MSHA ENFORCEMENT
NSSGA POSITION:
NSSGA supports fair, equitable and consistent enforcement of the Mine Safety and Health Act. Also, NSSGA supports an aggressive, pro-active approach by the Mine Safety and Health Administration (MSHA) to address continuing complaints by operators of uneven enforcement of MSHA regulations and using the NSSGA-MSHA Alliance, a collaborative industry-agency forum, to discuss and help resolve these issues.
BACKGROUND:
While some MSHA regulations are prescriptive, the majority are performance-oriented, giving mine operators necessary and desired compliance discretion. Many operators welcome the flexibility such an approach to regulations offers. However, the situation also leaves room for varying interpretations of some regulations by operators and inspectors alike. The result can be a situation where an operator is judged to be in compliance and inspectors make no comment on a situation for years, and then suddenly begin issuing citations due to a change in an inspector’s interpretation, even though the situation has not changed. Regulations dealing with moving machine parts seem especially prone to this type of enforcement problem.
Another aspect of this problem deals with recently purchased mine sites previously operated by another owner. NSSGA has received complaints of inspectors issuing a myriad of citations at a newly acquired property for conditions that appeared to have been accepted by MSHA under the previous owner.
A third issue relates to the agency’s tendency at times to release policy memos that break new regulatory ground without going through the notice-and-comment requirements of the Administrative Procedures Act.
TALKING POINTS:
- MSHA must place specific emphasis in its inspector training and retraining programs on the need for consistency in interpreting MSHA regulations.
- An industry-labor-MSHA work group should be established to review the agency’s regulations on moving machine parts and issue binding recommendations on how
to correct problems associated with the inconsistent enforcement of these regulations. - Heavy-handed enforcement at recently acquired aggregates mine sites should automatically prompt an investigation by the appropriate MSHA District Manager as to why a significant increase in citations occurred.
- Operators should not be discriminated against for reporting over-zealous enforcement.
- MSHA’s tendency at times to issue regulations in the guise of a policy memo must cease.
Updated: November 2008
