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"Model Workplaces" in Connecticut Not Always Safest

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In February 2007, David Gootkin came to the state Capitol in Hartford to testify in favor a bill prompted by his brother Robert’s death the year before at Covanta’s waste-to-energy plant in Wallingford. The bill, which eventually was adopted, requires that operators of solid waste facilities have at least two employees or a camera in the work area when waste is being fed into a hopper.

The previous May, Robert Gootkin, a 15-year employee of Covanta’s plant, was pinned against a wall and crushed to death by a hopper lid. David told lawmakers that his brother had been working a 12-hour overnight shift alone when the accident occurred, and that it took facility personnel 30 minutes to respond to alarms that went off.  As a former employee of the plant himself, David complained that workers were being exposed to unnecessary risks. Covanta lobbied against the bill, saying it took adequate precautions.

“My brother’s death was an accident waiting to happen,” said David, who left the company before Robert died.

At the time of the accident, Covanta of Wallingford was vying for elite recognition as a model workplace from the federal Occupational Safety & Health Administration [OSHA]. In 2008, the plant was awarded that recognition for its commitment to worker safety. It retains that status today, despite citations by the state Department of Energy and Environmental Protection for excess dioxin emissions and failing to properly audit its emissions monitoring equipment, and a follow-up lawsuit last summer by the state attorney general for continued violations.

Covanta’s Wallingford plant is one of 15 worksites in Connecticut that have gained special “star” status in OSHA’s Voluntary Protection Programs, or VPP, which recognizes select companies as model workplaces that demonstrate the “highest levels” of employee protection. The program rewards worksites deemed “self-sufficient in their ability to control workplace hazards.”

In return for a commitment to safety and health, VPP companies get an exemption from regular inspections and are not punished for standard violations if the problems are promptly corrected.  Once in VPP’s star program, companies are re-evaluated every three to five years.

A C-HIT review found that at least six of the state’s designated VPP worksites have had significant safety or other workplace lapses in recent years.  In some cases, the problems occurred before the companies were accepted as VPP sites; in others, they occurred afterwards.

Among them is the Millstone nuclear power station in Waterford, which was granted entry into the VPP program in 2004 and retains that status today. Last November, the plant was cited by OSHA for a serious safety violation carrying a proposed penalty of $6,000. OSHA records reveal that employees who may have been exposed to hazardous fumes in June 2010 were not provided with adequate medical attention “until weeks after the incident.” The citation was later deleted.

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