During a series of Web chats held last week, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) unveiled an ambitious prevention program as part of its spring regulatory agenda. The program, known as I2P2, is a major paradigm shift for the department, and as a result, input on the development of the program will be worked out through a series of stakeholder meetings.
Yesterday, OSHA announced details on these stakeholder meetings. The meetings will be held June 3 in East Brunswick, New Jersey, June 10 in Dallas, Texas, and June 29 in Washington, D.C. All meetings will take place from 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. local time. Those interested in participating in the meetings should submit a notice of intent to participate at https://www2.ergweb.com/projects/conferences/osha/register-osha-I2P2.htm.
The “I2P2 standard” would require each employer to implement an injury and illness prevention program tailored to the actual hazards in the workplace. The standard isn’t intended to be a substitute for other OSHA standards but rather will shift the burden and responsibility of identifying individual workplace hazards to the employer. That means it will be the employer’s responsibility to identify all hazards in its workplace, and then the actions taken to control those hazards will be governed by existing OSHA standards and the general duty clause.
More information on I2P2 is available in the Federal Register notice at http://s.dol.gov/35.