OSHA Advisory Council

June 25, 2004

Minutes
Members: Staff members:

Eric Ajax Jamie Anderson

Melanie Isabell Allen Debbie Caswell
Carol Bufton James Collins
Harvey Burski Todd Haglin
Gene Harmer Alden Hoffman
Michael Hawthorne Phil Jacobs
Pat McGovern Jim Krueger
Paul Grundy Patricia Todd
Scott Richter Roslyn Wade
Daryl Tindle
Visitors:
Members excused:
Brian Breider, IBM
Ed Raine Robin Peterson; MNAPTA
Scott Metcalf Dawn Westin; Unisys
Kristi Alberts; Hodgman Drainage

The meeting was called to order at 10:05 a.m., by chairperson Carol Bufton.
Members and visitors introduced themselves.

Bufton asked advisory council members to remember Jim Thill, whose funeral
would be starting at about 11 a.m. that day. Jim was a member of the safety profession
for more than 30 years, primarily with Excel and NRG. She asked for a moment of
silence.

Paul Grundy made a motion to approve the minutes from the Nov. 14, 2003, and
the March 5, 2004 meetings. Harvey Burski seconded the motion. All voted in favor of
the motion and the motion passed.

[Please note: The department's sound system was not functioning properly and
portions of this meeting could not be reliably transcribed and were omitted. The
following is an attempt to give the most accurate reflection possible of that meeting.]

V. Assistant commissioner’s update

Roslyn Wade asked DLI’s Legislative Affairs Director Jamie Anderson to give an
update about legislative activity. Anderson reported DLI requested one MNOSHA statute
change to incorporate NAICS into the AWAIR requirements. This provision was
included in both the Senate and House omnibus budget bills, but the Legislature did not
pass those budget bills this year. It will be put forward next year and they are hopeful it
will pass. She said there are still rumblings about whether there will be a special session,
but she did not think it was likely. Anderson invited OSHA Advisory Council (OAC)
members to contact her with any thoughts about legislative initiatives for next year.
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Minutes

Wade noted the department is starting to think about legislative issues in

preparation for the next session. It will be a budget session and DLI is preparing its
budget documents that will go to the Department of Finance as early as next week. This
activity is all very preliminary and no significant budget initiatives are being proposed at
this point. Wade said the department would revisit the legislatives initiatives not acted on
this past year. She noted that the budget is expected to dominate the next session.

Wade said that during session, other important work at the department was
delayed to provide feedback to the Legislature. After the session, Commissioner Brener
asked the staff at DLI to undertake a number of summer projects. There were 13 major
projects for the Workplace Services Division. None of the projects are specifically for
OSHA, other than the loggers’ program within the OSHA Workplace Safety Consultation
unit. There was a proposal made to the Legislature last session to move that program
from DLI to the Minnesota Loggers' Education Program (MLEP), which is the logger
education program located in Eveleth, in northern Minnesota. No decisions have been
made yet. DLI staff members continue to work with the participants and stakeholders of
that program. Those stakeholders will have discussions with the commissioner, Wade,
Jim Collins and Anderson. This proposal would require legislative activity to move the
program, so Wade does not expect anything to happen until next session.

Some of the other projects, although they are not specific to OSHA, will have
some impact. DLI is looking at the business review process and at all of the activities at
the agency to make sure DLI is taking advantage of all the technology, resources and
tools that are available to continually improve what DLI does and how it does it. Many
other projects in the areas that fall under Wade’s purview are keeping the Workplace
Services staff extremely busy this summer; Wade said she would bring back information
to the stakeholders about how DLI intends to go forward.

Wade reported they have seen reductions due to budget cuts in other units, but
nothing in OSHA was reduced significantly. She said DLI would have to perform its core
services with the remaining resources and decide if it can continue to support them. The
Cabinet members are working very hard and cooperatively with each other, and Wade
will bring back specifics after decisions about the summer projects are completed.

Gene Harmer asked whether there were any safety initiatives from DLI and also
whether there were any safety or OSHA issues introduced by someone other than the
department. Wade responded that the proposal to move the logger program was not from
DLI. There was an ergonomics bill passed out of the Senate to adopt an ergonomics
standard, but it was not heard in the House. Grundy recalled the proposal to reduce the
blood alcohol to .08 was the only safety-related bill passed this session, if you want to put
that bill in the safety category.

Wade mentioned the safety conference sponsored by the Minnesota Safety

Council was very successful. Bufton and her organization put on a top-notch luncheon. It
went extremely well and DLI was glad the governor was able to participate. Bufton noted
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Minutes

that sometimes we forget how important it is for organizations to get that public
recognition and that it means more when it is the governor passing that along.

VI. Federal OSHA update

Patricia Todd presented the federal OSHA update for Tim Kobernat. He passed
along information that federal OSHA's inspection activity was near their '03 goal.

• The number of consultation visits was within two percent of their forecast.
• Their new participants in federal recognition programs exceeded their forecast by
123 percent.
• Their new participants in strategic partnerships and alliances exceeded the
forecast by 39 percent.

Kobernat asked Todd to talk about some of the workplace violence activities they
are doing in the federal OSHA arena. They are doing a similar approach to what
Minnesota presently has with Vikki Sanders, working specifically on providing outreach
and guidance about what industries can do to anticipate or resolve some of the workplace
violence issues before they occur.

