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Outside Leveraging: Creating Relationships Through Partnerships with Stakeholders

Mini Case Study - "Maine Top 200" – OSHA Shifts its Focus From Regulations To Outcomes

An Agency Under Attack Develops a New Strategy

Background:

The Occupational Safety and Health Administration was established by the Nixon Administration in 1970. Its mission is to improve health and safety in the American workplace. Although it was run by Republican – appointed administrators during 18 of its first 25 years, it has been bitterly criticized by many Republicans (and by some Democrats as well) for its procedures. Its critics call it arrogant, rigid, more interest in promulgating regulations and issuing citations than in real problem solving, and they cite numerous anecdotes of seemingly absurd OSHA regulations stringently administered by narrow-minded OSHA bureaucrats.

OSHA defenders argue just as strongly that the agency has been a savior for American workers. They refer to studies showing that OSHA is responsible for saving 6,000 lives each year, that its regulations and oversight role have directly led to major decreases in injuries and illnesses on the job.

Whatever one’s views of OSHA, the nation needs a set of standards for workplace health and safety. Without such standards, any company spending money to improve its health and safety is potentially at a competitive disadvantage: it is raising its costs for improvements that may not be felt by customers. What isn’t clear, however, is the best way to achieve health and safety improvements. Eliminate OSHA? Privatize its functions? Cut its funding and reduce its regulations? Maintain its current role and approach? The OSHA office in the State of Maine has come up with a different solution, one that is working well for all parties.

Turning Away From the Old Approach

In 1992, Maine’s OSHA managers and staff took a hard look at the results they were getting, and they weren’t pleased with what they saw. Over the preceding decade, Maine employers had one of the worst accident rates in the country. In 1990, the state’s illness and injury rate was 63% higher than the rate for the country as a whole. The state was highest (worst) in the country in worker compensation claims per capita, it was the highest in costs per claim, it had one of the worst records for work days lost to injury.

Sources: Occupational Health and Safety, 11/94; Occupational Hazards, 11/94; Maine Top 200 Experimental Targeting Program Report, 10/14/94; Bill Freeman, OSHA Maine office; Common Sense Government, Third Report of the National Performance Review; Washington Post; 7/23/95, "Regulators To Consultants," in Government Executive, 11/95; "The New OSHA," in Government Executive. 5/97, Davis Layne, OSHA regional office.

Copyright © 1997, Russ Linden & Associates

Further, the staff realized that they weren’t getting the results they sought from their inspections of Maine employers. They had done numerous "wall-to-wall" inspections of large companies, writing up hundreds or thousands of citations for health and safety problems and collecting large sums in fines….yet, when their inspectors returned several years later they saw little if any improvement in the workplace.

One of the most worrisome findings was the lack of a correlation between the number of hazards that OSHA inspectors found in the workplace, and reduction in injuries on the job. In other words, OSHA staff were following their regulations and inspections manuals very well, but that still wasn’t producing an impact on workplace health and safety. It was a classic case of "the operation was a success, and the patient died." Indeed, the Maine office was the winner of one of OSHA’s "gold medals," recognized by the national office for detecting the most safety violations, issuing the most citations, levying the most fines. Yet the state ranked at the bottom in terms of workplace safety and health.

Labor unions complained that the employers were not taking strong corrective action, and employers complained loudly to Congress about the tedious OSHA regs and seemingly absurd OSHA rules that drove them crazy. It was a "lose-lose" situation, and the OSHA leadership in Maine decided it was time to take a different approach.

"We stepped back to look at the results of our work, and we realized we weren’t getting the outcomes we wanted," recalled OSHA’s area director in Maine, Bill Freeman. "We were finding literally thousands of individual workplace hazards in our major inspections, and then we’d come back eight years later and find no change in overall safety and health conditions. Focusing on our regulations, on the individual hazards we detected, wasn’t helping us achieve the mission. We needed to come up with a systematic approach to the problem, and to do that required involvement of the employees on the worksites."

Freeman noted other factors that contributed to OSHA’s problems:

• a fragmented organizational structure that separated the health from thesafety inspectors.
• separate inspections by the office’s health and safety inspectors of the sameemployers; the two inspection units weren’t coordinating and communicating the results of their inspections because they saw themselves in competition with each other.
• a staff focus on producing outputs (number of inspections, of citations issued, of fines levied, etc.), because that’s how they were measured.
• a reward system that forced OSHA compliance officers to find and cite as many hazards as possible; they had no discretion to issue warnings, and if they found no violations during an inspection, the assumption was that they weren’t looking hard enough.
• employers who didn’t understand OSHA’s detailed regulations, resented OSHA’s presence and saw the relationship as necessarily combative.
• a traditional inspection approach that was very time consuming. A "wall-to-wall" inspection of a large employer would involve 6-9 inspectors, working full time for three months or more on site, then working an additional three months in the office preparing the report. The reports frequently led to litigation, which could occupy inspectors for another 6-24 months.

