OSHA says Jags owner Shad Khan's Illinois-based company did not properly monitor workers' exposure to chromium and other toxic chemicals.
Jaguars owner Shad Khan has until the end of the month to act on citations from the U.S. Department of Labor’s Occupational Safety and Health Administration
OSHA has named nine serious safety and health violations by Khan’s Illinois-based company Flex-N-Gate.
Proposed fines total $57,000 following the December 2011 inspection and investigation into complaints.
“The principal violations were failing to monitor workers’ exposure to chromium, which is used to do the electroplating of the company’s bumpers that they manufacture there,” said OSHA spokeswoman Rhonda Burke in Illinois.
Four of the violations are related to medical surveillance for workers who are exposed to chromium and chromic acid.
"They failed to provide periodic examinations of exposed body parts, particularly the nostrils because chromium is a metal particle that gets inhaled and can cause respiratory damage," Burke said.
Other dangerous substances workers may have been exposed to include nickel, chromium, hydrochloric acid and sulfuric acid.
She said they also failed to implement and effective respiratory program to “include training of the workers to evaluate respiratory hazards, and then providing medical evaluations to ensure they could use a respirator properly and that the respirators were fitted properly for them.”
Another violation is for not conducting monitoring during an eight-hour time shift to make sure workers aren’t exposed to dangerous levels of toxic chemicals.
Employees have complained to OSHA since December, Burke said.
The Urbana-based Flex-N-Gate company employs more than 12,450 people at 50 manufacturing and nine product development and engineering facilities through the U.S., Canada, Mexico, Argentina, Brazil and Spain. The Urbana plant was inspected by OSHA in October 2010, resulting in two citations for serious violations.
The company has 15 business days from the receipt of the citations and penalties to comply, request an informal conference with OSHA’s area director or contest the findings before the independent Occupational Safety Health Review Commission.
Rhonda Burke says they have until the end of the month, as they were informed of the citations of violations on June 8th.
