Last week I completed the OSHA 500 Construction course training to teach OSHA 10 and 30 programs. Our instructor, Jay Fitzpatrick did a great job teaching the various programs and approaches used to train these programs.
There was a strong emphasis on teaching contractors in the residential industry the OSHA Standards. Workers in the residential construction industry are way behind their commercial counterparts when it comes to understanding what is required to comply with OSHA Standards.
The injuries and deaths are piling up every year and now OSHA is paying attention to smaller residential construction companies.
On Friday I learned that the Region 1 Fall Protection initiative will be extended throughout other OSHA regions in the country. The emphasis will be on compliance with Subpart M Fall Protection, Ladders and Stairs and Scaffolding. We will soon see OSHA doing outreach in these regions. Region 1 OSHA has offered many free programs to educate the industry on Fall Protection. Recently Darcy Cook of Safety Trainers and I held 5 free outreach OSHA seminars with Tim Irvine of Braintree Mass OSHA. Region 1 has recently held five free outreach seminars on fall protection in the Boston area.
The outreach will be accompanied by enforcement. We learned two weeks ago OSHA was planning sweeps in the residential sector looking for residential job sites.
There continues to be a National Emphasis Program focusing on the residential sector. This will likely be an additional level of scrutiny due to the huge number of fall injuries and deaths.
Here is a hot off the press OSHA Fine Announcement for Fall Hazards; this is a residential construction job site with numerous fall hazards violation, electrical hazards, and failure to provide head protection.
OSHA 10 programs
OSHA 10 is a good way for residential contractors to become familiar with OSHA and learn an overview of what is required to provide a safe work place for their workers. Workers would include employees and sub contractors.
Since early 2011 we have been conducting Fall Protection Training throughout New England. In these trainings we have observed that most residential contractors are vaguely familiar with what is required to align their companies.
For help with OSHA, questions and more contact us today. We have open courses and also come to you for private trainings.