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Printing Instructions

U.S. Department of Labor - Occupational Safety and Health Administration

Associated Builders and Contractors (ABC) - Central Ohio Chapter

ABC / OSHA Partnership for Construction Safety

Between the
United States Department of Labor
Occupational Safety and Health Administration
Region 5, Columbus Area Office
and the
Associated Builders and Contractors, Inc., Central Ohio Chapter

The United States Department of Labor Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) and the Associated Builders and Contractors, Inc., Central Ohio Chapter (ABC Central Ohio) mutually recognize the importance of providing a safe and healthful work environment for the nation’s construction workforce. In working together as partners, we are committed to achieving a reduction of injuries, illnesses and fatalities in the construction industry through means of open communication, promoting recognition for construction safety excellence, and sharing knowledge of the best industry technology, innovations and work practices that improve safety and health performance.

BACKGROUND/IDENTIFICATION OF PARTNERS
1. Background
  
  To facilitate our mutual goal of reducing occupational-related fatalities and serious injuries and illnesses within the construction industry, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) and the Associated Builders and Contractors, Inc., Central Ohio Chapter (ABC Central Ohio) have agreed to enter into a cooperative Partnership agreement which will effectively implement all facets of jobsite safety and health and achieve self-compliance through cooperative efforts from labor, management, and OSHA.
  
  This ABC / OSHA Partnership for Construction Safety [hereafter referred to
  as the ABC / OSHA Partnership] will provide assistance and incentives to
  construction contractors who voluntarily participate in the ABC National Safety
  Training and Evaluation Process (STEP) program and demonstrate implementation
  of effective safety and health programs.
  
  This Partnership is designed to address the hazards within the construction industry, and to promote and recognize contractors that have demonstrated an effective safety and health program. The Partnership agreement is an effective tool for ensuring safety on a variety of construction projects across the State of Ohio.
  
  The Partnership is consistent with OSHA’s long-range efforts to develop a contractor/government partnership approach to safety management. It allows for better use of OSHA resources and innovation in safety management and encourages more participation in the safety process from the construction community.
2. Partners
  1. Columbus, Ohio OSHA Area Office
  2. ABC Central Ohio and its members
PURPOSE/SCOPE

This partnering agreement was developed jointly by ABC Central Ohio and OSHA. The common objective and goal of the agreement is to provide a safe and healthful work environment for employees involved in the construction industry and to help prevent serious accidents and fatalities within the industry through increased training, implementation of best work practices, enhanced safety and health programs, and compliance with applicable OSHA standards and regulations. This initiative represents a voluntary agreement and affords a Partnership alternative to the traditional OSHA enforcement procedures.

According to 2006 data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), the construction industry had the highest number of fatal injuries of any industry sector in the United States. The fatality rate for construction workers was 10.9 per 100,000 employees compared with the manufacturing industry rate of 2.8. Construction has 21 percent of all worker fatalities but employs only seven percent of the workforce. The hazards associated with the construction industry are well documented. OSHA has identified the top four causes of fatalities: falls, being struck by equipment or machinery, electrocution, and caught-in/between equipment.

By focusing its efforts and utilizing the skills, knowledge and resources of OSHA, ABC Central Ohio and its partnered members expect to reduce exposure to hazards and the incidence of serious injuries and fatalities at construction projects across the State of Ohio. Increased communication between the stakeholders and the resultant mutual respect are additional benefits expected from this cooperative and voluntary partnership.
GOALS, STRATEGIES, AND MEASURES
1. Outcomes
  
  Outcomes of this Partnership will include:
  1. Reduction in partnered employers’ injuries, illnesses and fatalities;
  2. Increase in the number of contractors who are committed to improving the effectiveness of their safety and health management systems (SHMS) utilizing the OSHA Voluntary Protection Program (VPP) elements as a model;
  3. Development of a business/labor/government partnership approach to safety management; and
  4. Recognition of those contractors with exemplary safety and health management systems and effective site-specific safety and health plans.
2. Specific Goals
  
