Does your small sand and gravel pit have a history of safety, with inspector visits resulting in zero citiations? Congratulations! However, that very fact may be making you a target for MSHA to come down hard on you the next time they inspect.
Frank Adkins at Safeco, Inc. http://www.safeproinc.com has posted several articles this week about this very subject. Safepro, Inc. used to post a section on their website about mine operators who were outstanding in the zero or very low citation department. Frank now feels as if this proved to be a list for MSHA to target, and has suspended this practice.
There is more. Frank also posted that he has been told by a source inside MSHA that inspectors who make a visit to a mine site and do not write any citations are required to submit a report to their district manager how they justified that no tickets were deserved. He suggests that we all write to our senators and state representatives and inform them of this abuse of power.
Here in Oregon, we do know of a case where the inspector went out and did his job, and found nothing wrong at the site. He warned the mine operator to watch out, because his supervisor would be out to take a look. Sure enough, the supervisor came out the next day and wrote four S&S citations. There is something really wrong here, and apparently it is not always with the individual inspector.
I am also noticing a change in terminology. Last year, when we had a younger inspector in our area who was abrasive, aggressive and writing a lot of unfair citations, we were told by his superiors that the man was either a) just doing his job or b) was a "rouge" employee who they would talk to and tell him to settle down. Now, the supervisors are telling mine owners and operators that the inspectors who do not write tickets are "lazy" and are not doing their jobs. Wow.
This also makes me wonder if eliminating the Small Mines positions was due to the fact that this would eliminate one more person testifying that everything was fine at a mine site when they were there. In one way, the inspectors who give out two $100 citations may feel as if they are doing us a favor in the long run, but it doesn't really work out that way either, because of the pattern of violations clause. MSHA has it set up all in their favor, and continues to rethink all the little details to keep us right where they want us. They get us coming and going. It is unjust, to say the least, and very expensive for us, the mine owners.
I did a copy and past on the next part, from Safepro, Inc.'s website, because I feel that this letter to Frank clearly spells out what is now happening, and the frustration it brings to those who are just trying to make a living and provide jobs to those in their communities. The identifying names and company names were withheld so that the author would not get into further trouble with MSHA at this time:
"Frank,
Just read your comments on the "Zero" citation "witch hunt" that MSHA is currently implementing.
We here at ******* had a similar problem last month when the inspector showed up here. He came in on a ******* afternoon when we were shut down for the winter. He seemed to have trouble understanding why we were not producing since the day was fairly nice by January standards. I explained that we would not be running due to the low volume of sales and the weather uncertainty. He did a few looks at things, walked around the plant a little and said that he would be back tomorrow and hang noise and dust monitors on the only guy that I had working; which he was disappointed because he wanted to be able to use several guys for monitoring.
The next morning, after he had put his monitors in place he made a comment to me that really pi**ed me off, saying that he was researching our history and could not believe that we had not had citation in over 2? years. He said there is no way we are that good, and he felt that past inspectors were just lazy and didn't want to do their job.
At that point I knew that I was in trouble, and it was not going to be a good day. By the end of the day we a 1 non-S&S citation and 2 S&S citations for not having or implementing fall protection when a haul truck operator does a pre-shift on his ***** A-35C articulating haul truck each morning.
Needless to say I was extremely upset with him since we stress 3 points of contact just as the Operator's Manual directs us to do, his comment was that in his opinion we do not do that, and he claims to have seen me slip after demonstrating our practice to him (while wearing fall protection).
His next comment was he does not understand why "******'s Site Managers get so upset when he writes us a citation, and besides that I know you will contest these citations anyway, ****** always contests citations."
Needless to say he did not leave here without getting a real earful from me.
Hope all is well with you and Miss Blue.
Site Manager (Institute Graduate)
$afepro has removed names, dates, and times to prevent identification of the site. Here is the Manager's e-mail reply to my request to post the above.
Frank,
You may do anything with this e-mail that you want, and I wish I could truly express my distaste for MSHA at this time. I told the inspector that there was a time when we may not have liked having them come to our pit but after they left we knew that anything they found unsafe was brought to the attention of management and we were all the better for it. This is no longer the case we (being average Joe Miner) despise them coming in now because they don't care about average Joe Miner, they are only concerned about writing enough citation's to pay for their salaries and couldn't care any less about the miners, because now some of the ridiculous things that they are writing are causing more hazards then anything they are correcting. I wish I knew what the answer was to stop this bull**it that is going on with these inspectors.
Register for May 10-14 Institute at http://www.safeproinc.com"
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