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By
John Trotti
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John
Trotti
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In our companion
publication, Grading & Excavation Contractor, we’re
watching an interesting phenomenon take place; a fiscal
sword, wielded by the people with the projects, that
is having an amazingly positive impact on both safety
and environmental compliance that we in the waste industry
would do well to emulate. First let me pose examples
and then let’s look at how they may be applied
to our universe.
Hoofbeats
of the Dreaded EMR
EMR—Efficiency Modification Rating—is
the system developed by the insurance industry to measure
one activity’s safety performance relative to all
others with the same SIC. While the -methodology involved
is a little more complex, what it comes down to is this:
If your EMR is 1.0, your safety performance is dead-nuts
average for your SIC group. An EMR greater than 1.0
means your performance is worse than average; lower
than 1.0, your safety performance is better than average.
A few years
back, several large companies recognized that no matter
what the circumstances, accidents occurring during construction
on any of their sites inevitably led to litigation.
These pioneers decided to take matters into their own
hands by making safety part of the bidding process.
Quite simply, this was accomplished by refusing access
to the bidding process to contractors with worse (greater)
than a 1.0 EMR, and to bar the use of subcontractors
who didn’t meet the same standard. So dramatic
have been the results of this practice that it has been
adopted by an increasing number of project owners—public
as well as private—around the country.
Are contractors
getting the message? You bet, particularly when half
of them wake up to the realization that they are not
eligible to bid on a growing number of the most lucrative
projects around ... and that the safety bar will be
even higher in the future as contractors recognize the
importance of safety to their competitive viability.
Thus, whether as a matter of enlightenment or terror,
the road to safety in the construction field is showing
real progress.
The EPA
Sees the Light
The point was not lost on the water quality people
at the EPA who decided that the fastest, most effective
way to get their message out was not by handing down
punishments on individual contractors but by soliciting
the aid —quite often adversarily—of those
engaged in the greatest number of projects. Thus, as
the result of stormwater compliance litigation, the
EPA and Wal-Mart Stores Inc. entered into a consent
decree that not only will affect the contractors who
work on the retailer’s massive list of projects,
but is destined to impact all dirt-moving contractors
as well.
In compliance
with the consent decree, Wal-Mart has initiated a Storm
Water Professional training program for general contracting
firms, completion of which is required of project managers
and superintendents before would-be contractors are
allowed into the bidding process. Other large developers
eager to avoid costly sanctions are emulating Wal-Mart’s
approach, and are getting the message.
Is There
a Lesson Here for Us?
You betcha! If you contract out services, you have
an excellent opportunity—and I would go further
to suggest that you consider it an obligation—to
control risks to the people for whom you work, at the
same time taking effective action to upgrade the safety
and environmental stewardship of the entire industry
in ways that have proven to be both effective and fair.
On the safety
side of the coin, by establishing a baseline EMR for
would-be contractors, you’re not telling them how
to run their safety programs, instead you are insisting
on a proven level of safety performance.
On the environmental
compliance side for your landfill or other construction--related
activities, I suggest you go to www.forester.net and
subscribe to our sister publication, Stormwater Management,
for information and assistance with storm-water regulatory
compliance training and certification. It is the authoritative
publication on this and related subjects.
Send
John an Email
MSW - September/October 2005 |
