OSHA wants to fine a Tampa business $319,000 for ‘willful’ exposure to too much lead
Though the Gopher Resource website says it “provides advanced battery recycling services and hundreds of green jobs for citizens throughout the Tampa region,” OSHA says the company willfully put the safety of those workers at risk and should pay $319,876 in fines.
“This employer put their bottom line above the safety and well-being of their workers,” OSHA Area Director Danelle Jindra said in a statement. “Every worker has the right to a safe workplace, and they should never have to decide between their own health and earning a living. Continuing to put workers in harm’s way is unacceptable, and OSHA will continue to hold employers like Gopher Resource responsible.”
Five months of inspections by the U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration followed the March publication of a Tampa Bay Times investigation of the amount of lead exposure for workers at Gopher Resource and the long-term damage done. Those inspections produced Thursday’s 69-page PDF Citation and Notification of Penalty with a whopping 34 Serious violations and one Willful-Serious violation.
OSHA says a Willful violation is “defined as a violation in which the employer either knowingly failed to comply with a legal requirement (purposeful disregard) or acted with plain indifference to employee safety.”
That violation concerned full-face air purifying respirators. OSHA found that the respirators chosen by Gopher Resource were ineffective for keeping workers lead exposure below the maximum concentration allowed. These people toiled as, among other roles, blast loader operators, furnace operators, slag side blast operator, lead side furnace operators, kettle operators and maintenance personnel.
OSHA also said Gopher Resource :
▪ Had “cadmium, lead and inorganic arsenic exposure levels above the permissible exposure limit” in its facility.
▪ Didn’t employ procedures to cut lead and inoraganic arsenic exposure below legal limits.
▪ Let workers “share aluminized jackets that were damaged and stored in the open, and exposed to lead.”
▪ Made workers “wear respirators that were not fit-tested annually.”
Gopher Resource’s reaction to OSHA”s proposed penalties
Envirofocus Technologies, which does business as Gopher Resource, has 15 business days from Thursday’s issuance to either pay the proposed fines, request an informal meeting with the area director, or contest the violations and fines.
Gopher Resource emailed a statement to the Miami Herald that read in part:
“We have spent most of this year working cooperatively with OSHA to review our entire Tampa operation and to identify areas where historical practices could be improved. We have only just received OSHA’s report, and we are still reviewing it in detail, but as part of our continuous focus on protecting people and communities we have already implemented the majority of OSHA’s recommendations. Other recommendations that require further study have been given the highest priority.
“Although the OSHA investigation of our facility is now closed, we continue to work with OSHA regarding their determinations. Notably, there are some elements of the report that we respectfully disagree with, including the item related to respiratory protection, which we believe is based on inaccurate data and interpretation.”
A&B Maintenance and Construction also cited
Labor said OSHA proposed $16,834 in fines for five Serious violations by a Tampa company that also does maintenance at Gopher Resource’s Tampa plant. The violations concern excessive lead exposure and not having a written program of respiratory protection.
