whistleblowers

By Kirsten Stade - Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility, July 1, 2015

Disclaimer: The views expressed here are not the official position of the IWW (or even the IWW’s EUC) and do not necessarily represent the views of anyone but the author’s.

Washington, DC — The, U.S. Occupational Safety & Health Administration (OSHA) has cited the worker health and safety program in California for falling below minimum performance standards in response to a complaint filed by Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER). As a result, the state
Division of Occupational Safety & Health (Cal/OSHA) must upgrade its enforcement and inspection programs or face a variety of federal sanctions.

In a letter to PEER dated June 26, 2015, OSHA Area Director David Shiraishi upheld the bulk of the “Complaint about State Program Administration” that PEER filed in February 2014. In its review, OSHA found that Cal/OSHA:

• Fails to conduct an adequate number of inspections in dangerous workplaces and fails to follow its own policy of doing follow-up inspections on serious violators;
• Does not issue citations in a timely manner, thus delaying hazard abatement and prolonging dangerous conditions. OSHA found the “amount of time Cal/OSHA takes to issue citations is 69% longer than OSHA for safety inspections and 33% longer for health inspections”; and
• Takes too long to respond to worker complaints of unsafe or unhealthy conditions. Cal/OSHA “averaged almost working four days to initiate investigations for complaints alleging serious hazards” with one serious complaint sitting 106 days. For non-serious complaints, Cal/OSHA averaged more than two weeks before inspecting with one case sitting 300 days.

The OSHA letter contains recommendations for how Cal/OSHA can remedy the identified failures while concluding that “the State Plan is required to remedy these deficiencies.” Like California, nearly half the states are funded by OSHA to operate their own state plans which, by law, must be at least as effective as the federal program. This finding means that California is not meeting that minimum threshold.

By Kirsten Stade - Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility, June 18, 2015

Disclaimer: The views expressed here are not the official position of the IWW (or even the IWW’s EUC) and do not necessarily represent the views of anyone but the author’s.

Washington, DC — Strife within the U.S. Chemical Safety and Hazard Investigation Board (CSB) has burst into the open again with one board member seizing control and ordering immediate suspension of the agency’s entire executive staff, according to documents posted today by Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER). In less than a week, the CSB will be left with only two board members who cannot agree on governance of the small agency.

The U.S. Chemical Safety and Hazard Investigation Board (CSB) is an independent federal agency charged with investigating industrial chemical accidents in refineries, factories, and other fixed facilities. It is supposed to have five members but is currently operating with only three, after the White House pressured its own appointed CSB chair, Rafael Moure-Eraso, to resign in March before his nominated successor was confirmed. That left the CSB leaderless, since the White House is declining to designate an interim chair among the remaining three members.

On Friday June 12th, one of the board members Rick Engler circulated an email in which he claimed “the Board voted to designate me the Board Member Delegated Interim Executive and Administrative Authority.” However, there had been no CSB vote. Instead, acting without a quorum, Engler and outgoing Board member Mark Griffon, whose term ends on June 24th, made the designation by email. Their action came over the vehement objection of the third Board member, Manuel "Manny" Ehrlich. But Engler rebuffed Ehrlich’s overture that they act cooperatively to run the CSB until a chair could be confirmed.

This Tuesday June 16th, Engler summarily placed the CSB’s executive staff, Managing Director
Daniel Horowitz and General Counsel Richard Loeb, on administrative leave, forbade them from re-entering the building or talking to any CSB staff. Armed Federal Protective Service agents placed the two in custody and escorted them off the premises.

The stated basis for Engler’s action was that he had ordered an internal investigation into “possible misconduct” identified months earlier by a House Committee and the EPA Inspector General in reports that targeted the former board chair. The reports covered topics ranging from Moure-Eraso’s supposedly “autocratic” approach, use of private email, and staff complaints of a “toxic work environment.”

