제  목 : The Small Business Paperwork Reduction Act Amendments of 1998.
  일  자 : 1998년 08월
  제공처 : Internet

      The Small Business Paperwork Reduction Act Amendments of 1998.
      ==============================================================

  Mr. Chairman, members of the subcommittee, thank you for this opportunity
  to testify before you today about H.R.3310, the Small Business Paperwork
  Reduction Act Amendments of 1998 (SBPRA).

  OSHA joins in the subcommittee's desire to reduce unnecessary paperwork.
  Today, the New OSHA concentrates more on preventing illnesses and injuries,
  and less on simply enforcing rules. As part of that effort, OSHA has
  significantly reduced its focus on mechanical paperwork violations. For
  example, in the past, OSHA cited many employers who failed to display a
  required safety poster in their workplaces. Today, if employers fail to
  display the poster, our compliance officers give them one.

  OSHA reduced its paperwork citations by 75 percent from 1992 through 1997.
  As a percentage of all OSHA violations, paperwork citations have fallen
  from 29 to 10 percent. OSHA is continuing to focus on real improvements in
  the health and safety of working people, rather than on the number of
  inspections, citations or penalties. However, it is critically important
  for any legislation Congress enacts on this subject to distinguish between
  traditional "paperwork" requirements and the information collection
  requirements in standards that directly impact worker safety and health.

  Small Business Paperwork Reduction Act Amendments

  SBPRA amends the Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995 (PRA) to require that
  federal agencies: (1) publish annually a list of Federal paperwork
  requirements applicable to small businesses; (2) waive any civil penalties
  for first time violations of paperwork requirements by small businesses;
  (3) establish one point of contact for small business; and (4) establish an
  inter-agency task force to study and identify actions to streamline
  reporting requirements for small business. While OSHA applauds the intent
  of this proposal, we are extremely concerned that waiving penalties for
  some so-called "paperwork" violations could cost some workers their health
  or their lives.

  SBPRA uses the "collection of information" definition from the PRA.
  Consequently, it affects standards that most people would not view as mere
  paperwork. I will use my testimony to illustrate these issues to the
  subcommittee.

  Suspension of Penalties

  SBPRA prohibits agencies from imposing fines for first-time violations by a
  small business for information collection requirements, where the
  violations have not caused actual serious harm to the public health or
  safety, as long as the small business corrects the deficiency within six
  months. The bill provides an exception where the violation could imminently
  and substantially endanger public health or safety.

  OSHA understands the desire to treat businesses that make good faith
  efforts at compliance differently from those that do not. In fact, OSHA's
  current policies already make such a distinction. OSHA already provides
  significant penalty reductions based on employer size, good faith and
  history of violations, with the smallest employers eligible for the largest
  reductions. Our penalty reduction system is required both by the
  Occupational Safety and Health Act and the Small Business Regulatory
  Enforcement Fairness Act (SBREFA) and follows the President's directive of
  April 1995. As part of that system, where paperwork violations do not
  materially affect workplace health or safety, OSHA has directed its field
  compliance officers not to issue citations. Consequently, the proposal in
  SBPRA is duplicative and unnecessary. Moreover, eliminating the potential
  for any penalties for first time violations removes the incentive for
  employers to voluntarily comply without intervention. This is particularly
  important where requirements have a true health and safety impact. The bill
  attempts to guard against risks to safety and health by allowing employers
  24 hours to correct violations that have an imminent and substantial danger
  to public health or safety. In such instances, the bill allows the agency
  to impose the fine immediately if it informs Congress. While we acknowledge
  the authors' desire to protect against safety and health risks, the bill
  fails to protect workers from very real dangers. Therefore, we strongly
  oppose this provision of SBPRA.

  The bill should not hinder in any way an agency's ability to act
  immediately to eliminate an imminent or potential danger to the health or
  safety of workers and the public. Furthermore, the definition of "public
  health or safety" within SBPRA is not clear, as the bill provides no
  context to determine what "public health or safety" means. We suggest that
  the language of Section 2(b)(i)(1)(B) be amended to allow the agency to
  impose penalties not only when it believes the violation has "caused actual
  serious harm to the public health and safety" but also when the violation
  appears likely to cause serious harm.

