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 Safety at Center of
Hotel Organizing Drive
Illegal asbestos removal and
the serious health threat it poses to workers has become a centerpiece
of a union organizing drive at The New Yorker Hotel on 34th Street
and Eighth Avenue in Manhattan.
The New York Hotel and Motel
Trades Council recently initiated an organizing drive at The
New Yorker after workers complained about having to remove and
work around asbestos dust without protective equipment or safety
training.
In January, organizers from The
New Yorker campaign met with NYCOSH Director of Training Susan
O'Brien to assess the risk to workers of asbestos exposure. O'Brien
reviewed a video tape of workers removing insulation that lab
samples later proved was asbestos. She also gave the union activists
fact sheets and strategic advice about calling in regulatory
authorities, including the New York City Department of Environmental
Protection (DEP) and the U.S. Occupational Safety and Health
Administration.
In the weeks that followed union organizers distributed information
to workers about asbestos hazards and produced a booklet with
18 pages of information about health and safety issues, with
an emphasis on asbestos hazards.
Then on March 3, the New York
Times published a lengthy story, "Asbestos Removal Becomes
Issue in Hotel Union Drive." The article highlighted the
plight of workers being asked to work near or amid an ongoing
asbestos abatement job.
"I think asbestos is an
illustration of how much contempt for the work force the present
management has," Peter Ward, President of the Hotel Council,
told The Times.
Barry Mann, The New Yorker's general manager, told the Times
that the hotel has conducted the asbestos removal properly.
Yet a variety of workers at the
hotel, including many plumbers, maintenance staff and housekeepers,
have reported being exposed to asbestos. Some have been asked
to rip out asbestos without the legally required respiratory
protection, or safety training. These workers describe a "rip
and skip" removal operation: asbestos torn out from walls
and ceilings sending debris "flying into the air" before
being carted through the hotel in open trash containers and dumped
out with the "regular" garbage in apparent violation
of New York City asbestos laws.
"We've never been trained
to do this work," said Norman Sneed, a plumber at the hotel.
"Management has never given us the right protective equipment.
Some of us refuse to touch the asbestos but the problem is that
we're all exposed to it because they rip it down right where
we're working."
Dominga Salazar, a housekeeper
at the hotel, added: "When we work on the floors they just
finished renovating, the asbestos is still in the air. The hotel
doesn't seal off the area and test the air to make sure it's
safe for us. The little white mask they give us isn't enough
to protect us."
Meanwhile, having seen the Times
report, the New York City DEP conducted several inspections of
the hotel in early March. An official with the regulatory agency
told Safety Rep March 17 that workers installing a new sewer
line were found disturbing asbestos and that piping and floor
tiling containing asbestos were found nearby. As a result, the
hotel will be cited for failing to provide safety training; using
uncertified workers to undertake work involving the disturbing
of asbestos; failing to properly "bag" asbestos debris;
and failing to file the appropriate paperwork with the DEP.
Asbestos has been used in more
than 3,000 different commercial products -- from fireproofing
and insulation in buildings to automobile brake linings. Exposure
can cause a variety of serious ailments, including lung cancer,
mesothelioma (cancer of the lining of the lung or abdomen) and
asbestosis (scarring of lung tissue).
Although most commercial uses
of asbestos were banned in the U.S. in 1989, asbestos exposure
has caused an estimated 171,500 cancer deaths nationwide from
1967 to 1997. An additional 118,700 cancer deaths are predicted
before the epidemic runs its course in 2027, according to estimates
by scientists at Mount Sinai Medical Center.
Organizers contend that with
a union, workers will be better able to protect themselves from
asbestos and other unsafe conditions. Last year at the unionized
Carlyle Hotel on 76th Street and Madison Avenue in Manhattan,
asbestos contractors conducted a slipshod removal job, potentially
exposing a group of hotel workers to asbestos.
The union reacted quickly, officials
say, by calling an emergency meeting of the workers and filing
a grievance under the union contract. After arbitration, the
management agreed to:
-- perform asbestos removal or repair work only with prior approval
by the union;
-- pay for asbestos testing throughout the entire hotel;
-- allow any Carlyle worker concerned that they may be in danger
to stay home until the testing was complete; and
-- pay for medical screenings of every employee who may have
been exposed.
The union contends that workers
at The New Yorker, like those at The Carlyle, would be safer
with a union. They said that once more than half of The New Yorker
workers sign cards in favor of unionization, the union will ask
the New Yorker management to grant recognition. If management
balks, then the union will demand an election.
