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NAT-OSHA-11-110-MSD Column Stakeholder Meeting

Interested businesses that wish to participate in one of the teleconferences should contact Regina Powers at powers.regina@dol.gov by April 4, and indicate the teleconference in which they wish to participate. For more information, contact Robert Burt, director of OSHA’s Office of Regulatory Analysis, at 202-693-1952 or Bruce Lundegren, assistant chief counsel for SBA Advocacy, at 202-205-6144.   
Additional information is available online at http://www.osha.gov/recordkeeping/MSD_Column_Meeting_General_Info.html.
US Labor Department’s OSHA temporarily withdraws proposed column
for work-related musculoskeletal disorders, reaches out to small businesses
 
WASHINGTON – The U.S. Department of Labor’s Occupational Safety and Health Administration today announced that it has temporarily withdrawn from review by the Office of Management and Budget its proposal to restore a column for work-related musculoskeletal disorders on employer injury and illness logs. The agency has taken this action to seek greater input from small businesses on the impact of the proposal and will do so through outreach in partnership with the U.S. Small Business Administration’s Office of Advocacy. 
“Work-related musculoskeletal disorders remain the leading cause of workplace injury and illness in this country, and this proposal is an effort to assist employers and OSHA in better identifying problems in workplaces,” said Assistant Secretary of Labor for Occupational Safety and Health Dr. David Michaels. “However, it is clear that the proposal has raised concern among small businesses, so OSHA is facilitating an active dialogue between the agency and the small business community.”  
According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, MSDs accounted for 28 percent of all reported workplace injuries and illnesses requiring time away from work in 2009. 
The proposed rule would not change existing requirements about when and under what circumstances employers must record MSDs on their injury and illness logs. While many employers are currently required to keep a record of workplace injuries and illnesses, including work-related MSDs, on the OSHA Form 300 (Log of Work-Related Injuries and Illnesses), the vast majority of small businesses are not required to keep such records. The proposed rule would require those employers already mandated to keep injury and illness records, and to record MSDs, to place a check mark in the new column for all MSDs.  
Prior to 2001, OSHA’s injury and illness logs contained a column for repetitive trauma disorders that included noise and many kinds of MSDs. In 2001, OSHA separated noise and MSDs into two columns, but the MSD column was deleted in 2003 before the provision became effective. This proposal would restore the MSD column to the Form 300. 
OSHA and the U.S. Small Business Administration’s Office of Advocacy jointly will hold a meeting to engage and listen to small businesses about the agency’s proposal. Small businesses from around the country will be able to participate through electronic means, such as telephone and/or a Web forum. Details of the meeting will be announced within 30 days. OSHA also will conduct a stakeholder meeting with other members of the public if requested. 
Under the Occupational Safety and Health Act of 1970, employers are responsible for providing safe and healthful workplaces for their employees. OSHA’s role is to assure these conditions for America’s working men and women by setting and enforcing standards, and providing training, education and assistance. For more information, visit http://www.osha.gov.                                                   # # #

Budget Drag Affects Navy Ship Repair

BUDGET DRAG

  As parties spar over the 2011 federal budget in Congress, problems surface for the Navy
  By Bill Bartel
  The Virginian-Pilot

   Congress’ inability to approve a 2011 budget is causing significant problems for the Navy, officials say, by delaying ship repairs; reducing aircraft flight hours and ship steaming hours; postponing construction projects; and disrupting the orderly moves of sailors and their families.

     With half the fiscal year already gone, Congress has failed to reach an agreement on an annual federal budget and has instead passed a series of continuing resolutions that temporarily keep the government running for a few weeks at a time. The latest resolution, approved last week, provides funding at last year’s level – minus about $6 billion – until April 8.  

     Democrats, who control the Senate, and Republicans, who have a majority in the House, remain far     apart in budget talks, with the GOP generally wanting tens of billions more in spending cuts than Democrats say they will support. If no deal is struck by the April deadline to approve a budget to carry the government until Sept. 30, Congress has two choices: pass another temporary funding bill – the seventh since fall – or allow a government shutdown. 

