Wednesday, November 05, 2008

Short Notice

For those of you in the Los Angeles area who have ever wanted to acquire a clearer e perception of OSHA & how it works and/or doesn't work . Tomorrow is your big chance, to attend and interact with many other California Activist Networks. Such as Worksafe & SoCosh during the Cal/OSHA Advisory Committee meeting this Thursday, November 6, 2008 in downtown Los Angeles. Those who are interested in attending are also invited to join the Southern California Activist Network for their luncheon meeting following the Cal/OSHA meeting.. This is not only an opportunity to educate yourself on Cal/OSHA policies it is also a great opportunity to learn about upcoming changes and what and how you can do to play a role in creating those changes. Everyone is welcome and every new idea brought to the table brings us that much closer to creating an OSHA we can be proud of. One that is capable of protecting our workforce as it should and strong enough to successfully ensure that employers follow the rules or suffer the consequences.
Sorry about the short notice.


9:30 am
The Department of Water and Power
111 North Hope Street, Level “A” (Below the entry-level), Cafeteria
Conference Room
Los Angeles, CA.
Schedule:
The Cal/OSHA meeting begins at 9:30 a.m. and will last approximately 1
½ - 2 hours. shortly after the Cal/OSHA meeting ends.
The Worksafe Activist Network lunch meeting will commence for
approximately 1 ½ hours hosted by
Suzanne Murphy, Danielle Lucido, and Sophie Noero from Worksafe,
there are a lot of exciting ideas to discuss).
Why to attend:
To raise the profile of workers and their advocates in Cal/OSHA, and
show them that we take seriously our role in holding them accountable for
fulfilling their obligation to protect California’s workers from workplace
hazards.
Issues of Interest:
- “Reform” of Penalty Structure:
Cal/OSHA has proposed eliminating the
regulatory classification and removal of “severity,” “extent” and
“likelihood” factors in penalty calculations; eliminating penalties entirely
in certain situations; and reducing base penalty amounts for both general
and serious violations, all of which will further diminish the limited
effectiveness of existing penalties.
- Standards Setting and the Health Expert Advisory Committee
(HEAC): HEAC is a volunteer committee that is responsible for evaluating the risks to
workers from toxic substances in their work environments; it has made little
or no progress in setting standards (Permissible Exposure Limits or “PELs”)
that will adequately protect workers from chemicals that cause cancer, birth
defects, reproductive harm, and other serious health problems. While a
handful of dedicated worker advocates work hard to move the process along,
the painfully slow PEL-setting process is dominated by representatives of
the chemical industry, which benefits from the delay.
- Multi-Employer Liability:
Although we are in the middle of multi-employer
litigation (Harris) in State Court, Len Welsh has proposed holding a
stakeholder meeting in December, which could lead to a weakening of
California’s strong multi-employer regulations.
- Appeals on Abatement of Serious Violations:
Len Welsh has stated that he believes that 90% of employers who file appeals abate the cited hazard and
that revising the Policies and Procedures on inspections and issuing
citations that call for more dialogue between inspectors and employers is
the answer to abating hazards. We believe this to be an unrealistic
approach, which will not be adequate to ensure abatement by employers.
- Other:
If you would like to talk about a particular issue that is not
listed here, the structure of the meeting allows for anyone to bring any
issue up for discussion at the end of the meeting.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

They won't happen to have a conference phone set up, will they? I can't get to LA, but it would be great to hear some of this.
Jim
MA DPH- Occ Hlth Surv Prog
617-624-5632

Unknown said...

Jim,
Unfortunately there is not a conference line set up. Though that is a really good idea. I do know that one of the key points of discussion will revolve around the possibility of recording and posting future events for public viewing.
If you are interested in attending future meetings please let me know and I will have you added to the list. I believe the next one will be in the Oakland area sometime in January. As they take place every two months or so.

Mary Vivenzi

Anonymous said...

Mary-
Thanks for responding. Please do add me to the announcement list for future meetings.
james.laing@state.ma.us

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