OSHA's Safety Program
Rule Under Attack
The U.S. Chamber of Commerce
and the National Association of Manufacturers have formed a coalition
recently that will attempt to quash a soon-to-be proposed Occupational
Safety and Health Administration rule requiring every employer
to establish a workplace safety and health program.
Scheduled for release next summer,
OSHA s proposed program regulation is being welcomed by worker
safety activists. It would mandate employee involvement in the
design, implementation and evaluation of safety and health programs.
It would also require employers to conduct hazard identification
and assessment, hazard prevention and control, safety and health
training, and evaluation of program effectiveness.
The regulation would apply not
just to those hazards where OSHA has standards, but to hazards
covered by the General Duty Clause, such as heat, cold and workplace
violence.
Peg Seminario, Director of Occupational
Safety and Health for the AFL-CIO, told the Occupational Safety
and Health Reporter that the rule should have been enacted 30
years ago when OSHA was established.
In a recent press release, Randel
K. Johnson, the Chamber s Vice-President for Labor Policy, complained
about the impact on businesses. "This ill-defined regulation
is the worst of both worlds," he claimed. "It requires
employers to identify and address workplace hazards on a continuous
basis, while not providing any benchmark standards for compliance."
Johnson also said the Chamber
is concerned that the rule is so broad it would give OSHA inspectors
authority to fine employers over conditions that "have not
even been identified as significant hazards through rulemaking."
"Business trade groups like the Chamber want to have it
both ways," countered Joel Shufro, NYCOSH Executive Director.
"If OSHA issues a broad standard, they moan about the enforcement
discretion given to inspectors. But when the standard is very
specific, they complain that it unfairly targets certain employers."
"We are concerned that the
worker involvement be real and that workers receive quality training,"
Shufro added.
According to Jordan Barab, former Health and Safety Director
for the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees
and now an OSHA staff member, the point of drafting a broad program
regulation is to allow employers to design their own programs,
not to create a "one size fits all" rule. To ensure
that enforcement is fair, Barab said the agency will conduct
extensive training for OSHA inspectors about how to evaluate
programs.
The program proposal has already
cleared the Small Business Regulatory Fairness Act review process,
and it is now being examined by the Office of Management and
Budget. Public hearings will follow the proposal's release next
summer, Barab said.
Although the official comment
period will not begin until the regulation is released, letters
regarding the proposal can be sent to: Charles Jeffress, Assistant
Secretary of Labor for OSHA, U.S. Department of Labor, OSHA,
200 Constitution Avenue, N.W., Washington, DC 20210
In addition, the draft proposal
and other information about the safety program can be reviewed
at the
OSHA web site.
Ergonomics News
The Occupational Safety and Health
Administration released a "draft"
proposed ergonomics standard in February that would require
employers in some 2 million workplaces to safeguard workers from
an array of job-related musculoskeletal injuries to the back,
neck, wrist and arms.
After more than a decade of effort,
OSHA issued a proposal that would affect an estimated 25 million
workers, including millions of computer users in offices. Exempted
from coverage would be agriculture, construction and maritime
trades.
"We must push forward with
a sensible ergonomics program standard," said OSHA Administrator
Charles N. Jeffress. "We have ample sound scientific evidence
that too many workers are suffering serious injuries and illnesses
due to work-related musculoskeletal disorders."
According to OSHA, more than
647,000 U.S. workers suffer work-related musculoskeletal disorders
each year due to constant repetition, overexertion, awkward postures
or equipment not suited to their various sizes or strengths.
These injuries and illnesses account for 34 percent of all lost-workday
ailments and cost employers $15-20 billion annually in direct
workers compensation costs.
The move by OSHA comes despite
fierce opposition from business lobbyists and from some Republicans
in Congress, who claim there is no scientific proof that work
causes these disorders. Business-friendly lawmakers have repeatedly
written into appropriations measures language that barred OSHA
from preparing rules on the subject.
Now the U.S. Chamber of Commerce,
the National Association of Manufacturers and other trade groups
are urging OSHA to wait for the National Academy of Science to
complete a study examining whether there is a scientific basis
for a standard. The study would effectively repeat much of the
research NAS undertook last year under a similar congressional
mandate — research conducted by 65 of the world s top scientific
and medical experts in ergonomics that showed a strong connection
between repetitive work and musculoskeletal disorders.
"Trade associations have
never seen a regulation they like," Jeffress told The Washington
Post.
Meantime, Rep. Roy Blunt (R-MO) introduced legislation in early
March that would prohibit OSHA from moving forward with ergonomics
standard-setting or development of guidelines until the NAS study
is complete.