    Hampton Roads’ representatives are divided on what to do about the budget and the immediate concerns with military spending. The House and Senate are in recess this week, and most legislators are back in their districts meeting with constituents.   

   In the meantime, with no promise of funding past early next month, Navy officials have warned that they can’t make plans and have had to cut expenses just to meet payroll. The short-term budget problems do not affect the war efforts overseas, but that is not the case back home.    , Hillson said.    which he acknowledged “places a significant hardship on our military families.”    payment?’ ” 

   “While virtually every account will be impacted in some way, we will be especially hard hit in operations and maintenance, new ship construction and other procurement accounts,” Lt. Courtney Hillson, a Navy spokeswoman, said this week. 

    A $4.6 billion shortage in operations and maintenance funds has led the Navy to cancel 29 surface ship repairs, including projects at Hampton Roads shipyards, and defer maintenance on aircraft and aircraft engines

   The cash crunch also has forced reductions in maintenance at bases, as well as cutbacks on training and naval exercises, she said. 

    Navy Secretary Ray Ma-bus told a Senate panel last week that his department has a $600 million shortage in Navy and Marine Corps manpower accounts.  

   “As a result of this shortfall, the services must raid other accounts in order to meet payroll for the year,” Mabus said in his written statement to the Senate Appropriations Committee’s defense subcommittee. 

    He told lawmakers that to ease the cash shortage, the Navy is making more short-notice decisions when changing the permanent duty stations for service members,

   Typically, sailors have several months to plan for a move and deal with selling or renting a house, finding a new job for a spouse or placing children in a new school, said Craig Quigley, a retired admiral who heads the Hampton Roads Military and Federal Facilities Alliance, a group that lobbies to protect the region’s military assets. 

    Shorter-notice decisions about transfers put more stress on the service members, Quigley said.  

   “In addition to doing my day job of worrying about running a ship … now you’ve got to worry about ‘What is it going to cost me in my wallet?’ ” he said. “ ‘Do I, or do I not, sell the house?’ ‘Can I rent it and meet my mortgage

    Quigley said that even if the budget deadlock were resolved soon, restarting the operations and maintenance projects, training and other stalled programs would not happen overnight.    budget impasse is resolved. 

   The Navy “can’t cram 12 months of shipyard work into six. You have to rebalance and reprioritize,” he said. 

    U.S. Rep. Scott Rigell, who has supported deep cuts in federal spending, said he’s sympathetic to the military’s problems. The Virginia Beach Republican, who was elected in the fall, said he has pressed GOP House leaders without success to pass a Pentagon budget, even if the remainder of government spending is deadlocked, because national defense “is an essential and unifying duty of Congress.”  

   He has also lobbied leaders to keep Congress in session, including weekends, until the

    U.S. Rep. Randy Forbes said he’s aware of the immediate concerns of the military but thinks the more pressing national security issue is cutting spending to get control of the rising federal deficit.    about the severity of the Pentagon’s budget concerns, noting that Defense Secretary Robert Gates proposed billions in cuts last summer and that military leaders didn’t express great alarm late last year when Democrats controlled the House but failed to pass the 2011 budget before the start of the fiscal year. The Pentagon has not been forthcoming in providing more specific financial records to Congress, Forbes said. 

   The Chesapeake Republican expressed skepticism

    Defense officials “want to say, ‘It’s OK to make cuts when we say to make cuts,’” he said. “But if you do anything more or less, then the   sky is falling.”

   Forbes, chairman of the readiness subcommittee of the House Armed Services Committee, cited what he sees as a more serious long-term problem: Starting in a few years, the United States will have to make huge investments to upgrade its aging military hardware, including ships and aircraft.    effort to cut billions from the current budget, said the problem stems from Congress’ decision last year to retain the Bush administration tax cuts on incomes, inheritances and businesses. That added $3.7 trillion to the national debt over the next 10 years, he said.    to make now.”

   If government leaders can’t get control of spending now by enforcing budget cuts, there won’t be money to pay for those projects, he said. 

