Page images
PDF
EPUB

Uncapped compressed gas cylinder: Again all contractors probably charged with a violation for permitting their employees to work in a hazardous area. Tripping Hazard: Bent over dowels in area of upper landing of job ladder. Again all contractors probably charged with a violation for permitting their employees to work in a hazardous area.

Working under welding operations: Two employers charged with alleged violation for permitting their employees to work in an area where sparks from welding and cutting work being performed overhead on structural steel could drift or be blown on them. Welding operations themselves were in conformance. Inspection of cranes: Inspector indicated inspections being performed on cranes were inadequate. Discussed daily operator inspections, and routine periodic and an annual inspection by qualified inspectors. Section 1518 550 cranes and derricks provide that the employer shall designate a competent person who shall inspect all machinery and equipment prior to each use and during use to make sure it is in safe operating condition. They further provide for an annual inspection of hoisting machinery by a competent person, or by a government or private agency recognized by the Department of Labor, and the keeping of records showing the dates and results of such inspections.

Unstable pile of form material stored on embankment.

Ladder not properly tied into perimeter guard rails at upper landing.

No receptacle for used paper cups at water container.

The inspection of this job was a routine inspection and not one resulting from an accident nor from an employee complaint. The alleged violations recited above covered operations of all contractors performing work on the job at the time of the inspection. As you can determine by the fact that in several cases all contractors were charged with a violation as a result of a violation by one contractor, it is important to every contractor that every other contractor on the job is in compliance.

The regulations have a number of provisions regarding protection of employees relating to such things as hard hats, goggles, respirators, safety belts, etc. In the past we have often heard of the problem of an employer in getting his employees for instance to wear hard hats when required. We remind you that under federal regulations you can't afford this type of problem for failure of employees to wear such equipment where the situation requires it can result in a citation and a penalty being assessed against you, the employer.

Again we urge you to become thoroughly familiar with the provisions of the Safety and Health Regulations for Construction and comply with them. We have distributed some 500 copies of these regulations and have about 30 on hand. Two copies are available upon request free of charge, additional copies are at our cost of 35¢ each. The plastic laminated safety posters will be mailed out on October 26. Invoice will be enclosed. We are currently out of these posters but expect to get 500 more within the next few days. They are available to you at our cost of 50¢ each.

Prepare yourself now on the OSHA regulations, do not wait until you receive a call from one of your superintendents or foremen that an OSHA inspector is on one of the jobs on which you have employees working.

Very truly yours,

HOWARD L. KNAUF, Managing Director.

BOB BOWRON BUILDERS, INC..
Boulder, Colo., November 29, 1971.

Hon. JAMES MCKEVITT,

Cannon House Office Building,
Washington, D.C.

DEAR CONGRESSMAN MCKEVITT: I am writing in regard to the Williams-Steiger Occupational Safety and Health Act of 1970 which President Nixon signed into law December 29, 1970. I am sure our Home Builders Association in Washington had time to oppose it and probably did, maybe that is why it is not worse than it is.

These things are getting out of hand. We are frantically trying to house America's people but we cannot under these ridiculous requirements. As I have gone over the rules I am saddened that again, my trusted Legislators and President have succumbed to pressures by labor groups or groups who have never had to produce.

We are required under this law to use 2'' planking and scaffolds. All material on conventional job-sites is 11⁄2". You can imagine the cost of keeping more material to be lost, split-up, torn up, stolen, etc. We are to construct an infirmary clinic to treat the injured. We should have one at each construction site, so this means one at each sub-division that a Contractor is building. Just out of common sense I always have carried a box of band-aids, vaseline, tweezers and iodine when I was a framing carpenter. We are taking all the need for common sense away from employees now. Any successful business hires men, trains them, and keeps this a continuing process. Part of a man's training is to know when a wound is serious enough to go to a Doctor for treatment and when a sliver is minor enough to be pulled out with his own tweezers. This is idiotic and stupid. We will have to install guard rails on all ladders and make sure ladders are long enough to extend 30" above the landing the employee is crawling onto.

The law goes on and on. Someone took a lot of time to write this up, convince Congress and the Senate that we had to have it and then go out and get it signed by a man all too busy to look at this nonsense. Our laws are tying our hands, Mr. Congressman, and it has to stop!!! No wonder the youth is all shook up about our Government. It is all red-tape. Now most people agree with me, you are doing a fine job and we cannot hope to correct a stupid law like this by electing a soft peddling liberal, we must do something.

Please get your gang together and stop the writing of nonsensical laws. Only do the things we need. You would make a much better impression on your constituents by spending all your time repealing laws rather than proposing anything new.

I just cannot understand it. All this time to design a law to protect an employee who should be concerned about his own safety. . . virtually ruining the employer's earning capacity because of more forms to fill out and inspections suddenly pulled by Federal Inspectors, and all the time the Drug traffic runs rampant because we refuse to give the Death penalty for selling drugs.

