Vol. 6 No.6 WOMEN'S OCCUPATIONAL HEALTH RESOURCE CENTER SCHOOL OF PUBLIC HEALTH COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY New Jersey Right to know Upset •• Briefly Noted •• By Mary Sue Henifin FUNDING FOR OCCUPATIONAL HEALTH continues to occupy a small part The nation's most comprehensive law and hazardous waste disposal facilities. If of the rederal budget. FYI985 once again governing the right to know about danger­ the federal OSHA standards were to be has programs for occupational safety and ous substances in the workplace, as it expanded to cover any of these non­ health among the lowest funded health pro­ applied to manufacturers, was struck down manufacturing industries, their coverage by grams. The National Institute for Occupa­ on January 3, 1985 by a federal district the New Jersey right to know law would also tional Safety and Health, NIOSH, received court. This was the first court battle on the be preempted. $66.7 million, or 16 % ofthe Centers for Dis­ issue. The New Jersey law had been The federal Occupational Safety and ease Control, it's parent agency, budget. challenged by various manufacturers and Health Act only allows states to regulate NIOSH's share is about 1 % of the total their trade associations in the case New Jer­ areas where no federal standards are in National Institutes of Health Budget. The sey Chamber of Commerce v. Hughey, effect or where state plans have been NIOSH budget is to cover research, and C-84-3255. approved by OSHA. New Jersey did not training as well as scientific and technical The New Jersey right to know law had seek prior federal approval of a state plan. services to other agencies such as OSHA. required that all employers provide informa­ States with approved plans may thus have a In an analysis of federal spending on tion about hazardous chemicals to commu­ better chance of successfully winning a research and development, Chemical and nities, the State Department of Health, court battle over preemption and right to Engine<ring News, published by the Ameri­ emergency service squads and workers. It know laws (if they have passed them.) can Chemical Society, reported that in the also required that all containers and pipe­ The Court's opinion described New Jer­ past twenty years the budget for defense lines carrying hazards substances be sey as "one of the most densely populated related research has grown from 48 % to labelled. states with a high concentration of industry" 70 % of the total. Health has gone for 10 % Non-Manufacturing Sites Covered where worker and community exposure to to 35 % of the non-defense budget. The court held that OSHA:s Hazard Com­ hazardous substances results in "debilitat­ Occupational health related research is munication Standard preempted New Jer­ ing or fatal illness. particularly cancer, lung also carried out with a small part of research sey's regulation. The OSHA standard only ailments, sterility and birth defects." funds from other health agencies but these cOvers manufacturers so that this decision The opinion suggested that New Jersey sources have not been clearly defined. only preempts the state's regulation of could pass a state law requiring infOrmation manufacturers but leaves intact the regula­ "to assist emergency response services, THE UNITED MINEWORKERS re­ tion of other workplaces such as hospitals, enforce compliance with environmental cently negotiated 40-month contract in­ universities, dry cleaners, dentists offices (Continued on page 6) cluded an agreement to establish a joint committee to study the issue of parental leave. Union spokesmen predicted that the Growing Activism on VOTs contract might eventually lead to'~ .. Ieave for mothers, fathers or guardians of newly­ In December 1984 a bill for setting stan­ Coalitions of women's groups, state com­ born, newly-adopted or seriously ill dards was filed in the Massachusetts legis­ missions on women, health activists and children." lature. Similar bills have been introduced in unions have been heavily engaged in lobby­ Barbara Regan of Westover, West Vir­ other states, such as New York and Connec­ ing efforts, as have industry councils in ginia, a UMWA mine committee person, ticut, but to date none have become state law. blocking these bills. hailed the move as a "historic moment:' In a move timed to coincide with the Mas­ adding ')\t a time when social programs ... sachusetts bill. the Service Employees Inter­ are under attack, this ofrers an example to national Union, SEIU, and 9 to 5, The other workers of how to use their union con­ National Association of Working Women, tracts to fight for things that will benefit the launched a "Campaign for VDf Safety:' The whole society," according to a report in Coal health and safety problems of office workers Mining