    U.S. Rep. Bobby Scott, a Newport News Democrat who has opposed the Republican-led

   Now, Scott said, to make up for the tax cuts, Republicans want to slash spending for education grants, public transportation, community services and other important social programs. 

    “I said last year that letting the tax cuts expire is an ugly choice,” he said. “But look at the choice we have

   Even if this year’s budget deadlock is resolved, there is more of the same on the horizon.  

   House and Senate leaders are already drawing up plans – and battle lines – in their debate over the 2012 spending plan, which will take effect Oct. 1.     At the same time, several groups in Congress have been proposing long-term plans to make deep cuts in federal spending over several years to begin to reduce the $14 trillion federal debt. 

    Bill Bartel, (757) 446-2398 begin_of_the_skype_highlighting              (757) 446-2398      end_of_the_skype_highlighting, bill.bartel@pilotonline.com

5th Annual Lego Ship Repair Students in the News!

Publication: The Virginian-Pilot; Date: Mar 17, 2011; Section: Hampton Roads; Page: B1 
  Building blocks for students’ futures
  By Elisabeth Hulette
  The Virginian-Pilot 
CHESAPEAKE
   Huu Vu’s aircraft carrier navigational radar system was looking pretty good, but he said it could use more support around the base. 
   Christopher Bailey, a mechanical design engineer, suggested more Legos. 
   “We’d bolt the deck with some L-shaped pieces of iron,” he said Tuesday, pointing to Huu’s design on a computer screen, a 3-D tower built with digital versions of the colored building blocks. 
   Huu is an eighth-grader, Bailey works for WRSystems, and the radar tower is Oscar F. Smith Middle School’s contender for the 5th annual Lego Ship Repair Industry Awareness Competition.
   The contest will be held in April; 16 schools are expected to attend. It’s designed to encourage middle-school students to consider careers in shipbuilding and repair, a vast industry in Hampton Roads but one students don’t always consider. 
   “I think kids mostly think about being a doctor or a lawyer or a teacher,” said Tiana Green, a sixth-grader who got involved with the project in part because she’s related to a ship superintendent. 
   “My uncle said it’s a cool job to work on a ship,” she said. 
   Tiana and Huu are two of about 14 students in Oscar Smith’s STEM Club – that’s Science, Technology, Engineering and Math. 
   For the Lego competition, they have to submit the design, which Huu modeled after the carrier Ronald Reagan, as well as essays on careers in shipbuilding. Tiana and Alijah Jackson, for example, picked contract management. 
   “It’s good because we’re learning about contract administrators, how you get the job and what are the benefits,” Alijah said.
                   Kayla Owens and Kerri Mast, also both sixth-graders, picked welding: 
   “Because you get to melt things,” Kayla said. 
   Ronald Jenkins, a program manager for WRSystems, which is lending a hand to the Oscar Smith team, said the project is a good way to get students interested in engineering, science and especially math. Too often kids don’t find any value in studying math, he said. 
   “It’s just something they’re told to do,” Jenkins said. “We have to get them to understand it’s useful and fun. It’s fun to see how things work.” 
   And it’s important to get them interested early. For many technology fields, students need to take the right courses in middle school so they can take the right courses in high school that colleges require from science majors, said Tina Cox , head of Oscar Smith’s science department. 
   “We try to lay that foundation … ” she said. “If you start in 10th grade, you’re too late.” 
   Elisabeth Hulette, (757) 222-5216
 
  DAVID B. HOLLINGSWORTH PHOTOS | THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT     Huu Vu, 14, looks over a project that uses Legos to design a navigational radar system for an aircraft carrier. It’s part of an entry in a contest in which students from Oscar F. Smith Middle School in Chesapeake are participating.  
  Employees of WRSystems, including Steve Cherry, right, helped students, among them eighth-grader Huu Vu, left.

