Obama Administration Missed Chance to Get Tougher on Unsafe Mines:

[amborin]

Obama Administration Missed Chance To Get Tougher On Unsafe Mines

"Long before the explosion that killed at least 25 coal miners inside Massey Energy's Upper Big Branch Mine on Monday, Obama administration mine safety officials were aware of a major loophole that allowed companies like Massey to avoid stricter enforcement despite alarming safety records.
Perhaps miners need more than prayers after the fact. Mining safety regulations were tightened in 2007, following an explosion the previous year that killed 12 miners at the Sago Mine, also in West Virginia. But mining companies immediately began gaming the new system.

Mines that are designated as having a "pattern of violations" are subject to a greater level of oversight. But Massey and others ducked that designation simply by lodging formal appeals against the major violations issued against them.
It turns out that, according to current rules, contested violations can't be taken into consideration when assessing whether a pattern of violations exists.
Contesting those violations also allowed Massey and other companies to delay paying the fines levied against them -- thwarting a key enforcement mechanism.

And all the appeals overwhelmed the commission charged with adjudicating them, creating a massive backlog that effectively allowed the companies to flaunt the rules indefinitely.
Joe Main, a former United Mine Worker of America official, took over the Mine Safety and Health Administration (MSHA, pronounced em-sha) in October. He told a congressional hearing in February that the backlog has effectively prevented MSHA from applying the stepped-up enforcement mechanisms to mines with a pattern of serious violations.
"And I think the consequence there is that mines have the ability to continue that pattern unabated," he said. His conclusion: "e must diminish the incentives for operators who appear to be developing a pattern of significant and substantial safety violations to contest, simply to delay enforcement."

But that was in February -- at a hearing called by a concerned chairman of the House Education and Labor Committee, Rep. George Miller (D-Calif.).
And according to Celeste Monforton, a George Washington University public health professor and former MSHA official, Obama administration officials had known of the problem for more than a year by then.
"I feel very confident that when the presidential transition teams in December and January were meeting with the senior career people in the agency," she said, "they heard that, one, there's a huge backlog in the review commission and, two, this is neutering, or making impotent, the pattern of violations provision of the Mine Act."

So, Monforton told HuffPost, "The question is: 'What did you do, knowing on January 21st that they're gaming the system? What did you do?'
"It doesn't look like they did anything."
Actually, the Obama administration did add four administrative law judges to the panel of 10 charged with ruling on the contested violations, in an attempt to somewhat reduce the backlog. And they've now requested four more.
But the basic rule that the companies are exploiting remained unchanged.

snip

http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2010/04/10-2

[babylonsister]

1. Sounds like they were getting tougher...

so which is it? Someone who wants to slam the admin again? There's a surprise.

Actually, the Obama administration did add four administrative law judges to the panel of 10 charged with ruling on the contested violations, in an attempt to somewhat reduce the backlog. And they've now requested four more.

[amborin]

2. they did nothing to close the loophole, which they were well aware of

[BrklynLiberal]

3. Too late now for 29 miners and their families......

[Name removed]

4. Deleted message

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