  The overall goal of the Partnership is to create a working relationship that focuses on preventing work-related fatalities, controlling or eliminating serious workplace hazards, and establishing a foundation for the development of an effective safety and health program. This Partnership will strive to achieve that goal by establishing a foundation of proactive measures which will include:
  1. Reducing the three-year average rate of recordable and lost-time injuries, illnesses, and fatalities affecting participant employers with a goal of achieving three-year average Days Away Restricted Transfer (DART) and Total Case Incidence (TCIR) rates 25 percent below the respective BLS rate for each company’s respective North America Industry Classification System (NAICS) code;
  2. Increasing the number of construction companies that commit to improving their SHMS utilizing OSHA’s VPP model by five percent; and
  3. Increasing the percentage of construction workers who have completed safety-related training each year.
  4. Complete a Partnership Success Story prior to the expiration of this agreement.
3. Strategies
  1. Conduct frequent job-site inspections with written summaries in order to provide continuous coverage and documentation over a wide variety of and perspective to site conditions.
  2. Conduct OSHA 10 and 30- Hour courses.
  3. Conduct other hazard-specific training on an as-needed basis.
  4. Require written safety and health programs in order to participate
  5. Encourage companies to pursue VPP by joining OSHA’s Challenge Program. ABC Central Ohio will commit to providing resources to assist member companies in this process, and to itself pursue becoming an OSHA VPP Challenge Administrator.
4. Measurement Systems
  1. The measurement system will use OSHA injuries and illnesses to determine the TCIR and DART rates for the participants and participant sites compared to the average for the construction industry using the latest available BLS data.
  2. Activity measures shall include the applicable number of construction workers trained. Intermediate measures will include the number of safety and health programs instituted, and the number of participants progressing through the STEP Program and pursuing VPP.
  3. Outcome measures will be gathered on a quarterly basis and will incorporate data to analyze the number of hours worked, number of injuries, illnesses and fatalities, and the number of serious violations found as a result of onsite audits, job-site inspections, and OSHA inspection activity.
  4. The total number of hazards documented during site inspections and corrected, in addition to a listing of improvements made to safety and health programs, will be gathered.
  5. Actions specific to NFPA 70E (work on live electrical equipment, training records, PPE availability and use, permits) will be documented.
  6. Measurement factors will be compiled quarterly by ABC Central Ohio.
ANNUAL EVALUATION

The program will be evaluated on an annual basis through the use of the Strategic Partnership Annual Evaluation Format measurement system as specified in Appendix C of CSP 03-02-002, OSHA Strategic Partnership Program for Worker Safety and Health Directive.

It will be the responsibility of ABC Central Ohio to gather required participant data to evaluate and track the overall results and success of the Partnership program. This data will be shared with OSHA.

It will be the responsibility of OSHA to conduct, write and submit an annual evaluation to Region 5.
BENEFITS
1. ABC / OSHA Partnership participants will receive special recognition in ABC’s publications.
2. Upon acceptance as a ABC / OSHA Partnership participant, the OSHA Columbus Area Director will provide certain incentives to participants:
  1. After receiving a successful comprehensive compliance inspection (programmed or unprogrammed) in the Columbus Area Office (AO) jurisdiction, participating ABC / OSHA Partnership employers who are general contractors will be removed from the University of Tennessee Report construction resources analysis in that AO’s jurisdiction on which that contractor may appear for the next 12 months provided that:
    
    a) Participating ABC / OSHA Partnership employers can demonstrate that they have safety and health responsibility for their jobsites, which includes subcontractors job-site control;
    
    b) Participating ABC / OSHA P Partnership employers require their subcontractors on site to have written comprehensive, site-specific safety and health programs, where practical;
    
    c) On multiple prime work sites, during OSHA inspections, ABC / OSHA Partnership participants and their subcontractors will not be inspected unless there is in-plain-view evidence that their employees or those they control are exposed to serious hazards, such as falls, struck-by, caught-in-between or electrocution hazards.
  2. After receiving a successful comprehensive compliance inspection (programmed or unprogrammed) in the Columbus AO jurisdiction, participating ABC / OSHA Partnership employers who are subcontractors will not be inspected under the University of Tennessee Report construction resources analysis in that AO’s jurisdiction for the next 12 months.
  3. If cited by OSHA, all ABC / OSHA Partnership participants in good standing will be eligible for the maximum good faith, size and history penalty reductions currently available in the OSHA Field Inspection Reference Manual (FIRM) CPL 2.103. ABC / OSHA Partnership participants will be granted maximum penalty reductions allowed in the OSHA FIRM for good faith and history. In cases where a partner’s total penalty reduction is 100 percent or more, the minimum penalty provisions of the FIRM will apply (see FIRM, ChapterIV.C.2.b).
OSHA INSPECTIONS AND QUALITY ASSURANCE

OSHA will conduct planned quality assurance inspections of up to 10% of the Partnership participants. These inspections may be non-enforcement inspections, provided serious hazards are corrected immediately. Inspections conducted in response to complaints, Local Emphasis Programs, or referrals may qualify as quality assurance inspections at the discretion of OSHA if, in addition to addressing the complaint/referral item(s), the compliance officer completes the focused inspection protocol for the worksite.