“In charge for less than a week, Engler has presided over the escalation from a toxic work environment to thermonuclear war,” stated PEER Executive Director Jeff Ruch. “These stale and frankly trivial matters do not merit Egyptian-style martial-law retribution meted out here.”

Ironically, it was Engler who was an outspoken critic of the “lack of transparency” and collegiality under Moure-Eraso. Yet, his actions make those of the prior chair pale in comparison.

By Steve Zeltser - The Daily Censored, February 16, 2015

Disclaimer: The views expressed here are not the official position of the IWW (or even the IWW’s EUC) and do not necessarily represent the views of anyone but the author’s.

The epidemic of refinery explosions and derailments  leading to massive explosions seem to increase by the week. Behind this collapse of health and safety protection according to advocates is the failure to protect health and safety whistleblowers. The fear of workers to complain about serious health and safety problems is a key part of this failure. Now a Federal lawyer at OSHA Darrell Whitman has charged along with health and safety whistleblowers that the agency management and the DOL have not been enforcing the law to protect not only the whistleblowers but the health and safety of all Americans.

In an explosive document sent to Secretary of Labor Thomas Perez in May 2014, Federal OSHA attorney Darrell Whitman, charged that there is systemic corruption in the agency that is preventing the protection of health and safety whistleblowers. As a result of making these charges with extensive documentation, Whitman has himself become a target of workplace bullying and moves to terminate him from the agency. In fact according to Whipple his supervisor Joshua Paul who is also an attorney at the agency ordered him to falsify federal documents  which is a criminal felony. On February 21, 2015 the agency sent a mover to his house and took his documents and badge preventing him from doing his work.
Whitman has a lot of years under his belt. He has been working over 10 years for state and Federal agencies so he knows a bit about how the Federal government operates.

His latest job was as an investigator in the OSHA program that investigates health and safety complaints by workers in industries from oil, rail, trucking and other companies in OSHA region 9 which covers nearly 40 million workers in the West.
As one of the 6 OSHA staff in this unit, there have been only three that actually doing investigations. Whitman investigates whether OSHA complaints by workers are valid and then makes a determination of whether or not their complaints are serious enough to gain a merit status. Under Federal law this merit status provides full back pay and can provide punitive damages to workers who are terminated for making their health and safety complaints.

By Garrett Brown - Portside, January 28, 2015

Disclaimer: The views expressed here are not the official position of the IWW (or even the IWW’s EUC) and do not necessarily represent the views of anyone but the author’s.

An underlying theme of California's most prominent union organizing campaigns in recent years-among warehouse workers east of Los Angeles, carwasheros in Los Angeles proper, and recycling workers in Oakland and southern California-has been worker concerns about unsafe and unhealthy conditions at work.  As labor visionaries like Tony Mazzocchi predicted, workers are deeply concerned about and can be successfully organized around workplace health and safety issues.  Rank-and-file concerns about health and safety, however, have not been taken up by union officials or lobbyists who view health and safety as a lower priority than labor legislation or gubernatorial appointees.

As a result, labor officials in California have passively watched as Democratic Governor Jerry Brown put California's state workplace health and safety agency-Cal/OSHA or DOSH-on a starvation diet. Since 2011, the agency has employed fewer field inspectors and has counted on lesser enforcement resources than under Republican Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger. The unions also stood quietly by (with a couple of notable exceptions) when Ellen Widess, appointed as chief of Cal/OSHA in April 2011, was forced to resign in September 2013 following an intense employer campaign against her.

Cal/OSHA under Widess worked with Warehouse Workers United to identify the many hazards facing warehouse workers (heat, forklifts, falls) and to cite both the warehouse operators and the temporary staffing agencies as the workers' employers.  Cal/OSHA seriously investigated hotel workers' ergonomic complaints (UNITE HERE); health care workers' concerns about workplace violence and assaults (SEIU and CNA); and recycling workers' exposure to chemicals, biological, and mechanical hazards in the "green" industry (Longshore and Teamsters unions).  Yet the state's labor officials' and lobbyists' strategy of maintaining access and friendly relations with Brown and his appointees-at all costs-has undermined the resources at Cal/OSHA and led to the weakening of enforcement and worker protections.