Moving to A Different Approach: "Maine Top 200"

In response to the discouraging results of its self examination, the OSHA office began a program called Maine Top 200, a new approach to improving workplace health and safety. Early in 1993 the office identified the 200 Maine employers with the highest number of serious workplace injuries and illnesses. The list included most of the state’s largest companies—paper mills, hospitals, nursing homes, retail stores, restaurant chains, including such well-known organizations as L.L. Bean and Friendly’s Ice Cream. OSHA gave the 200 a choice. They could join Maine Top 200, a voluntary program in which they would learn to do self-inspections and take responsibility for planning and implementing health and safety improvements. Or they could opt for the existing relationship, in which OSHA would continue playing its "gotcha" role, would place the company on a "primary inspection list" and give it very rigorous and frequent inspections. If they opted to be part of Maine Top 200, OSHA wouldn’t levy fines for safety violations as long as the company was making a good-faith effort to eliminate the hazards.

198 of the 200 chose to go to the self inspection route. Because of mergers, acquisitions, and the fact that some didn’t meet the requirements for the program, there were 190 employers in the program as of fall, 1995. These 190 included 127,000 employees working at 1,245 locations. The 190 companies represented only 1% of Maine businesses: however, they accounted for 30% of the state’s workforce, and 45% of comprehensible injuries, illnesses, and fatalities.

How The Program Works

Those participating in Maine Top 200 had to develop their own proactive, comprehensive plan for improving health and safety at the workplace. OSHA identified the outcomes -- health and safety, elimination of workplace hazards -- and asked employers to determine how to meet those outcomes. It didn’t micro manage the companies in any way, but it did require them to ensure extensive employee involvement in writing and carrying out the plan. Those participating in the Top 200 program had to do the following:

1. Show how the employer would deal with the injuries and illnesses that occurred in the workplace.
2. Conduct a baseline inspection of the premises, using OSHA health and safety standards,
3. Develop, within 30 days of the baseline, a plan to abate the hazards identified during the baseline inspection
4. Eliminate the hazards within 12 months, and
5. Report each quarter on its progress

OSHA’s role changes dramatically for those in the Top 200 program. The wall separating health and safety inspectors is coming down. Inspectors are working on cross-functional teams, focusing on analysis of the systems and programs the companies put into place to find and eliminate hazards. Rather than try to find hazards, the inspectors are shifting that responsibility to the employers (where it belongs, according to OSHA’s enabling legislation), and are adding value through their new roles of teacher, coach, analyst, feedback provider.

Thus, OSHA’s relationships are turned around in the Top 200 program. OSHA is no longer in the "gotcha" mode. Rather it acknowledges that "nobody knows the workplace better than the employees" in Bill Freeman’s words, that those best positioned to find work hazards are the employees, not OSHA inspectors. OSHA staff still do inspections on the Maine Top 200 companies, but it is a monitoring inspection of the self-inspection process. They randomly select certain sites to visit, review the employer’s plan, and determine how well the company is following through on its plan. Most employees and employers view it as a helpful step.

Further, the Top 200 program is based on a key assumption, that employers will take positive action to find and eliminate hazards if given an opportunity, and an incentive to do so. The incentive in this case is the removal of an adversarial relationship with OSHA, one that was time consuming and expensive for employers and for OSHA

Results To Date:

Results can be summarized in quantitative as well as qualitative terms. Here are the numbers:

First Two Years of the Top 200 Program

• Employees in the 190 participating companies found 180,390 hazards in their workplaces.

• Participating companies corrected over 126,270 of those hazards (70%)

• 65% of the participating employers are seeing reductions in overall injury and illness rates since joining the program.

• Participating companies experienced a 47.3% decrease in compensable claims for worker’s compensation; the overall average for all Maine employers was a 27% decrease over the same time period.

• Many companies reported significant reductions in the number of lost work days due to injury or illness. The following data on lost work days are typical:

In the 8 Years Prior To the Top 200 Program:

• OSHA inspectors found 34,000 violations in their inspections of thousands of Maine workplaces, many of which went uncorrected after OSHA’s inspections.

Four Years After Program Began:

• OSHA staff did 447 follow-up inspections of the 190 participating companies (a walk-through to see if the hazards identified by company employees were eliminated, plus a review of the companies’ efforts to follow their own plans): only 3 companies "failed" (in the sense that they didn’t follow through on their own plans, didn’t clean up their hazards).

• 120 participating companies have "graduated" from the program, meaning that they followed through on their plans, corrected all hazards, and did all that OSHA asked them

• Participating companies continue to show their results (e.g., finding and eliminating hazards) demonstrated in the first two years.

In qualitative terms, the program is also proving a success. Freeman finds that the team approach is increasing communications among the previously separated specialists. Since the employers are asked to take a comprehensive approach to the abatement of hazards, OSHA staff must break down their own organizational walls and work cross-functionally as well if they are to provide meaningful analysis and assessment of employer efforts.

Previously, when inspectors saw hazards during an inspection they noted it in their reports. It was then up to their supervisor to decide whether to cite the company; the inspector went on to the next inspection. "Our inspectors never saw the results of their work," noted Freeman. "Someone else took over after they left. And when we did a follow-up inspection, it was done by another inspector!" Now, inspectors follow the company from start to finish; they have a sense of ownership for the results. And plant managers, who used to view inspectors as nothing more than meddling bureaucrats, are starting to gain some respect for them.

