Worker deaths, injuries spur call for safety

In 2004, Roger LeBlanc, a 39 year old Massport electrician, was electrocuted and lost his life while working at Logan Airport. On Wednesday, February 13, injured workers, a doctor, labor leaders and safety advocates testified in support of a bill requiring public employers to institute safety measures already required of private employers. These basic measures might have saved Leblanc’s life and some of the 100 other public employees killed and thousands more injured on the job since 1990.

“We have a chance to ensure that similar accidents, similar injuries and similar loss of life do not happen to workers and their families in the future,” said Robert Haynes, President of the Massachusetts AFL-CIO.

Filed by Representative Martin Walsh and Senator Marc Pacheco, House Bill 1866/Senate Bill 1088 would mandate that public employers observe OSHA-established safety procedures, currently only required of the private sector. Though twenty-seven states already apply these regulations to public employees, Massachusetts has failed to pass this important safety measure.

“What does New Hampshire know that we don’t know?” Marcy Goldstein-Gelb, MassCOSH’s executive director, asked the committee. “One thing that New Hampshire knows is that, aside from doing the right thing by protecting their employees, when you reduce injuries, you save money.”

According to data provided by New Hampshire’s Department of Labor, after implementing OSHA protections to state employees in 1998, the state of New Hampshire reduced their workers comp claims by an average of 51% - and between the years 2001 and 2004 they saved $3.3 million.
Each year, Commonwealth residents spend more than $50 million in workers’ compensation costs for injuries and illnesses incurred by state employees alone. If you include all state, county and municipal employees the cost goes up to almost $200 million per year.

“A wood shop teacher in the Metro Southwest area became deaf because of the consistent noise exposure in his classroom,” AFT-MA’s Phil Katz told the committee. “If the schools were subject to OSHA, this unfortunate occurrence would never have happened.”

Contact your legislator and urge them to call Chairmen David Torrisi and Thomas McGee and express their strongest support for this bill.