Kobernat wanted to note they are continuing with their national emphasis-
program for trenching. They have been noticing an increase in the number of trenching
fatalities and serious injuries in federal areas, so they are revitalizing the trenching
emphasis-program at the federal level.

Todd reported there is a Congressional Conscience Office that ensures federal

government agencies are compliant with safety and health rules. Federal OSHA has
developed a partnership with them. Bufton asked how they are doing. Todd responded
Kobernat did not say and neither did the article. There are approximately 30,000 people
impacted by this.

Todd noted the Washington, D.C., Corporate Watch Dog Agency named a new
director, Gregory Watchman. He joined them as part of the Government Accountability
Project. Federal OSHA continues to move forward in regard to the Star program and the
VPP.

Pat McGovern asked about a New York Times series of articles about criminal
prosecution in regard to fatalities and whether federal OSHA developed any kind of
response. Todd said federal OSHA is looking at what they call an "enhanced enforcement
program" (EEP). They are trying to identify companies based on specific types of
inspections that would trigger follow-up inspections at the federal level. She reported
Minnesota already has something similar, where it identifies what type of things would
trigger a follow-up after an inspection. Some of the things federal OSHA is looking at in
its EEP have to do with fatalities and whether the violation caused or contributed to the
death of the individual. They also consider, based on the seriousness of the original
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Minutes

citations that were issued, whether they will conduct a follow-up inspection. They are
working on the directive in regard to EEP this fiscal year.

Harmer asked if any national OSHA bills were moving forward. Todd said she
read about four bills that were moving forward. One had to do with federal OSHA
covering federal employees; one had to do with the amount of time for a small employer
to contest; one dealt with time to generate a report; and one had to do with penalties
related to fatalities. There seems to be mixed support on those bills. Grundy said he was
in their Washington office; their legislative office did not think those bills are going to
make it through the Senate this year. Their best guess was that the bills are stuck in the
House.

Daryl Tindle noted there are numerous federal regions that do not have a director
assigned to them for economic reasons. He feels it is important all safety professionals
share with our elected federal representatives that we believe those positions were
important and should be filled.

VII. Staff reports

OSHA Compliance

Todd presented the MNOSHA Compliance update.

• The Grassroots publication about state-plan states is set for

printing in September. As of next year, Minnesota will be in charge of
coordinating the publication for three years.
• The federal grant application, which includes the annual
performance plan, is due to the regional federal office June 30.
• The Workplace Safety Report, with information about Minnesota’s
job-related injuries, illnesses and fatalities, and a copy of the fatalilty and serious
injury report are in the meeting packets.
• The 75/25 program is to provide a 75 percent reduction in penalties
for employers that reduce their workers’ compensation claims. It provides a link
between workers’ compensation and MNOSHA. Two companies are interested in
the program, which has been running for three or four months.
• The winner of the MNOSHA “Photo of the Year” contest will be
in the Safety Lines publication soon.
• MNOSHA staff members are trying some new technology. The
unit is purchasing four laser devices to determine if they can improve the
accuracy of measuring trenches. It is also evaluating the use of hand-held tablets
for use by inspectors in the field.
• Two new investigators were hired and will begin June 28. Two
investigator positions remain open.
• Jane Luger left the agency. Todd noted they appreciated all she
added to the group. Her knowledge in workers' compensation will be missed.
They decided to replace the vacant director position with two supervisor
positions. This will result in a one-to-10 ratio of supervisors to staff members.
OSHA Advisory Council -5- June 25, 2004
Minutes

• Strategic-plan activities included a workflow analysis and a work-

skill assessment. The workflow analysis will focus on the health inspection lapse
time and the citations issuance lapse time. The work-skill assessment identified
the major types of positions within the MNOSHA program and corresponding
training needs.
• Online information includes payment of penalties, three online
surveys (for employers, employees and the effectiveness of the Web site). Forms
that external stakeholders fill in following an inspection are available online.
• Rules changes will be published in Safety Lines. There is nothing
that had a real significant impact.
• The only federal standard that was adopted that they received any
comment about was the respiratory protection rule change. This standard will go
into effect June 30.
• DLI will participate in a tabletop exercise regarding homeland
security next week. The Department of Public Safety and Homeland Security are
coordinating these meetings. They will discuss how to work together to respond
to homeland security issues.

