OSHA’s PSM Standard applies to most meat packing, poultry, and food processing plants. One PSM requirement is that the company must conduct an audit of their compliance every three years. Stewards can request to see the recommendations from the past two audits and find out what actions have been taken. By looking at the audit results and the follow-up stewards can see if the company is taking their PSM seriously.

“When I was sent out for training, I received a lot of information about PSM that I realized could be helpful to not only me, but also my co-workers at the plant,” said Jim Oldenburg, a steward at JBS and a member of UFCW Local 1473 in Green Bay, Wisconsin.

Even though every worker at the plant cannot receive specialized PSM training, workers do have the right to stay informed about their plant’s PSM program and come to their stewards with questions or concerns. To help his co-workers at the plant, Oldenburg submitted a list of PSM questions and responses to the company. These questions were developed by the Industrial Refrigeration Consortium at the University of Wisconsin – Madison.

“People look to me to help them and I’m doing everything that I can for them every day. Having this information available is just one of them,” said Oldenburg.

Here are the ten questions Jim submitted to management. According to the PSM standard your company must respond adequately to your concerns. Their responses to these questions can give you a sense of the condition of your plant’s ammonia safety program. If you need help evaluating the company’s response you can email the UFCW Health and Safety Representative for Process Safety Management at bthielen@ufcw.org.

1. When was our last compliance audit?

2. Can you show me the closeout of recommendations from the last compliance audit?

3.  Can you provide me a copy of the most recent incident report and documentation that shows how we closed out recommendations/from the incident report?

4.  When was our last Process Hazard Analysis (PHA) conducted and can you show me documentation that closes out the recommendations from the last PHA?

5. How often do we certify our plant’s written operating procedures for the covered process?

6.   What training program do we have for our operators and what are the means used to verify they have understood the training?

7.   How often do we do refresher training?

8.       Based on our plant’s mechanical integrity program, what is the next piece of equipment scheduled for retirement and when is it scheduled to come out of service?

9.  What criteria do we use to evaluate contractors that work on our covered process?

10.  What was the last change made to our system and can you show me the documentation for that change?

USDA did not contact the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA), the agency responsible for protecting the health and safety of American workers, before publishing this proposed rule. This sets an alarming precedent for all agencies that may want to use administrative rulemaking to change policies that could weaken health and safety protections for workers. This lack of transparency or collaboration with the agency responsible for workplace safety could put workers in danger. And as we know, when worker safety is at risk in food processing facilities, the safety of our food supply can also be jeopardized.

Please join the UFCW in urging the USDA to pull this rule in its entirety until adequate safety studies are conducted and OSHA uses this information to create standards to protect workers. Click here to send a letter to USDA Secretary Tom Vilsack, urging him to pull the poultry rule today.

The good news is, according to new reports from the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), workplace safety in the meatpacking industry is steadily improving, with injury and illness rates for full-time workers on the decline.

The bad news is, in comparison to other industrial and manufacturing sectors, meatpacking and poultry processing are still among the most dangerous. Food manufacturing workers are twice as likely to experience injuries and illnesses than industrial and manufacturing workers as a whole. The meatpacking industry also ranks high for severe injury and illness cases – meaning those that cause workers to miss days at work or those that necessitate restricted work activities or even job transfers. Nationally, the poultry industry has the fifth-highest rate of worker illness across all industries.

Though progress has been made on worker safety in the meatpacking and poultry industries, we must understand what the numbers really mean, and make sure we are addressing issues that really make a difference in improving safety and health in these industries.

Some in the meat industry, like the trade association (read: lobbying outfit) American Meat Institute, are quick to highlight improvement using data that does not reflect the most dangerous jobs in the industry. That’s a slippery slope – and one that risks obscuring the truth on safety for the sake of profit-margin. The truth is, there is some doubt about the accuracy of the BLS numbers themselves. Studies conducted by the National Institute of Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) conclude that both BLS and OSHA miss from 20 percent to as much as 50 percent of the nation’s workplace injuries. A number of factors can cause this kind of under-reporting: workers sometimes don’t report injuries because of fears surrounding their immigration status and retaliation by their employers; employers are motivated to under-count injuries in order to win safety awards, and managers are incentivized by low-injury bonuses; and finally, some employers have instituted programs requiring workers who report injuries or accidents to undergo drug testing – adding additional risk to reporting.