Compiled by x344543 - IWW Environmental Unionism Caucus, February 1, 2015

Disclaimer: The views expressed here are not the official position of the IWW (or even the IWW’s EUC) and do not necessarily represent the views of anyone but the author’s.

The following news items feature issues, discussions, campaigns, or information potentially relevant to green unionists:

Lead Stories:

• Register now for the Future of Railroads: Safety, Workers, Community & the Environment Conferences: Richmond, California (March 14, 2015) and Olympia, Washington (March 22, 2015) - railroadconference.org
• How Scrappy Community and Labor Activists Took on a California Oil Giant—and Won - By Jane Slaughter, In These Times, January 26, 2015
• Shut It Down Now! Former Nuclear Plant Technician Bob Rowen on Nuclear Power - By Steve Zelter, TruthOut, January 30, 2015
• Union rejects second refinery workers contract proposal - By Erwin Seba, Reuters, January 27, 2015

Crude by Rail:

• California Cities and Citizens Speak Out Against Oil Trains - By Ethan Buckner, Forest Ethics, January 26, 2015
• The Dangers of Hauling Crude Oil by Rail - By John Kristensen, Railroaded, January 25, 2015
• Oil Train Spills Hit Record Level in 2014 - By Tony Dokoupil, NBC Nightly News, January 26, 2015
• Why New "Improved" Oil Trains Are Not Nearly Good Enough: a closer look at the many flaws of CPC-1232 tank cars - By Eric de Place, Sightline Daily, January 28, 2015

Carbon Bubble:

• Big Oil needs a Plan B. It hasn’t got one - By Giles Parkinson, ReNew Economy, January 29, 2015
• BP cuts jobs in Houston as it trims Gulf of Mexico business - By Collin Eaton, FuelFix, January 28, 2015
• BP will freeze pay for most of its employees - By Robert Grattan, FuelFix, January 26, 2015
• ConocoPhillips tells employees to expect layoffs - By Robert Grattan, FuelFix, January 29, 2015
• Drilling contractor may cut 2,000 field jobs as rigs idle - By Collin Eaton, FuelFix, January 30, 2015
• The False Promise of Local Fracking Jobs - By Susan Christopherson, The Conversation, January 27, 2015
• Glencore mulls shutting down South African coal mines, lay offs - By Cecilia Jamasmie, Mining.Com, January 28, 2015

Green Jobs and Just Transition:

• Just Transitions Speaking Tour with Bob Massie - Yes 2 Renewables [FOE], January 30, 2015
• Parents, Teachers and Students Ask School Districts to Go 100% Renewable Energy - By Stefanie Spear, EcoWatch, January 27, 2015
• SMA Solar to cut 1,600 jobs as European demand slides - By Christoph Steitz and Maria Sheahan, Reuters, January 27, 2015

Other News of Interest:

• 400 parts per million and class struggle - By Victor Wallis, Climate and Capitalism, January 25, 2015
• ALEC Forces the Question: Will Labor Really Go Local? - By Simon Davis-Cohen, Truthout, January 25, 2015
• Bangladesh Garment Workers Win Bargaining Pacts at 5 Factories - By Jennifer Kuhlman, AFL-CIO Solidarity Center, January 27, 2015
• Bribery Is a Bargain for Big Oil - By Steve Kretzmann, Oil Change International, January 22, 2015
• Former DNR employees say regulator stifles public information - By Jacob Barker, St Louis Post Dispatch, January 26, 2015
• The Heat Is On: Via Campesina and Allies Challenge Climate Capitalism - La Via Campesina, January 27, 2015
• The Precariat and the Basic Income: Part 1 - By Andrew Curry, The Next Wave, January 26, 2015
• The Precariat and the Basic Income: Part 2 - By Andrew Curry, The Next Wave, January 27, 2015
• 'Tiny houses' no solution to the unaffordability crisis - By Mike Stewart, Rabble.Ca, January 28, 2015
• Uber Accused of Lax Safety Practices by Delhi Woman - By Mike Isaac, New York Times, January 29, 2015
• Union workers press their case for contract demands at Lyondell refinery - By LM Sixell, FuelFix, January 28, 2015
• Up to 6,000 carcinogens, mutagens and reprotoxins floating around EU - European Trade Union Institute, January 30, 2015

