When the Occupational Safety and Health Act of 1970 passed, it was to prevent workers from being killed or seriously harmed at work. Centuries of workers’ blood had been shed prior to that fateful day.

The OSH Act created the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, which sets and enforces protective workplace safety and health standards. It also requires employers to provide their employees with working conditions that are free of known dangers.

As part of the OSH Act, any state in the country can (and should) have its own state-run OSHA office. Currently there are 26 state-run OSHA offices up and running, including the one in California, known as Cal/OSHA. State-run OSHA offices are charged with the primary responsibility of carrying out exactly what the federal administration does … OR BETTER. In other words, Cal/OSHA (as any state OSHA) cannot lessen the Act, it can only do equal or better than the Act.

Improving working conditions has been a priority for labor unions since their inception. It is with member strength and determination that unions – such as ours – can applaud the successes of everything from staffing ratios and bloodborne pathogen regulations to safe needles and safe patient handling.

When the leadership of Local 121RN approached me and a few others to help build up the Local’s health and safety program, we had to look at all the layers of issues our members deal with and pair those with the tools we both have in place now by way of the OSH Act and other labor laws, and also with new tools that we need to create, such as a workplace violence prevention Cal/OSHA standard.

In less than nine months we have come a long way in helping educate members and staff, mobilize folks around the issues, and even organize potential new members whose health and safety isn’t highly regarded where they work. We have a lot of exciting and challenging work ahead of us and unfortunately there are only so many days in the week to get it all moving. We need help.

The help we need the most is in making sure that every 121RN member, staffer, and officer understands what our rights are now and what rights we need to get better protections around. As that was identified, we set up workshops that would include other health and safety professionals.

It is to that end that on September 9 at 10:00 am we will have our CE on the Recordkeeping Standard. That class will be presented here at the local in Pasadena and hosted by myself, Katherine Hughes, RN, and Katy McNamara from the UCLA Labor Occupational Safety and Health Program.

We will then conduct another training on layered bodymapping on October 30, also at Local 121RN. That course will be facilitated by Dorothy Wigmore of Worksafe, one of our key health and safety allies.

While it is my sincere wish that we have so many people registered for these events that we have to have a second date, if anyone has any questions or concerns about what all we are doing with our health and safety program at Local 121RN, please reach out to me directly.