Still A Potential Issue?
Although The U.S. Department of Labor’s Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) and the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) have regulated various aspects of asbestos for many years, some companies are still unaware or unwilling to comply with the regulations. As a result, employers are still being cited and fined for failure to adhere to these rules. On May 24, 2011, OSHA issued penalties of $1,247,400 to an Illinois company that was using unprotected and untrained workers to conduct asbestos removal. In February 2011, the Washington State Department of Labor and Industries fined a company $400,000 for willful and serious worker safety violations involving the removal of asbestos from an old high school and a government building. In March of 2011, the EPA settled an enforcement action against the General Services Administration (GSA) and four of its contractors for violating the federal Clean Air Act requirements by failing to properly remove, handle and dispose of asbestos during a supposedly “green” renovation project of a post office and a court house building in Boston, Massachusetts in 2007. The EPA fined the GSA and the four contractors $100,000 for this violation.