Participants belonging to ABC Central Ohio will remain subject to OSHA inspections and investigations in accordance with agency procedures.
EMPLOYEE/EMPLOYER RIGHTS AND RESPONSIBILITIES

This Partnership does not preclude employees and/or employers from exercising any right provided under the OSH Act (or, for federal employees, 29 CFR 1960), nor does it abrogate any responsibility to comply with rules and regulations adopted pursuant to the Act.
PARTNERSHIP MANAGEMENT AND OPERATION
1. ABC Central Ohio:
  1. ABC has implemented a program to assist its member construction companies in evaluating their safety and health program performance and their safety and health training programs. This program is known as the Safety Training and Evaluation Process, or “STEP” program. The ABC National Office processes all applications and, in turn, presents awards to qualified applicants.
  2. The STEP program was created by the ABC National Safety Committee in 1992. The National Safety Committee is composed of construction safety professionals drawn from ABC member companies throughout the United States. Along with this national committee, ABC has over 60 safety committees formed in various chapters across the United States and Guam. Safety committee members at these local chapters identify and provide safety courses and seminars on safety compliance programs pertinent to their geographical area. These committees convey concerns, stance on issues and other items of construction safety and health interest to the National Safety Committee.
  3. Partnership Steering Committee from the National Safety Committee will oversee the activities of the STEP ABC / OSHA Partnership Incentive program. The Partnership Steering Committee will be comprised of safety and health representatives from ABC member companies. The Committee will review and approve or disapprove Platinum applications.
  4. The STEP program has four award levels. The Bronze, Silver, and Gold awards are based on self-evaluation scores and are administered by ABC. The fourth category, Platinum, will be open to those companies whose achievements in the area of worksite safety are, certifiably, the best of the best. Acceptance into the ABC / OSHA Partnership level will require additional validation of safety and health program efficacy through an on-site comprehensive inspection. Contractors which are accepted into the ABC / OSHA Partnership level will receive incentives from OSHA, as listed in Section V of this document.
  5. Description of the STEP program:
    
    a) It is implemented in two phases:
    
    (1) First phase is the completion of the STEP application. ABC National will distribute applications to construction contractor members. Typically, distribution is in January or February of each year. The application consists of a two-part form. Part One of the form requests safety and health statistical data. This data is found on summary OSHA Injury and Illness Logs. Part Two of the form is the self-evaluation section. Here, contractors answer a series of questions related to the safety program; each response has a numerical rating. Responses from questions are totaled, providing a self-evaluation rating.
    
    (2) The second phase of the STEP program is the evaluation of applicants and the distribution of certificates. Application evaluation is conducted at the ABC National office. Data from each application is keyed into ABC National’s database. This includes information from the applicant’s Summary OSHA Injury and Illness Log, employee work-hours from the noted calendar year, as well as the self-evaluation score. While Summary OSHA Injury and Illness Log data are collected from all STEP participants, this data will be used for evaluation purposes only for Platinum award level applicants; self evaluation scores are used to determine the award levels of Bronze, Silver and Gold.
    
    b) Applicants seeking ABC / OSHA Partnership status will have additional criteria to satisfy. ABC / OSHA Partnership applicants must:
    
    (1) Submit their Summary OSHA Injury and Illness Log and have an occupational injury & illness recordable rate (total case per BLS formula) below the average for their Industry.
    
