Tuesday, March 24, 2015

HAZARDOUS WORK TAKES TOLL ON LATINOS




MARCH 22, 2015 

Some of the most dangerous occupations for Latinos include construction and agriculture. But work in the petrochemical industry is hazardous too. 

In 2004, Katherine Rodriguez's father, Ray Gonzalez, was performing maintenance with two other workers on a super-heated water line at the BP refinery in Texas City. As work continued, the pipe burst, spraying and scalding him with 500-degree water. He survived numerous operations over several weeks until his body eventually failed and he had to be taken off life support at the age of 54.

Just a few months later on March 23, 2005, a huge explosion at the Texas City refinery took 15 lives and injured some 180 workers. Today, the Houston area marks the 10th anniversary of that tragedy.

As the chairperson of the U.S. federal agency that investigates chemical disasters, I am concerned for all workers. But as an immigrant from Colombia, where I first studied chemical engineering, I have a heightened concern for Latinos who work in and around chemical facilities across Texas and in the U.S. Their fatality and injury rates are disproportionately high.

In 2013, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, approximately 4,405 workers were killed on the job in the United States. This represents an overall fatality rate of 3.2 workers killed for every 100,000 in the workplace; thankfully the rate has been dropping. But for Latinos, the fatality rate has actually increased to 3.8 per 100,000 workers. In human terms, it represents 797 Latino workers gone from their wives, husbands, children, and communities. That is two Latino lives lost at work every day in 2013.

Some of the most dangerous occupations for Latinos include construction and agriculture. But work in the petrochemical industry is hazardous too. Although the Bureau of Labor Statistics does not specifically list accidents in this industry, it reports 148 workers died in "fires and explosions" in 2013, twenty of them Hispanic workers, and another 330 total workers dying from "exposure to harmful substances or environments," 68 of whom were Hispanic.

Why are Latino workers so vulnerable to workplace injuries and fatalities? 

According to a report from UC Berkeley, they are overrepresented in jobs with low wages and dangerous working conditions, less likely to have adequate training or health insurance, and sometimes lacking enough English language skills to access safety information. And they may be fearful of exercising their rights as employees to raise health and safety concerns, or even afraid of deportation, the report said.

And Latinos are more likely to be at risk near chemical facilities. An environmental justice study released last year showed the percentage of Latinos living in fence line zones to be 60 percent greater than for the U.S. as a whole. Many remain anxious that an explosion or toxic release could occur - accidents like the blast that destroyed part of West, Texas, in 2013, or the 2012 refinery fire and smoke plume in Richmond, Calif., that sent 15,000 residents to local hospitals.

The Center for Effective Government recently published a disturbing study: it found that at least 1 in 3 U.S. children attends a school within the vulnerability zone of a hazardous chemical site. More than three million students are in these vulnerable areas in Texas. In Houston, 63 percent of kids in the Houston Independent School District are Hispanic, and more than 270 of the schools in the city are in multiple vulnerability zones.

More needs to be done. I commend OSHA for its outreach to Latino workers over the years. I hope that real reform will come through President Obama's 2013 executive order called "Improving Chemical Facility Safety and Security," which calls for the first major overhaul of chemical plant safety rules in two decades. Along with other Americans, my fellow Latinos and I have a real stake in seeing that order implemented in the next few months.

You can't put a price on someone's life. Latinos help drive the country's economy working hard for companies big and small, often in dangerous occupations. They have a right to safer workplaces and communities.