Further, OSHA staff are taking more of an outcomes approach to their job. No longer focused on citations, fines and specific regulations as the ends to be achieved, they are learning to be flexible on the means they use while remaining very focused on the desired outcome of workplace health and safety. As one OSHA compliance officer remarked, "We’re finally getting the chance to be safety professionals."

Perhaps most important, the approaches being taken by the participating employers are likely to have lasting impact. Using the traditional adversarial approach, OSHA inspectors saw little improvement in overall workplace health and safety. They identified hazards one at a time, companies often argued and sued when they disagreed, and there was no joint effort toward improvement. Under the Top 200 approach, it is in the employer’s interest to develop comprehensive plans for improvement, plans that seek root causes of problems rather than the old one-problem-at-a-time approach. And with the active involvement of employees (and their unions), workers are at no risk when they identify problems and propose solutions.

What about the understandable concerns that some companies will cut corners using the self inspection approach, writing beautiful safety plans but not following through with them? That’s a risk, but OSHA-Maine has shown it will deal with it. When one of the participating Maine companies reneged on its commitment and subjected its employees to unsafe and unsanitary conditions, OSHA stepped in quickly with citations and penalties.

Customer Feedback

The program isn’t inexpensive to participating companies. "They [the company employees] were much more thorough than any OSHA inspector could have been, because they know the mills so well," according to Glenn Rondeau, manager of safety services at Bowater Inc.’s paper mills. The employee inspection teams at Bowater mills learned that many of the violations they uncovered had been identified by OSHA in an earlier inspection; those hazards hadn’t been corrected by the company, or had reappeared after being corrected. Stan Higgins, director of human resources and administration at a Bowater mill commented that his company preferred the self-inspection approach because "it’s better to invest in safety and training [to detect and correct violations] for our employees, than pay OSHA fines."

Skip Pratt, safety and security manager for S.D. Warren Co., also praises the program, in part because of its educational value. "In the past there were very few people on site who understood OSHA regulations. I knew this was going to drive a lot of people to become familiar with safety and health…Before [Maine Top 200] we were fairly safety conscious, but there were a lot of things that we didn’t realize were safety violations."

Carl Turner, also of S.D. Warren, credits the program for a significant drop in his company’s injury rate. "There is a direct connection between the 200 Program and the drop in the accident rate; we spent 18 years under the old OSHA program and nothing happened." Under the [Top 200] program, that’s changed, big time. Five in-house inspection teams at the S.D. Warren paper mill found 18,000 violations, 300 of which were potentially life threatening. "It [Top 200] focused our efforts," says Tina Fernald, human resource manager at the company.

In addition to reducing the hazards and injuries, the program improves company performance by bringing labor and management together in a constructive endeavor. As an official at Georgia Pacific notes, "We have joint communications and meet together. I never thought I’d see the day."

OSHA-Wide Implementation of the Maine 200 Strategy

In June, 1995, President Clinton announced that the Maine Top 200 concept (which is now called the Cooperative Compliance Program, or CCP) would be expanded to the rest of the country. Wisconsin has begun using a similar model; the injury rates in the targeted Wisconsin companies dropped 30% in its first two years. By 1996, OSHA had implemented the CCP in nine more states. It was successful there, and was extended to the rest of the country in December, 1997.

The CCP operates on the same principles as Maine 200. In addition, it takes a more targeted approach to its work. In the past, OSHA was as likely to inspect employers with good health and safety records (as measured by the number of workplace illnesses and injuries) as those with poor ones. Using the new, more targeted approach, employers with high rates of illness and injuries (meaning twice the national average or more) are placed on a High Rate Inspection Targeting List, which means they automatically receive an intensive, time-consuming OSHA inspection. There are over 12,099 employers now on this list. From the list, OSHA puts employers into one of three groups:

Group I: employers that join the CCP. They have only a 30% likelihood of being inspected; OSHA is recognizing them for their voluntary cooperation by reducing the inspection burden on them.

Group II: small employers (e.g., under 100 employees) that join the CCP. They will have only a 10% chance of being inspected, as long as they use OSHA consulting services.

Group III: employers choosing not to participate in the CCP. They remain on OSHA’s Primary Inspection list, which means OSHA continues to do thorough inspections of them.

Approximately 500 employers with the highest illness and injury rates, and with a history of very serious violations, are not being offered the CCP. They continue to receive intensive safety and health inspections.

Employers with high rates of workplace illnesses and injuries that join CCP are expected to work collaboratively with their employees and with OSHA in finding, preventing, and ameliorating hazards. If they do receive an inspection it will be shorter than in the past because many of the workplace hazards will have been identified and corrected by the participating employer. If problems are found during the inspections the penalties will be lower (as long as the employer has made a clear effort to support the CCP). And they will not be cited for non-serious violations that are promptly corrected during inspections.

Implications of the New Cooperative Compliance Approach

The change from activity focus to outcomes focus is evident in other OSHA changes. One of the most powerful and important changes: performance measures of OSHA staff. OSHA field offices are now judged on how well they help to reduce injury and illness rates in their jurisdictions, not on the number of citations issued (as was true in the past). And this change in measurement is having an impact. In 1996, OSHA conducted 43% fewer inspections than it did in 1994, a record low 24,024. Yet reported cases of workplace injuries and illnesses fell 3% during that time period.

