If OSHA’s fiscal year 2013 budget ever gets formal approval by Congress, part of the budget plan calls for cost-savings by consolidating three of the agency’s ten regional offices. States the FY 2013 Congressional Budget Justification for OSHA: “In an effort to streamline agency operations, OSHA is reorganizing its regional structure and jurisdictional authority from its current operation of 10 Regional Offices (ROs) to seven.
I was reading something yesterday where the writer described a person as being at that point in their life where they are saying, “been there, done that, is that all there is?” ISHN reader surveys have pointed out what’s already well-established: the EHS professional ranks are top-heavy with graying baby boomers beyond age 50.
According to the fiscal year 2013 Congressional Budget Justification document for OSHA, here are salary averages for agency personnel: Executive schedule (top officials in the executive branch) - OSHA average ES salary in FY2012 = $170,036. GM/GS grade employees - OSHA average GM/GS salary in FY 2012 = $84,959.
Climate change was the subject of a surprising amount of President Barack Obama’s remarks in his 20- minute Inaugural Address given at 11:55 am EST, January 21, 2013, on the steps of the United States Capitol. According to press reports, the President devoted more words to climate change than any other single issue in his address.
Positive thinking is deeply embedded in American culture, and in American business culture. I’ve worked with enough magazine publishers and advertising sales reps who would be seriously non-productive if not for their “can do, will do” spirit. But here is a counter-intuitive thought: Psychotherapist Albert Ellis, who died in 2007, was a pioneer of the negative path, and he once said the best way to address an uncertain future is to focus on the worst that can happen, instead of the best-case scenario.
According to the fiscal year 2013 Congressional Budget Justification document for OSHA, the agency proposes a total of $73,131,000 and 264 full-time employee equivalents (FTE) for federal compliance assistance, a decrease of $3,224,415 and 31 FTE below the FY 2012 enacted level. OSHA historically ramps up compliance assistance under Republican White House administrations, and de-emphasizes compliance assistance when Democrats control the White House.
According to the fiscal year 2013 Congressional Budget Justification for OSHA, the agency will be more transparent in divulging information to the next-of-kin of workplace fatality victims. OSHA has long been criticized by activists such as Alabama’s Ron Hayes, whose son was killed in a grain silo, of frustrating victims’ families by leaving them out of the information loop.
Everyone these days is talking about performance indicators for workplace safety. It’s widely understood that if you only measure injuries and follow OSHA injury/illness recordkeeping requirements you have a large blindspot in truly assessing how you safety processes are working, or not working. OSHA has its own set of measures.
A new study, funded by the Canadian Cancer Society, will examine the human and economic impact of workplace exposure to 44 known or suspected carcinogens and their links to 27 types of cancer. The study's main goals are to quantify - for the first time - how serious the problem is in Canada by estimating the number of new cancer cases and cancer deaths that can be attributed to workplace factors, and also to weigh the economic impact.
