Feds Forge Ahead on Safety

he Occupational Safety and Health Administration, which has been touting its reinvented partnership approach to private industry for several years, now wants to collaborate with the federal sector. The agency's goal: to boost safety and health awareness among federal managers to help reduce accident rates and workers' compensation costs.

Former Labor Secretary Robert Reich initiated the plan back in 1995 after noting that federal injury and illness rates were at a 10-year high. OSHA later surveyed agencies and found that safety and health generally were not considered priorities. "We were concerned," recalls Richard Fairfax, OSHA deputy director of compliance. "For that reason, we are trying to establish a presidential initiative to refocus attention on safety and health."

That initiative, called Fed 2000, was launched in October. Originally slated to start in 1997, the program will use workers' compensation and employment data to identify the 200 federal work sites with the highest lost workday rates--standard measures showing the average number of days per 100 workers that employees had to be put on restricted work duty or could not report to work at all because of an occupational injury or illness in a given year. OSHA then will offer those facilities the chance to work cooperatively to improve safety and health or face inspections and possible citations.

A similar program for private sector employers called the Cooperative Compliance Program, started in 1997, is on hold. Last February, an appeals court judge issued a stay on the program in response to charges from business groups that it coerces participants. The court is scheduled to decide on the merits of the case in December. As of late September, agencies had not raised similar arguments against the Fed 2000 program.

In fact, officials at the National Park Service welcomed the opportunity to join forces with OSHA. "Safety has not been taken too awfully seriously in the history of this organization," admits Richard Powell, risk management program manager for the park service. The agency had an average lost workday rate in fiscal 1997 of 7.15, with some parks experiencing rates greater than 20, Powell says. The federal agency average for that year was 2.51.

OSHA and the Park Service first agreed to partner last February after an inspection at Yellowstone National Park found more than 600 violations, many of which were things OSHA had warned the park of in previous years. During the inspection, which was triggered after a park mechanic died in a snowmobile accident, OSHA found that the park had an injury and illness rate more than four times the average for all industries.

"They had a safety and health program, but it wasn't working," Fairfax says.

Now the issue is a priority for Park Service Director Robert Stanton. "It's at last on the screen of management," Powell says. The agency has included reducing accidents and workers' compensation costs as performance goals under its Government Performance and Results Act strategic plan. They also are rewriting the safety and health program, converting it from a guideline to a director's order.

Under the Fed 2000 agreement signed in October, OSHA will help 10 Park Service sites evaluate their safety and health problems, and train staff to recognize and fix hazards. Though the agency has a long way to go to improve things, Powell is optimistic. "We recognize our moral as well as our legal responsibility to employee health and safety," he says. "To make that culture shift is a slow process. But I think we're going to get there."