McGovern asked for an example of what the OSHA citation might be for in the
75/25 program, how MNOSHA links to claims data to make the employers clean up their
act and what that link was. Todd responded that for an employer to qualify for the
program, certain conditions must exist. The initial penalties must exceed $5,000. The
employer must contest the original citations and say they want to participate in the
program. An informal meeting is then set up with MNOSHA; afterward, they meet
quarterly – in person or on the phone – to track how things are going and determine how
to reduce workers' compensation injuries. MNOSHA wants to look at how many First
Report of Injury Forms (FROIs) are provided, not how many are accepted by the
insurance company. They are attempting to reduce the number of FROIs, because they
are the trigger for potential workers' compensation indemnity or medical claims. They
ask the employer to give a count for the FROIs. Todd reported the 75/25 program had
been very well received by the two companies that were participating in the program. The
employer is required to commit to provide certain training at the time of the informal
conference. If most of their injuries were related to a punch press, for example, then one
of the recommendations would be to get additional training with punch presses. Todd
stated if the employer is not required by statute to have an AWAIR program, they will be
required under 75/25 to have an AWAIR program. They are also required to have a safety
committee. In this manner, MNOSHA is working with an employer to point out an
opportunity to see some savings on a penalty and instead invest those dollars is a safety
and healthy environment to affect their injury/illness rates and affect a cultural change.
OSHA Advisory Council -6- June 25, 2004
Minutes

OSHA Workplace Safety Consultation

James Collins presented the OSHA Workplace Safety Consultation (WSC) staff
report. He said the WSC federal budget was reduced by $5,000 in federal-fiscal-year
2004 (FFY04) without a corresponding reduction in the level of services. Essentially, the
reduction was made without regard to the annual goals set and agreed upon by federal
OSHA and the Department of Labor and Industry. The current funding level is at
$922,000.

Collins said the department received instructions to prepare a joint application for
Compliance and WSC for FFY05. The two directors prepared the application and
submitted it to the Region V administrator for review and approval. He reviewed the
application, approved it and sent it to Washington, D.C., for final review and approval in
accordance with federal directions. The joint application was prepared at FFY04 funding
levels.

Collins reported WSC experienced a staffing change June 16, when Chris Bellefy
left to work for Minnesota Power Company in Duluth, Minn. Collins is in the process of
hiring a safety consultant. The other vacancy occurred when Tracey Josephson, safety
grant specialist, transferred to the Department of Revenue for a potential promotional
opportunity. That vacancy was filled by Ernest Matilla, who has a master’s degree from
Mankato State University and 20 years of administrative management experience. He
served as the grants specialist for the Department of Public Safety, Department of Health
and MNSCU. The commissioner approved one new full-time position for construction, to
meet the overwhelming demands for service from the construction industry. Mike Seliga
was transferred from general industry into construction. Seliga is an industrial hygienist
senior with a master’s degree in public health; he has been with the state for more than 24
years. He has considerable construction experience and is an asset to the construction
team.

Collins reported federal OSHA has published guidelines to add nonfixed sites to
MNSHARP. Currently, the guidelines only allow fixed sites to participate in this
program. The proposal now is to include nonfixed sites, such as construction and logging
worksites. At the national level, federal OSHA is looking for three or four sites to
experiment with for a pilot program. Minnesota is not participating as one of the states.

Collins noted the current MNSHARP has 12 sites and four federal sites
participating in the program. They added three new partners: Malco Products
(mechanical power presses); Morrisey, Inc. (mechanical power presses); and Minnesota
Freezer Warehouse (warehoused frozen goods).

Collins said the state of Minnesota has three approved SGEs, which are
employees with two or more years experience in safety and health, employed by a VVP
STAR site. They work as volunteers, helping other employers that are currently
participating in the VVP or are trying to enter the program. They are additional human
OSHA Advisory Council -7- June 25, 2004
Minutes

resources who are willing to help employers. They are our partners. Federal OSHA
certifies these employees after comprehensive training in safety and health. They are then
put on the list to share their experiences with employers that would like to participate in a
VPP. They work on VPP teams for on-site reviews for certifications. Minnesota has
agreed to participate in this program as one way to leverage safety and health
professional resources. Currently, there are 12 VPP-approved sites in our state and this
year they were able to conduct all of the re-certifications and add two new sites. The two
new sites are Louisiana Pacific and Weyerhaeuser. Louisiana Pacific was approved at a
“Merit” level; Weyerhaeuser approved at the “STAR” level in FFY04. The applications
pending include Mankato School Systems (17 schools), Lund Boats, Specialty Minerals,
Inc. and Midwest Electric Products (GE site for corporate level application). Other
companies requesting application information include 3M and Koch Refinery. IBM has
applied for corporate level participation in the VVP. This means that if IBM is approved,
it will be able to use the new streamlined corporate application process. Their application
is currently pending at the federal level for approval.

Collins reported the department conducted 16 seminars during the spring session,
with 1,049 employers and employees participating. The sessions included CPR/first aid,
chainsaw/PPE, tire maintenance safety, transportation equipment safety, electrical
equipment guarding, meth lab awareness and hazardous clean-up safety. He noted Wade
mentioned the Minnesota Loggers’ Education Program is trying to privatize and take over
the LogSafe Program, which means they would like to administer the program and take
over the funding of the $125,000 that is currently being appropriated to the commissioner
of DLI for LogSafe training. As she mentioned, for them to take over the program, a
change in legislation is required. This association is prepared to introduce legislation to
move the program under their control. The commissioner and some of the DLI staff are in
discussions with this group.

Eric Ajax asked about the measurement program with logging in terms of
reducing workers' compensation costs. This is "where the rubber meets the road" with
many employers. He asked if there have been any efforts to bring the nursing home
approach to other industries. Collins said, "yes, they do use that approach with other
programs." WSC has the workers' compensation database of the number and types of
worker injuries by body part, as well as the cost of injuries. The scheduled inspections
will have the basic workers' compensation data and will tell the employer up front that
they have access to that data.

