by jbs091409 e3 — September 16, 2009—Illinois recently became the newest state to receive approval from the U.S. Department of Labor’s Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) to administer its own occupational safety and health plan for public employees in the state. A notice of the approval appears in the Federal Register.
Illinois joins New Jersey, Connecticut, New York and the Virgin Islands as one of five states and territories authorized by federal OSHA to administer a safety and health program of standards and enforcement specifically for state and local government employees. The Illinois plan is the first new state plan to be approved since New Jersey was added in 2001. Twenty-one states, in addition to Puerto Rico, have OSHA-approved plans for the private sector that also extend coverage to state and local government employees.
The plan will be administered by the Illinois Department of Labor, Safety Inspection and Education division. The program covers more than 1 million public workers, including 161,200 state government workers and 690,000 municipal workers, along with workers in the public education sector. Illinois has provided protection to its public employees for many years but will now meet the additional requirements of the federal OSHA program. Private sector employees remain under the jurisdiction of federal OSHA.
Illinois will adopt and enforce standards identical to most federal OSHA safety and health standards and has committed to bringing all its standards in line with OSHA requirements. The state plan also provides that future OSHA standards and revisions will be adopted by the state.
Once a state plan has been approved, federal OSHA funds up to 50 percent of the program’s operating costs.
