ConDig (28-Sept-17). The New York City Council has given the thumbs up to a construction safety bill that will require workers to undergo at least 40 hours of safety training over the next one to three years.
Passage of the bill, named Intro 1447, comes after months of drawn out negotiations between union and nonunion groups. Critics from the real estate industry have argued that it will hamper construction.
The legislation comes amid a rise in construction-related deaths over the past few years on sites in the city. There have been more than 40 deaths at construction sites in the city from 2015 through September 2017.
The legislation requires workers to complete a 40-hour training course by December 2018, or September 2020 if the Department of Buildings (DOB) determines that there are not enough training facilities available for workers to meet that deadline.
Workers must have completed a 10-hour Occupational Safety and Heath Administration course by March 2018. They will be required to complete an additional 30 hours of training, and then the DOB will determine an additional 10 to 25 hours. At least eight of those hours will focus on the dangers of falling workers and objects at construction sites, according to the bill.
The Construction Safety Advisory Committee of New York (CSACNY) said it welcomed the bill that will extend training requirements for workers on job sites under 10-stories and require recognized safety coursework such as OSHA-10.
It added that the move was the first step towards creating an Online Registry to verify that workers have completed the necessary training courses.
“Fraudulent safety training ID cards are putting workers in harm’s way and leading to accidents and fatalities. These cards are often difficult to decipher from legitimate training cards, but there is a simple solution,” said CSACNY.
“In order to crackdown on the existence of fraudulent cards, we must create a Central Online Registry in which all construction entities will be able to easily verify the legitimacy of safety training by simply scanning the unique QR code on each training card. This QR code would link to an online database and provide a profile displaying the worker’s photo, name, safety training history and status.”
The Real Estate Board of New York (REBNY) and other groups opposed the bill amid claims that construction accidents often take place at smaller projects that are 10 stories or less.