Yet Congress never meant to use
the NAS study to stall rule-making. In October, Rep. Robert Livingston
(RLa.) and Rep. David Obey (D~Wis.) wrote to Secretary of Labor
Alexis Herman stating: "We understand that OSHA intends
to issue a proposed rule on ergonomics late in the summer of
1999. We are writing to make clear that by funding the NAS study,
it is in no way our intent to block or delay issuance by OSHA
of a proposed rule on ergonomics."
The OSHA proposal includes six
elements of an ergonomics program: management leadership and
employee participation; hazard identification and information;
job hazard analysis and control; training; medical management;
and program evaluation.
In its current form, the standard
would provide the greatest protection for workers in manufacturing
and "manual handling" operations, involving pusing,
pulling, carrying, lifting or lowering objects. OSHA targeted
these jobs because the agency asserts they represent 60 percent
of days lost from work because of musculoskeletal injuries. In
these workplaces, employers must implement the first two components
of the ergonomics program: management leadership and employee
participation, and hazard identification and information. The
other elements of the program would kick in after a musculoskeletal
disorder is reported — or if a known ergonomic hazard exists.
In other industries, employers
will not be required to establish an ergonomics program unless
an injury or illness is reported.
"The draft proposal represents
an important step in the right direction towards protecting workers
from these disabling injuries," said AFL-CIO President John
J. Sweeney. "However, we remain deeply concerned that the
draft excludes large numbers of workers from coverage. We are
equally concerned that, as drafted, in many workplaces the rule
is only triggered after workers are injured."
Eric Frumin, Director of Safety
and Health for the Union of Needletrades, Industrial and Textile
Employees, was even stronger in his indictment of the proposal
s single-incident "trigger" when he appeared on the
News Hour television broadcast with Jim Lehrer on February 19.
"There are a lot of workers in other industries, whether
it s grocery stores, restaurants, post offices, offices and stores
of many different kinds and unfortunately for them, there s no
training, there s no obligation for the employer to initiate
anything," Frumin said. "And unless they have the ability
to find out about this on their own, they re going to be suffering
until one of them is hurt badly enough that they re finally forced
to take time off, and until then, the employer has to do nothing."
The AFL-CIO will work to ensure
implementation and expansion of the standard. OSHA is expected
to hold regional hearings on the proposed standard in the Fall,
and one site is likely to be New York City. In the meantime,
NYCOSH s RSI Committee, composed primarily of injured workers,
will continue monitoring the ergonomics rulemaking process. For
information about the committee, contact Susan O Brien at (212)
627-3900 Ext. 13 or NYCOSH@compuserve.com
Campaign for Safe Needles Continues
Prevention of infectious disease
transmitted by unsafe needles in health care institutions is
the subject of a grassroots campaign calling for proposed legislation
in 19 different states, according to the Service Employees International
Union, the nation s largest health care union.
In the latest news from this nationwide campaign, a law calling
for the use of safe needles in New Jersey was passed unanimously
by the Assembly Health Committee in early March. Under the proposal,
which is being supported by a union coalition led by the Health
Professionals and Allied Employees union (an affiliate of the
American Federation of Teachers), the state's Health Commissioner
would designate a class of safe needles that have been approved
by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.
Health care facilities licensed
under New Jersey state law would then establish an evaluation
committee to select from the list provided by the health commissioner
which needles the facilities would use. At least half of the
evaluation committee would have to be composed of "frontline"
health care workers.
In addition, the facilities would
be required to provide education and training about the use of
safe needles, develop a mechanism for reviewing and evaluating
new equipment, and report all needlestick injuries to the New
Jersey Department of Health within 30 days. The DOH would then
review the reports and make recommendations to the facilities.
"Our bill would help reduce
the risk of health care workers getting accidentally stuck with
a needle contaminated with HIV, hepatitis or other bloodborne
diseases," said Republican Assembly member Alan Augustine,
the primary sponsor of the bill.
Other proposals to address the
growing problem of unsafe needles are being developed in New
York State and throughout the country. Legislation has been or
will be introduced in Connecticut, District of Columbia, Indiana,
Iowa, Illinois, Florida, Georgia, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts,
Michigan, Missouri, Montana, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Texas, Wisconsin
and Washington.
"Workers are dying because
hospitals aren t using safe needles that are available for the
cost of a postage stamp," said Andrew L. Stern, SEIU International
President. "Unless states act now, more health care workers
will die from this preventable epidemic."