    (2) Participants with limited numbers of employees, less than 50 and/or 100,000 hours worked will be allowed to use the best 3 out of the most recent 4 years’ injury/illness experience.
2. The ABC Central Ohio is responsible for the following program monitoring activities:
  1. Periodic reviews by ABC Central Ohio chapter activities to ensure that program requirements are met.
  2. Reviews will include random on-site verification of ABC / OSHA Partnership participants to validate Partnership program administration;
  3. Termination of a participating contractor’s status if findings indicate unacceptable performance or submission of falsified documentation;
  4. Providing recommendations to the ABC National Safety Committee for program improvements.
  5. Information submitted by contractors as part of the application or renewal process, as well as information obtained by virtue of the contractor's application or participation in the program, will be held in strict confidence within the confines of the partnership program. However, in event of an OSHA inspection, such information that is relevant to any element of the investigation and normally is available will be provided to OSHA upon request.
  6. As soon as practicable, ABC Central Ohio will notify the Columbus AO of the identity of those contractors who have achieved ABC / OSHA Partnership Partnership status, and of any member company who is pursuing VPP.
3. Participating Companies will be responsible to:
  1. Go beyond OSHA’s minimum requirements, and further reduce exposure to fall, struck by, caught in-between and electrical hazards.
  2. Implement a fall protection program ensuring that a series of reasonable steps are taken to cause elimination or control of the injurious effects of an unintentional falls while accessing or working at heights over six feet.
  3. Provide for employee involvement in the safety and health program, for example, participation in self-audits, site inspections, job hazard analyses, safety and health program reviews, safety training, and mishap investigations;
  4. Show evidence of effective employee training for avoidance of hazards specific to the contractor’s trade(s);
  5. Provide construction site supervisors with training equivalent to the OSHA 10-Hour construction safety course;
  6. Designate safety personnel who, through training and experience, are able to recognize work hazards and have the authority to take prompt corrective action. Training curriculum equivalent to the OSHA 30-Hour Construction Safety course will be deemed to be satisfactory;
  7. Have no Willful violations in the last three years;
  8. Have no Repeated violations in the last two years;
  9. Have no fatalities or catastrophes within the last two years.
  10. Ensure compliance with OSHA’s Electrical Safe Work Practices (29 CFR 1910. 331-335) when working on live electrical equipment, including training and the availability and use of personal protective equipment. A permitting system will be implemented to oversee the implementation of appropriate protective measures prior to exposure. (NFPA 70E can be used as a guide)
4. OSHA will:
  1. Participate as available in the quarterly Partnership Committee meetings.
  2. Designate an experienced safety and health specialist to serve as a resource and liaison for partnership participants.
  3. Give priority to the ABC Central Ohio participants when technical assistance is needed.
  4. Audit the quarterly reports/documents and make recommendations for improvements in meeting Partnership Goals.
  5. Conduct inspections in accordance with section VI of this partnership.
  6. Use telephone and fax to handle all other inquiries except in cases of reported serious injuries. When an inspection is deemed necessary, a copy of the complaint will be provided to the ABC Central Ohio.
    ABC / OSHA Partnership participants will receive unprogrammed inspections only in response to reports of imminent danger, fatalities/catastrophes, observed serious hazards, referrals, and signed formal complaints.
  7. Not issue citations for other-than-serious violations for all ABC / OSHA Partnership participants, provided the violations are abated immediately.
  8. Not include ABC / OSHA Partnership members in OSHA inspections of non-participant employers unless the compliance officer documents that the ABC / OSHA Partnership participants are responsible for, or has employees exposed to, hazards listed in B.1. C.
Termination
1. A contractor's participation will be terminated and OSHA will be informed of the termination if one or more of the following occurs:
  1. An inspection reveals a significant deviation from program criteria;
  2. The contractor has falsified information on the application or supporting records; and
  3. The Contractor takes other such actions that may be determined to be grounds for termination by ABC Central Ohio.
2. Prior to final termination of a contractor's status, the following will occur:
  1. The contractor will be notified in writing of the intent to terminate;
  2. The notice will include an explanation of the reasons for termination;
  3. The contractor will have an opportunity to reply to the written notice within a period of thirty (30) days; and,
  4. The contractor will have the right to make an appearance before the Central Ohio Chapter.
3. ABC Central Ohio, in conjunction with OSHA, will have the authority to reinstate the contractor if it determines that the contractor's experience was unusual and not necessarily inconsistent with a sound safety and health program. In this event, another comprehensive inspection will be conducted.
4. Any contractor may terminate participation in the program at any time.
5. The Partnership pilot shall have an initial term of one year and may be renewed if all parties concur.
6. Any party to the Partnership may withdraw from the agreement at any time after submitting written notification of intent to the other partner.
7. If OSHA chooses to withdraw its participation in the Partnership, the entire agreement is terminated. Any signatory may also propose modification or amendment of the agreement.

Amended and Agreed this day, September 18, 2008
_________________________ Deborah Zubaty Area Director U.S. Department of Labor OSHA Columbus Area Office	________________________ Jon Howard 2008 Board Chair Associated Builders & Contractors, Inc. Central Ohio Chapter
_________________________ Mary R. Tebeau President Associated Builders & Contractors, Inc. Central Ohio Chapter

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