As far as the Maine OSHA offices, Freeman says his staff would never go back to the old approach. "There was some resistance at first. Going to the team approach was new, it wasn’t easy for some to let go of their special expertise area, and it was difficult for some staff to understand how they would be measured and evaluated. With the old approach, they knew we went ‘by the numbers – number of inspections, number of citations, etc. With the new approach we have to create different evaluation methods. But the staff has responded very well. They like working in teams, they like having more

discretion in how they manage their time, they like their new roles, and they like the results we’re getting from the new program."

Maine Top 200 - - Critical Success Factors

• Education and training -- of employees at participating businesses (who need to learn OSHA regs., what constitutes a violation, etc.), and of OSHA staff.

• Requiring employers to actively involve their employees in planning and implementing the program.

• Changing the role of OSHA inspectors: focusing on training, monitoring, analysis, and using citations and fines as a means to an end, not the end itself; applying tough enforcement as needed, but only after a company has shown it isn’t serious about using self inspection.

• Using a targeted approach. Maine Top 200 involves only 1% of the state’s businesses, but that 1% includes 30% of the workforce, and almost half of the illnesses and injuries occurring in the state.

• Putting a focus on preventing injuries and illnesses (not just on compliance with the law).

• Customizing the plan -- dealing with a huge company like Boise Cascade requires a different approach than when working with a nursing home.

• Overall, the key to success is the formation of partnerships -- between employers, organized labor, employees, and OSHA.

• As with all major changes, senior managers must be involved and committed -- both in the participating companies and in the OSHA office.

Real Choices for the Public to Work with OSHA

In policing the nation's workplaces, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) traditionally relied on inspections and after-the-fact fines for violations. The Maine Top 200 Program took a radically different approach. It encouraged employers to identify hazards themselves and take corrective action before they lead to injury or illness.

The Maine Top 200 Program started in 1993 after OSHA examined state workers' compensation data and recognized that enforcement efforts were not targeted to the firms registering the highest worker compensation claims. The mismatch was particularly troubling because of the state's relatively high incidence of hazards, injuries, and illness. The employer could choose to work with OSHA by identifying and correcting hazards themselves and also by implementing comprehensive safety and health programs to sustain the effort. The company's other choice was an increase in traditional OSHA inspections. Nearly all the firms chose to enter into partnership with OSHA.

The Maine Top 200 Program was selected for the 1995 Innovations in American Government Award sponsored by the Ford Foundation, the Council for Excellence in Government, and the John F. Kennedy School of Harvard University. In a set of May 1995 recommendations from the President, Vice President and the National Partnership for Reinventing Government (NPR) OSHA was asked to:

...expand the most successful features of this program (Maine 200) nationwide. These successful elements include:

1. using worksite-specific data to help identify high-hazard workplaces,

2. providing information to employers about effective safety and health programs,

3. offering employers a choice in how they want to work with OSHA (an opportunity to partner),

4. ensuring management commitment and worker involvement, and

5. modifying enforcement policies for high-performance employers.

OSHA set out on a course to achieve this task. Despite set backs and challenges all five of the above successful elements are integral parts of OSHA programs today and will remain so in the future.

With the success of the Maine 200 pilot OSHA set out to further test its use of worksite-specific data via multiple pilots including the Alabama 4, Dakota First, New Hampshire Focused 50, Wisconsin 200, and Florida Focused 50. With lessons learned in mind OSHA then developed an agency-wide directive entitled, " OSHA High Injury/Illness Rate Targeting and Cooperative Compliance Programs," which became known as the CCP program.

Cooperative Compliance Program (CCP)

Background: The previous OSHA targeting system used data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics to identify high rate industries as defined by Standard Industrial Classification Codes (SICs). Employers in those industries were then randomly selected for inspection. With this system, OSHA did not know beforehand if the worksite being inspected was one with a high injury and illness rate, or one with a low injury and illness rate. Regardless of the employer's site-specific rate, OSHA conducted an inspection.

In view of these limitations, OSHA explored the use of worker's compensation data to target specific worksites with high rates. This led to the concept of a cooperative approach to compliance with the implementation of pilot programs in Maine, New Hampshire, and Wisconsin. These programs offered employers identified as having the highest number of workers compensation claims an opportunity to work with OSHA to identify and correct workplace hazards and reduce injuries and illnesses in their workplaces. Because of the success of these programs, CCPs were developed in each Region. Nine state-wide CCPs are operating today utilizing workers' compensation data and/or high hazard SIC data. Problems arose however, with the use of worker's compensation data. The data was not consistent among states, and the use of the number of compensation cases as the basis of selection was biased against employers with a large number of workers.

In May 1995, the President announced, "The New OSHA: Reinventing Worker Safety and Health." The "New OSHA" focused on the implementation of strategic "data-driven" initiatives specifically aimed at reducing workplace injuries and illnesses, as was demonstrated by the early CCPs. In January 1996, OSHA outlined the new requirements for the strategic CCP initiatives. The first and foremost requirement was that the initiative be driven by site-specific data. This would give OSHA the ability to target establishments with high rates of injuries/illnesses based on actual data from that worksite.

The use of uniform site-specific rate information made available by OSHA's Data Initiative for targeting specific worksites under the CCP would effectively address the above problems. With site-specific data now available, OSHA expanded its CCP to all of the Federal enforcement states.