Please consider the point that the employee should have some responsibility. As an employee I always enjoyed making decisions on my own. This law is making the assertion that employees are not capable of making their own decisions as to whether or not a scaffold is safe or is a ladder properly secured, or "how far am I from the first aid infirmary?". This is not so. It would seem logical, if an employee does not like the conditions his employer works him under, he can quit and go to work for a safe contractor. This is a Free America at work. Good men are so much in demand that it would be impossible for a Contractor to be successful in this day and age using unsafe techniques. You see, we have no need for such a law. Here again I compare the Drug problem . . . Compare the two. I am sure you will find more deaths, crimes and broken homes attributed to drugs than you will find even from the worst Contractors using the most unsafe scaffolds and unfilled band-aid dispensors.

We all have so little time. Please work for the repeal of this Act which degrades a working man's intelligence. Please let us spend our time working so we can pay our taxes rather than filling out more forms.

You have a lot on the ball, please check this bill over-then get rid of it.
Sincerely,

KENT D. BOWRON.

ROCKY MOUNTAIN AUTOMOTIVE WHOLESALERS ASSOCIATION, INC.,

Representative MIKE MCKEVITT,
Cannon House Office Building,
Washington, D.C.

Denver, Colo., February 29, 1972.

DEAR CONGRESSMAN MCKEVITT: I am sure it was not the intent of Congress to force the small independent businessman out of business, but the Occupational Safety and Health Act of 1970 surely could do this.

I think the Act itself is needed, but rather than having a fine for the first inspection, maybe a warning should be given and a time limit placed on when the correction should be completed.

I have just read the article in The Rocky Mountain News of Monday, February 28, 1972, and if the man was fined $1,000 on each of the 20 offenses he wouldn't be able to stay in business.

Who decides what the penalty should be? Is it based on the law, or is it whatever the inspector thinks it should be?

We hope you will look into this at your earliest possible convenience and see that some amendments will be made to the law to help the small businessman. Sincerely,

RAY J. CAMPBELL, Executive Secretary.

Hon. JAMES D. McKEVITT,
House of Representatives,
Washington, D.C.

NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF HOME BUILDERS,
Washington, D.C., January 13, 1972.

DEAR MR. MCKEVITT: I am enclosing copies of letters, dated July 22, 1971, and January 12, 1972, I have sent to Congressman William Steiger of Wisconsin. These letters were written to Mr. Steiger in response to memos to the Republican Members of the House of Representatives which he sent out on July 7 and December 14, 1971.

In his two memos, Mr. Steiger made reference to the activities of the home building industry with respect to the application of standards under the Occupational Safety and Health Act of 1970 to that industry. From reading these two memos, one could get the impression that the home building industry has been attempting to thwart the intent of the Congress in enacting the Occupational Safety Act.

This we have not been doing. We recognize and accept the Occupational Safety Act and we are not attempting to avoid the imposition of safety standards on our industry. However, we have run into a very troublesome problem with respect to the fashion in which the Act has been applied to our industry.

We believe that the treatment accorded the light residential construction industry by the Labor Department under the Act has been very inequitable, since the Department has prescribed the same set of standards for our industry as it has applied to heavy construction. These are two separate and distinct industries and not, we believe, susceptible to treatment as one. Since March, we have been attempting to achieve the kind of sensible treatment for the light residential construction industry which, in our opinion, would be in accord with the intent of Congress in enacting the Safety Act.

The enclosed two letters to Congressman Steiger are in the interest of setting the record straight. I hope that you will give these letters your careful attention. Sincerely,

JOHN A. STASTNY, President.

[From Construction Economics, February 1972]

WHAT ABOUT THE OCCUPATIONAL SAFETY AND HEALTH ACT?

A four-letter acronym-OSHA-looms as the biggest single problem for the construction industry this year, and for years to come.

The vast and thickening cloud of federal regulations and confusion that has already resulted from implementation of the Occupational Safety and Health Act (Public Law 91-596) has already had a number of predictable results:

(1) It has confused most construction contractors, and also most enforcement agencies;

(2) it promises considerable added expense in conducting business; and (3) it has provided what Labor leaders think is a powerful bargaining weapon.

It has also produced a rising wave of protest which is being felt in Washington, and might result in some modifications-though not soon-of what the industry sees as worst aspects.

The contractors argue that regulations already issued will cost them vast sums of money: $2 billion, on an industry-wide basis, just to convert older tractors to carry now-required rollover protection equipment (because frames on machines built before 1969 aren't figured to carry the extra weight and force); $250.000 for just one medium-sized Nebraska contractor to add load-measurement devices to his cranes; a small roofing contractor has notified his smaller builder-clients that he can no longer do business with them, because of the cost of extra scaffolding and safety devices.

They point They point to some ridiculous requirements already in force: Provision of coat hangers in job-site temporary toilets; requirements for lifelines and guard rails on roofs not 10 feet off the ground; load-measurement devices (to prevent cranes from overloading) that obstruct the operator's view of the job; requirements for mud-guards on off-highway equipment, and seat belts on slow-moving machinery like rollers, where the operator stands as much as he sits during working hours.