OSHA Action Highlights - 2011 First Quarter

 

OSHA's Crystalline Silica Rule At OMB For Review
OSHA is a step closer to publishing a proposed rule regulating crystalline silica exposure in general industry, construction, and maritime.  OSHA's proposal has been submitted to the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) for review under Executive Order 12866.  This is the final internal review before the proposal gets published in the Federal Register and signals that OSHA's proposal will be out in early to mid-Summer.

Crystalline silica is ubiquitous, comprising a substantial percentage of the Earth’s crust.  OSHA has evidence that exposure to crystalline silica at the current permissible exposure limit (PEL) causes silicosis and other diseases.  It has been seeking to comprehensively regulate the substance – and reduce the PEL – for over a decade.  In 2003, OSHA completed a Small Business Regulatory Enforcement Fairness Act (SBREFA) panel for an early draft version of the rule and has since been preparing regulatory text and background health, risk, and economic data to support the rulemaking. SCA participated in this SBREFA process.

OSHA's rulemaking efforts in this area are complicated by the broad scope of the rule -- a number of employers in a variety of industries use silica in their operations -- as well as technical issues associated with controlling silica exposures.  There are also difficult issues of sampling methodology that the Agency must overcome.  And of course, stakeholders are keenly interested in what ancillary provisions OSHA might propose, such as medical surveillance requirements, housekeeping requirements, and requirements related to regulated areas.

Stay tuned.

OSHA Temporarily Withdraws MSD Column Rule From OMB Review
The Department of Labor announced that OSHA is temporarily withdrawing from review by the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) its proposed rule to restore a column for musculoskeletal disorders (MSDs) on employer injury and illness logs.

The rule, originally proposed last year, would have required employers to “check a box” in a separate column on the OSHA 300 log – an “MSD” column – for injuries and illnesses that fit within the Agency’s proposed definition.  OSHA also proposed to remove existing language from its recordkeeping compliance directive that “minor musculoskeletal discomfort” is not recordable as a restricted work case “if a health care professional determines that the employee is fully able to perform all of his or her routine job functions, and the employer assigns a work restriction for the purpose of preventing a more serious injury.” Recall, SCA submitted comments on this proposal. To view them click HERE 

OSHA Withdraws Proposed Noise Interpretation
Citing "concerns raised" and the need for "more public outreach," OSHA is withdrawing its  proposed interpretation on occupational noise.  The proposal would have altered existing Agency enforcement policy for determining when an employer could utilize PPE to protect employees from noise exposures, as opposed to relying on engineering and administrative controls.  Existing policy provides that employers will be cited for not implementing certain engineering or administrative controls when hearing protectors are ineffective or the cost of such controls are actually less than the cost of implementing a full hearing conservation program.  OSHA was proposing to eliminate this framework and consider engineering and administrative controls to be feasible so long as they would "not threaten the employer's ability to remain in business or if the threat to viability results from the employer's having failed to keep up with industry safety and health standards."

Many stakeholders expressed concerns over the proposal and the potential costs.  OSHA originally set a 60-day comment period for the proposal, but then extended that in response to numerous requests for more time to submit comments.  OSHA will no longer pursue the proposal at all. .

Instead, the Agency says that it will find other ways to reduce the number of hearing loss cases by:

•Conducting a thorough review of comments received from the public in response to the proposed interpretation.
•Holding a stakeholder meeting to discuss ways to prevent occupational hearing loss.
•Consulting on approaches with NIOSH and the National Academy of Engineering.
•Initiating a "robust" outreach and compliance assistance effort to provide guidance on "inexpensive, effective engineering controls" to reduce noise exposures. 

Budget Delay Sinks Shipyard Projects

Publication: The Virginian-Pilot; Date: Mar 14, 2011; Section: Front Page; Page: A1 
  U.S. BUDGET DELAY SINKS LUCRATIVE SHIPYARD PROJECTS
  By Robert McCabe
  The Virginian-Pilot
     NORFOLK   

   The Navy has canceled four ship-repair jobs at Hampton Roads shipyards because of the federal budget impasse, and more cancellations could be on the way. 

   The work lost so far because Navy ship maintenance funds remain frozen at year-ago levels was worth about $28 million, according to information presented at the National Ship Repair Industry Conference in Washington.

