Over half of the workplace inspections performed by 37 federal Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) and state departments of labor area offices during the beginning of FY93 through April 6, 1993 were initiated in response to employee complaints, according to OSHA DATA, an information service specializing in standard and custom searches of OSHA enforcement data.Topping the list was Oregon's Medford Health District Office with 93% complaint inspections followed by Tennessee's Nashville Health Area Office (78%), California's Bakersfield District Office (77%), Michigan's Pontiac Health District Office (76%), and California's Sacremento District Office (74%). California, by far, had the most number of district offices within the classification (17 total), followed by Tennessee (6 total), Michigan (6 total) and Oregon (2 total). The two federal OSHA area offices on the list were Omaha (66%) and Denver (51%).
"These findings are significant," said Matthew Carmel, President of OSHA DATA, "in that unannouced inspections are less likely in workplaces covered by the identified OSHA offices." Both federal and state administrative procedures require complaints be given high priority. Unfortunately, with understaffing and reduced budgets, greater scheduling of programmed inspections is not possible. Some may argue that complaint inspections offer greater opportunity for OSHA to reinspect the same workplace more frequently than would otherwise be allowed under current inspection scheduling rules. However, complaint inspections are generally limited to the area of the complaint and can only be expanded under certain narrow criteria.
Copyright 1997 OSHA DATA (tm), Maplewood, NJ.
# # # Back to OSHA DATA Home Page