the edge, Gill told Wittenauer. The Occupational Safety and Health Administration is investigating the death to determine whether a monitor should have been used"

Tragic, but so far, routine. Then there's the last paragraph:

A toxicology test showed no alcohol in Nesbitt's system. Madison County Deputy Coroner Ralph Baahlmann said that at some point prior to the accident Nesbitt had used marijuana and that he may have been under the influence of marijuana at the time of the accident.

At what point prior to the incident? Minutes, days, weeks? According to whom? And is this an excuse for not having fall protection? What is this doing in the newspaper? Sounds like "blame the worker" B.S. at its worst to me.

LEGAL DOESN’T MEAN SAFE: Black lung study casts cloud over coal-dust limits

A rather disturbing article from the Louisville Courier Journal revealing that miners –- both below and above ground -- are still getting black lung disease at alarming rates, even thought they have worked their entire careers at supposedly “safe” or at least “legal” limits of coal dust.

WASHINGTON -- New cases of black lung are developing in miners who have worked their entire careers under federal coal-dust limits that were supposed to prevent the crippling respiratory disease, according to a new study.

Tommie Hall, of Topmost, Ky., worked in mines for 26 years under the dust-control limits. Yet he said he has black lung and has filed a claim with the state.

His breathing is so bad that it takes him 10 to 15 minutes to recover after climbing the single flight of stairs in his house, said Hall, 50.
Dust controls in the mines he worked in were regularly ignored, he said. Miners knew they couldn't complain. ''If you said something, you'd go look for a job,'' Hall said. ''That's the way it is.''

Even more disturbing is that these findings may be underestimated:

The study emphasized that it was limited to working miners and that the X-rays were voluntary. Participation rates in X-rays were low, and data on work experience wasn't consistent, researchers added.

Dr. E. Lee Petsonk, one of the authors of the study, also pointed out that disease rates among retired or sick miners who were forced to leave work weren't included, nor could researchers do much about miners who didn't participate but may have signs of black lung.

As we always say when training workers about chemical exposure limits, "legal does not mean safe." I wonder if the same problems exist for OSHA's Permissible Exposure Limits, which are coming up on their 40th birthday?

Workers Memorial Day Articles in Today’s Press

Too many Hispanic workers are dying on the job (Houston, Texas)

Hundreds mourn fallen workers at ceremony (Olympia Washington)

Remembering those who gave lives at work (Clarksville, TN)

Workers Rally for Safe Conditions (Jackson, Mississippi)

Parents keep up FIGHT for safety (Nashville, TN)

Fewer workplace deaths in Mass., but immigrant worker deaths rising (Portsmouth, NH)

Workplace deaths decline in Mass. (Boston, MA)

Memorials for those who died on the job (Philadelphia, PA)

Redesigned Workers Memorial to honor local victims (South Bend, IN)

Pohat man who died on job honored (Bethlehem, PA)

UNION MEMBERS GATHER FOR MEMORIAL AT TYLER PIPE (Tyler, TX)

Ceremony will commemorate those who died at their jobs (Pittsburgh, PA)

Aumentan las muertes de trabajadores latinos (New York, NY)

WORKERS MEMORIAL DAY SPECIAL

Remember when WMD stood for Workers Memorial Day?

Bush's OSHA: Flee from All That You Can Be

Now as you all know, I really try to give these guys in the Administration the benefit of the doubt sometimes. Even if they weren't really elected. Even if many of them are anti-worker zealots who behave like subsidiaries of the Chamber of Commerce and National Association of Manufacturers. I think some of them really do want to do something to save workers' lives, in their odd, dysfunctional, nasty Republican way. And you've got to give them a little credit for recognizing Workers Memorial Day every year. A little.

But sometimes, sometimes, they just drive me over the edge. Especially on Workers Memorial Day. Let me count the ways.

