Pro Publica Report: OSHA Investigates Small Dairy Farms So Rarely That Many Worker Advocates Don’t Bother to Report Deaths and Injuries
ProPublica is an independent, nonprofit newsroom PRODUCING investigative journalism AND A new investigation by ProPublica finds when a farmworker is injured or dies on a Catskills dairy farm, federal labor safety investigators often look the other way.
In New York State, OSHA, the federal Occupational Safety and Health Administration, is barred from looking into injuries and deaths on farm with fewer than eleven workers. Many local dairy farms are that size or smaller.
The exception is if the workers are deemed in a “temporary labor camp.” But ProPublica reporter Melissa Sanchez told New York Public Radio’s David Sommerstein that because the majority of New York dairy workers are Mexicans or Central Americans who are undocumented, that definition is a gray area.
