b'Garys CornerGary Auman, MRCA Legal CounselSome Thoughts on Safety Unfortunately, the program they used did not A s general counselhave all of the necessary components to make for the MRCA I findit an effective program. The program they used myself filling multipletalked in generalities. Rather than assign specific roles. I advise the MRCA Executive Director onresponsibilities to supervisors to ensure that issues requiring legal analysis and opinion. I alsothe five necessary components of a good heat advise the Board of Directors on similar issuesillness prevention program were included in their and questions. But, the area in which I feel I canprogram with steps for implementation, their be most beneficial to our members is in answeringprogram spoke in generalities, did not assign questions they may have on a variety of topics.specific responsibilities for implementation Sometimes I have to refer the member to one ofand failed to provide any details on the critical the other lawyers in our office, but frequentlycomponents of the required program. So, we had a on questions of OSHA compliance, safety andprogram which the applicant felt met the NIOSH workers compensation, I try to assist the membercriteria document, but not only did not meet it; myself. You notice that I said OSHA complianceclearly demonstrated the applicants attitude for AND safety. While these terms are not mutuallyproviding a safe place of work for its employees. exclusive, many times employers lose sight ofBut, how can I say this? It is not hard! Such a safety in their drive to be in compliance withprogram shows that the company is not really OSHA standards.committed to safety. The MRCA has conducted While OSHA standards make an attemptat least one webinar, one conference presentation to ensure a safe working environment they areand more than one article in MR regarding heat not custom designed for each job site and workillness prevention. It was obvious that some of environment.OSHA tries to contemplate everythese applicants were not concerned enough about situation and to guard against every foreseeablethe safety of their employees to participate in any hazard; the task before them is not easilyof these sessions or review any of these articles. conquered. This was very evident to me andIn many of these cases, the remainder of the the grading committee that recently graded theapplication spoke volumes of the same kind.SHARP Safety Recognition Award applications.There were other examples. Another of these It is usually fairly easy to tell when a company isdeals with safety enforcement programs. Again, really thinking about safety or just giving it liphow can you say you are really concerned about service.employees safety when you fail to enforce your safety rules. This goes beyond the unpreventable OSHA tries toemployee misconduct defense to an OSHA citation. All employers need to realize that contemplate everywhen an employee violates a safety rule he/situation and toshe not only puts himself/herself in danger; in most cases other employees working with or guard against everyaround the recalcitrant employee are also put in foreseeable hazard danger. A safety monitor on a low sloped roof is violating an OSHA standard if he/she is talking There were several questions in whichon their cell phone, or is in some other way not this became very evident. Perhaps the leadingpaying attention to employees working outside question that falls in this area was the questionthe warning lines. How many times should the regarding the heat illness prevention. Quite aemployer look the other way and not enforce few applicants used a heat illness preventionthis requirement? My answer is NONE. And, I program that was clearly off the shelf.am sorry, it does not matter that the employee violating the rule for safety monitors is the best 40 www.mrca.orgMidwest Roofer'