Page 77 - MetalForming October 2009

Senate Bill 1580—
The Ghost of OSHA Future?
It’s labeled as the “Protecting Amer- ica’s Workers Act.” If passed, this bill would forever change how stakeholders would view OSHA.
What is this bill’s proposed provi- sions? To increase legal protections to job-hazard whistleblowers by prohibit- ing employer discharge or discipline any worker who refuses to work where the employee “has a reasonable appre- hension that performing such duties would result in serious injury impair- ment of the health of the employee or other employees.”
New time limits are placed on the Department of Labor to process these cases; a new monetary sanctions clause including attorneys fees and investiga- tion prosecution costs is proposed for these types of cases against violating employers; and a new admonition against employers adopting policies that discourage employee reporting work- related injuries or illnesses. Most of these might be considered tightening up with specific protections already in the general OSHA law prohibiting job safe- ty complaint discrimination.
The big proposed OSHA changes statute would come under a section labeled “Title VII—Increasing Penal- ties for Violators.”
If these drastic penalty proposals
Criminal Penalties
For any “responsible corporate officer” for a willful violation causing::
become law, employer appeals of OSHA citations could be predicted to expo- nentially escalate. Any final order cita- tion which could lead to repeat or will- ful future charges would present a major risk, both corporate and indi- vidually. And since intentional work-
place tort lawsuits these days frequent- ly include or focus upon any third- party safety audit or maintenance con- sultants as defendants, who is going to be performing safety audits, safety cer- tifications or maintenance certifica- tions for employers? MF
Death to any employee punish- able by imprison- ment for up to 10 years (up to 20 years for second conviction), and a Federal U.S. Code fine or both
A serious Injury to Any Employee punishable by imprisonment up to five years (up to 10 years for sec- ond conviction), and a Federal U.S. Code fine, or both
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