Countering these complaints are: (1) the undeniably poor safety record of the industry-rated second only to mining in regard to hazard; (2) the fact that there are no reliable statistics on what addition of devices and compliance with new regulations would really cost (contractors up to 30 percent more); (3) no figures on the actual extent of death and injury resulting from construction work, because of wide variations in reporting requirements of the states. Finally, of course, there's the current political popularity of almost any move to aid the "worker" and the "public" in his struggle against "business operators". In the political year of 1972, that's a very important consideration.

Regardless of what may develop during the year, however, here's what the industry faces:

Two federal laws are involved: The "Construction Safety Act" of August 9, 1969 (P.L. 91-54), and the Occupational Health and Safety Act (P.L. 91-596), of December 29, 1970.

Both of these statutes require issuance of regulations by the Department of Labor, spelling out requirements. Under the Safety Act, regulations were issued (see Federal Register for April 17, 1971 and subsequently), and these have been incorporated bodily into OSHA, though further regulations are being added. States will carry most of the enforcement burden, with the federal government providing as much as 90 percent of enforcement costs during early periods, then 50 percent.

Existing state safety laws are superseded by federal law only where they are less stringent. Thus, contractors will be well advised to find the toughest provisions of either state or federal law that may be applicable—and assume that these will be the governing rules. There is no thought that "shopping around" to find easiest provisions will be permitted.

Much of the cost will be charged to the contractor, since machinery manufactured before the current regulations were adopted will have to be fitted, progressively, with required safety applications (all equipment must be so fitted by 1975). New machinery now rolling off assembly lines will be required to carry added safety equipment.

The regulations go far beyond machinery. They include detailed requirements for such things as ladders and scaffolding, guard devices at door and window openings if more than 10 ft above ground, provision of safe and sanitary working conditions (including washing and rest facilities, heat or cooling if the site demands it, and much else). Also included is a potentially vast amount of record-keeping (for a minimum of three years, for instance) that must be kept available for inspection in the event of a check or a complaint reaching the Labor or state departments responsible.

Obviously, a vast amount of research is necessary over the next few years. if safety regulations are to be effective and costs are kept within some sort of reason. There are some provisions for such research at the federal level-but they are woefully small. Much of the research, apparently, will have to be funded and conducted by states and private trade and professional associations. Mr. HUNGATE. Mr. Bergland?

Mr. BERGLAND. I want to join with my colleagues in commending you. Mr. Chairman, for initiating these hearings. I don't think any Member of Congress wants to change the law or rules that could lead to unsafe working conditions. But it seems to me that some of the rules that have been developed are of the Mickey Mouse variety and it is my hope that these hearings will separate those kinds of unreasonable regulations from those that really contribute to safe working conditions, and that some kind of change can be effected. Thank you. Mr. Chairman.

Mr. HUNGATE. Thank you very much.

I think the presence of so many busy members of this subcommittee reflects the interest and concern in Congress on this subject.

We are pleased to have as our first witness on these hearings Mr. O. C. Fisher, a Congressman from Texas, and one of the high ranking members of the Armed Services Committee, a man who has shown great leadership and concern with the problems of small business and this legislation.

TESTIMONY OF HON. O. C. FISHER, A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF TEXAS; ACCOMPANIED BY MCNEILL STOKES, GENERAL COUNSEL, THE AMERICAN SUBCONTRACTORS ASSOCIATION

Mr. FISHER. Mr. Chairman, I welcome this opportunity to testify briefly concerning the need to amend the Occupational Safety and Health Act.

It is noted you have a long list of witnesses to be heard, and I shall be very brief. With me today is Mr. McNeill Stokes, of Atlanta, an eminent attorney whom I believe to be one of the best authorities in the country on the OSHA and the havoc it is causing to thousands of businesses everywhere. He has a brief statement which is authoritative, and I am sure he is prepared to respond to any questions that may be asked.

It is absolutely imperative, as I see it, that this law be amended in a number of respects. I have never known of a newly approved law which has caused such universal consternation, hardship and amazement, and for good reason.

As you know, the regulations alone are voluminous and highly complicated. I saw a box of them that weigh at least 75 pounds, and that is only half of it. Over 100 pounds have already been produced.

It would take a proverbial Philadelphia lawyer to determine if a particular business is or is not in compliance. And relatively few of the thousands of potential victims can afford to hire a lawyer. Under this law each of them is a potential victim of a bureaucracy which is given authority to act as investigator, prosecutor, and judge.

Mr. Chairman, when enforcement of this law got underway I began to receive complaints, chiefly from small business enterprises, complaining that it would be next to impossible to comply with OSHA requirements, and that the cost in some instances would be prohibitive. Responding to these pleas I introduced H.R. 12068, which would exempt from the act all nonmanufacturing business, or any business having less than 25 employees-in those States which have occupational and health standards governing their business. We have that in Texas. It is ample, I think, to take care of situations I have described, of small businesses where they are in a better position to police their own safety problems rather than big manufacturers, and the big plants which present completely different problems than the small businessman.

I am informed this would exempt about 64 percent of enterprises now covered by the law. Perhaps the exemption should apply to those with more than 25 employees, and there is good reason to make the

« PreviousContinue »