For more green news, please visit our news feeds section on ecology.iww.org; Twitter #IWWEUC

By Gordon Hoekstra - Vancouver Sun, November 20, 2014

Disclaimer: The views expressed here are not the official position of the IWW (or even the IWW’s EUC) and do not necessarily represent the views of anyone but the author’s.

Unions representing government inspectors and engineers and Mount Polley mine workers, supported by First Nations, called on the B.C. government Wednesday to provide “whistleblower” protection to workers who provide information to an expert panel appointed by the government.

The three-member expert engineering panel recently made an unusual call for public submission on the cause of Imperial Metals’ Mount Polley gold and copper mine tailings dam collapse.

The collapse on Aug. 4 at the mine in the Central Interior released millions of cubic metres of water and tailings containing potentially toxic metals. The spill, among the largest in the world in the past 50 years, sparked widespread concerns about the long-term effects on the Quesnel Lake watershed and has put intense scrutiny on tailings dam safety in British Columbia.

“Unless your government provides immediate protection to employees to speak freely about the disaster, there is a real risk that the panel will not obtain all the evidence it needs to do its job properly,” the parties said in a letter to Premier Christy Clark dated Wednesday.

The letter was signed by representatives of the B.C. Government Employees Union, Professional Employees Association, United Steelworkers, Williams Lake Indian Band, the Xatsull First Nation (Soda Creek Indian Band) and the University of Victoria Environmental Law Centre.

By Mark Calzavara - Rabble.Ca, November 17, 2014

Disclaimer: The views expressed here are not the official position of the IWW (or even the IWW’s EUC) and do not necessarily represent the views of anyone but the author’s.

"I told them in no uncertain terms to go f**k themselves because what they were doing was blatantly unsafe and illegal"

- Excerpt from TransCanada whistleblower Evan Vokes' eye-opening speech at our annual conference in Hamilton. (Watch the video of his speech below.)

TransCanada has had five ruptures over the past year -- far more than any other pipeline company according to National Energy Board statistics.

The five ruptures occurred on both recently-built pipelines and pipelines that are up to 40 years old, which raises serious questions about TransCanada’s ability to safely build and maintain pipelines.

By Kirsten Stade - Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility, September 24, 2014

Disclaimer: The views expressed here are not the official position of the IWW (or even the IWW’s EUC) and do not necessarily represent the views of anyone but the author’s.

Washington, DC —As federal prosecutors promote substantial financial rewards for white collar crime whistleblowers, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency cashiered its modest witness bounty program long ago, according to records released today by Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER). This may help explain the stagnancy of EPA’s anti-pollution criminal enforcement program.

In a September 17, 2014 speech at the New York University Law School, Attorney General Eric Holder advocated increasing the size of whistleblower awards under white collar crime bounty laws, saying it “could significantly improve the Justice Department’s ability to gather evidence of wrongdoing while complex financial crimes are still in progress – making it easier to complete investigations and to stop misconduct before it becomes so widespread that it foments the next crisis.”

By contrast, EPA has no interest in whistleblower bounties. In 1990, Congress authorized EPA to pay “an award, not to exceed $10,000, to any person who furnishes information or services which lead to a criminal conviction or a judicial or administrative civil penalty for any violation” of the Clean Air Act. In response to a Freedom of Information Act request from PEER about how this bounty authority had been utilized, the agency conceded that this provision had become a dead letter. EPA could find only one responsive document, a 1996 internal manual provision, because –

“Nearly all the records you requested were destroyed in 2012 because the retention schedule for those records had been met (10 years retention time).”