For all these reasons, we must not let a modest increase in overall workplace safety lull us into a false sense of security when it comes to the meatpacking and poultry processing industries. We must continue to strive for better and safer workplaces for all meatpacking and poultry processing workers – and for collective bargaining agreements as well as stronger regulations that make it safe for all workers to report hazards and injuries.

Many UFCW members in meatpacking, poultry and food processing plants may not be aware that they work around anhydrous ammonia – a highly hazardous chemical that could trigger an evacuation of their plant as well as the surrounding community.

 
Under OSHA’s Process Safety Management Standard, workers and their representatives have special rights to action and information in every facility with over 10,000 pounds of ammonia. Most plants that have to cool large storage or production areas use well over 10,000 pounds in their ammonia refrigeration systems.

 
Since an ammonia release could affect workers in any area of the plant, stewards can benefit from a basic knowledge of the hazards of ammonia and the steps the employer must take to protect workers.

 
The Process Safety Management Standard gives stewards the right to ALL information the company has about their ammonia refrigeration system. The company also has to have a system in place for workers to express their concerns and to receive responses about those concerns.

 
“Anhydrous ammonia is a deadly material,” said Jeff Dillener, a steward at Cargill and member of UFCW Local 230 in Ottumwa, Iowa. “As a UFCW steward, I have been trained to follow exact procedures in handling this material so that I can keep my fellow workers safe from harm.”

 
Every three years, the company has to conduct an audit of their compliance with the Process Safety Management regulations. Stewards can request to see the recommendations of the past two audits. If the company is carrying over the same recommendations from one audit to the next, that’s a good indication that they are not taking their own Process Safety Management program seriously.

 
The regulations for highly hazardous chemicals are different from the general health and safety regulations for regular production operations. One of the big differences is that breakdowns are not acceptable in ammonia refrigeration systems. Components of the ammonia refrigeration system must be replaced BEFORE they reach their breaking point! Every component of an ammonia refrigeration system (including the miles of piping on the roof) should have an estimated life cycle and a scheduled replacement date. This system of fixing things before they break is called Mechanical Integrity. Since ammonia refrigeration systems are closed systems, the ammonia never should get out of the system into the air. A leak or a release is an indication that the system is not being maintained the way the law requires it to be.

 
An important provision of the Process Safety Management Standard is the requirement for the company to think through changes to the system BEFORE they make those changes. They must document this process, which is called Management of Change. OSHA has made it very clear that personnel changes, such as changes in staffing levels, hours, outsourcing and training, that have an impact on the ammonia refrigeration system must go through the Management of Change process. Members can ask to be part of this process and weigh in on the possible consequences of the change being considered. This is a way for workers to fight dangerous reductions in Refrigeration Technician staffing levels or dangerous increases in mandatory overtime. Contact the UFCW Health and Safety Office at (202) 223-3111 for information about training.

Safety is one of the most important issues at any plant. Preventing injuries at the workplace is about identifying hazards and getting them fixed, and stewards play a particularly important role in making sure this happens.
Many workers are already familiar with the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA), a division within the U.S. Department of Labor that sets and enforces safety standards in the workplace.
These standards are the law and employers are required to comply with them. Among these requirements is the OSHA Form 300. Most employers with 10 or more full-time employees are required to file this form, which is a yearly log of work-related injuries.
Miguel Luna, a steward from UFCW Local 2, works in a plant in Guymon, Okla. He has been an active member of his plant’s safety committee for more than four years.
“I joined the safety committee to help to keep my coworkers safe. Together with other members, we have helped to improve safety at the plant. The OSHA 300 logs are fundamental for our mission. They help a lot,” Luna said.
OSHA mandates that employers record all new cases of work-related fatalities, injuries and illnesses if they involve death, time away from work, restricted work, transfer from another job, medical treatment beyond first aid, loss of consciousness, or a significant injury or illness diagnosed by a physician or other licensed health care professional.
“An OSHA 300 log is where companies record the injuries that occur at the workplace,” said Luna. “By law, they have to report all the injuries to OSHA.”
The OSHA law gives workers and their unions the right to have access to injury logs.

Stewards, workers, and supervisors can use the OSHA 300 logs to help to improve safety in a food processing or meatpacking plant.
“At our plant, our safety committee meets once a month. We talk about how to improve safety at our plant,” said Luna. “The OSHA logs are very useful for those
of us on the committee, because we can see if we need to improve safety in one area or if we can do something different.”
Luna added that there have been several instances when the OSHA logs have helped the committee to improve safety at the plant.

