16.4 OSHA Competent Person Duties vs EPA Certified Supervisor Duties

Two hats, two statutes — the EPA card does not inspect OSHA

Quick Answer: A 1926.62 competent person is someone capable of identifying existing and predictable lead hazards in the surroundings or working conditions and authorized to take prompt corrective measures to eliminate them. The written compliance program requires frequent and regular inspections of job sites, materials, and equipment by that person. An EPA certified supervisor is trained by an accredited program and certified under 40 CFR 745.226 to supervise and conduct abatements and may prepare occupant protection plans and abatement reports. 745.227(e)(2) puts that supervisor on site during all work-site preparation and post-abatement cleanup; at other times the supervisor is on site or available and able to be present in 2 hours. Those are not the same legal instrument. You cannot skip OSHA because the firm is EPA certified. A site can fail 1926.62 with a valid EPA card and fail 745.227 with a valid OSHA competent-person designation.

Sections 16.1–16.3 were the OSHA duties. This section is who is on the hook to run them, and how that person is not automatically the person who signed the EPA notification. Chapter 1 already taught the 2-hour rule. Chapter 8 taught the OPP. This section is the collision between those EPA presence rules and OSHA's “authorized to correct it now” definition.

What each definition actually says

1926.62(b) competent person: one who is capable of identifying existing and predictable lead hazards in the surroundings or working conditions and who has authorization to take prompt corrective measures to eliminate them. Capability without authority is a knowledgeable bystander. Authority without capability is a superintendent who can yell but cannot recognize a Group 2 task. OSHA wants both.

745.223 supervisor: an individual trained by an accredited training program and certified by EPA pursuant to 745.226 to supervise and conduct abatements. Supervisors may also prepare occupant protection plans and abatement reports.

Those sentences do not mention each other. EPA does not say “the supervisor is the OSHA competent person.” OSHA does not say “an EPA card is the competent-person designation.”

Duty table — keep the files in their columns

Worked example — 2-hour phone versus prompt correction. Mid-removal on an occupied single-family job, the EPA supervisor is at another site 90 minutes away, cell phone on, which 745.227(e)(2) allows because this is not prep or cleanup. A competent person who is only that remote supervisor cannot take prompt OSHA corrective measures when a worker pulls the shroud off a grinder (Group 2 with a Group 1 half-mask) or opens lunch on the drop cloth. Either someone on that site is a competent person with authority, or the remote supervisor is not filling the OSHA hat while filling the EPA hat. The 2-hour rule is an EPA presence rule. It is not an OSHA prompt-correction rule.

The same person may wear both hats — if both are real

On a small residential abatement the EPA supervisor often is designated the OSHA competent person. That is legal only if:

1. The person holds a current EPA supervisor certificate (and the firm is certified) — otherwise the EPA hat is fake.
2. The person is actually capable of identifying 1926.62 hazards: trigger-task bands, PEL/AL, hygiene, when a BLL pair is removal, when a half-mask is the wrong APF.
3. The person is actually authorized to shut a task down, send a worker off an AL job for MRP, spend money on a PAPR, and stop lunch in the containment — without waiting for an owner who “wants production.”

Writing “competent person: EPA supervisor on site” on page 1 of the compliance program, while the owner has told that supervisor not to stop work, is not a designation. OSHA's definition is authorization, not letterhead.

Conversely, a steel-bridge competent person who has run 1926.62 blasting for a decade is not an EPA certified supervisor. That person cannot legally supervise 745.227 abatement in target housing, cannot file the EPA notice as the certified supervisor, and cannot prepare the OPP in the supervisor's slot unless they also hold the EPA credential (or a project designer does the OPP). Capability to identify lead fume on a bridge is not 745.226 certification.

How a site fails one statute while passing the other

Valid EPA card, OSHA failure (classic exam facts):

• No initial determination, no personal samples, no trigger-task interim protections — but the OPP and 5-business-day notice were perfect.
• Half-mask on unshrouded needle-gun work (Group 2 assumed >500 µg/m³).
• Lunch in the contained room because “respirators are on.”
• Coveralls worn home; no change area.
• Periodic BLL 55 µg/dL, no follow-up, worker still on the gun — “we are EPA, not a factory.”
• Compliance program that says “use PPE as needed” and never names a competent person with stop-work authority.

Valid OSHA competent person, EPA failure:

• Excellent exposure assessment and MRP file — started two days after the owner called, without 5-business-day EPA notice and without a unique OPP.
• Competent person is a safety-only employee who is not EPA-certified, directing certified workers with no certified supervisor during prep.
• Self-clearing dust wipes by the competent person who is not a certified inspector or risk assessor.
• Open-flame torching “controlled” with SAR respirators — OSHA might still argue about the assumed Group 3 band; EPA has already lost under 745.227(e)(6).

Worked example — dual-hat residential job that actually works. Certified firm. Certified supervisor Maria is on site for hanging containment (prep) and will be on site for final cleanup. The written 1926.62 compliance program names Maria as competent person and states she can stop work, upgrade respirators, and remove a worker from ≥AL exposure pending MRP. Trigger-task Group 1 heat-gun work starts under interim protection. Cassettes later show 28 µg/m³ — below AL, so monitoring need not repeat unless something changes; hygiene keyed off the pending assessment was already in place. A worker's BLL comes back 42 µg/dL; Maria issues the written result within 5 working days and the MRP-warning language, shortens the BLL interval to every 2 months, and does not remove yet because 42 is not a 50-pair. That is one person, two hats, both real. The EPA card did not “cover” the BLL letter; the competent-person authority did not “cover” the OPP.

Training is also two programs

1926.62(l) requires lead training for employees exposed at or above the action level on any day, before initial assignment and at least annually, covering the standard, health effects, medical-surveillance rights, engineering controls, and respirator use. That is OSHA employee training. It is not the EPA 32-hour supervisor course and not the EPA 8-hour worker course. Sending the crew through RRP renovator training does not satisfy either. Sending Maria through EPA supervisor training does not, by itself, train the laborers under 1926.62(l).

Supervisor decision test before you accept both hats. (1) Is my EPA supervisor certificate current, and is the firm certified? (2) Did someone with authority write down that I can stop work, upgrade PPE, and execute MRP — and will production overrule me? (3) Will I be physically present for EPA prep and cleanup, and is someone with prompt OSHA authority on site when I am on the 2-hour clock? (4) Are the OSHA compliance program and the EPA OPP/notice both in the folder, or did we photocopy one card onto both statutes?

Official sources: 29 CFR 1926.62(b), (e)(2), (l) (competent person, compliance-program inspections, training); 40 CFR 745.223 (supervisor); 40 CFR 745.226; 40 CFR 745.227(e)(2), (e)(4)–(e)(6).