Texas workers can’t afford to wait years for OSHA's new heat safety policy | Grumet
John Guerrero Jr.’s first day on the job was also his last day on Earth.
The 46-year-old was part of a crew framing walls for a luxury apartment building sprouting in East Austin on May 16, 2022. The heat index that day reached 96 degrees. “The worksite was in direct sunlight with no shade available,” an inspector with the Occupational Safety and Health Administration wrote.
At that time, Austin’s water break ordinance had not yet been struck down by the state, and the contractor made sure water and Gatorade were available. Guerrero drank both, but he told others he still wasn’t feeling well. He stopped sweating, a sign his body was dangerously overheating.
Guerrero finished his shift, then died of heat stroke. Even with access to beverages, the OSHA inspector noted, “the employee was not trained on how to identify the symptoms of heat illness and their severity.”
Studies suggest heat exposure is among the top causes of worker deaths — responsible for 600 to 2,000 U.S. fatalities a year, not to mention roughly 170,000 workplace injuries, according to a Public Citizen analysis — yet federal action has been infuriatingly slow.
Experts have been urging OSHA to set heat safety standards since 1972. OSHA finally launched that rulemaking process in September 2021.
The result of that long-awaited effort, a proposed rule unveiled this past week by the Biden administration and championed by U.S. Rep. Greg Casar, D-Austin, is promising. It would require rest breaks and access to shade and water when a job site reaches a heat index of 80 degrees. Importantly, employers would have to provide training and establish emergency response plans for heat-related injuries — efforts that could have saved the life of Guerrero and many others who’ve died on the job.
While heat stroke can afflict workers within a matter of hours, finalizing OSHA’s heat safety rule could take at least a year or two. By law, the bureaucratic process requires a period for comments and then responses to every single concern raised. (Other factors, such as potential litigation or a change in presidential administrations, could also upend the rule.)
Federal officials say they recognize the urgency, though. At a recent Workers Defense Project event, OSHA assistant secretary of labor Doug Parker called the heat safety rule "our No. 1 rulemaking priority at OSHA," adding that, "we've done this rule faster than most of these types of complex rules have ever been done since the 1980s."
And Casar told my American-Statesman colleague Bayliss Wagner: "I'll work with the Biden administration to finalize this rule as quickly as possible, to make sure that there's positive comments and protection of his rule from whichever corporate interests might try to slow it down or block it."
It is imperative that OSHA expedite its review. Every day, people are working strenuous jobs in the unforgiving heat. The risk to workers is particularly acute in Texas, which saw one-fifth of all U.S. heat-related deaths last year, according to an Associated Press analysis. Climate change is contributing to longer and hotter summers, while at the same time, Texas lawmakers last year struck down water break ordinances in Austin and Dallas as part of a massive bill nullifying various local regulations.
David Chincanchan, policy director for the Workers Defense Project, noted some employers already take the right steps to ensure a safe worksite.
“But other folks are willing to trade 10 or 15 minutes of productivity, which is how long a water break would take, for potentially a human life, and obviously it's not worth it,” he told me.
“We're not talking about numbers. We're not talking about productivity,” he continued. “Ultimately, we're talking about individuals with lives and families and hopes and dreams and just full people that are an important part of our community. Unfortunately, workers aren't always seen that way.”
I kept thinking of Chincanchan’s words as I read through the OSHA reports of the heat-related worker deaths in Texas just during the time the proposed federal rule has been in the works:
May 15, 2022: While replacing the roof on a home in Ennis, Jose Armando Tobar, 63, became ill and fell off the building to his death. OSHA found heat exhaustion caused the fall.
June 21, 2022: Jorge Gomez spent the morning framing a new house in Liberty Hill, and he then couldn’t stand up after his lunch break. The 49-year-old complained of chest pains before collapsing. OSHA records say his death was caused by heart failure related to heat exposure.
June 23, 2022: Gabriel Infante, 24, toiled under the San Antonio sun, using a hand shovel to dig out a fiber optic cable and reinstall it a few feet away. Around 5:30 p.m., he became so combative that police were called; then he collapsed and died at the hospital from severe heat stroke. An OSHA report said Infante’s core body temperature had reached 110 degrees.
Aug. 8, 2022: Christopher Strickland, 31, spent the day digging narrow trenches with a pickaxe and then laying irrigation pipes for a sprinkler system outside a San Angelo office building. He collapsed and died of heat stroke, OSHA records said.
June 20, 2023: Postal carrier Eugene Gates, 66, collapsed while walking along his delivery route in Dallas. OSHA found the heat exacerbated Gates’ fatal heart condition.
June 27, 2023: After handling cinder blocks at a Rockport construction site, Eloy Maldonado Valdez, 59, told a co-worker he didn’t feel well. He laid down in the shade. He never got up.
All of them went to work one day and never came home to their loved ones. All of them might still be with us, if only the right safeguards had been in place for those working in the heat.
OSHA has crafted such a rule. It should move swiftly to finalize it before any more workers trying to provide for their families join this list.
Grumet is the Statesman’s Metro columnist. Her column, ATX in Context, contains her opinions. Share yours via email at bgrumet@statesman.com or on X at @bgrumet. Find her previous work at statesman.com/opinion/columns.
This article originally appeared on Austin American-Statesman: Texas workers can’t afford to wait years for federal heat safety rule