For more information about safe
needle devices, contact Joel Shufro at NYCOSH at (212) 627-3900
ext. 15 or NYCOSH@compuserve.com.
Internet Resources
AFL-CIO WEB SITE REVAMPED. The AFL-CIO has revamped its
internet site and improvements include a new and improved
safety and health section.
Safety and health information
available on the site includes regular updates from the Federation's
Safety and Health Department, as well as legislative updates
about issues including the OSHA ergonomics standard and funding
for OSHA enforcement.
The site is located at www.aflcio.org.
NYCOSH REDESIGNS WEB SITE . NYCOSH has also redesigned
its web site, making a range of information about safety and
health hazards easier to access. The organization's site also
now includes the NYCOSH Bi-Weekly news alert, as well as the
latest issues of the NYCOSH newsletter, Safety Rep.
The NYCOSH site is located at
www.nycosh.org.
Supreme Court Backs Insurance Companies in Workers' Compensation Case
The U.S. Supreme Court decided
March 3 that a provision of Pennsylvania s workers compensation
law that arbitrarily cuts off medical benefits for injured workers
without giving them adequate notice or a chance to respond is
consitutional. The ruling reverses a 1998 decision by a federal
appeals court and constitutes a significant setback for injured
workers and their advocates.
The decision stems from a lawsuit
filed by a group of injured workers, the Philadelphia Federation
of Teachers, Local 3 and the Philadelphia Area Project on Occupational
Safety and Health (PhilaPOSH), NYCOSH s sister organization.
The group claimed cost-cutting measures enacted by Pennsylvania
in 1993 cut off medical benefits for injured workers without
giving them notice or allowing them a chance to respond. These
measures included establishment of "utilization review"
procedures that permitted insurers to refuse payment of benefits
pending review of medical treatment.
Advocates for injured workers
had hoped that the Supreme Court would uphold the Appeals Court
s ruling that insurers -- although privately owned -- were functioning
as state agents. In New York, for example, if insurance carriers
were found to be "an arm of the state," then provisions
of the workers compensation law permitting the practice of unilaterally
denying medical treatment and/or wage replacement without prior
notice and before any hearing -- a practice that is currently
routine -- would also be vulnerable to court challenges.
The Supreme Court also held that
private insurance companies cannot be considered "an arm
of the state" when they participate in cutting workers comp
benefits without a hearing.
A copy
of the decision is available on the Internet.
Obituary -- Gwen Wells (1946-1999)
Gwen Wells, labor activist and
journalist, and longtime friend of NYCOSH, died January 15 in
New York City after a battle with cancer. She was 53.
Gwen joined the staff of the
Office and Professional Employees International Union 1979. During
her two decades of work for the union, she revamped the Research
& Education Departments, redesigned education programs, produced
new publications and improved and expanded the union s newspaper,
the White Collar.
Here at NYCOSH many of us remember
Gwen s critical role back in the early 1980s in developing some
of the country s first programs and materials to address the
health effects of computer use. This was some of the most important
work undertaken by NYCOSH in our early, upstart years, putting
the organization — and more importantly, the issue of computer
safety — on the map.
On a personal level, those of
us who were lucky enough to call Gwen a friend will also remember
her courage, her commitment and her compassion. The entire labor
movement will miss her.
Whistle-Blower Shield May be Strengthened
The Clinton Administration has
vowed to strengthen protections for workers who complain about
safety and health hazards, officials announced in early March.
"If employees hesitate to exercise their rights for fear
of losing their jobs, these rights are meaningless," Charles
N. Jeffress, Assistant Secretary of Labor for the Occupational
Safety and Health Administration, told The New York Times. "Too
many employers feel they can retaliate against whistle-blowers
with impunity."
OSHA Section 11 (c) is intended
to provide protection against discrimination for workers who
report on-the-job hazards. The statute requires OSHA to investigate
complaints made within 30 days of the action taken against a
worker. The agency can then refer cases to the Secretary of Labor
for litigation in the U.S. District Courts, where employers can
be forced to reinstate workers with back wages. In rare cases,
employers can also be forced to pay punitive damages.
As Safety Rep has previously
reported, most workers who file discrimination complaints under
section 11 (c) see their cases dismissed or otherwise scuttled.
In a review of 1,185 OSHA 11(c) cases filed between October 1,
1997 and April 30, 1998, 471 (40 percent) were dismissed because
the agency found that the claimants couldn't prove the allegations;
258 (22 percent) were dismissed without prejudice; 234 (20 percent)
were settled; 148 (12 percent) were withdrawn; and 46 (four percent)
were either referred to another agency or handled in another
manner.