1. OSHA's theme for Workers Memorial Day 2003 is “Safety and health add value to businesses, workplaces and people's lives.” We know that this is the them because OSHA’s Workers Memorial Day Press Release repeats this phrase twice. This is amusing because this was the year that the New York Times and Frontline did a series on McWane Industries, which clearly believed that added value lay in making as much money as possible not caring how many workers you injured or killed until finally high OSHA fines, adverse media attention and threats of criminal prosecution forced the company to be accountable for its workers' safety and health. Interestingly, corporate accountability is the world-wide labor union theme for Workers Memorial Day this year.

2. Henshaw to Families of Workplace Fatalities: "Message -- I care." Last year's big Workers Memorial Day announcement from OSHA was that Assistant Secretary John Henshaw would personally write letters to the families of all workers who are killed on the job. This year, OSHA triumphantly announced that Henshaw had, in fact, "written to the families of over 500 men and women who lost their lives while at work." (How careless of them to "lose" their lives. Where did they go?)

Statistical Note: Letters were sent to only 500 of the more than 6,000 workers killed in on-the-job "accidents" each year, because many are in state plan states and others fall outside of OSHA's jurisdiction, leaving 1,000 deaths that OSHA investigated. For half of those, "OSHA has not been able to identify parties where letters could be sent." Just as well. All those letters could have caused a musculoskeletal injury.

3. Last year on Workers Memorial Day, OSHA announced that it would "soon begin to collect data on country of origin and primary language capability for all workers involved in fatality and other serious accident investigations." That was a good thing. In fact if you look up the two recent confined space deaths that I wrote about a couple of weeks ago, you would find that they were coded as immigrant workers.

Now that OSHA has a better handle on who's being killed, this year's big immigrant announcement was that OSHA was going to address the high number of immigrant fatalities by releasing not one, but two public service announcements to over 650 Spanish radio stations across the country. One spot is meant for employees and their families; the other targets employers.

We here at Confined Space think that these public service announcements should be really helpful in preventing the deaths of Hispanic workers. I can hardly wait to see them. I'm sure that if only those public service announcements had been out a few months ago, those two Hispanic workers (and probably hundreds of others) would be alive today. And I'm sure all of those employers who kill Hispanic workers are shaking in their boots:

Message from OSHA to Contractors Who Employee Hispanic Workers: You are accountable for the health and safety of your employees. Yet you have been taking advantage of your workers, especially your immigrant workers, seriously injuring and killing many of them. We're out of patience. You've been warned. You've had your last chance. We are now bringing down the full weight of the Government of the United States upon your heads. We are announcing today the release of two public service announcements. And if you don't shape up, we'll release two more. And we'll keep releasing them until you understand that health and safety means added value to your enterprise. And if you still don't get the message, you can look forward to a long, painful future of partnerships, alliances and voluntary guidelines.

Time out for an ironic note on all of this. Henshaw's promise to write letters to the families of workers killed in the workplace ("lost their lives") drew strong praise from Ron Hayes, a member of OSHA's National Advisory Committee on Safety and Health, who became a workplace safety activist several years ago after his son was killed in a workplace accident and OSHA fined the company only $42,000. The irony, is that the TOTAL fine against the company that killed the two workers in the confined space referenced above was $62,000. Only $56,000 of that -- $23,000 a body -- was for the fatalities.

4. Eureka! On this Workers Memorial Day, OSHA has just discovered (or re-discovered) that "the long term health effects of exposure to chemicals and other toxins can take years and even decades to determine." So what's the agency to do with this new-found knowledge?

Three guesses.

a) Issue new chemical exposure standards.

b) Announce a major new initiative to propose legislation allowing the agency to revise OSHA's old Permissible Exposure Limits for chemicals -- limits that are currently based on recommendations from the 1960's

c) Announce that a respiratory disease study will be undertaken in cooperation with the Bureau of Labor Statistics and the National Institute of Occupational Safety and Health to improve outreach, compliance assistance and enforcement efforts relating to specific contaminants and industries.

d) Announce a health targeting system, similar to one used to guide enforcement efforts in general industry.

e) (c) and (d)

f) (a) and (b)

(Hint: If you guessed (a) or (b), I know a guy in Baghdad who has some Weapons of Mass Destruction to sell you.)

