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What Should We Expect from new OSHA head?
“OSHA has the potential to contribute to a real reduction in workplace injuries and illnesses. . . and saving hundreds if not thousands of lives each year. Sadly, OSHA is not fulfilling that promise.”
These words come from a witness who testified in a 2007 Congressional hearing on OSHA’s regulation of chemical hazards. This week, President Obama appointed the man who uttered those words to head OSHA.
Meet David Michaels
David Michaels, PhD, MPH, is an epidemiologist and one of the nation’s leading health and safety researchers. Before becoming a professor at George Washington University, Michaels served as assistant secretary at the Department of Energy.
Michaels’s world view is one in which greedy corporations suppress the truth about the health effects of their products. In his 2008 book Doubt Is Their Product: How Industry’s Assault on Science Threatens Your Health, Michaels documents how industry giants have used various “tricks of the trade,” like skewing negative studies to make them look positive, to block scientific research and the dissemination of information about health hazards. Michaels singles out the tobacco industry and manufacturers of chemicals like beryllium, asbestos, lead and chromium for criticism.
What Will Michaels Do at OSHA?
In his article for the Winter 2009 issue of the New York Committee of Occupational Safety newsletter (called Safety Rep), Michaels wrote that OSHA “badly needs a change in direction and philosophy.” According to Michaels, the agency should seek to achieve four objectives:
- Issuance of a workplace injury and illness prevention program rule;
- Awarding of more training grants;
- Development of a new electronic recordkeeping and reporting system; and
- Launching a campaign aimed at “changing the way the nation thinks about workplace safety.”
Michaels’s scientific background is also expected to result in closer cooperation between OSHA and its research arm, NIOSH (the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health) and the development of new standards addressing hazards associated with emerging technologies like nanotechnology.
Conclusion
Michaels’s scientific background (OSHA hasn’t had a director with a scientific background since the Carter Administration) and ingrained suspicion of industry herald a new OSHA era that will almost surely be characterized by two things: energetic development of new standards and aggressive enforcement of existing ones.
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I am so looking forward to the day that OSHA becomes a help to industry and not an enforcer. It doesn't seem that it will be anytime soon. When is OSHA going to be willing to accept the fact that though many of us know what we are doing and want to do the right thing, we have to have the resources to do them, and they can't always blame our managers for not providing the resources. With rising costs for practically everything, it is getting tougher and tougher to stay in compliance with the thousands upon thousands of regulations. Dr. Michaels' "ingrained suspicion of industry" heralds the same old OSHA that treats the average safety manager as either 1) the poor soul beaten down by management; or 2) just another company-oriented employee who doesn't give a damn about the safety of employees unless it fits within the budget or management's restraints.
"Part of our responsibility (as a regulatory agency) is to design and apply interventions to reduce injury and illness." --Paul Cyr (now retired) OSHA inspector and trainer.
I've been around long enough to see some of the shift from a focus on enforcement to a focus on support, but the attitude is still far from where it should be. There is certainly a role of enforcement in such agencies as OSHA, who routinely deal with employers that haven't figured out their responsibility to provide a safe and healthful workplace. However, I agree that a presumption of guilt is counterproductive: many employers are willing to do what is necessary if they have the tools and assistance to find and implement cost-effective solutions.
OSHA would be much more effective if they would remember that they are called Civil Servants for a reason. Having said that, my experience has been that when I initiate interaction with OSHA, I've found them very supportive and helpful, with the caveat that most of them have never had to actually "do" safety and have no experience at implementing effective programs in the workplace.