   Altogether, 29 surface-ship projects, hundreds of jobs and $4.6 billion in Navy maintenance spending are on the line if the federal funding issues are not resolved, ship-repair industry officials said. 

    “These are very, very unusual times here,” said John Strem, chief operating officer of Metro Machine Corp., a shipyard in Norfolk’s Berkley section. 

   Met ro M ach i ne rec ent ly learned it lost a job worth around $10 million on the dock landing ship Gunston Hall, Strem said. “It was scheduled for 13 April, and it’s not going to work.”  

   While Metro Machine has enough repairs scheduled to prevent layoffs, subcontractors the company would have been required to hire for about 40 percent of the Gunston Hall work could up end taking the brunt of

    “Who’s to say how badly any or all of them may be hurt?” he said.       

   Other local projects canceled include work on the patrol crafts Squall ($5.5 million) and Thunderbolt ($5.5 million), as well as on the guided missile destroyer Gonzalez ($5.1 million), according to Navy numbers released at the conference. 

    MHI Ship Repair & Services in Norfolk was scheduled to handle the Thunderbolt and the Gonzalez.  

   Asked if there would be layoffs as a result, the company’s president and CEO didn’t want to speculate. 

    “It’s too early for me to try to assess the impacts,” said Tom Epley, who also is chairman of the Virginia Ship Repair Association, which represents 200 companies. “We pursue multiple markets.”  

   BAE Ship Repair’s Norfolk yard was scheduled to work on the Squall, but that cancellation is not expected to affect employment levels there, the company said. 

    “I don’t know what’s going to happen,” said Malcolm P. Branch, president and CEO of the ship-repair association. “I think we’re in somewhat uncharted territory.” 

   Because Congress has yet to pass a budget for the federal fiscal year that began on Oct. 1, funding across the government has been stuck at levels authorized for fiscal year 2010 through a series of stop-gap measures known as “continuing resolutions.” 

    The fourth one expires Friday. Congress will either have to pass a 2011 budget or another continuing resolution or the federal government effectively will shut down, said Cindy M. Walters, a federal contracting expert and director of government-sponsored programs at Old Dominion University.  

   The two sides in the budget impasse remain far apart, with the House wanting about $64 billion in federal spending cuts and the White House and the Senate about $6 billion, Walters said. 

    The government last shut down – leaving only essential personnel identified by agencies on the job – in the mid-1990s.    as well, including work scheduled in Northrop Grumman Corp.’s Shipbuilding sector. 

   “I hope that can be avoided and businesses contracting with the federal government will be able to plan beyond the short term,” Walters said. 

    In a letter to Hampton Roads’ congressional delegation on Jan. 27, Branch warned that Navy ship-maintenance work planned months in advance is being scaled back at some companies, jeopardizing jobs.  

   There’s a roughly $760 million difference between the 2010 funding levels and those the Navy requested for the current fiscal year, Branch wrote. 

    The association’s letter asked that, in the absence of a 2011 budget, Congress include language in ongoing continuing resolutions to fund Navy ship maintenance at the level requested in President Barack Obama’s 2011 defense-authorization bill.  

   “We’re hoping that Congress can come to some resolution on freeing up Navy maintenance money,” Branch said. “They understand what the need is; they’re hopeful they can restore the funding levels.” 

    Branch said he recently asked some members of Congress, whom he did not identify, what might happen, but “none of them were willing to even go there.”  

   The uncertainty extends beyond Navy ship repair, touching shipbuilding

    The stop-gap measure that Congress has in place to fund the government has resulted in a so-called “production rate” problem, Navy spokesman Alan Baribeau wrote in an e-mail. It essentially blocks the appropriation of money for construction contracts for more ships than the number appropriated for building in the prior fiscal year, he wrote.   

   For the current fiscal year, the White House requested two new destroyers and two new Virginia-class submarines. Because only one of each was appropriated in last fiscal year’s budget, the stopgap measure does not include funding for a second destroyer and submarine. 

