Cristina Tzintzun, executive director of the Workers Defense Project, and Michael Cunningham, executive director and secretary/treasurer of the Texas State Building and Construction Trades Council, send us this. 

Few construction labor leaders have ever thought of Texas as an easy place to organize. The state legislature is controlled by a super majority of Republicans that are sternly anti-immigrant and anti-worker. Construction business interests have a firm grip on the legislature. The biggest Republican donor in the state is Bob Perry, of Perry Homes, one of the largest home builders in Texas. That is why the efforts of unions and community groups to reform the construction industry in the state are so significant.

BP is slated to pay a hefty fine for willful violations of the U.S. Department of Labor’s Occupational Safety and Health Administration's (OSHA) process safety management standard at its refinery in Texas City, Texas: $13,027,000.

The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) and National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) issued a hazard alert that urges employers in hydraulic fracturing operations to take appropriate steps to protect workers from silica exposure. Last month, in response to findings reported by NIOSH that workers in fracking operations were exposed to silica levels well in excess of OSHA permissible and NIOSH recommended levels, the AFL-CIO, Mine Workers (UMWA) and the United Steelworkers (USW) sent a letter to the federal workplace safety agencies urging they act to protect workers in these operations.  

One of the most important legacies of the Wisconsin uprising is the mobilization of a new wave of activists. A powerful example is the nearly 300 workers at Palermo’s Pizza in Milwaukee, who were emboldened by the broader movement for workers’ rights in Wisconsin to fight back to raise standards for themselves and customers alike. Many of the workers had come to the United States to build better lives for themselves and their families, and their concern over unsafe working conditions and unfair wages at the frozen pizza plant inspired a desire for a voice on the job.

If you work in the hydraulic fracturing industry—better known as “fracking”—you may be exposed to high levels of crystalline silica, putting you at risk of developing silicosis, lung cancer and other debilitating diseases, according to a letter sent today from the AFL-CIO, Mine Workers (UMWA) and the United Steelworkers (USW) to the top federal safety agencies.

We’ve known this for decades and now the journal Science has empirical proof that workplace safety and health inspections by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) save lives, reduce employers’ costs for workers’ compensation and do not have any negative economic effect on the inspected businesses.

The authors of the study—three professors from the University of California, Harvard Business School and Boston University—say they set out to answer a simple question: Do government regulations kill jobs—as business groups such as the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and Republican lawmakers claim—or protect the public?  

Last October, the Hyatt Regency in Santa Clara, Calif., fired two sisters with 30 years of combined experience after they objected to the posting of demeaning pictures of housekeepers in bikinis on a company bulletin board. Yesterday, Hyatt workers, clergy, and local elected officials delivered nearly 100,000 petition signatures from around the world to the hotel’s general manager condemning the hotel’s dismissal of sisters Martha and Lorena Reyes and calling for their reinstatement with full back pay.

Some of the most hazardous job sites for workers in the nation are the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE's) nuclear weapons facilities. But House Republicans are pushing extreme proposals in the Defense Authorization bill to deregulate worker safety and allow employers self–regulation and self-oversight—even at the most hazardous facilities.

With summer approaching, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) has kicked off a national outreach initiative to educate workers and their employers about the hazards of working outdoors in hot weather and how to prevent heat-related illnesses that kill 30 workers a year.

The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) has told Hyatt Hotels what the hotel chain’s housekeepers have been telling it for years—“Hyatt Hurts.” OSHA issued a formal Hazard Alert letter telling Hyatt that its housekeepers face ergonomic risks every day on the job. The letter outlines steps Hyatt can take to reduce housekeeper injuries.