“The Justice Department now emphasizes the importance of whistleblowers to effective enforcement against corporate criminality while EPA remains clueless,” stated PEER Executive Director Jeff Ruch. “Corporate pollution violations are just as much a white collar crime as securities fraud.”

Reflecting persistent complaints about shortages of agents, lack of focus and low priority on complex pollution cases from within EPA’s own Criminal Investigation Division (CID), PEER points out that –

• Criminal cases generated by EPA have been in overall decline over the last decade, with more than half of all its criminal referrals rejected for prosecution. During the first three-quarters of FY 2014, EPA generated only 207 new cases, putting it on track for the lowest number since 1992;
• Despite policies requiring timely enforcement, EPA allows major wastewater dischargers to violate their permits for years without even a citation; and
• EPA’s new five-year Strategic Plan deemphasizes traditional enforcement in favor of industry self-reporting of emissions and discharges.

“Agencies such as the Securities and Exchange Commission actively seek to verify corporate filings but when it comes to the environment EPA has no means for, or apparent interest in, checking whether industry pollution self-reporting is accurate,” added Ruch. “EPA hands out citizen awards for all sorts of volunteerism but not for helping catch polluters.”

By Damien Gillis - Common Sense Canadian, September 8, 2014

Disclaimer: The views expressed here are not the official position of the IWW (or even the IWW’s EUC) and do not necessarily represent the views of anyone but the author’s.

Larry Chambers warned Imperial Metals that its tailings pond was bound to fail – and he was fired for it, the Likely, BC resident told media in Vancouver earlier today.

He and his wife, Lawna Bourassa-Keuster, have now lost their home on once-beautiful Quensnel Lake – too afraid to drink the cloudy and discoloured water, which they brought with them to Vancouver in a jar.

“Christy Clark did come to Likely and at that time, she informed us that she would make sure that Quesnel Lake would be brought back to its pristine state,” said Bourassa-Keuster. “We haven’t seen or heard from her since.”

“We, like most of the residents, live in Likely for its beauty and peacefulness. This is heartbreaking to see.”

The couple didn’t pull any punches when discussing the company’s attitude toward safety during a press conference hosted by the Union of BC Indian Chiefs and featuring a Secwepemc First Nation representative as well. After complaining in writing to the Ministry of Energy and Mines about safety conditions at the mine, Chambers says he received a phone call “saying my services were no longer needed there.”

Chambers described instances of being bullied by supervisors at the mine for insisting on safety standards that were not being properly implemented.

It was an ongoing concern about the size of tailing pond and half the employees there knew there was a problem. This just shows you, as soon as you say something, you’re out of there.

By Andrea Germanos - EcoWatch, August 7, 2014

Disclaimer: The views expressed here are not the official position of the IWW (or even the IWW’s EUC) and do not necessarily represent the views of anyone but the author’s.

The owner of a Youngstown, Ohio-based company was sentenced on Tuesday [August 5, 2014] to more than two years in prison for ordering his employees to repeatedly dump toxic fracking waste into a local waterway.

Between Nov. 1, 2012 and Jan. 31, 2013, employees of Hardrock Excavating LLC, which provided services to the oil and gas industry including storing fracking waste, made over 30 discharges of fracking waste into a tributary of the Mahoning River. Sixty-four-year old Benedict W. Lupo, then-owner of Hardrock Excavating, directed his employees to dump the waste, which included benzene and toluene, under the cover of night into the waterway.

According to reporting by the Cleveland Plain Dealer, “employees tried to talk Lupo out of it, but he refused. [The judge] also pointed out a prosecutor’s pictures that detailed six weeks of clean-up in an oil-soaked creek.”