    Other shipbuilding programs are affected as well, including construction of CVN 79, the second carrier in the new Gerald R. Ford class; the midlife overhaul of the carrier Abraham Lincoln; and the program to replace Ohio-class submarines, Baribeau wrote.  

   Northrop Grumman’s Newport News shipyard is the only one in the country that builds carriers and one of only two that make submarines. 

    A Northrop Grumman spokeswoman declined to say what, if any, impact the budget impasse might have on its Newport News operation.  

   “The budget process is a complex and dynamic one,” Jennifer Dellapenta said. “Although we are planning for all contingencies, it’s premature to speculate on the outcome.” 

    Even shipyards that are only minimally affected by canceled work still face uncertainty because of lack of funding.  

   “It’s all still in flux; we don’t know,” said Richard Sobocinski, vice president/contracts, at Colonna’s Shipyard in Norfolk. 

    As bigger yards scale back work loads, they compete for the same jobs that Colonna’s does, Sobocinski said.  

   “The summer could be a very difficult time for all of us,” he said. “This whole thing is like a domino effect.” 

    Robert McCabe, (757) 446-2327 begin_of_the_skype_highlighting              (757) 446-2327      end_of_the_skype_highlighting, robert.mccabe@pilotonline.com

       The lost jobs are among seven canceled projects nationwide, including two in Mayport, Fla., and one in San Diego, that were worth $62.4 million, conference participants learned.    the cancellation, he said. 

NSRIC Presentations Posted

A very successful National Ship Repair Industry Conference (NSRIC) was held 2/28 - 3/3.  The presentations that were made on Navy and Industry day at NSRIC11 are now available on the SCA website!  Please click HERE or copy and past the following link into your browser: (http://www.shipbuilders.org/membership/events/NationalShipRepairIndustryConference/NSRIC11PresentationsInformation/tabid/616/Default.aspx)
 
To view the press release, please click HERE!

Foreign Rebuilding Determinations - Comments Requested

The US Coast Guard seeks comment on a petition for rulemaking the requests the Coast Guard to amend its regulations relating to an application for a foreign rebuilding determination. The petition requests amendments to the major-component test, the considerable-parts test, the criteria for when vessels altered outside the United States must submit material to the National Vessel Documentation Center and what materials must be submitted, and the preliminary rebuilt determinations application requirements. It also proposes addition of a requirement for the Coast Guard to publish in the Federal Register notices of applications for rebuild determinations and a requirement that the owner of a coastwise trade eligible vessel that had any work performed on that vessel at a facility outside the United States to submit a Customs Form 226, Record of Vessel Foreign Repair or Equipment Purchase to the Commandant. Comments on the petition should be submitted by May 26. 76 Fed. Reg. 10553 

