Highlights

The following statement is from Debra Coyle McFadden, executive director of the New Jersey Work Environment Council (WEC). “We’re glad to see Doug Parker, a highly qualified safety professional, confirmed today by the U.S. Senate. As assistant secretary of labor, he will head the U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA). “Doug brings his experience as head of Cal/OSHA, the nation’s largest statewide safety agency. He also served as executive director at Worksafe, a non-profit that provides legal services and public advocacy for workers seeking to improve safety on the job. Worksafe and WEC are both affiliates of the National Council for Occupational Safety and Health. Read more here.

When Abraham Lincoln School in Garfield reopens in September, students will cram into a building constructed 50 years after the 16th president was assassinated and is showing its age: A sagging roof, water damage from leaks in the mortar, no air- conditioning. It gets no better in some schools in Paterson, where the local teachers union has reported mold, leaky ceilings and rodents. But they do have running drinking water, which is more than can be said of at least half the schools in Jersey City. Those schools are examples among dozens throughout New Jersey’s 31 so-called Schools Development Authority (SDA) districts that will fully reopen this school year in “deplorable conditions,” as the Education Law Center put it in legal filings. Hot, overcrowded, poorly ventilated classrooms have become a way of life for students and teachers in these districts that have been so down-at-the-heels that the Supreme Court ruled decades ago that the state is responsible for school repairs and replacement so students can get a “thorough and efficient” education. Read the full story here.

As the new school year starts, the National Coalition for Healthier Schools, coordinated by Healthy Schools Network, is calling for critical and immediate actions and $75 Million in funding to rapidly expand EPA’s capacity to mount education and technical assistance campaigns on clean indoor environments in the nation’s schools: Clean Air, Clean Water, and Clean and Healthy Products. “Clean air in every school should be a national priority for all k-12 schools and childcare facilities,” says Claire Barnett, executive of the Healthy Schools Network. “No child should suffer a full day of polluted and or cold and flu virus-filled indoor air. Teaching suffers; learning suffers; absences and asthma rise. Children are denied the future they and the nation need.”... “Students and staff deserve to learn and teach in healthy schools with adequate ventilation systems. Proper ventilation is important when it comes to good indoor air quality and reducing the spread of COVID-19. Funding must be authorized at the state and federal level to help achieve these goals,” said Heather L. Sorge, NJ Work Environment Council. Read the full article here.

"Heather Sorge is an organizer for Healthy Schools Now, a coalition under the umbrella of the New Jersey Work Environment Council. She said her organization has been advocating for stricter standards for years. The issue, she said, is a lack of awareness. “We’ve advocated for a statewide survey of where these floors are, testing to see if there is a mercury component and then funding on a statewide level because the districts shouldn’t be responsible for these costly repairs,” Sorge said. Not all of the floors are problematic, but it's impossible to know without testing. Mercury exposure can harm the brain and central nervous system. The risk is higher for young children, whose neurological systems are still developing, and who are lower to the ground where vapors linger. Even short-term exposure can cause a cough or sore throat, headaches and chest pain." It's critical that we identify these floors and have them tested and remediated. Read the entire article here.

Testimony Given by Debra Coyle McFadden to the U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration Whistleblower Stakeholder Meeting on May 19, 2021 Thank you for the opportunity to testify. My name is Debra Coyle McFadden, and I am the Executive Director of the NJ Work Environment Council. We are a coalition of 70 labor, community, and environmental organizations, as well as many individuals advocating for safe, secure jobs and a health sustainable environment. The NJ Work Environment Council is also an affiliate of the National Council for Occupational Safety and Health Network as well as the national coalition to Prevent Chemical Disasters. Let me be direct. If workers are not truly protected when participating in safety or health activities, or reporting workplace hazards to their employer, they won’t do it. The consequence of this will be that more workers will die in workplace fatalities or become sick or injured on the jobs. The impact of not reporting health and safety hazards may also go well beyond the workplace. For example, if a refinery or chemical worker doesn’t feel protected from retaliation, they might not report a serious health and safety hazard that if reported and corrected could prevent a toxic catastrophe. [...]