Document ID: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-caDC-00-01497/USCOURTS-caDC-00-01497-0/pdf.json

Parties Involved:
Manganas Painting Company
Petitioner
Secretary of Labor
Respondent

Document Text:

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United States Court of Appeals

FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA CIRCUIT

Argued November 9, 2001 Decided December 11, 2001

No. 00-1497

Manganas Painting Company,

Petitioner

v.

Secretary of Labor,

Respondent

Petition for Review of an Order of the

Occupational Safety and Health Review Commission

Roger L. Sabo argued the cause and filed the briefs for

petitioner.

John Shortall, Attorney, United States Department of Labor, argued the cause for respondent. With him on the brief

were Joseph M. Woodward, Associate Solicitor, and Ann S.

Rosenthal, Attorney.

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Before: Henderson and Tatel, Circuit Judges, and

Silberman, Senior Circuit Judge.

Opinion for the Court filed Per Curiam.

Per Curiam: Manganas Painting Company appeals the

Occupational Safety and Health Review Commission's decision that it violated the Occupational Safety and Health Act of

19701 by failing to adequately protect its employees against

falls when preparing a bridge for repainting. The Secretary

of Labor reasonably interpreted her own regulations, and

substantial evidence on the record as a whole supports the

Commission's findings, and therefore, we affirm.

I.

Manganas is a painting contractor that specializes in industrial commercial painting. At its peak, the company employed approximately 35 employees. In 1992, Manganas was

the low bidder to the Ohio Department of Transportation to

sandblast, repaint, and make certain structural repairs to the

Jeremiah Morrow Bridge, a twin structure supported by

structural steel girders spanning an approximate two hundred

foot gorge which includes the Little Miami River. The EPA

and the Occupational Safety and Health Administration

(OSHA) required Manganas to equip the bridge with a device

to contain the lead-based paint being removed from the

bridge and with protection (such as a safety net) for employees exposed to the risk of falling. The Act and its implementing regulations set forth a comprehensive scheme of fall

protection that applies in the absence of an industry-specific

scheme--OSHA has not implemented regulations specific to

the bridge painting industry, so the general fall protection

regulations applied to Manganas' bridge project. In 1993, an

OSHA Compliance Officer inspected the bridge, which Manganas was in the process of preparing for environmental

containment and safety nets. At that time, the scaffold regulation provided as follows:

__________

1 29 U.S.C. ss 651-678 (1994 ed. & Supp. V (2000)).

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Guardrails and toeboards shall be installed on all open

sides and ends of platforms more than 10 feet above the

ground or floor, except needle beam scaffolds and

floats.... Scaffolds 4 to 10 feet in height having a

minimum horizontal dimension in either direction of less

than 45 inches, shall have standard guardrails on open

sides and ends of the platform.

29 C.F.R. 1926.451(a)(4)(repealed). The safety net regulation

provided:

Safety nets shall be provided when workplaces are more

than 25 feet above the ground or water surface, or other

surfaces where the use of ladders, scaffolds, catch platforms, temporary floors, safety lines or safety belts is

impractical.

29 C.F.R. 1926.105(a).

After multiple inspections, the OSHA CO issued Manganas

several citations, three of which are on appeal.2 First, the

CO cited Manganas based on the employees' method of using

safety belts, which they were using while rigging the bridge

for safety nets. When they were working on the steel beams

of the bridge, and were exposed to falls upwards of 150 feet,

the employees would hook the metal safety hooks of their

safety belts to the portholes of the steel flanges that were a

part of the bridge deck structure: the metal hooks did not

close completely. The employees also used this method of

"tying off" their safety belts when ascending and descending

45 and 90 degree angle beams. Second, the CO faulted

Manganas' use of "painters' picks," which are lightweight

boards, approximately twenty inches wide and eight to twelve

feet in length. The painters' picks extended from the handrail of a permanent catwalk running underneath the length of

the highway spanning the bridge, and rested on a cable

running horizontally along the outside of the bridge. Considering them to be scaffolds, the CO issued Manganas a citation

because they did not have guardrails. Finally, the CO found

__________

2 The CO issued several separate citations and an amended

citation, but only three violations are on appeal.

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that a Manganas employee, Stillwell, had failed to tie his

safety belt off at all when he was in the process of securing

the painters' picks to the horizontal cable running along the

outside of the bridge.3 The CO characterized the safety belt

violation stemming from the open hooks as a "repeat" violation because Manganas had been cited previously for violating

the same standard.