Ajax asked Collins for an estimate of what the reductions are during the past 10
years for all of the companies that have worked with WSC. Collins said the DLI Research
and Statistics unit has looked at five years of data, but it has been difficult to calculate the
WSC program's effectiveness in terms of workers' compensation reductions. They tried
an effectiveness study with construction, but because the sites are nonfixed sites,
Research and Statistics abandoned that study. The nursing homes study is the first
definitive study Research and Statistics has undertaken to show WSC's effectiveness by
looking at the workers' compensation data for those employers covered by the study.
OSHA Advisory Council -8- June 25, 2004
Minutes

VIII. Old business

There was no old business.

IX. New business

Wade said the OAC would take one suggestion made by the council at the
meeting last September for a discussion topic at each meeting. The subject at this meeting
was ergonomics. We heard from the OAC that this discussion is critical to the safety and
health of Minnesota's employees. Wade noted Collins' group has been doing some
impressive work. It is critically important to DLI as an organization, but more
importantly to the employees of Minnesota, to find an effective way to advance the
ergonomics discussion and make some significant improvements. Ergonomics is not
going away. For some employers, "ergo" remains a four-letter, nasty word.
Unfortunately, it represents 40 percent of the injuries that are processed in the workers'
compensation system. Therefore, it is critical to the workers of Minnesota that we find a
way to address these ergonomic injuries. It is important to get the employers to the table,
because DLI firmly believes change will only occur if we have their dedication and their
leadership, so appropriate resources are directed to address ergonomics when necessary.

Wade said Collins would give specific information about the activities that have
been occurring, but she said they would like to see more industry representatives come to
the table and appealed to the OAC, as a group, and to the audience where possible, to do
this. Collins will tell you about the success of the first training sessions. They specifically
designed this process and the training began in June. Wade said this is the time for
assessment and we have to look at ways to improve it to get more people at the table. She
asked Collins to give a briefing about the activities and said there would be discussion
about the questions that were sent for members to think about before the meeting.

Collins reported he has two full-time staff members working in his program. Dave
Ferkul has been with the agency for 12 years and Phil Jacobs joined WSC in June. He
served as the chairman of the Ergonomics Task-force. With his training from 3M and
owning his own consulting business, he brings a wealth of knowledge to DLI.

Collins said they have looked at the education/training for their staff members and
have established goals to supplement their training to include more ergonomics and more
OSHA types of training. They are focusing on training and education as their objectives.
They are designing a plan to conduct 40 training sessions around the state. The first
training sessions will be designed to attract senior management, such as CEOs, vice
presidents, risk management people and human resources directors.

Collins reported they were fortunate to have Dr. Grundy's organizational ideas
and help when designing the training program. Collins described the training program
curriculum and the presenters, which include Jacobs, Linda Brown and Jolyn Crum to
describe the laws and ergonomics guidelines, and the strategies for reducing workers'
compensation costs; and Brian Breider, a safety engineer from IBM. Dr. Lohman, from
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DLI, is an associate professor at the University of Minnesota and a medical doctor, so he

brings a wealth of knowledge to help explain the ergonomics guidelines. Todd Haglin
will explain the ergonomics guidelines, along with Brown and Crum.

Collins thought the training sessions would make a dramatic impact in raising the
awareness of senior managers. They would then begin training supervisors and workers.
They had one test-run in June, and the rest of the sessions will follow in August and
September. They are looking at different ways to market the training, because there is a
lot of training going on in our state, especially in the summer. They will use partners and
alliances to the extent they can. The goal is to get at least 25 participants at each
workshop. The workshops are statewide, so they are ready to train in the metro area and
greater Minnesota.

McGovern asked for a clarification about whether any employer could contact
WSC, about managing ergonomics in their workplace, if they can have 25 or more people
at the training session. Collins said they would come out and provide training for any
group with a reasonable number of people and they would not always require 25 people.

Collins said that after the senior management training, they would train
supervisors and workers. They are looking across the board – from manufacturing,
service and construction industries – to conduct this training.

Melanie Allen asked for a clarification about whether WSC is focusing on senior
leadership of organizations, because of the financial implications and the cost
effectiveness of safety programs, and then later WSC would talk with supervisors about
coaching how these people work safely and then, finally, the workers would be provided
tactical approaches about how to work safely. Collins said that was correct and is why
they always make sure senior management will provide support in the system – to the
supervisors and the workers – and that management recognizes the impact these types of
injuries have on the bottom line. After they realize that, they can then empower their staff
members to use their resources to develop strategies. Grundy agreed this was a good
strategy to get commitment and buy-in.

Harmer asked how long the class is; Collins responded it is a half-day course.

Collins reported the department's Research and Statistics unit helped them do an
analysis of where they should begin their ergonomics initiative and they decided to start
with nursing homes, because nursing homes have the highest workers’ compensation
costs. Research and Statistics looked at 420 nursing homes in the state and chose 103 of
them. Fifty-three nursing homes were assigned to an intervention group and 50 nursing
homes were assigned to the control group. Research and Statistics advised WSC that they
would have to visit at least 26 nursing homes for this project to be successful.