The primary objectives of the CCP were:

A. To establish a site-specific inspection targeting system for the highest LWDII rate employers.

B. To reduce work-related injuries and illnesses in manufacturing and certain other industries that experience the highest lost work day injury and illness (LWDII) rates through the identification and correction of hazards.

C. To provide eligible employers with an opportunity to work cooperatively with OSHA to improve their workplace safety and health conditions, qualify for placement on a lower priority inspection targeting list, identify and correct workplace hazards, and develop and/or improve a comprehensive workplace safety and health program.

D. To leverage limited OSHA resources.

Employer Requirements for the CCP were to:

1. Identify and correct hazards,

2. Work toward a significant reduction of injuries and illnesses,

a. In some cases the reduction of an employer's reported LWDII rate will occur swiftly. OSHA recognizes however, that in other circumstances reduction will be a gradual process. In fact, during the initial phases of identifying and correcting hazards and implementing a safety and health program an employer may find that its reported rate increases. This may occur because, as an employer improves its program, worker awareness and thus reporting of injuries and illnesses may increase. Over time, however, the employer's LWDII rate should decline if the employer has put into place an effective program.

b. OSHA did not set an LWDII-rate-reduction goal for employers. OSHA is expecting employers to experience a decline in their rates over time. The degree to which a rate is reduced will depend on the employer's efforts and the nature of the industry and the type of hazards prevalent in that industry.

3. Implement or improve a comprehensive safety and health program as set forth in the OSHA 1989 Safety and Health Program Management Guidelines; Issuance of Voluntary Guidelines

4. Involve workers in the identification and correction of hazards,

5. Involve workers in the structure and operation of the site's safety and health program

6. Maintain policies and programs that encourage the reporting of hazards to the employer for corrective action,

7. Provide OSHA with information from its Annual Injury and Illness Log (OSHA 200) each year.

8. Establishments with 100 or fewer workers (and no more than 500 workers controlled by the employer) have an additional option; they can commit to requesting outside assistance in the form of the OSHA Consultation Program from the State

9. Contractors: The host employer shall ensure that appropriate information is exchanged with the contractor(s) about safety and health hazards, controls, safety and health rules, and emergency procedures.

CCP Agreement:

In return for making the CCP agreement, these establishments would be removed

from the primary inspection list and placed on a secondary or tertiary list (for smaller establishments utilizing consultation services). The secondary and tertiary lists provide for a reduced chance of inspection (no more than 3/10 for a secondary list establishment and 1/10 for a tertiary list establishment) over a two-year period. Moreover, no inspection under the CCP will be scheduled until at least May 4th, 1998.

Interim Plan for Inspection Targeting (ITP)

Background:

On November 25, 1997, OSHA issued OSHA Instruction CPL 2-0.119, which

initiated the use of a new high hazard targeting system that included a partnership component, the Cooperative Compliance Program (CCP). This new system was driven by establishment-specific illness and injury data, which was made available by OSHA's Data Initiative.

On February 17, 1998, the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit stayed OSHA Instruction CPL 2-0.119, until the court could rule on the merits of the litigation challenging the instruction. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce, National Association of Manufacturers, American Trucking Association, and the Food Marketing Institute had requested the stay, contending that OSHA Instruction CPL 2-0.119 did not comply with legal requirements.

In view of the delay likely to result during the litigation, and in order to have a national targeting inspection plan that will enable the Agency to fulfill its responsibilities under the statute, OSHA developed an interim plan to use until the court makes its determination. The interim plan identifies high hazard industries using Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) data at the four-digit Standard Industrial Classification (SIC) level at which BLS makes those data available. It includes

those industries with the highest average injury and illness rates for which establishment-specific data from the Data Initiative are available. The interim plan does not include a cooperative compliance component. OSHA notified the court of its intention to implement the interim plan for inspection targeting, and on April 6, 1998, the court clarified that its stay order of February 17, 1998, did not bar implementation of the interim plan.

On April 10, 1998, OSHA issued a notice implementing its interim plan for inspection targeting. Several questions from the field have necessitated this notice to clarify (1) size of inspection cycles, (2) Integrated Management Information System (IMIS) coding, (3) compliance officer verification of establishments' OSHA 200 log entries and SIC codes, and (4) how the interim targeting plan relates to Process Safety Management (PSM) Program-Quality-Verification (PQV) inspections.

Description of Interim Inspection Plan:

A. The interim targeting system targeted individual worksites with elevated rates in approximately 100 industries. The interim plan first uses BLS data for 1996 to identify the industries, as characterized by four-digit SIC Codes, with the highest LWDII rates, excluding construction, agriculture, mining, and public administration. (Construction is excluded because construction work-places are inspected pursuant to a separate administrative plan. Agriculture is excluded because most agricultural workplaces are subject to a low level of OSHA regulation, and inclusion of agricultural workplaces in OSHA's general administrative inspection plan would therefore result in inefficient use of

OSHA's resources. Mining is excluded because mining operations are subject to the Mine Safety and Health Act. Public administration is excluded because state and local governments are not subject to federal OSHA enforcement.) For those four-digit SIC Codes for which BLS did not report LWDII rates at the four-digit level (such as non-manufacturing), OSHA attributed the rate reported by BLS at the three-digit SIC level.

