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OSHA violates provisions of OSH act, has to give up on major compliance effort

January 12th, 2017 by Dakota Software Staff Industry News

OSHA violates provisions of OSH act, has to give up on major compliance effort

The Occupational Safety and Health Act was a major shift for many different workplaces across the country, especially because it led to the creation of the Occupational Safety and Health Administration. The federal health and safety regulator is empowered by the OSH Act, but it's also possible for the organization to make decisions that run afoul of the regulations it contains. Those circumstances recently occurred and were reviewed by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, which ultimately ruled against OSHA for failing to follow the relevant rules related to updating and changing its safety regulations.

A major win for agricultural retailers and an example of OSHA overreach
OSHA's reprimand from the court is tied to a change the regulator tried to make to the retail facility exemption under its Process Safety Management Standard. According to the East Oregonian, a retail exemption related to the handling of potentially dangerous fertilizers, such as anhydrous ammonia, has been in place since the PSMS was developed in the early 1990s. In general, businesses handling 10,000 pounds or more of anhydrous ammonia have to create and follow strict safety plans and inspection protocols. Agricultural retailers have been exempt from this component of the PSMS since the regulations took effect.

OSHA issued a memorandum in summer 2015 that aimed to change this exemption and place agricultural retailers under the PSMS, partially in response to the deadly explosion at a fertilizer facility in West, Texas, in 2013. A battle over the proposed change ensued, and the D.C. circuit court of appeals eventually ruled in favor of the agricultural retail industry. The court decided OSHA took an inappropriate path to the rule change, ignoring certain necessary aspects like a public input period. Industry news source Farm Futures spoke with the Agricultural Retailers Association about the matter.

"This administration has broadly and unjustly avoided proper procedure to construct and reinterpret myriad federal regulations without public input," said Daren Coppock, president and chief executive officer of the ARA, to Farm Futures. "The court's decision in this case affirms the importance of regulatory agencies following proper notice and comment rulemaking procedure."

While the decision itself is specific to agricultural retail, the court's action has a more general impact on OSHA's decision-making and rule-changing processes. This rebuke from the appeals court could impact how OSHA tries to make rule changes going forward.

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