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On Oct. 30, ABC submitted post-hearing comments to the U.S. Department of Labor’s Occupational Safety and Health Administration in response to OSHA’s informal public hearing on its Heat Injury and Illness Prevention in Outdoor and Indoor Work Settings proposed rule. On June 18, ABC participated in the informal public hearing and was asked a series of questions by OSHA, which ABC’s comments address.

Sept. 17, the U.S. House Committee on Education and Workforce passed the ABC-supported H.R. 2844, Michael Enzi Voluntary Protection Program Act, The bill makes VPPs permanent and requires the U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration to allocate a minimum of 5% of its annual budget to the program. ABC believes that encouraging collaborative partnerships between the regulated community and OSHA, such as VPPs, is a win-win approach.

On July 14, the U.S. Department of Labor updated its guidance on penalty and debt collection procedures, outlined in the Penalties and Debt Collection section of OSHA’s Field Operations Manual, to help minimize the burden on small businesses and increase prompt hazard abatement. The new policy expands penalty reductions for small employers, making it easier for small businesses to invest resources in compliance and hazard abatement.

On Dec. 11, the U.S. Department of Labor’s Occupational Safety and Health Administration announced its final rule on Personal Protective Equipment in Construction, which adds specific language requiring that employers provide PPE that properly fits construction industry workers. The change aligns the construction industry standard with the standard already in place for general industry. The final rule is effective on Jan. 13, 2025. To learn more about the final rule read OSHA’s Frequently Asked Questions.

Planning for a successful safety program starts with setting goals, implementing proper recordkeeping procedures and ensuring documentation is correct. ABC's STEP Safety Management System provides the framework to drive improvements in construction safety programs through recordkeeping and benchmarking in 25 key components. Discover four helpful tips for submitting OSHA incident data. 

The Occupational Safety and Health Administration recently announced it had renewed its partnership with ABC’s Central Texas Chapter and promoted the partnership as a success story. In an article posted to its website, OSHA highlighted a number of collaborative programs between ABC and OSHA that led to a significant safety achievement: The 2016 combined Days Away, Restricted or Transferred (DART) rate for participating contractors was 50 percent below the 2015 U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) average.

WASHINGTON, March 24—The Construction Industry Safety Coalition (CISC) has concerns with the final rule on respirable crystalline silica released today by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA). It appears, upon initial review, that the 1,772-page final rule contains some of the same problematic provisions that the CISC previously identified and shared with the agency. CISC has been a highly engaged participant in the rulemaking process since OSHA put forth the proposed rule two and a half years ago.

WASHINGTON, D.C., April 4—Eight construction industry organizations filed a petition for review of the final crystalline silica rule by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit today. Petitioning groups included: Mississippi Road Builders’ Association, American Subcontractors Association of Texas, Pelican Chapter of Associated Builders and Contractors, Louisiana Associated General Contractors, Associated Masonry Contractors of Texas, Distribution Contractors Association, Mechanical Contractors Associations of Texas and Texas Association of Builders.

The anti-retaliation provisions of the Occupational Safety and Health Administration’s (OSHA) Electronic Injury Reporting and Anti-Retaliation final rule (also known as Improve Tracking of Workplace Injuries and Illnesses) go into effect Thursday, Dec. 1. The rule, which was finalized on May 12, 2016, will make the submission of the injury and illness forms mandatory and exclusively electronic for most employers. For the first time, OSHA plans to make this information publicly available on the Internet through a new searchable database and use the data for enforcement purposes. Also, some forms of post-accident drug testing and accident-free programs will be deemed to be unlawfully

A recent interpretation letter by the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) has refined the definition of a recordable injury under 29 CFR Part 1904 – Recording and Reporting Occupational Injuries and Illnesses. According to the interpretation, an employee’s self-treatment of wrist pain with a rigid brace qualifies as a reportable injury even if a physician later determines that the brace is acceptable yet unnecessary treatment.