  As drafted, section 2(b)(i)(1)(B) could place workers at risk of serious
  accident or injury. Many important "collection of information" requirements
  exist that significantly and directly protect workers from serious injury
  and illness. However, those requirements might not reach the bill's
  imminent and substantial danger threshold. For example, OSHA's worker
  right-to-know program in its Hazard Communication Standard requires a
  certain amount of paperwork to ensure that the program is effective. If a
  worker is unaware that a hazardous chemical substance is present in the
  workplace, he or she may be at serious risk of illness or death. At the
  same time, this risk, while serious, may not be so great as to constitute
  "an imminent and substantial danger to the public health or safety."
  Enforcement of OSHA standards concerning written lockout/tagout programs,
  analysis of hazard processes at chemical plants, hearing conservation and
  toxic exposure monitoring records, all of which have a direct and
  significant impact on employee safety and health, would also be rendered
  ineffectual in most instances by this section of SBPRA.

  There are countless examples of workers being killed or injured when
  employers failed to adhere to basic information sharing requirements. In
  one instance, an explosion ripped through a Phillips 66 Company complex in
  Houston, Texas, killing 23 people, in part because a small subcontractor
  failed to obtain the necessary permits to ensure that proper safety
  precautions were observed during maintenance operations. After this tragic
  incident, Congress directed OSHA to require all businesses using large
  quantities of potentially volatile chemicals to implement written
  procedures minimizing the potential for catastrophic explosions, fires or
  other events which can seriously harm workers and people living nearby.
  Under the resulting Process Safety Management standard, written process
  hazard analyses and procedures, covered as paperwork under the PRA, must be
  put in place to protect workers before a catastrophe occurs. The bill, on
  the other hand, would send a message that employers can allow life
  threatening conditions to persist until, and even after, they are
  discovered by OSHA. To allow any additional time for a catastrophe to
  occur, whether it be one hour, twenty-four hours, or six months later,
  would seriously jeopardize employee safety and health and undermine OSHA's
  statutory mission.

  In another instance, two employees died from asphyxiation in a confined
  space while cleaning a tank. Failure to follow written procedures required
  in OSHA's confined space standard was a significant factor in their death.
  OSHA's confined space standard requires employers to monitor and record the
  level of contaminants in the atmosphere before employees enter work areas
  which may be deficient in oxygen or contain contaminants. Records of such
  monitoring is considered a "collection of information" under the PRA. If
  employers do not perform such monitoring, employees face the risk of being
  asphyxiated or overcome by radiation or toxic fumes. If this monitoring is
  to protect workers effectively, employers must monitor routinely whenever
  there is a possible danger, not just when OSHA can prove that a particular
  employee in a particular confined space is in "imminent danger" of death or
  serious injury.

  Tragically, OSHA has many other examples where lack of compliance with the
  "paperwork" requirements of the confined space regulation led directly to a
  worker's death, including the recent accident at the Yorktown Naval Weapons
  Station. Four workers were asphyxiated after being exposed to raw sewage
  fumes because their employer had not developed proper rescue procedures or
  trained its employees in proper confined space entry practices and
  procedures. All these corrective measures are part of a confined spaces
  entry program which would be considered a "collection of information" under
  SBPRA.

  Small Business Liaison

  The New OSHA uses a variety of tools to protect workers, including
  enforcement, partnership, compliance assistance, standards development,
  special emphasis programs at the national, regional and local level, and
  other appropriate tools. This balance of approaches helped earn OSHA good
  reviews in the Small Business Administration ombudsman's recent report to
  Congress. According to the report, "OSHA has positively influenced small
  businesses' perception of their regulatory enforcement efforts." The
  importance that OSHA places on working with businesses to improve safety
  and health led us to hire a small business liaison. Consistent with the
  intent of SBPRA, OSHA's liaison already works directly with small
  businesses, assisting them with every aspect of OSHA's program.

  In Conclusion

  Although OSHA agrees that legislation like the SBPRA could be beneficial,
  we have serious concerns about the safety and health impact of the
  penalty-related provisions in section 2 of the bill. We urge the
  subcommittee to consider these concerns and modify the bill to guarantee
  that America's workers are protected.