Workers at the Genesis Alkali mine in Green River, Wyo., encountered silica dust so thick that it matted their clothes, their hair and their respirators.
Some days, the miners coughed up black mucus. Other times, the poison dust hung so heavily in the air they couldn’t see more than a foot in front of them.
With members’ lives on the line, the USW’s Health, Safety and Environment (HSE) Department last year secured new federal standards that not only afford miners groundbreaking protections from silica but hold employers accountable for the first time.
This transformational change occurred only because of the USW’s HSE advocacy and our commitment to staying the course, no matter how fierce the opposition we face.
The HSE Department works across all of the union’s workplaces, industries and sectors to prevent fatalities, injuries and diseases, to uncover the root causes of incidents and exposures that do occur, and to push for laws and policies that make workplaces safer.
Guiding all of these efforts are USW members on the front lines who know better than anyone else the risks they face and the steps essential to building safer workplaces.
Awareness of workplace hazards is meaningless without the power to act. Workers must have a voice in HSE and a negotiated power to refuse unsafe or unhealthy work without fear of retaliation from management.
Awareness of workplace hazards is meaningless without the power to act.
Winning Silica Safeguards
USW members at Genesis Alkali mine trona, a mineral needed for soap and many other essential products.
But boring through rock exposes the workers to silica, a cause of the lung-scarring disease known as silicosis as well as lung cancer, kidney disease and other ailments.
Workers in rock quarries and miners producing coal, iron ore, copper, nickel, zinc and other critical materials all face these risks, which greedy, callous employers refused to adequately address.
The HSE Department spent years advocating for national standards specifying the steps all employers must take to better protect workers from silica exposure. The union’s HSE activists testified about the need for these safeguards, but also relied on the firsthand accounts of members like Marshal Cummings, president of Local 13214, who spoke to regulators about the conditions he and his co-workers at Genesis experienced.
All of these efforts paid off in April 2024, when the U.S. Mine Safety and Health Administration (MSHA) issued a final rule limiting silica exposure in mines and other workplaces under its jurisdiction.
MSHA directed employers to combat silica dust by applying the hierarchy of controls, including ventilation and collection systems. It also mandated air monitoring to ensure the effectiveness of these measures and ordered companies to provide medical surveillance to track workers’ health.
The rule mirrors one put in place years ago, also at the USW’s urging, for workers in general industry, maritime trades and construction. Those workers fall under the jurisdiction of another agency of the Department of Labor, the U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA).
Safeguarding Workers’ Voices
Workers deserve robust investigations that uncover the root causes of incidents resulting in injury or death on the job.
They want employers to be held accountable for providing safer workplaces. And they need a voice in the process and real safeguards to avert fatalities, injuries and illnesses.
OSHA’s “walkaround rule”—another safety improvement resulting from USW advocacy—helps to accomplish those essential goals.
In March 2024, OSHA issued a final rule affirming workers’ right to have representatives of their choice accompany them during the agency’s safety and health inspections. Employers already selected their own representatives to take part in these inspections, meaning the new rule critically and belatedly leveled the playing field for workers and their representatives.
At times, employers attempted to keep local unions from bringing in their HSE experts for OSHA investigations. That afforded employers the opportunity to scapegoat workers for an incident or cover up crucial details.
Now, the walkaround rule provides a bulwark against these kinds of threats, builds workers’ trust and ensures the integrity of the process.
The HSE Department’s involvement following the deaths of two brothers at the BP Husky refinery in Oregon, Ohio, three years ago highlights how important it is for workers to know they’re adequately represented in the aftermath of a tragedy.
A representative from the HSE Department participated in the OSHA inspection and follow-up meetings. He provided expertise and fresh eyes at a time when local union officials were stretched thin caring for the families of their fallen union brothers while also helping other workers cope with their grief and the disruption in the refinery.
Kyle Downour, unit chair for Local 1-346, later credited the HSE Department with helping to ensure the thorough investigation that led OSHA to cite the company for numerous safety failures.
Revolutionizing Long-Term Care
We worked with the Health Care Workers Council, Rapid Response, the Legislative and Policy Department and numerous local unions representing health care workers to achieve trailblazing safe staffing regulations for the long-term care industry.
Nursing homes and other employers opposed the regulations, even though they increase worker safety and create better environments for patients as well.
Our push for safe staffing relied heavily on the firsthand accounts of front-line members, such as Sarah Hardnett, who works as a certified nursing assistant at Magnolia Ridge in Gardendale, Ala. In a Rapid Response ActionCall and other forums, she spoke about the challenges of meeting the needs of at-risk patients without adequate support.
The U.S. Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services adopted the final rule, containing staffing ratios and other requirements, last year.