Manganas challenged the citations and an Administrative

Law Judge held a three-day hearing, issuing a decision in

1996. The ALJ concluded that the painters' picks were

scaffolds requiring guardrails; that Stillwell had failed to tie

off when on the painters' picks; and that the safety belts,

with open hooks, did not provide adequate fall protection. He

rejected the Secretary's argument that the safety belt violation was a "repeat" violation. The Secretary petitioned the

Commission for review, arguing that it was; Manganas also

petitioned for review, arguing that the painters' picks were

not governed by the scaffold regulation and disputing the

ALJ's finding that the fall protection was inadequate. Four

years later, the Commission affirmed the ALJ's finding of

violations, but reversed his finding that the safety belt violation was not "repeat." Counsel explained that the delay was

a result of the Commission's inability to find two commissioners who could agree on the outcome of the case.

II.

Manganas argues primarily that the regulations in place in

1993, as opposed to more explicit subsequent regulations, did

__________

3 Manganas argues that the CO essentially double-counted the

same violation: that Stillwell worked on the painters' picks without

guardrails and without tying off. In oral argument, counsel for the

Commission clarified that the second citation for Stillwell's conduct

was for his failure to tie off while putting the pick in place, a

situation in which the guardrails would not have provided fall

protection. Counsel for the Commission also clarified that the

guardrails are a type of fall prevention, while safety belts arrest

falls that have already occurred, and that they are not necessarily

interchangeable forms of abatement.

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not adequately proscribe the cited conduct. Because the

later regulations explicitly address the method of using safety

belts, the company reasons, it could not be cited for inadequate fall protection if the problem stemmed from the method

of use, rather than the type of protection. This argument is

without merit. We defer to the Secretary's reasonable interpretation of her original regulation. In this case, the Secretary has interpreted the safety net regulation to require

effective fall protection, an interpretation that certainly merits

deference--indeed, it seems obvious. It certainly is not so

unexpected as to violate Manganas' due process rights, as the

company argued. Substantial evidence, including courtroom

testimony and demonstrations, supports the Commission's

finding that Manganas' method of tying off was effective only

when the employees leaned back. In other words, the protection was not effective in many situations, and therefore

Manganas failed to provide adequate fall protection.

Petitioner makes a similar argument with respect to the

scaffold regulation violation. According to the company, the

painters' picks are actually catenary scaffolds, which subsequent regulations address as a separate category. The company's argument fails for two reasons. First, the Secretary

reasonably concluded that the painters' picks are not catenary

scaffolds, which are defined as platforms between two horizontal cables--the painters' picks, by contrast, had one end

resting on a permanent catwalk while the other rested on a

horizontal cable. Second, even if the painters' picks were

catenary scaffolds, the Secretary reasonably concluded that

such scaffolds fell within the general scaffold regulation,

which required guardrails. The appropriate question is not

whether the regulations explicitly addressed the specific

method of safety belt use or guardrails on catenary scaffolds;

instead, the question is whether the Secretary's interpretation

of the safety net and scaffolding regulations as proscribing

the cited conduct was reasonable. It was.

The company also challenges the Commission's finding that

it had constructive knowledge of the violations, arguing that

the Commission imposed a constant supervision requirement

on the company, contrary to its own precedent. The record

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does not support this argument. As to the safety belt

violation that stemmed from the non-closing hooks, Manganas

taught its employees to use that fall protection and cannot

now argue that it was unaware that its employees were

following directions. In addition, Manganas was clearly

aware that its painters' picks lacked guardrails. As to Stillwell's failure to tie off his safety belt while on the painters'

picks, his testimony made clear that Manganas was not cited

for an isolated incident. Instead, Stillwell's practice was to

walk across the painters' picks without tying off and to fasten

the painters' picks to the cable without tying off. The record

also makes clear that Stillwell was visible to his supervisor,

and was, in fact, periodically aided by his supervisor when

setting up the painters' picks. The Commission's finding that

Manganas should have been aware, or was aware, is supported by substantial evidence.

Finally, Manganas disputes that the Secretary carried her

burden of showing that the safety net violation was a "repeat"

one. According to Manganas, it was not enough that the

Secretary showed that Manganas twice violated the same

standard while painting bridges. But the Commission has

made it clear that the Secretary makes a prima facie showing

that a violation is "repeat" if the prior and present violations

are for failure to comply with the same standard. See, e.g.,

Potlatch Corp., 7 O.S.H.C. 1061 (1979). The burden then

shifts to the employer to demonstrate that the violations took

place under disparate conditions and hazards associated with

the separate violations, which Manganas did not do. The

company argued only that the first violation was for a failure

to provide any fall protection, the second for a failure to

provide adequate fall protection. This argument does not

show that Manganas did not commit a "repeat" violation of

the safety net regulation.

Accordingly, the Commission's decision is affirmed.

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