Wes Gerrie

All articles by Wes Gerrie

 

As the Weather Warms Employers Must Be Wary of Heat-Related Hazards Early On

OSHA requires that employers provide a workplace free of known safety hazards – this includes protecting workers from heat-related illnesses. Beginning in 2011, heat safety became a focus of OSHA with its Heat Illness Prevention Campaign which includes tailored training, publications, and outreach programs designed to educate employers on the dangers of working in heat. When it comes to preventing heat illness, it is important to think ahead. It is common sense that the risk of heat-related illness becomes greater during the late spring and…  

Element Three of the Unpreventable Employee Misconduct Defense: Insistence on Compliance and Established Methods of Discovering Violations, Despite Not Knowing About the Subject Violation

In part three of this four-part series addressing the “Unpreventable Employee Misconduct” defense, we will examine the third element an employer must prove to successfully defend against an OSHA citation: that the employer insisted on compliance and had methods of discovering violations of its rules, even though it did not know about the specific violation. Similar to all other elements of this defense, the concept is relatively simple: the employer must insist on safety compliance and have established methods for discovering violations of OSHA violations,…