Battling Killer Heat
Climate change continues to fuel record heat waves across the country, putting tens of millions of workers—those working outdoors and in facilities like mills and foundries—at risk of severe injury and death.
With the HSE Department’s assistance, local unions regularly bargain provisions such as cool-down periods, scheduling modifications, buddy systems and access to hydration and shade to protect workers during extreme heat.
Since the last convention, however, the HSE Department stepped up the fight at both the state and national levels for uniform, common-sense protections to make workplaces safer for all workers across the country.
HSE representatives testified before state and federal officials, networked with allies, went on radio shows and published newspaper articles demanding action on this pressing issue.
In August 2024, OSHA responded with a proposed rule incorporating many of our requests and suggestions. The rule would require employers to monitor temperatures, implement initial safeguards when the heat index exceeds 80 degrees and activate additional measures when the heat index hits 90 degrees.
At the time this report went to press, OSHA was soliciting public comment on the proposed rule, a necessary step before adoption.
Bargaining Safer Workplaces
Department representatives sit at the bargaining table whenever needed and otherwise assist members in negotiating enhanced HSE protections across sectors and in individual workplaces.
In the 2022 master negotiations with U.S. Steel, for example, the HSE Department provided expertise that helped the union negotiate improved training for workers involved in certain production processes known as isolation purging and reintroduction. This improvement benefits thousands of workers at numerous mills.
We also worked with OSHA in 2023 to negotiate a model settlement following injuries to two of our members at Salem-Republic Rubber Co. in Sebring, Ohio.
The agreement established a hazard identification, notification and tracking process, granted workers the authority to stop work when they encounter safety risks, and upgraded personal protective equipment (PPE), among other improvements.
The union intends to institutionalize this language in the bargaining unit’s next contract, ensuring the new safeguards remain in place. The scope of the settlement so impressed OSHA that the agency intends to use it as a template for settlements with other violators.
The HSE Department often battles a “blame-the-worker” mindset at employers and works tirelessly to shift the focus.
Safety-Kleen provided us one such opportunity a couple of years ago when it sought USW support for its application to OSHA’s Voluntary Protection Program, an agency initiative recognizing companies with good safety programs.
The HSE Department, District 7 and Local 1011 agreed to endorse the Indiana company’s application after it agreed to several vital improvements in safety culture.
The company ended its anti-worker, behavior-based safety program and consented to union-management HSE committees, safety and health audits, union member involvement in incident investigation, and workers’ authority to stop work when they identify hazardous conditions. Safety-Kleen, a provider of environmental services to various industries, also agreed to provide PPE at no cost to workers and participate in the union’s HSE conferences.
Protecting Oil Workers
Alongside local unions, the National Oil Bargaining Program and the BlueGreen Alliance, the HSE Department participated in public hearings and provided written comments for the upgraded Process Safety Management (PSM) standard enacted in the state of Washington.
The updated rules, which took effect last year, mandate planning and analysis that prioritize risks based on the danger they pose, identify and document effective safety measures, and take into consideration human factors like staffing levels, turnover, training, fatigue, and task complexity.
In addition, the new standard requires reviews to identify the most effective ways to control a hazard, regular scrutiny of processes that are likely to damage or wear down equipment, root cause analyses after significant incidents, and assessments of workplace safety culture aimed at prioritizing safety rather than production.
The new rules will serve as a model for federal OSHA as it updates its own standard for the first time in 30 years.
Building Solidarity Around Safety
The department’s conferences, held every 18 months, bring together hundreds of members to share challenges, discuss HSE practices, celebrate victories, build solidarity around safety and innovate new strategies for making safer workplaces across all of our sectors.
The conferences offer dozens of workshops on incident investigation, whistleblower protections, ergonomics, workplace stress, mental health, fall protection, active shooter situations, fatigue, cancer protection and many other topics that participants take back to their locals for consideration and action.
In addition, the conferences include inspiring stories from workers who leveraged union power to enhance safety in their workplaces, such as new members at the Blue Bird bus company in Fort Valley, Ga., who organized partly to address growing safety and health concerns at the plant.
Recent conferences also included appearances by Julie Su, who was acting labor secretary during the Biden administration, and Jim Frederick, the former USW member serving as Biden’s deputy assistant labor secretary for occupational safety and health. Both praised USW members’ safety and health activism.
Advancing our Mission
Decades ago, the Steel Workers Organizing Committee put HSE at the heart of the union’s work when it made “protecting the limbs, lives and health” of workers one of the USW’s founding principles.
The HSE Department strives to honor and advance that mission every day.
Companies have a legal responsibility to ensure safety and health on the job. We will continue to provide the tools, resources and advocacy needed to empower workers, hold employers accountable and ensure our members return safely home to their families at the end of every shift.