Workplace Safety & OSHA

Overview

Of course you don’t want anyone to get hurt on the job. No matter what type of business you are in, maintaining a safe and healthy workplace is not just a legal responsibility – it’s critical to maintaining worker productivity, your company’s reputation, and a successful bottom line. But with a complicated maze of state and federal regulatory requirements, it can be easy to overlook many of the details involved in maintaining and properly documenting your safe and healthy workplace.

Led by a former Assistant Secretary of Labor heading OSHA, Constangy’s team of experienced attorneys helps our clients anticipate and meet legal requirements for worker safety, identify situations that are likely to draw regulatory attention, manage audits and inspections, respond when crisis strikes, and represent clients during OSHA inspections and if citations are issued.

What Sets Us Apart

Unlike other firms, the attorneys in our OSHA practice group are solely dedicated to assisting clients with OSHA-related matters. We do not just occasionally handle OSHA matters; this is what we do every day. In addition to being solely dedicated to helping clients with OSHA matters, we are unique in the relationships that we have developed with the Agency.

Several members of our team have served in key national positions with OSHA, including, as noted, a former head of OSHA, a former Administrative Law Judge in the Occupational Safety and Health Review Commission, and a former attorney with the Occupational Safety and Health Review Commission in Washington, D.C. As a result of this experience, we have unique insights into the Agency’s inner workings. While we’re not afraid to go to the mat for our clients’ interests, we use that knowledge whenever possible to resolve disputes in an efficient manner and to help foster positive working relationships between employers and key safety and health officials.

What We Do

Constangy attorneys help our clients with a full range of workplace safety issues, including:

Preparing for and representing clients during inspections by OSHA and other agencies
Preparing written responses to employees’ safety complaints to OSHA
Responding and reporting appropriately when an incident occurs
Defending employers who have been issued OSHA citations in enforcement proceedings, including allegations of willful, repeat or serious violations
Developing workplace safety policies and programs that comply with federal and state OSHA requirements
Keeping policies and processes up-to-date as rules and requirements change
Training executives, managers and front line staff on how to comply with regulatory and reporting requirements
Managing internal audits of compliance and reporting processes
Obtaining authoritative and timely interpretations from OSHA officials on compliance issues
Conducting due diligence of safety and health compliance programs for mergers or acquisitions
Guarding against retaliation and whistleblowing complaints and representing employers during these investigations
Providing comments and testimony on policy proposals and rulemakings

Insider OSHA Knowledge
Our team includes former OSHA officials and judges, offering rare insight into agency priorities and enforcement strategy.
Inspection & Citation Defense
We guide employers through inspections and defend against citations, including serious violations and through the appeals process.
Safety Program Development
We design practical, compliant safety policies and conduct audits to help businesses stay up to date with current developments in the law.
Training & Crisis Response
From compliance workshops to accident investigations, we help teams prepare, respond, and protect what matters.

Experience

Matters

Helped a national retailer create and update its workplace safety programs to increase compliance across a network of more than 7,000 locations.
Conducted numerous recordkeeping audits and training for various Fortune 500 companies, none of whom have been cited for OSHA recordkeeping violations.
Advised the United States Occupational Safety and Health Administration on recordkeeping interpretations and issues.
Represented clients during OSHA rulemaking process to obtain favorable regulatory action.
Represented clients before Food and Drug Administration and OSHA to successfully secure favorable revisions to existing hazardous material labeling requirements and issuance of Hazard Bulletin addressing health issue important to client’s business.