The demographics of the nursing homes they are going to visit are: 35 percent of
those are in the seven-county metro area; 11 of those are public sector; 27 are church
affiliated; 40 are nonprofit; and three are unknown. The average nursing home has 130
OSHA Advisory Council -10- June 25, 2004
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beds, with an average of 190 employees. They are the worst workers’ compensation risk,
with an average of 9.8, almost 10, WMSD claims per nursing home staff member from
January 2001 through June 2003.

Workplace Safety Consultation looked at and designed an intervention strategy

and will target registered nurses, licensed practical nurses and nursing aides. They
designed an intervention strategy and will conduct a comprehensive inspection at every
nursing home with two WSC full-time staff members spending a week and three days
doing an inspection, including safety and health assessments, in every nursing home.
"Comprehensive" means wall-to-wall communication. Aside from the safety and health
assessment, they will also look at the management systems. They have plans to do
training and education specifically for each nursing home. Upon completion of the wall-
to-wall inspection, an ergonomics intervention will occur.

WSC conducted nine on-site inspections initially, then they have the safety
committee specialists come in after they have done the safety and health assessment.
They know they have a ways to go and need five more to get the required 26. They
would like to exceed that goal. They are employing some different kinds of strategies.
Included in those strategies are ways that Research and Statistics is beginning to help
them. They will follow-up with phone calls and small training sessions to explain the
objectives and action plan to accomplish the goals. If they do all of these things, the
nursing homes might be lucky to show a 50 percent reduction in workers' compensation
costs. They also know they need to just show a reduction, period. The Workers’
Compensation Division did the research, analyzed the type of injuries, the type of claims
and the cost of claims, and gave that information to WSConsultation for careful review.
At the end of this study, they would be able to track the actual reductions and evaluate its
effectiveness. Collins wanted people to know that having two people spending this
amount of time at one nursing home for this length of time is a real investment of
resources, but now they know, in the future, they can prove their effectiveness. In the
end, they will be able to go back and report what the reductions actually were. If this
works, Collins said this is the wave of the future. This is important for the state to show
the effectiveness of the resources invested. On average, they are finding approximately
$12,000 worth of potential safety and health violations during the initial assessment.
There is a lot of work for them to do and they are doing the work. Collins had some
specific preliminary findings, but paused to take some questions.

McGovern said she thinks this sounds really exciting. She asked if this effort is
entirely financed through internal resources at Minnesota OSHA or whether they have
federal dollars that are also helping to support this study. Collins said they have two
positions, which are 100 percent state-funded.

McGovern asked about the timeline. Collins said they would like to see the initial
phase completed within 12 to 18 months and then the employers will be required to
submit reports to Research and Statistics.
OSHA Advisory Council -11- June 25, 2004
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Collins noted that after they focus on the safety and health assessment, they now
have Phil Jacobs do the ergonomics piece of the assessment.

Ergonomics discussion

Bufton asked the ergonomics experts to come to the table to guide the ergonomics
discussion. She referred to the May 20, 2004, memo sent to members ahead of time, so
they could think about the questions and be prepared to discuss them.

1) DLI has determined that we will address ergonomics-related issues in the

same way as federal OSHA. Using a four-pronged ergonomics strategy through a
combination of industry-specific and task-specific guidelines, outreach, enforcement
and research. How would you suggest we move this strategy forward?

Ajax said he thinks DLI is clearly on the right track with the outreach programs.
This approach makes it much easier for an employer to work with OSHA and he thinks
that it is less threatening for the employer. He thinks the educational piece of informing
employers that ergonomics injuries are 40 percent of workers' compensation costs and
showing it is out of control is valuable and, if we could perform some assessments to help
show some measurable results, he did not know how anyone could argue with that

Allen asked for a clarification about whether the response that DLI is looking for
is how to implement the federal ergonomic recommendations. Bufton said it is her
understanding the department is looking for feedback from this group about how to
implement some of these strategies. Collins has talked about some of them, and some of
them are laid out in the recommendations. It looks like the department prioritized those
that can be tackled with the resources it had; that was not just dollars, but people and so
forth. The May 20, 2004, memo outlines the goals DLI is going to be tackling first and
the questions they are asking are about how to best go about that, what advice the OAC
has for OSHA and how to implement those goals. Wade confirmed that is correct.

Allen noted, in business corporations, employers require the stronger units in the
company to bring the weaker units along. She suggested using the better performers in a
particular SIC code grouping, that fare better than average, to give their best practices in
exchange for some kind of relief or that could be offered in a training forum for those that
perform worse than average, perhaps creating a mandatory requirement for those lagging
behind to come to find out about some of these best practices. She suggested MNOSHA
communicate this effort and let those companies know they are lagging behind their peers
and that MNOSHA is going to hold a group forum to help companies address some of the
issues that are specific to their industry. This would address MNOSHA's four-pronged
approach of implementing this ergonomics strategy. Employers would be strongly
encouraged to come to learn how to better themselves from their peers in this
noncompliance, nonpunitive forum facilitated by MNOSHA.

