A newsletter of workplace safety and labor issues
Get the Lead Out: Joe Rubin at Huffington Post has a troubling story of how the California Department of Public Health failed to crack down on lead contamination at a firing range, or even refer the case CalOSHA despite serious worker overexposure and neighborhood contamination. Trump’s Impact on Public Safety: Former OSHA head David Michaels…
“My conductors, on a weekly basis, are either verbally or physically assaulted.” Two assaults were reported recently, he said, including one against a female conductor who required medical attention after she was pushed into a train wall. –Stephen Burkert, a New Jersey Transit union leader Conductors, engineers, ticket salesperson and others working for the New…
It’s not all bad news out there. While Washington sucks workers down into an abyss of corporate anarchy, the State of California is showing us that humans can be rational and protective of their fellow beings. Despite efforts by federal EPA to roll back its Risk Management Program improvements, other Trump administration attacks on worker…
Despite the political setback last November, some of us still believe that the arc of justice for working people bends forward — however slowly. But then we come across this deeply disturbing article by Brett Murphy of USA Today, based on a year-long investigation into the abuse of short-haul truckers who transport goods from the…
Construction Worker Dies After Falling From Brooklyn Building: NYPD New York, NY — A construction worker fell from a building and died in Brooklyn on Sunday, authorities said. The 58-year-old man fell from scaffolding at 1382 Nostrand Ave. in East Flatbush, police said. The address is of a brick building that is a couple of…
“I’ve had a 33-year career and would say I’ve been assaulted at least 50 times if not more. I’ve been kicked, been punched, been called every name in the book, been bit, slapped, had weapons pulled on me … and it’s something that’s becoming more and more common throughout the state. It’s not just in…
Just another tragic story in America? Plainville DPW worker killed in accident PLAINVILLE , MA — A public works employee died Thursday when the lawn tractor he was driving overturned and landed on top of him, police said. The employee, whose name was not released pending notification of family, was cutting grass at the town…
Exporting Cancer and Miscarriages: An upsetting but must-read article by Cam Simpson at Bloomberg Business Week looks at American semi-conductor companies who discovered in the 1980’s that chemicals they were using in the production of micro chips were causing cancer and reproductive problems in women working in their plants. So they did the honorable thing…
All preventable workplace fatalities make me mad, but none make me madder than trench collapses and confined space fatalities. There is no reason for any of them to happen. The hazards of trenches and confined spaces are well known and there are good OSHA standards that would prevent these deaths if followed. The first fatality…
But as the ….government has promoted the [chemical] sector’s rapid growth, it has struggled with its impact on the environment. The chemical industry has quashed calls to strengthen oversight and force companies to publicly disclose what substances they produce. Local environmental bureaus are often politically feeble and understaffed. — New York Times, June 13, 2017…