B. The interim inspection plan also used establishment-specific injury and illness data obtained in OSHA's 1996 data survey. OSHA surveyed 80,000 establish-ments having 60 or more workers in manufacturing and fourteen other industries for their 1996 injury and illness experience.

C. Of the 107 SICs with the highest LWDII rates based on the 1996 BLS data, 99 were included in OSHA's 1996 data survey. Eight SICs were not included in OSHA's 1996 data survey, and there are therefore no establishment-specific LWDII data for them. They are:

1. SIC 4512, Air Transportation, Scheduled, and 4513, Air Courier Services, were not included in the 1996 data survey because, at the time the survey was designed, OSHA was uncertain about the extent to which these industries included worksites that were within OSHA's jurisdiction. OSHA has since learned that these industries include auxiliary land operations that fall within OSHA's jurisdiction, and they are included in the 1998 survey, which will collect injury and illness data for calendar 1997.

2. The following SICs from the 1996 data survey were excluded for reasons such as a high concentration of public employers, regulation by other agencies, or a predominance of workplaces that are not readily subject to OSHA inspections or enforcement. They are: SIC 4111, Local and Suburban Transit; SIC 4119, Local Passenger Transportation, Not Else-where Classified; SIC 4131, Intercity and Rural Bus Transportation; SIC 4424, Deep Sea Domestic Transportation of Freight; SIC 4952, Sewerage Systems; and SIC 4959, Sanitary Services, Not Elsewhere

Classified.

D. The interim plan applied to establishments in the 99 four-digit SICs with an LWDII rate of 6.4 or higher for which OSHA has establishment-specific data. (If all SICs with an LWDII rate of 6.3 were included, a list of 109 SICs would have been generated.)

E. For each four-digit SIC on the list, each establishment in the SIC reporting in the 1996 survey an LWDII rate equal to or greater than the LWDII rate for that industry will be subject to inspection. An exception is made for establishments in SIC 8051, Skilled Nursing Care Facilities; SIC 8052, Intermediate Care Facilities; and SIC 8059, Nursing and Personal Care, Not Elsewhere Classified. This group of three industries contained many more establishments than the other SICs on the list. To avoid over concentration of inspections in this group of industries, only the top 20% of the establishments in these SICs with LWDII rates equal to or greater than the industry rate will be subject to inspection.

OSHA’s 3-pronged Approach to Deliver the Spirit of Maine 200 Nation-wide

Due primarily to the judicial set back OSHA faced with its CCP program, we have now developed a 3-pronged approach to expand the five most successful features of the Maine 200 program nationwide. This 3-pronged approach includes, 1). the Site Specific Targeting Plan, 2). OSHA Strategic Partnerships for Worker Safety and Health, and 3). a draft proposed Safety and Health Program rule written in plain language.

Site Specific Targeting (SST)

Background:

On April l0, 1998, OSHA issued a notice implementing its interim plan for

inspection targeting. The interim plan targeted for inspection establishments in 99 high hazard industries for which establishment-specific data from calendar year 1996 (1997 Data Initiative) were available. These industries were identified by using Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) data. On August 14, 1998, the April 10 notice was updated and amended in minor respects.

This program replaced the interim targeting plan with a new site specific targeting (SST) plan. The SST plan targets for inspection establishments with high injury and illness rates in calendar year 1997, as shown by data collected in the 1998 Data Initiative.

Description of the Site Specific Targeting (SST) Plan :

A. Inspection Targeting List. The SST plan targets individual worksites, as identified through the 1998 Data Initiative. The national average LWDII rate for private industry for 1997 was 3.3. The SST plan initially targets those worksites with a LWDII rate above 16.0 (over 2200 sites). However, an exception is made for establishments in Skilled Nursing Care Facilities (SIC 8051), Intermediate Care Facilities (SIC 8052), and Nursing and Personal Care, Not Elsewhere Classified (SIC 8059). This group of three industries contains many more establishments than the other SICs on the list. To avoid over-concentration of inspections in this group, only the top 20% of the establishments in these SICs with LWDII rates over 16.0 will be included on the list. All of the establishments on the Inspection Targeting List will be inspected by December 31, 1999, except as provided below in XI.B.

B. Supplemental Inspection List. If an Area Office will complete its inspections of all establishments with LWDII rates above 16.0 before December 31, 1999, it should estimate the number of additional programmed inspections it can conduct before that date. The Area Office should request a supplemental inspection list containing that number of additional establishments from the Office of Statistics through the Directorate of Compliance Programs. Additional establishments will be randomly generated by the National Office from those establishments reporting an LWDII rate between 10.0 and 16.0 in the 1998 Data Initiative. These establishments will be inspected using procedures defined in this notice.

To avoid over-concentration of the three SIC codes mentioned in paragraph X.A., establishments in these SIC codes will be pooled together with general industry firms. Then the needed number of establishments will be randomly selected from the pool, but the number of establishments from the three SIC codes may not exceed 10% of the number of establishments selected for an Area Office's Supplemental Inspection List.

C. Establishments with Fewer than 50 Workers. If an establishment to be inspected under the SST plan currently has fewer than 50 workers, the inspection will still be conducted, provided that it has more than ten workers and its LWDII rate is greater than 10.0 or if records are not available. See XIII. E., below for more details.