Women. Support Team News. are "no less serious than the problems faced by industrial workers in the 1930's and they THE DEPARTMENT OF LABOR con­ are even more insidious because of their tinues to be under the scrutiny of the Con­ subtlety:' according to John Sweeney SEIU gressional Committee on Government president. The SEIU is the nation's fifth­ Operations and is not faring too well. Its largest union. Sixtieth Report (House Report 98-1144) is It is to be anticipated that SEIU and 9 to entitled: Occupational Illness Data Collec­ Logo used by Labour Council ofMetro­ 5 will rely heavily on VDf safety issues in tion:Fragmented, Unreliable, and Seventy politan Toronto for VDT Conference (Continued on page 6) (Continued on page 2) 2/Women's Occupational Health Resource Center It)o,&, %.tc~ Rebecca Davis - Pioneer Wrote of Past Horrors By Vilma R. Hunt Eye-witness accounts of working condi­ tions in 19th century America are rare. By the time of the Civil War the fuctory towns were well established but the image of America was stili of wide open spaces, clean rivers and clear air-a land of opportunity. One story, Life in the Iron Mills, pub­ lished in 1861 described the impact on wor­ kers and the environment of the early industrialization of America and is a con­ temporary view of Wheeling, Virginia (now in West Virginia). It is the tale of a 19 year old millhand who carves beautiful and grotesque statues from the pig-iron slag that comes as waste from the furnace he tends. To read the story today is to see and feel the misery of servitude that was the begin­ ning of American industrialization and also the striving for something beautiful by a young worker who has been too close to the fiery furnace for half of his life. It was Rebecca Harding Davis' first story Contrary to popular belief, the entrance of women into the workplace is not a and it was a shock to all who read it. It phenomenon of the 1980's. Pictured here is a 19th sheetmaking factory where described a picture quite different from what women workers are shown folding, gathering and sewing sheets. The manufac­ was then generally believed by the majority ture of textiles, although much more automated today, is a major employer of of Americans. Their view of industry came women. In 1980 there were 782,000 textiles mill workers in the United States. from reports of life in the textile mills of Almost half (49%) were women according to the U.S. Department of Labor. Lowell, Massachusetts, which had become idealized as a community of young women, working in model fuctory conditions with Davis was telling her readers that she saw BRIEFLY NOTED (Continued from page 1) both educational and social opportunities. working conditions in mills and factories as 'krrible tragedy, a reality of soul (and body) Over the years, a very successful public rela­ li-ars Behind Communicable Disease Sur­ tions program had kept from public starvation, of living death." She was charg­ veillance and concludes that a crisis exists ing misuse of black and white human beings knowledge the problems of deteriorating in the information systems on occupational conditions and serious worker dissatisfac­ in an industrial world. Her stories were disease. tion there. So an author who wrote of poor widely acclaimed but within a decade were Of particular interest to women is the forgotten, indeed forgotten for nearly 100 people-laborers, mechanics and factory Committee's Sixty-First Report on the years and only rediscovered in the 1960's. hands -was bringing new information to a Women's Bureau which concluded that there Today we can recognize Rebecca Hard­ naive public in the 1860's. is an urgent need for funding and increased ing Davis as a lone voice writing of the activism by the Bureau. (House Report encroaching smoke in a land where every­ 98-Il45). one expected to be able to see forever, and WOHRC readers should be aware that the about people of little importance to those Women's Bureau played a pivotal role in who saw only opportunity ahead. Hers was bringing to light the needs of working the first warning voice, one that was not women (see illustration on page 5) in the heard until too late. 0 past and sponsored the work and reports of such pioneers of occupational as Alice SCHOOL OF PUBLIC HEALTH Life in the Iron Mills (The Korl Woman) by Hamilton. COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY Rebecca Harding Davis with a biographi· cal interpretation by Tillie Olsen. Feminist 1985 INDEX I DIRECTORY OF 600 WEST 168TH STREET WOMEN'S MEDIA has been issued. It is NEW YORK, NY 10032 Press, Box 334, Old Westbury New York II568. 1972. a valuable resource that lists 464 women's (212) 694-3737 periodicals, 1I6 women's press and pub­ lishers, 80 women's bookstores, 67 execuUve Director Dr.