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MARCH 8, 2001

Following the lead of the Senate, the House of Representative on Wednesday voted 226 to 206 to kill a set of environmental health and safety regulations finalized by the Clinton administration last November.

The move is a win for business leaders who lobbied a Republican controlled Congress heavily to repeal a program they called costly and over-reaching. But Democrats criticized the action to overturn 10 years of research as one motivated solely by money.

"We should not turn our backs on progress just because private interests think it's the right thing to do for their bottom line," said House Democratic Leader Richard A. Gephardt. "We should not rush to the floor partisan measures eliminating worker safety rules without holding one minute's worth of discussion or a single hearing."

Yet the manner in which Republicans made their strike against the Ergonomics Program Standard doesn't allow for the kind of debate Gephardt seeks. Under the Congressional Review Act of 1996, repealing is made easier by prohibitions on filibustering in the Senate and limits on debate in the House.

Estimated to affect some 102 million workers at 6.1 million work sites throughout the country, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) regulations require employers to provide information on musculoskeletal disorders (MSDs). They are also required to make workplace environments more ergonomically-friendly and provide certain types of disability compensation to employees who suffer from MSDs.

And with a government reported cost of $4.5 billion, they are also the type of program Republicans and conservatives have been eager to defeat ever since George W. Bush was officially declared the President. The measure to repeal them will now go onto Bush, who is expected to approve it.

A number of regulations affecting or benefiting Indian Country have also been targeted, including one which limits commercial air tours over the Grand Canyon in Arizona in response to complaints aired by the Hualapai and Havasupai Tribes. But since the Review Act can only be used on rules expected to have an effect on the economy of more than $100 million, thse and other regulations are off limits to the same swift action seen this week.

Otherwise, repealing regulations can take just as much time and effort as was needed to implement them. A set of controversial rules limiting the construction of roads in federal forests were the product of more than two years of public comments and hearings.

Get the Regulations:
Ergonomics Final Rule (OSHA November 2000)

Relevant Links:
OSHA - http://www.osha.gov

Related Stories:
Health regulations face GOP threat (Politics 3/7)