The Ohio legislature is wrangling with a second attempt in recent years to force energy refineries to hire union workers for safety inspections – despite the current contract workers producing a better safety record.
Now, in an incredible development, the United Steelworkers Union (USW) – which represents the vast majority of refinery workers in the United States – voiced their opposition to House Bill 205 (HB 205), largely because the ill-conceived HB 205 would force many inexperienced construction trades workers into refinery safety inspections.
The letter rightly noted that the bill “is an anti-Steelworker and anti-safety piece of legislation” and that “eliminating highly skilled maintenance workers who have spent their careers working on refinery equipment and replacing them with construction company ‘visitors’ who may be working on refinery equipment for the first time, does not make refineries a safer place to work, it does the opposite.”
Proponents of HB 205 have gone as far as to use “the tragic death of two [USW] members, brothers by the name of Max and Ben Morrissey, over the objections of their family” to advance the bill. Moreover, “there is no indication that anything addressed in HB 205 would have prevented these tragic deaths.”
Rather than mandating that “building trade contract workers… replace the highly skilled permanent maintenance workforce in Ohio’s refineries,” legislators should permit free enterprise to determine which worker is best suited to maintain the safety standards at Ohio’s refineries. Mandating the replacement of efficient and experienced workers with those favored by one set of unions is a recipe for disaster.
Unfortunately, HB 205 has received bipartisan support in the House and has been sent to the Senate Energy and Public Utilities Committee. There are proponent and opponent testimony hearings expected to take place in the coming weeks. Ohio ratepayers would be subject to higher costs for this reckless labor mandate and should voice their concerns to their senators.