Grundy said that was his point as well. He thinks there has been some difficulty
getting by and there is frustration for both industry and, perhaps, from Labor and
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Minutes

Industry. He thinks Collin's tactic to address a buy-in is valid, but perhaps we could
renew some sort of an effort Allen suggested and tackle this through the Minnesota
Business Council, the Minnesota Labor Council or some of the big membership groups
our companies belong to, to try to get some sense of commitment and buy-in at this level,
because this would be a very aggressive program in which we are asking for volunteers; a
nonregulatory buy-in process, in lieu of it being forced down everybody’s throats. He
thinks it has been a bit frustrating for the department to get that buy-in and he thinks there
is some way we could try to reinforce that through our business counsel connections and
our Labor and Industry connections.

McGovern suggested a kind of a spin of both those ideas. She told about an
experience she had with a student who worked for a large health care plan that is based
here in Minnesota. This student did a claims analysis, looking at incidents of carpal
tunnel syndrome. The analysis showed how it was the longest lag-time to reporting and
they were the most expensive claims. She turned it over to risk management. They had a
small risk-management unit and the problem was there were people who did not have a
lot of personal power within the organization. For example, if you had a health plan
group to really try to get to the decisionmakers, because what she heard from the risk
managers was they did not know how to be heard, so management would say this cost is
not that significant given all of our other costs and they would just pay it out. Therefore,
the question is, how do you really engage top leadership? Because, ultimately, leadership
is going to have to give the resources to risk management to do something if it is going to
do something different.

Grundy approved of McGovern's suggestion. His concern with what Collins is

doing is the turnout. He agreed Collins is trying to approach the right folks, but unless
WSC can somehow excite them a bit at a level above and get them interested in this, even
if we hold up a hammer to do it, Grundy had concerns about whether it would work. He
expressed interest in seeing what the response to this approach is, but he suspects with the
people that are being targeted, WSC will find that they will be "pretty thin on the ground"
when they actually go there.

Harmer suggested the Minnesota Chamber of Commerce as a resource to consider

for outreach purposes. They have the eye of senior management and are also pro-active in
looking for alternatives and voluntary programs. An example was the waste voluntary
program.

Tindle said he read the Ergonomic Task-force’s report with a degree of bias and
went on to explain his statement. The incentive of lowering the workers’ compensation
costs may not work, because it is cheaper to pay the claim than it is to provide the funds
to resolve the ergonomics issues. If we go completely away from compliance and
penalty, his concern would be the bottom line, and that approach does not always indicate
the best opportunity to provide a safe workplace. He would assume someone in this
review of ergonomics has looked at the fact that the workforces in those nursing homes
have been significantly downscaled during the past several decades. This is one of the
issues. The economic issue of saving money on the workforce makes the bottom line
OSHA Advisory Council -13- June 25, 2004
Minutes

better, but having a bunch of people hurt themselves does not impact it as much. In the
utility industry, they have downsized there. They have allowed their lineman to work on
higher and higher voltages every year. What will happen, is in his opinion, is the linemen
will have very short careers, because they are using very stiff gloves, called "Class 3
high-voltage gloves." There is no way a person can use those gloves and have what we
used to consider a full career without ending up with carpal tunnel. Therefore, when he
looked at this report and the information on page three concerning the enforcement
tactics in the state of Washington, he was concerned. He is not opposed to education,
because it is important at the high levels right down to the employee levels. When he
looks at the approach to these, surely education-driven and absent – apparently – of any
penalty, it concerns him when he goes back to page 29 and looks at the input from the –
essentially – labor representatives on the task force. They bring in the idea of education
and training, but they bring it in as part of an enforcement practice. Federal OSHA has
dropped the ball, in his opinion. He expressed disappointed in MNOSHA. We have some
future, at least, if we intend to do enforcements, but otherwise not.

Wade noted this is an extremely difficult issue for regulators across the nation, as
well as across the world. Since this report was put out, the Washington state rule has
already been repealed. That suggests to her that ergonomics, unlike many other safety
and health issues, is not an area that we seem to be able to come to a consensus. This is
partly because it affects almost every industry, except it affects them in very different
ways. Therefore, the notion of adopting a standard for purposes of compliance
enforcement seems highly unlikely at this time. She noted on the record at the previous
meeting that enforcement is a part of this discussion. As long as ergonomic hazards result
in ergonomic injuries, there will be a compliance component. MNOSHA will not sit idly
by and rely solely on the employer voluntarily addressing this. DLI is still obligated,
under OSHA Compliance, to respond to any complaints. If DLI receives a complaint,
MNOSHA will investigate it. Wade noted that, absent a specific standard, MNOSHA is
limited by the general-duty clause as far as penalizing the employer. Wade said DLI has
to continue to advance the discussion; getting employers to the table to get their input on
ways that MNOSHA can make a difference in this area is extremely important, but she
does not want anyone to feel that MNOSHA is taking a single-handed approach. DLI is
doing everything it can with the resources that it has available and will respond to
specific complaints through its Compliance program, but they really want employers at
the table so they can make some progress. Wade clarified Minnesota does not have a
standard. She said she believes North Carolina’s standard has been repealed, because they
came in right after federal OSHA and adopted the federal ergonomics standard, which
has since been repealed. Wade thought California is the only state with a rule on the
books for compliance enforcement purposes.

