After 9 Strip building site deaths, some workers want more safety

[Omaha Steve]

http://www.lasvegassun.com/news/2008/apr/13/cautious-push/


CONSTRUCTION WORKER DEATHS ON THE STRIP:
A CAUTIOUS PUSH
After Strip building site deaths, some workers want more safety demands from unions, but press too hard and they may be jobless

Steve Marcus

Ironworkers at the Fontainebleau Las Vegas staged a rare work stoppage in July in an attempt to improve safety at the site. Three days after work resumed, a worker died.

By Alexandra Berzon, Michael Mishak

Sun, Apr 13, 2008 (2 a.m.)

The 70-odd ironworkers working at the Fontainebleau construction site were fed up with dangerous conditions.

In July, they stopped working in the unsafe areas and persuaded their union, Irownworkers Local 433, to negotiate with the contractor to correct several specific safety problems: They wanted a caged elevator, not an open lift, to ride to higher floors. They demanded installation of a promised cable so they could attach their safety harnesses. They wanted the safety net, then balled up somewhere on the site, stretched beneath workers, where it belonged.

Work resumed after three days, but dangerous practices continued. Three days later, the contractor relied on a makeshift hook that state investigators later said should never have been used.

The hook broke. Apprentice Norvin Tsosie fell to his death, becoming one of nine workers who, the Las Vegas Sun has reported, died in construction accidents on the Strip in the past 16 months.

Workers had failed to force a subcontractor, Nevada Prefab Engineers, to make the site safe. But they tried — and persuaded their union to back them up. By most accounts, that hasn’t happened often on the $32 billion in projects under way on the Strip.

In a town where powerful service unions, including the Culinary Union and the Service Employees International Union, pride themselves as being wary adversaries of management, construction trade unions have shown reluctance to confront contractors over safety. That often leaves workers themselves as the last resort.

FULL story and photos at link.