The Clinton Administration will
propose that Congress amend section 11 (c) to give workers six
months, rather than 30 days, to file complaints. It will also
propose that:
-- cases be tried before administrative law judges rather than
in Federal District Court;
-- punitive damages be levied against employers in egregious
cases;
-- workers be allowed to appeal decisions in Federal court if
they are dissatisfied with decisions; and
-- notices be posted in workplaces explaining any settlement
or ruling in favor of a whistle blower.
"Working men and women have
for years been forced to keep quiet about dangerous conditions
in order to save their jobs," said NYCOSH Executive Director
Joel Shufro. "We applaud any effort that will empower workers
to make jobs safer."
Associated Press Kills Story About Newspaper Carriers Denied Workers' Compensation
The Associated Press killed a
story this Spring that reported on the newspaper industry s decades-long
campaign to exclude hundreds of thousands of young newspaper
carriers from workers compensation.
The story was written by A.P.
workplace reporter Maggie Jackson. Jackson is based in the A.P.
s New York City bureau.
Jackson had been reporting on
the story for a number of weeks and had finished writing the
article when she learned that the story would not run.
Jackson was fed the story by
University of Iowa Law Professor Marc Linder. Linder had written
a law review article detailing the newspaper industry s effort
to exclude its carriers from state workers compensation statutes.
("What s Black and White and Red All Over? The Blood Tax
On Newspapers -- or, How Publishers Exclude Newscarriers from
Workers Compensation," Loyola Poverty Law Journal, August
1998.)
In an interview, Linder said
he didn t know why the Associated Press killed the story. "I
can only speculate that either the people who killed it have
so internalized the thought patterns of the publishers who cooperatively
own the AP that they know on their own that this is not a subject
that would redound to the benefit of the cooperative owners,"
Linder said. "Or someone from the publishers side caught
wind of the story, called them and killed it. This latter point
is total speculation on my part. I don t know that, but I can
imagine it."
Linder said that he fed the story
about newspaper carriers being excluded from workers" comp
to other newspaper reporters and none have run with it.
"I have been told directly
by various reporters and columnists that they would never get
it past their editors and they don t want to waste their journalistic,
political capital on this matter because it is not going to get
published anyway and they don t want to struggle with their editors
over it," Linder said.
Linder said that between 1992
and 1997, 99 news vendors were killed on the job, eleven of them
under the age of 18.
A 1994 Newspaper Association of America survey found there were
about 450,000 child and adult carriers in the United States,
and that only 5.9 percent of carriers were treated as employees
and thus covered by workers compensation.
"The success that the publishers
have had here is merely a reflection of their greed and their
ability to latch onto a group of people who can t defend themselves,"
Linder said.
-- Russell Mokhiber
Reprinted, with permission, from Corporate Crime Reporter
(Volume 13, Number 9, March 1, 1999)
COMINGS AND GOINGS
LAURA KENNY, a member of the NYCOSH Board of Directors
and former New York Regional Health and Safety Director for the
Service Employees International Union, has accepted a job with
the Occupational Safety and Health Administration.
Kenny, who worked with SEIU for
more than 12 years and also served as the union s Assistant Director
of Safety and Health, will be the Labor Liaison for OSHA Region
II, which encompasses New York, New Jersey, Puerto Rico and the
Virgin Islands. In her new job, Kenny will be working with unions
to assist with implementation of OSHA programs. Kenny started
at OSHA February 22 and can be reached at the Region II office
in Manhattan.
MICHAEL MCCANN, a longtime NYCOSH activist, has accepted
a job as Director of Ergonomics and Safety for the Center to
Protect Workers Rights (CPWR) in Washington, D.C. CPWR is a national,
nonprofit research institute for unions with members in the building
and construction trades.
McCann, who for the past two
years has been New York State Health and Safety Project Director
for Communications Workers of America, District One, began his
new job in mid-February. McCann can be reached at CPWR, 111 Massachusetts
Avenue, N.W., Washington, D.C., 20001. The phone number is (202)
962-8490.
JIM YOUNG, NYCOSH Public Affairs Director for
the past 10 years, has accepted a position with the New Jersey
Work Environment Council, a nonprofit coalition based in Trenton.
Jim will be working on a variety of projects for WEC, an organization
building alliances among labor, environmental, and community
activists.
Young will also continue freelance
writing on a variety of labor topics, including occupational
health. He can be reached by phone at WEC: (609) 695-7100 or
by Email: jfyoung@erols.com.
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