With that said, Wade said we simply have to figure out how to advance. We
cannot just simply point fingers and say, "you just need a standard," because there is not
enough consensus in the workplace, in the safety and health community and, certainly
not, on the political level, that we could get a uniform standard that is going to be
acceptable. But, absent a standard, it does not mean there is not a role of enforcement.
OSHA Advisory Council -14- June 25, 2004
Minutes

Harmer stated that AWAIR is a provision for enforcement to identify ergonomics

hazards.

Bufton noted one of the things the task force also said is they hoped MNOSHA
would be better trained and get more expertise in recognizing ergonomics hazards, so
they could look at the enforcement tools that were there and enforce them using what
they had for resources. She thinks that is part of what Collins was talking about when the
WSC staff was increased and also bring more information to the staff. She is hearing that
it is not perfect, but it is what we can do with what we have.

Allen asked if anyone had communicated with other states that attempted to get
ahead and established standards, about what they would have done differently and why
their Legislature pulled the standard back. Can we find out what we can do before we
make our run at setting a standard?

Wade said MNOSHA has been a part of the ergonomics discussion for a very
long time, even prior to establishing the Ergonomics Task-force. As early as the early
1990s, Minnesota had begun to do the research to consider an ergonomics standard.
Shortly after they began their efforts, the issue of an ergonomics standard started to make
progress on the federal level. Through the ‘90s, there were riders attached to every budget
discussion that prevented federal dollars to be used for purposes of adopting the standard,
so we have been in this discussion for quite a while. They had numerous conversations
with the state of Washington and the other territories that have an ergonomics rule of
some sort. The California standard, as Wade understood it, is not a strong standard from
the standpoint of enforcement. The standard remains on the books, but Wade thought the
floor that created a specific obligation for the employer was so insignificant that many
employers do not have to. There are not many mandatory activities, because of where the
floor is. The state of Washington had a model standard that required some very
aggressive activity on the employer. It would be simple to reduce it by saying politics is
what caused the standards to be repealed. However, politics is just a reflection of all of
our input to our elected leaders. Wade said she thinks that simply because ergonomic
hazards impact so many different industries, that for a single employer to be held to a
very specific standard that says, for instance, if 220 bangs on the table makes it
hazardous, what happens if it is 219? Those are the kind of questions that businesses
raise, because it affects almost every industry. It affects such a large group of employees
that it seems almost impossible in this day and time to get business and labor to come to
consensus that "this" is what is needed and "this" is how it should be implemented. Wade
thought the diversity of the injuries and the diversity of the industries that were impacted
was just so significant, it did not seem to lend itself to a consensus standard.

McGovern commented this is just stepping back from the regulatory aspect for a
second, back to the voluntary thing. She asked all the people who represent industry on
the OAC if they were pulling together groups through their professional trade
organizations. She asked how helpful it would be to take a very aggressive stand with the
press and, perhaps, have a labor management group in an industry such as health care
looking at an issue like MSDs, then work with MNOSHA and tell the press they have
OSHA Advisory Council -15- June 25, 2004
Minutes

come together, built this partnership, set these goals and this is what we are going to do.
She wondered if the press could be used, not only ideally to create good will, but to also
help make some employers more accountable. Is something like that a strategy that might
be workable or is that too political to do something like that?

Collins responded that the assistant commissioner recently came from a

conference at the university to explore that concept of bringing in nursing home folks for
discussions. A meeting was planned in a couple of weeks with Jacobs and Ferkul to see if
that was doable. Also, since they have now done the first round of training sessions, they
came back and were thinking about how best to promote those training sessions. WSC
talked about some ideas with the commissioner and Wade; they both agreed to help them.
The Department of Commerce and Collins added on the large insurance companies to see
if they could partnership.

Ajax complimented the Ergonomics Task-force on its recommendation and said it

was very solid. He would be in favor of aborting the mandatory performance-based
ergonomics standard, really taking a look at challenged industries to focus on those and
also abort mandatory compliance. Ajax commented he knows firsthand what it has done
for his business and his industry working with professionals like Todd Haglin, for
example, from MNOSHA Workplace Safety Consultation. It saves his company literally
hundreds of thousands of dollars in workers' compensation costs and that measures the
success of programs like this. For example, put out the word about the nursing homes that
have become involved with WSC's ergonomics programs and, as a result, reduced their
workers' compensation costs. That is something he thought the media would certainly be
interested in reporting.

Allen agreed and said she is concerned about having the WSC unit be the
leadership and to actually "own" driving these efforts, because they are so resource-
constrained. She could see them being very effective and having a broader reach if they
act as facilitator among industry groups and to enable those industry groups, or provide a
forum for industry group representatives to talk about their specific challenges, to come
up with something that is performance-based and that is practice-oriented, so it not only
talks about what the rules are, but also how it could make your business better, more
profitable and a more enjoyable work experience, so people want to work there and stay
there, and there would be less turnover in personnel. If WSC took the role as facilitator
and empowered this group by giving it a road map, you could then spread WSC's
resources a little bit better than having to have the people tied up in running and
managing all these different routes. WSC could do that with buy-in from senior
management, to agree to participate in this work team and be actively involved, because
this is supposed to determine how they are measured in the future and how they were
viable in the future as a company in terms of profitability lowering our defenses.