Battle Coming Over Proposed Workplace Safety Rules

Lobbying battle on tap over proposed changes to workplace-safety rules
By Kevin Bogardus - 03/04/11  
 From TheHill.com 
 Business and labor are preparing to wage a lobbying battle over a new rule expected later this year that could have a profound effect on how health and safety are handled in the workplace. 
Over the past year, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) has been gathering input from trade associations and unions while promoting an initiative that would require workplace managers to institute their own Injury and Illness Prevention Program — often referred to as I2P2.  
The rule would require employers to identify their workplaces’ health and safety hazards on their own and take action to resolve them.
In a January speech before the watchdog group Public Citizen, OSHA head David Michaels said the rule “represents the most fundamental change in workplace culture since the passage of the OSHA Act” — the 1970 law that created the agency.
Michaels and his agency has promoted the initiative heavily. Since announcing  the rule in April, the OSHA chief has mentioned it in almost a dozen speeches. The agency has held at least five public meetings with stakeholders to get feedback on how to draft it.
President Obama’s fiscal 2012 budget request asks Congress for $2.4 million to help develop I2P2, which is an increase since he did not seek any funding for the rule for fiscal 2011.
Michaels told The Hill that his agency is working on the regulation because OSHA does not have the manpower to stop every workplace accident. 
“It would take over 100 years for OSHA to visit every workplace under its jurisdiction,” Michaels said. “OSHA believes that workers will be better protected if each employer has a proactive plan to find and fix hazards in their workplaces so that workers don’t get hurt.”
Economic and feasibility analyses of the regulation were slated to be released in late 2010. But those reports were delayed to June in order “to gather more stakeholder input” and crunch more data, Michaels said.
OSHA’s focus on the rule has caught the attention of a number of business groups. Members of the Coalition for Workplace Safety, like the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the National Association of Manufacturers, have grown concerned about the rule.
“This would be the most sweeping regulation that OSHA has ever put out,” said Marc Freedman, the Chamber’s executive director of labor law policy. 
Freedman believes the rule could require employers to identify all hazards in the workplace, even ones not already mitigated for by OSHA.
“There is one school of thought that they would not have to issue another regulation ever again,” Freedman said.
Michaels said, however, that no new health and safety standards would be developed under the rule.
“It is intended to help employers develop a systematic plan to find and fix workplace hazards that are currently covered under OSHA standards or that are currently covered under the General Duty Clause,” Michaels said.
The rule’s supporters say it will be the federal version of laws already on the books in California, Minnesota, Washington and many other states. Those laws require employers to have a written health and safety plan to deal with workplace accidents.
Those plans typically designate an employee as the safety officer, establish training programs for workers and set up a system to report and evaluate workplace hazards. That should allow businesses to collaborate with inspectors on how best to lessen risks for workers, according to the rule’s supporters.
Peg Seminario, the AFL-CIO’s director of health and safety, called the rule “a framework” that should help employers find those hazards before they can do harm to their employees.
“You are looking at problems, trying to identify them and address them before workers get hurt,” Seminario said about the rule.
OSHA has discussed proposing the rule before. Agency officials in the Clinton and George W. Bush administrations had similar ambitions. 
But much of that discussion at that time was overwhelmed by a massive lobbying campaign by business groups against an ergonomics standard issued by OSHA. Using the Congressional Review Act, a Republican-led Congress was able to the overturn the ergonomics rule in 2001.
Freedman of the Chamber believes OSHA wants to re-establish that ergonomics standard using the I2P2 rule. Since the ergonomics rule was rejected under the Congressional Review Act, the agency cannot reissue a regulation that would be similar to the voided standard.
“Not only is this similar to the ergo rule, this will be how this OSHA does ergonomics,” Freedman said. “This is their ergo rule in style and substance.”
Seminario of the AFL-CIO said the reference to the voided ergonomics standard is a scare tactic and has been used before, most recently, she said, with OSHA’s proposed regulation that would restore a column on employer injury and illness logs to record workers’ musculoskeletal disorders. The rule was temporarily withdrawn earlier this year. 
“They are trying to make this something that this is not,” Seminario said.
A major player in the ergonomics debate, however, disagreed with Freedman’s take. Charles Jeffress, head of OSHA from 1997 to 2000, said the rule under consideration by the agency now would not result in an ergonomics standard.
The rule “changes the dynamic where OSHA doesn’t have to go rule-by-rule. Instead, employers are asked to identify hazards in their own workplace and asked to fix them,” said Jeffress, now the chief operational officer for the American Association for Justice, a trial lawyers’ trade group.
“You don’t become a stickler for what the black-letter rules say. You become a stickler for whether or not employees are protected from injury,” Jeffress said.

Shipyards to Congress: Budget Impasse Threatens Jobs

  Continuing last year’s funding levels jeopardizes projects
  By Robert McCabe
  The Virginian-Pilot
  Robert McCabe, (757) 446-2327, robert.mccabe@pilotonline.com
     Layoffs are possible at local shipyards if Congress doesn’t approve a new budget or carve out an authorization for Navy ship-repair funding at the level   planned for 2011, executives from those yards said.

 

   Because Congress has yet to pass a budget for the federal fiscal year that began on Oct. 1, federal funding across the government is stuck at levels authorized for fiscal year 2010 through a stop-gap measure known as a continuing resolution.

