MSHA Enforcement Costs 5 More Jobs

Hoover Excavating & Trucking Inc. ceased crushing rock on Monday Oct. 31 due to MSHA fines and regulations. Mine safety fines are up across Coos County, OR as are rumors of discrimination by the federal government.

MSHA collected $42.8 million from assessed safety violations nationally in 2006. In 2010, the federal organization more than tripled its intake to $157.2 million.

The dramatic increase in the amount of the fines came after the 2006 Sago Coal Mine disaster in West Virginia, which cost the lives of 12 miners and caused congress to pass extremely harsh legislation. This was done before the tragedy investigation was completed that concluded the disaster to be an “act of God”!

Hoover Excavating & Trucking Inc., a 5 man surface mining operation in Coquille, received $91,965 in MSHA fines between 2009 and 2011. The company has never had a single accident or injury in its 11 years of operation.

On Monday, MSHA ordered owner Reggie Hoover to close his rock crusher until further notice because the safety guards on the machine did not meet government standards. The new guards Hoover put on the machine passed a previous MSHA inspection this year.

“If it was about safety, it would be one thing, but it’s not. It has become big business for government,” Hoover said.

Coos Bay Timber Operators closed its rock-crushing business in 2010 after 30 years of operation because of concerns that MSHA fines would only increase as inspectors cracked down.

Surface mines that operate throughout the year must receive two inspections from MSHA. So far in 2011, Hoover Excavating & Trucking Inc. (an intermittent operation) has received nine separate visits from MSHA inspectors.

Complaints about MSHA’s new stricter policies on citations extend well beyond the borders of Coos County.

The Oregon Independent Aggregate Association has been trying for years to get MSHA to make a distinction between underground mines and the notably safer surface mines present throughout Oregon.

“Every time there is a mining disaster, a horrible situation, the ripple effect is that miners all over Oregon and throughout the United States feel the screws clamped down,” OIAA President Mary McNatt said.

In the past decade, the surface mining operations in Oregon recorded 9 fatalities. Comparatively, the predominantly underground mining states of West Virginia and Kentucky topped national mining fatalities at 139 and 105 since 2000, respectively.

"$afepro can see "no good business or legal reason" for MSHA’s bullying a small operator out of business. History has shown that if a bureaucracy is allowed to get away with persecuting small business then large businesses are next! This action by MSHA has not contributed to safer job creation! It has only left 5 families without an income!"