When workers die from job injuries in NC, companies often get breaks on state fines

Companies cited for safety lapses at Charlotte construction sites after five workers died last year are not alone in getting state fines reduced.

Across North Carolina, state labor officials trimmed penalties more than 40% of the time after citing companies for violations linked to worker deaths in 2022 and 2023, according to data reviewed by The Charlotte Observer.

Businesses have the opportunity to request lower penalties when safety inspectors find workplace hazards. Among the companies that got breaks in Mecklenburg County:

• Friends Masonry, a contractor cited for three serious violations in the Jan. 2, 2023 scaffolding collapse that killed three men at the building site of a 16-story apartment complex near Charlotte’s Dilworth neighborhood. Labor officials cut the company’s penalty by a third — from $43,500 to $29,004.
  
  

• Baker Insulation, a contractor that was initially cited for four serious violations related to the massive fire that killed two construction workers near SouthPark Mall on May 18, 2023. The state ultimately deleted three of the citations and reduced the fine by 25% — from $6,250 to $4,687.
  
  

• Metrolina Greenhouses, a Huntersville company that was cited for two serious violations after an employee fell to his death while preparing to install overhead lighting on May 24, 2022. State officials proposed a fine of $29,153, but cut that by 35% — to $18,949.

Such penalty reductions send a dangerous message to employers, lawyers and others who advocate for workers say.

“How are fines supposed to be a deterrent if they are so low and can be easily reduced?” said Ashley Hawkins, President of the Charlotte-Metrolina Labor Council, a group that represents unionized workers locally. “...It sends a message to employers that it’s okay to mistreat workers in North Carolina. That it’s okay to endanger workers in the pursuit of profits.”

A debate over how to make job sites safer

The state agrees to negotiate with employers because that’s often the fastest way to get them to correct workplace hazards, said Paul Sullivan, Assistant Deputy Commissioner of the Occupational Safety and Health Division.

When the state agrees to reduce penalties, it usually requires employers to make additional safety improvements, such as requiring extra training or safety inspections, Sullivan said.

In the SouthPark fire settlement, the state agreed to cut the fines levied against Baker Insulation after stipulating that the company had to improve its safety and health program, according to labor department spokesperson Erin Wilson.

“We’re trying to get some additional concessions from the employer,” Sullivan said.

If the state doesn’t budge on reducing penalties and companies choose to litigate, that can take more than a year and delay safety improvements, he said.

Charlotte lawyer Vernon Sumwalt, who represents the relatives of one of the three men who died after the scaffolding collapse, said he isn’t sure that’s the best way to make job sites safer.

“If the routine is to seek a reduction of fines, is that really going to deter future conduct?” asked Sumwalt, who has represented more than a thousand families of workers hurt or killed on the job over the past 26 years. “I think the answer is obvious.”

The debate is happening at a deadly time for Charlotte construction workers.

There were at least six construction deaths in 2023 — more than any of the previous 14 years, according to an The Observer analysis of state department of labor data.

Just two tragedies — the scaffolding collapse and the SouthPark fire — accounted for five of those deaths.

Friends Masonry and another contractor working on the residential tower near Charlotte’s Dilworth neighborhood at the time of the scaffolding collapse were cited for failing to repair the rusted scaffold, for failing to inspect the scaffold for visible defects prior to each shift and other violations.

The state inspectors who investigated the SouthPark fire found, among other things, that the exits of the seven-story wooden building weren’t arranged to provide an easy way out for the workers who were trapped inside the building when the fire broke out.

Are fines too low?

North Carolina doesn’t always reduce fines.

After the SouthPark fire, the labor department deleted one of its citations against MCRT Carolinas Construction LLC, the contractor on the 239-unit apartment building, Modera SouthPark. But in the settlement reached with MCRT last week, the state did not reduce the $46,875 penalty.

Sullivan, the assistant deputy labor commissioner, cited federal data showing that North Carolina does not reduce fines as much as most states do.

North Carolina made companies pay about 81% of all initial penalties in the federal fiscal year 2023, with $6.9 million collected. The average amount collected nationally was 70% during the same period, according to the U.S. Department of Labor data.

But North Carolina has lagged behind in other categories, according to the AFL-CIO’s most recent “Death on the Job” report.

For each of the five years ending in 2021, the workplace fatality rate in North Carolina exceeded the national average, that report shows. There were 3.9 deaths for every 100,000 workers in 2021, according to the most recent federal data. Nationally the figure was 3.6.

The average penalty for a serious workplace safety violation here in fiscal year 2023 was $3,709, slightly below the national average of $3,866, according to the U.S. Department of Labor.

Maximum fines for serious violations more than doubled in fiscal year 2022, from $7,000 to $15,625. They will increase again July 1 to more than $16,000, Sullivan said.

That increase helps explain the size of some recent penalty reductions, Sullivan said..

“When you suddenly increase your penalties, there is going to be a little bit more movement in penalty reductions,” Sullivan said. “You can’t all of a sudden double your penalties, and not be able to give a little bit.”

But workplace safety advocates say the state penalties are often too low to get the attention of many employers.

The median penalty ultimately levied in workplace death cases in 2022 to 2023 was a little less than $12,000, The Observer found.

“If you’ve got someone dying at work because of a workplace safety violation, a penalty of $12,000 seems grossly inadequate to me for an employer whose carelessness allowed an employee to be killed,” said Charlotte workers comp lawyer Bob Bollinger.

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