 

   This has put local shipyards, which provide jobs for thousands of workers, in a bind.   They had a lean year in 2010 but were anticipating more funding this year.

 

   Nearly one in every 11 jobs in Hampton Roads depends directly or indirectly on the private-sector shipbuilding and repair industry, according to a 2007 study by Old Dominion University’s Economic Forecasting Project.

 

   In a Jan. 27 letter to Hampton Roads’ congressional delegation, a local trade group   representing 200 companies warned that Navy ship-maintenance work planned months in advance is being scaled back at some firms, jeopardizing jobs.

 

   “This job loss is the direct result of the lack of projected     funding stemming from the current appropriations impasse,” wrote Malcolm P. Branch, president and CEO of the Virginia Ship Repair Association. “The situation is exacerbated as more immediate repairs are performed and the available funding for the purchase of any long-lead items for future alterations or maintenance is consumed, creating a potential bow wave” into the next fiscal year.

 

   There’s a roughly $760 million difference between the 2010 funding levels and those the Navy requested for the current fiscal year, according to Branch’s letter.

 

   If Congress were to delay approving a 2011 budget for the rest of the year, the association is asking that specific language be included in continuing-resolution legislation to keep Navy ship-maintenance funding at the level requested in President Barack Obama’s 2011 defense authorization bill.

 

   “Obviously, what’s at   stake are jobs,” said Tom Epley, president and CEO of MHI Ship Repair & Services in Norfolk and chairman of the ship-repair association.

 

   “We saw 2011 being a very robust year, and many of us made plans for that,” said Epley, adding that those plans included hiring workers and investing in equipment.

 

   MHI employs about 420 workers, of whom between 20 to 30 percent could be at risk if layoffs become necessary, he said.

 

   The Navy, Epley said, is now constrained to act at 2010 funding levels, though there are more ships to be repaired this year.

 

   If Congress doesn’t address the funding issue by March or April, putting off action until the middle of the summer, when there will be only a few months left in the fiscal year, it will be too late, he said.

 

   “We size our work force on the way things are planned a year in advance,” said Jerry Miller, president and CEO of   Portsmouth-based Earl Industries, which employs 800. “If all they’ve got is the money from the year before, they might cancel or delay some of the work from being funded.”

 

   Miller doesn’t foresee any layoffs at Earl, but said that even if funding comes through later, the adjustments made because the money wasn’t there as planned carry economic consequences.

 

   “When you do something out of sequence, it becomes more expensive to do,” said Miller, comparing the situation to a household that delays required maintenance on a car, which can lead to further deterioration and   costlier repairs.

 

   The Navy has said that 220 of the 284 ships in service today must be in service in 2020 to meet increasing commitments worldwide, according to the association’s letter.

 

   “Execution of scheduled ship maintenance is the key enabler for this to occur,” Branch wrote.

 

   BAE Systems Ship Repair employs about 1,200 at its Norfolk shipyard and about 2,800 more at facilities in San Diego; San Francisco; Pearl Harbor, Hawaii; Mobile, Ala.; and Jacksonville, Fla.

 

   “If we defer the maintenance, it impacts their fleet readiness,” said Bill Clifford, president of BAE   Systems Ship Repair.

 

   It was too soon to say how many workers there could be affected, Clifford said. “We don’t know yet what work may be deferred or rescheduled by the Navy, so the impact on layoffs isn’t known at this time.”

REGIONAL SECURITY EXERCISE 2/21 - 2/23

ALL Hampton Roads Contractors NOTE - this WILL affect your work.
“EXERCISE” SOLID CURTAIN 2011 - US Fleet Forces and CNIC will conduct an annual CONUS-wide Anti-Terrorism (AT) “Exercise” under the Solid Curtain-Citadel Shield Series from 21-25 February.  This “Exercise” provides an opportunity to validate security plans, and assess Unit and Base Installation processes for deterring, detecting, mitigating the effects of, and recovery from a terrorist incident.  Expect additional security measures at all Bases during this time.