OSHA Strategic Partnerships for Worker Safety and Health (OSP)

Background:

Over the past several years, OSHA has been expanding on its already substantial

experience with voluntary programs by proposing and implementing various new cooperative initiatives in both the National Office and the field. These efforts have been designed to increase OSHA's impact on worker safety and health and, at the same time, to help OSHA change its way of conducting business from one of command and control to one that provides employers a real choice between partnership and a traditional enforcement arrangement. Employer groups,

labor organizations, individual employers, and employees and their representatives committed to developing and implementing strong and effective safety and health programs are finding OSHA to be a willing partner. Individual employers who fail to step up their efforts to protect their workers are continuing to face strong enforcement.

In the absence of clear agency policy on partnerships, however, program developers specified varying partnership requirements, qualifications, and OSHA incentives. Seeing a need to establish "boundaries" for partnership programs, OSHA formed an ad-hoc workgroup of agency staff. The workgroup's task was to develop a partnership framework that would ensure a basic level of consistency for these various cooperative efforts. The workgroup was particularly concerned to strike a balance between consistency and flexibility so that the established boundaries were not so rigid as to inhibit innovation. After several opportunities for review and comment by a group of senior National Office managers, Regional Administrators, State Programs, and agency stakeholders, the efforts of this ad-hoc workgroup evolved into this document.

This instruction states the agency's general policy on OSP programs but does not bind the agency to approve or disapprove any particular partnership proposal, limit the agency's discretion to enter into agreements that do not meet the criteria listed within this instruction, or create any rights in private parties.

Core Elements:

A. Situation Analysis

This element is the analysis that determines if a particular situation lends itself to the OSP approach. Examples of possible reasons for developing OSPs:

1. Expanding OSHA's reach to industries and workplaces where no intervention models presently exist, or where current intervention methods are inadequate.

2. Providing the agency with a means to address cutting edge issues.

3. Experimenting with abatement technologies that may prove to be as effective as or better than traditional methods.

4. Enabling OSHA to increase its emphasis on known or traditional hazards.

B. Identification of Partners

Priority for OSPs will be given to those programs that support OSHA's Strategic Plan and make the best use of agency resources. Accordingly, OSP programs normally will be developed with groups of employers and employees and/or their representatives in high-hazard workplaces or in workplaces with prevalent types of injuries and illnesses. OSHA, however, may partner with employers, employees, and/or their representatives from individual workplaces or low-hazard establishments if the originating office finds it will have a significant impact on the reduction of injuries and illnesses, e.g., partnering with a large establishment or conducting a pilot program to test the efficacy of an innovative abatement strategy.

C. Goal

A clearly defined goal statement identifies the safety and health issues the program is intended to address, expected program impact, measures to gauge success, time frames including a "sunset clause" completion date (which can be extended after careful evaluation), and OSHA's resource needs. Comprehensive OSPs must contain goals for employers, employees, and/or employee representatives that are clearly articulated,

measurable, and verifiable.

D. Measurement System

Comprehensive OSPs must contain a results-focused measurement system, developed at the outset of the program. This measurement system must:

1. Use activity, intermediate, and outcome measures (including measures to address the effectiveness of leveraging).

2. Identify baseline data corresponding to all summary line items on the OSHA-200 Log. Collecting this information, which is consistent with OSHA's data initiative, will help the agency compare the efficacy of various programs and develop impact data

that spans more than one agency activity.

Consider for inclusion in the measurement system such measures as changes in exposure levels, the experience modification rate (EMR), and comparisons of pre- and post-intervention scores obtained using appropriate tools, e.g., the Safety and Health Assessment Worksheet (OSHA Form 33). Note: Care should be taken in using EMRs, because some are workplace-specific, while others are employer-specific and involve multiple worksites. This makes direct comparisons of employers' EMRs difficult.

E. Safety and Health Programs

Effective workplace safety and health programs are self-sustaining systems that encompass four main areas: management leadership and employee involvement; worksite analysis; hazard prevention and control; and safety and health training.

Employers participating in Comprehensive OSPs must have now or agree to implement in the near future effective site-based safety and health programs. These programs should be based on OSHA's 1989 Safety and Health Program Management Guidelines whenever feasible. (Any alternative safety and health programs that differ significantly from OSHA's 1989 Guidelines must be carefully considered and thoroughly described in the Partnership proposal.)

A Limited OSP, e.g., one focused on a specific hazard, may find it feasible and appropriate to either require or encourage employers to implement effective safety and health programs.

One of the tools available to help determine a program's effectiveness is the agency's Safety and Health Program Assessment Worksheet (OSHA Form 33).

F. Employee Involvement and Employee Rights

1. Employees can bring valuable skills and perspective to the development stage of a Partnership. Their involvement in the initial formulation of Strategic Partnership policy and direction is encouraged. Employee involvement in the day-to-day implementation of worksite safety and health programs and other Comprehensive OSP activities is required.

2. Partnership Development: For Comprehensive OSPs that include the participation of unionized worksites, all affected unions must be supportive for the partnership to go forward. The level at which the union is involved, i.e., local, international, or both, will depend on the scope and nature of the Partnership. When employees are represented by labor organizations, union representatives at either the local or international level must be signatories to the Comprehensive Partnership agreement or, alternatively, must indicate their willingness for the Partnership to proceed but waive their opportunity to be signatory.