Time's up. The correct answer is (e). (Really)

5. Enhanced Enforcement: Last month the agency announced its "Enhanced Enforcement Program to target employers who have a history of the most severe safety and health violations." This is a result of the McWane investigation by the NY Times and Frontline. They're going after the bad actors. But no sign that they are planning to increase penalties. The AFL-CIO reports that in FY 2002, serious violations of the Occupational Safety and Health Act carried an average penalty of only $886 ($867 for Federal OSHA, $904 for state OSHA plans).

I remember not too long ago OSHA would frequently issue million dollar penalties for ergonomic and other hazards. Their latest ergonomic citations were a few hundred dollars.

As for me, I'd take all the parking tickets you can give me as long as the fines are low enough.

6. Finally, maybe I'm quibbling about wording. This is what John Henshaw said: "Every day 16 workers die in this country, and many more become injured or seriously ill. We must challenge those who are not doing their part to step up to the plate."

Now, when my kids need to do better in school, I "challenge" them to "step up to the plate." When my kids are afraid of striking out in baseball, I "challenge" them to "step up to the plate." But when my kids do something incredibly boneheaded or dangerous or careless that endangers their lives or the lives of others -- especially when they knew what they were doing was wrong -- I'm way past "challenging" them to "step up to the plate." Exit supportive parent. ENTER WRATHFUL GOD.

WHY DO WE CARE?

This is the introduction to the Occupational Safety and Health Act of 1970:

To assure safe and healthful working conditions for working men and women; by authorizing enforcement of the standards developed under the Act; by assisting and encouraging the States in their efforts to assure safe and healthful working conditions; by providing for research, information, education, and training in the field of occupational safety and health; and for other purposes.

Cutting through all of the spin and press releases and rhetoric, this is the bottom line: Congress gave OSHA the responsibility and the mandate to develop standards and enforce those standards in order to make employers accountable for assuring American workers a safe and healthful workplace. Employees have right to a safe and healthful workplace and the employer is responsible. The bald truth is that OSHA is not fulfilling the mandate that Congress gave it, nor are they even making a good faith attempt to do so. Despite the high number of new and revised standards needed to make our workplaces safer, OSHA has gone out of the standards business. They don't have enough inspectors to reach more than a small fraction of American workplaces each year, and even when they do inspect a workplace and cite an employer – often after workers have been killed or injured due to willfull violations of OSHA standards, the penalties are so low that most employers don't even care. They add more value to their businesses by correctly figuring that they'll never see an OSHA inspector.

You know what? I’ve changed my mind. I refuse to give them credit for recognizing Workers Memorial Day. It just cheapens the whole thing and allows them to rest smugly in their hypocrisy and dishonesty. As far as I’m concerned, Bush’s recognition of Workers Memorial Day adds no value – or dignity -- to anyone’s lives.

Labels: AFL-CIO

Interesting Facts:

U.S. Dead in Iraq War (March 20 - April 14): 134. Find their names here and here and here and many other places.

U.S. Dead in American Workplaces (March 20 - April 14): Approximately 416 (not counting those killed by workplace illnesses) Bet you can't find most of their names anywhere.

And, just in case you're interested:

Iraqi Casualties (March 20 - April 14): Don't ask.

AFL-CIO Releases 12th Annual Death on the Job Report

The AFL-CIO has released its 12 Annual Death on the Job report. The report is a national and state-by-state profile of worker safety and health in the United States. It's considered the policy "bible" for workplace health and safety activists. Here are some of the "highlights." But be sure to download the entire report. Use the information when dealing with politicians and those who hope to be politicians.

• Penalties