“For example, if we see in the logs  that many injuries are occurring on the line due to an ergonomic issue, then we look into what is causing that issue, we investigate, and once we have reached a conclusion, we meet with the plant’s safety director,” he said.
Unfortunately, in some instances, workplace injuries are being under-counted. This year OSHA has enacted an enforcement program to review the logs and make certain that employers record all injuries.
Luna said that stewards play an important role in making sure employers keep the log current.
“As stewards, we have to review the logs to make sure injuries are being recorded in an accurate and proper way,” he said. “I recommend that stewards stay on top of things and check the logs on a regular basis.”
He said that if a steward suspects that an injury has been inaccurately reported in the OSHA logs, the best way to solve any discrepancy is to talk to the injured worker, get the facts, and talk to the plant’s safety manager or supervisors to try to clarify the issues.
For Luna, the most important thing to do if an injury occurs is to make sure that the affected worker fully recovers.
“Stewards should check back with the injured worker and follow up throughout his or her recovery. We have to support each other and that means making sure injured workers get the proper treatment,” he added.

Even in a safe workplace, injuries are sometimes unavoidable. If a worker is injured, it is important that she or he get immediate medical attention.
Stewards should be prepared to act if an injury occurs during their shift.
“If a coworker is injured we should know what to do,” said Jorge Palomera- Angel, a steward from UFCW Local 22, who works at a meatpacking plant in Fremont, Neb. “As stewards, we should make sure that our coworkers receive immediate and proper medical attention if they get injured on the job.”
Palomera-Angel has been a steward for over six year at his plant. He said that during this time he has always helped coworkers who were injured on the job.
“When a coworker gets injured, the most important thing to do is to act as fast as you can,” said Palomera-Angel. “Immediately after the incident, notify your line supervisor and, if possible, accompany your coworker to your plant’s nurse’s office, if they have one.”
He said that it is important to be with the injured coworker while filing the injury or incident report with management.
“Try to help with the report. If you saw the incident, include yourself as a witness, or try to find other coworkers who were present at that time,” said Palomera- Angel. “Make sure that the report is complete and accurate. This will help to resolve any possible future conflicts.”
Palomera-Angel said that many workers don’t take full advantage of their health insurance.
“When people get injured, sometimes they just go to their company’s nurse office and their health worsens, because they don’t visit a physician right away,” he said. “I’ve known people who don’t want to go to the doctor because they are afraid of the costs.”
Palorema-Angel, a father of four, said he feels very fortunate to work in a unionized plant because of the great health care benefits.
“I have some friends who work in a non-union plant and they have to pay way too much money for their health insurance. We are lucky to have a union and a good contract,” he said.
Stewards should be acquainted with their company’s health insurance policy so they can guide and advise other workers who might need this benefit, said Palomera-Angel.
“Sometimes injuries go unreported because workers don’t say they are injured and don’t go to the doctor. We cannot improve safety at our plants if workers don’t step forward and report an injury, even if it is a small cut,” he said.
Palomera-Angel said that workers should visit their own primary care physician, even after they have been treated by the company’s medical services.
“Some of my coworkers don’t want to take time off to go and see the doctor. Many of them don’t know that we have sick leave in our contract,” he said.
Stewards should be familiar with their contract’s sick leave and extended sick leave policies, Palomera-Angel said.
“Stewards play an important role in improving the safety at the plant. We are in a union because we support each other, and that means looking out for each other’s health and safety,” he said.

If you feel that the line at your plant is moving too fast, a first step is to ask for a copy of the company’s crew chart-a document that outlines the standard for how many staff should be assigned to each job. Often, you might find that the company is not in compliance with its own crewing standards.

If necessary, the union can have industrial engineers conduct a time study. Joseph Rezac, UFCW Local 22′s chief shop steward at the Hormel plant in Fremont, Nebraska, recommends gathering as much information as possible before seeking a time study or filing a grievance. “There’s more to this than just getting the numbers. You should look at the safety, the ergonomics, and get the company to explain why the speeds are set the way they are. The company knows we have the right to file a grievance, and they don’t want that to happen.”
It’s important to get all the facts. There are times when time studies show a line is in compliance, but someone may feel it’s too fast because their knives are dull or they’re fatigued or just having a bad day. Rezac, who has worked for Hormel for 23 years, adds that it’s not difficult to detect the signs of unsafe line speeds. “I’ll find out right away if the line speed is up…The meat is not going to be cut properly or not going to be cut at all.”
When you see that happening, he says, it’s time to step up and start asking for changes to ensure that you and your co-workers are working in a safe environment.