Allen referred to an earlier comment by Tindle and said she is faced with the
same challenge of relying on economics. If you look at the entire umbrella, or the total
expenses, for a large company, they waste more money on misprints in brochures than
they do on workers’ comp expenses. Therefore, when you are sitting at the table, you
OSHA Advisory Council -16- June 25, 2004
Minutes

have to talk about what return on the investment the dollars you are given to resolve the
safety problems will result in and you have a very weak argument. Other units at the
company will say they can save the company hundreds of thousands of dollars, and
others, in marketing for example, can say they can save the company millions. Allen said
she would fall very low on the priority list, so she should not rely solely on economics to
get her some "air time" around the table at her company.

Harmer said benchmarking is a really good tool. It helps to justify it to a business

based on a competitor’s performance versus just financially.

Bufton added one follow-up that could occur is there could be some conversation
among people, such as Phil Jacobs and others, about what we would measure if we were
going to be doing that, then charging and facilitating benchmarking within industry
groups. Is that what you are saying?

Burski suggested the experience modification factor insurers published for

workers' compensation could be used, because it deals both with costs and the numbers of
claims. Collins said that is part of the data the Research and Statistics unit gave WSC to
use to look at the average cost of the premiums, the average cost of the claims and the
lack of retraining. They have some of the information and he intends to take a deeper
look.

Burski mentioned acting as clearinghouse. He has looked for newspaper articles,

since March, related to ergonomics and there has been nothing in the paper. If
ergonomics is important, he questioned, why wasn't there anything being published? The
Minnesota Safety Council is the only one publicizing ergonomics and, unfortunately, not
everybody is a member of the safety council. Unless companies are getting information
from somewhere else, or their workers' compensation insurer, they will not hear it is
important.

Brian Breider said he thinks the IBM-approach is good. It challenges how you get
the decisionmakers to the table, as far as the training sessions go. There is a perception
that ergonomics [ergo] is a four-letter, bad word; he thinks we have to look at how we
could change that mindset from this bad thing in the eyes of business to show them where
the value is for business to improve their ergonomics. They do not look at workers'
compensation costs at IBM. He could not even sell their ergonomics based on their
losses, so they look at their quality and efficiencies. All of these things play into it, so it is
back to the question "How do you get a good metric on that." It is not very easy. An
example he gave is from their manufacturing area in Rochester, Minn. They put servers
through there that weigh 80 pounds. They have put some through that weigh almost two
tons or one ton, and they incorporate ergonomics into those lines because: 1) they do not
want anybody to get hurt; and 2) their production cycles vary. When they have those
spikes, this allows them to bring their software engineers, secretaries and whoever else
out to the line to do those tasks to help during those peak periods. Those workers can then
go back to their other jobs. Breider thinks this is a huge business value that the businesses
are not seeing yet and we need to find a way to get people to the table for training
OSHA Advisory Council -17- June 25, 2004
Minutes

sessions. He thinks they did a good job of bringing that visibility to the people that did
attend, but how do we get more people to those sessions to start evangelizing more about
the business value of this, because they are really huge? Outside of workers’
compensation and all those other things, which is the direct cost, there are huge indirect
costs for the corporations. However, the measurements of that are not always easy to put
into a spreadsheet or into a balance sheet, like the workers' compensation costs. Breider
suggested that if we get some examples out there of what a company did, not only from a
workers' compensation angle, but from a business perspective they are doing in some of
the examples in their training session, showing not only the cost savings, but also
improvements in productivity and quality, like Ajax talked about the savings to his
organization. Breider suggested we get more of that publicized and the business world
could see that and also the associated cost savings with ergonomics investments and that
would get us some mileage.

Ajax commended Collins for taking the right approach. They obviously have
limited resources in personnel. Starting with the challenging industries first and trying to
talk out how some successfully resolved their issues is the right approach.

Tindle said he believed the educational price is important. Companies in the

nursing home industry look at nursing home staff members as expendable. When they
start looking at the potential costs of these claims from a workers' compensation
retraining point of view, it becomes important.

X. Future agenda items

Bufton reported "How to obtain more involvement from external stakeholders"

would be the discussion topic for September.

Burski asked for an update from Collins about how the training sessions are going
and for “comments” as an agenda item.

Bufton asked Collins to send an e-mail message to OAC members from time to
time to let them know how the training sessions are going and, if there are sessions in
their areas, to ask for help in promoting those sessions.

Bufton reminded members the next meeting date will be Sept. 10, 2004, and it
will be in Rochester, Minn. Grundy said the meeting would be at IBM. He would like to
get as many names as possible for those who are planning to attend, because they would
also serve a luncheon, hosted by IBM. He offered to give a tour to look at Breider's ergo
initiatives and the world's largest computer. Ajax asked if OAC members could
participate via teleconference and Grundy said he would be happy to do teleconferencing.
Anyone interested in attending should contact Deb Caswell to be placed on the mailing
list and be provided with information about the meeting.

Ajax made a motion to adjourn the meeting at 12:04 p.m. McGovern seconded the
motion. All voted in favor of the motion.
OSHA Advisory Council -18- June 25, 2004
Minutes

Respectfully submitted,
Debbie Caswell
Executive Secretary

dc/s