Joseph A. Dear, 62, who was appointed by President Clinton to run OSHA in 1993, died on February 26 in Sacramento, CA. The cause was prostate cancer, according to a statement issued by the California Public Employees’ Retirement System (CalPERS), where Mr. Dear worked as the chief investment officer.
Mr. Dear ran OSHA from 1993 to 1997, a period when Vice President Al Gore used the agency to spearhead his “reinventing” government project which called for federal agencies to be more customer-friendly and solution- and consultative-oriented. Though OSHA has remained a workplace safety laws enforcer and infrequent standards-setter, the pivot OSHA made 20 years ago to become more education and training focused has remained a sustained activity. Safety and health alerts, safety apps, electronic training tools, a web-based “A to Z” knowledge bank on safety and health topics are staples of the agency in 2014. The OSHA web site received more than 205 million visitor sessions in fiscal year 2012. In FY 2013, 206,750 calls were made to the OSHA 800 number, 26,899 questions were submitted by email, 735,126 students were taught thought the agency’s outreach training program, and 811,807 OSHA publications were provided, according to OSHA.