The Occupational Safety and Health Office offers workshop trainings on many topics, including:

• Identifying safety and health hazards in the workplace

•  Incident investigations

•  Workplace violence prevention

• Building a stronger union through safety and health

•  Workers’ rights under OSHA

•  Ergonomics

• Personal Protective Equipment

•  Strengthening safety committees

Adolph Simms is a UFCW Local 325 member working at the Bay Valley Food Processing plant in Pittsburgh, Pa., where he has been a union safety representative for almost 10 years. Simms has participated in several UFCW safety and health trainings over the years and encourages others to take advantage of them.

“There are many opportunities for UFCW stewards and members to participate in safety trainings. If you think about it, the union’s basic mission is to advance the quality of life for workers. If there is a serious injury on the job, that clearly diminishes the quality of life for that worker and even the worker’s family.”

Simms says workers best know the hazards of their jobs, and it’s really in their interest to take an active role in safety and health on the job. “As workers, we have the most to lose from an unsafe work environment. Therefore we should have the largest role and the greatest impact in promoting workplace safety.”
Safety and health workshops can also be conducted at stewards’ conferences. In addition, the UFCW International hosts an annual Train-the-Trainer program where participants not only learn about safety issues, but also develop the skills needed to train their co-workers when they return to their worksite.
Simms has also participated in a Train-the-Trainer program and says the knowledge and skills he has learned from this workshop is helpful back on the job for many reasons. “Not only have I learned a lot and taken that knowledge back to the shop floor to help other workers,
but I’m also a part of contract negotiations to make sure our safety and health issues are addressed.”
If stewards don’t think they have time to participate in safety trainings, Simms argues it might make more sense to find a union member interested in making safety and health his or her only agenda. He says that stewards can be overwhelmed with many tasks, and it may work out better to have a union worker solely devoted to safety.

So it should not come as a shock that when accidents happen, it really takes the union’s action to force the company to take responsibility and comply with safety standards.

Being on the front line, the steward plays an essential role in workplace safety by being involved in accident investigations. It is also vital for shop stewards to be on their union’s safety and health committee, so that co-workers know who to turn to in case of an
accident and to make sure the company puts in place safety measures to prevent workplace injuries.
Dolores Sandoval is a chief steward at UFCW Local 1546 and a member of her union’s safety committee. She recently investigated an accident involving a machine guard at her Hormel
Foods plant in Rochelle, Ill. Sandoval’s co-worker, who worked as a machine operator, slipped on a piece of bacon and her hand slid into the cutter. Had themachine guard been working correctly, the machine would have stopped automatically. But it didn’t stop. The outdated
guard did not completely guard the blade, which allowed the worker’s
hand to slide through. The cutter pounded through the worker’s thumb, cutting
it almost completely. The woman suffered nearly 30 minutes with her hand
lodged in the machine until maintenance could get her out.
While the worker was flown to Madison, Wis., to have her thumb operated on, the union immediately took action in response to the accident: The safety committee inspected the machine, Sandoval drove over three and a half hours to interview her co-worker recovering in the hospital, and Sandoval also interviewed workers on the line at the time of the accident and maintenance workers.
“When an accident happens, you must respond immediately by talking to the workers involved,” Sandoval said. “You get first-hand information of the accident, not management’s spin.”
Sandoval says that besides investigating the accident, stewards must make sure to go over the worker’s statement with them to prepare for meeting with management. That includes choosing and using the right words to say when describing the incident to management.
Management may try to twist statements around to blame the worker for getting hurt if the worker is not careful of how to word his or her explanation.
However, Sandoval’s years of experience as a steward and safety committee member paid off with a solid accident investigation. The union’s safety committee determined the company needed to put different guards on the machine. The company shut down the work area, and within three days of the accident, rebuilt the machine guards to meet safety standards.
Sandoval knows that if it weren’t for the union, management would place safety solely on the responsibility of the workers.
“The company still feels it was her fault, but they had to report it as an accident because of the union’s investigation,” Sandoval said. “It’s the union— not the company—that checks to make sure all the guards are now working properly and that the company supplies workers with necessary safety equipment.”

The accident happened in October, but doctors are still not sure the worker’s thumb will heal. The woman, who still has no feeling in her thumb, has been moved to light duty since returning to work.