For non-union worksites, involving employees at the outset in the development of the Partnership is encouraged, if feasible. It is highly desirable that there be evidence of employee involvement in and commitment to an OSP.

3. Involvement at the Worksite: Experience has shown that employee involvement is an essential component of any effective safety and health program. In any OSP that requires implementation of safety and health programs, partnering employers must commit to incorporating in their programs a high level of employee involvement. The degree and quality of such involvement must be considered during any onsite inspections and as part of the periodic worksite safety and health program evaluations expected of all participating sites.

4. Examples of employee involvement include, but are not limited to:

participating on safety and health committees, joint labor- management committees, and other advisory or specific purpose committees, if otherwise lawful and appropriate; conducting site inspections, safety and health audits, job hazard analyses, and other types of hazard identification; developing and using a system for reporting hazards; developing and revising the site's safety and health rules and safe work practices; participating on workplace teams charged with identifying root causes of accidents, incidents, or breakdowns; implementing controls to eliminate or reduce hazard exposure; collecting samples for monitoring; making presentations at safety and health meetings; delivering training to current and newly hired employees; and participating in safety and health program reviews.

5. OSP programs must explicitly safeguard employees' exercise of their rights under the OSH Act and OSHA regulations and policy, including walkaround rights.

G. Stakeholder Involvement OSP programs are expected to involve those stakeholders, both national and local, whose input and participation are important to the program's success, as appropriate. Communication with other OSHA offices may be valuable in identifying important stakeholders.

H. OSHA Incentives All Comprehensive OSPs must offer OSHA incentives. If a Limited OSP chooses to offer any incentives, then it must adhere to the following parameters.

Incentives offered to OSP partners must be commensurate with the participating

employers' efforts to provide safe and healthful working conditions and their degree of success. Further, OSP incentives must be consistent with OSHA incentives contained in other agency programs, policies, and procedures. Following are examples of OSHA incentives that OSP programs may offer:

1. Outreach information and assistance during the initial implementation phase of a Partnership.

2. Priority consideration for onsite consultative services provided by OSHA's 7(c)(1) Program if the appropriate Consultation Project agrees.

3. Programmed inspections that focus on the most serious hazards prevailing at the partnering workplaces when these hazards are identified as targets of the OSP effort.

4. For any cited hazards, penalty reductions calculated in accordance with agency procedures in the Field Inspection Reference Manual (FIRM) that provide good-faith reductions for effective safety and health programs.

5. Agreement about ways the parties may provide positive publicity about the OSP and the partnering establishments.

6. Technical Assistance. The providing of technical assistance will be a valuable component in many OSPs. Onsite services may be provided by OSHA's 7(c)(1) State Consultation Program to partnering employers who qualify under the Consultation regulations. OSHA Consultation is intended primarily to assist small and medium-sized businesses -- no more than 250 employees at the site requesting assistance, and no more than 520 employees company-wide -- that are either in high-hazard industries or involved in hazardous operations. A Partnership may make use of OSHA Compliance Safety and Health Officers (CSHOs) to deliver offsite technical assistance to employers. OSHA personnel may provide onsite and offsite training. OSHA's National and Regional offices are additional potential sources of technical assistance, e.g., assistance from OSHA's Health Response Team and other resources within the Directorate of Technical Support. It is anticipated that some OSPs will employ private consultants to provide technical assistance.

Note concerning OSHA Incentives and Programmed Inspections: Within the context of OSHA Strategic Partnerships for Worker Safety and Health, the term "programmed inspection" refers to traditional enforcement inspections as described in the FIRM, i.e., inspection of workplaces that are selected according to national scheduling plans for safety and for health or special emphasis programs. Exemptions from routine programmed inspections will not be provided under OSP programs. Only worksites qualifying for the Voluntary Protection Programs (VPP) and the OSHA Consultation Safety and Health Achievement Recognition Program (SHARP) are eligible for this incentive.

Draft Proposed Safety and Health Program Rule

What is the purpose of this rule? The purpose of this rule is to reduce the number of job-related fatalities, illnesses, and injuries. The rule will accomplish this by requiring employers to establish a workplace safety and health program to ensure compliance with OSHA standards and the General Duty Clause of the Act (Section 5(a)(1)).

(a) Scope.

(a)(1) Who is covered by this rule? All employers covered by the Act, except employers engaged in construction and agriculture, are covered by this rule.

(a)(2) To what hazards does this rule apply? This rule applies to hazards covered by the General Duty Clause and by OSHA standards.

(b) Basic obligation.

(b)(1) What are the employer's basic obligations under the rule? Each employer must set up a safety and health program to manage workplace safety and health to reduce injuries, illnesses and fatalities by systematically achieving compliance with OSHA standards and the General Duty Clause. The program must be appropriate to conditions in the workplace, such as the hazards to which employees are exposed and the number of employees there.

(b)(2) What core elements must the program have? The program must have the

following core elements:

(i) Management leadership and employee participation;

(ii) Hazard identification and assessment;

(iii) Hazard prevention and control;

(iv) Information and training; and

(v) Evaluation of program effectiveness.

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