1.6 Safety & Health Programs, Cooperative Programs & Multi-Employer Worksites
Key Takeaways
- No federal general industry standard requires a single comprehensive written safety and health program; instead, more than a dozen individual standards each require their own written program, and some State Plans (such as California's IIPP) mandate one outright.
- OSHA's Recommended Practices for Safety and Health Programs is built on seven core elements, ending with communication and coordination for host employers, contractors, and staffing agencies.
- The On-Site Consultation Program is free, confidential, and organizationally separate from enforcement; it issues no citations or penalties, but the employer must commit to correcting serious hazards found.
- SHARP certification exempts a site from OSHA programmed inspections for up to 2 years initially with renewals up to 3 years, and VPP participants are not subject to programmed inspections while they maintain status - but neither exemption blocks complaint, referral, fatality/catastrophe, or imminent-danger inspections.
- OSHA's Multi-Employer Citation Policy (CPL 02-00-124) sorts employers into creating, exposing, correcting, and controlling categories and applies a two-step test; a creating or controlling employer can be cited even when only another employer's workers were exposed.
1.6 Safety & Health Programs, Cooperative Programs & Multi-Employer Worksites
The Standard That Does Not Exist
There is no federal general industry standard requiring a written, comprehensive safety and health program. OSHA proposed one for years under the name Injury and Illness Prevention Program (I2P2) and never promulgated it. That surprises candidates, because OSHA talks about safety and health programs constantly. Two things fill the gap:
- Program-by-program written requirements. More than a dozen individual standards each demand their own written document, and an inspection that finds none of them is an inspection that finds a stack of citations. Know this list cold:
| Written document required | Standard |
|---|---|
| Hazard Communication program | 1910.1200(e) |
| PPE hazard assessment certification | 1910.132(d)(2) |
| Respiratory protection program | 1910.134(c) |
| Hearing conservation program elements and records | 1910.95(c)-(m) |
| Emergency Action Plan (more than 10 employees) | 1910.38(b) |
| Fire Prevention Plan (more than 10 employees) | 1910.39(b) |
| Permit-required confined space program and permits | 1910.146(c)(4), (f) |
| Energy control (lockout/tagout) procedures | 1910.147(c)(4) |
| Bloodborne pathogens Exposure Control Plan | 1910.1030(c) |
| Process Safety Management elements | 1910.119 |
| Lead and asbestos compliance programs | 1910.1025(e)(3), 1910.1001(f)(2) |
| Powered industrial truck operator training certification | 1910.178(l)(6) |
- State Plans that went further. Several State Plans do mandate a written program - California's Injury and Illness Prevention Program (8 CCR 3203) is the best-known example. An employer operating in a State Plan state must check the state rule, because a State Plan may be more stringent than federal OSHA but never less effective.
OSHA's Recommended Practices: The Seven Core Elements
OSHA's Recommended Practices for Safety and Health Programs is guidance, not a standard, but it is the framework compliance officers, consultants, and VPP reviewers use to judge whether a program is real. It has seven core elements:
- Management Leadership - visible commitment, resources, and written policy from the top.
- Worker Participation - workers involved in every element, with the barriers to participation removed.
- Hazard Identification and Assessment - inspections, incident and near-miss investigations, exposure monitoring, job hazard analysis.
- Hazard Prevention and Control - controls selected using the hierarchy of controls and tracked to completion.
- Education and Training - for workers, supervisors, and managers, in a language and vocabulary they understand.
- Program Evaluation and Improvement - measure performance, verify the program is working, correct shortfalls.
- Communication and Coordination for Host Employers, Contractors, and Staffing Agencies - the element that ties directly into multi-employer worksites.
This framework has direct money value at citation time: the good faith penalty reduction under Chapter 6 of the Field Operations Manual is up to 25 percent for an employer with a documented written safety and health management system containing the core elements, and 15 percent where the documented system has only incidental deficiencies.
Cooperative and Recognition Programs
OSHA runs a parallel, non-enforcement track. Candidates are expected to distinguish these programs from each other.
| Program | Who it serves | What the employer gets |
|---|---|---|
| On-Site Consultation Program (Part 1908) | Small and midsize businesses | A free and confidential hazard survey delivered by state consultants who are organizationally separate from enforcement. No citations, no penalties. The employer must commit to correcting serious hazards found. |
| SHARP (Safety and Health Achievement Recognition Program) | Small employers that complete a full-service consultation visit and operate an exemplary safety and health management system; priority goes to sites with 250 or fewer employees onsite | Recognition plus exemption from OSHA programmed inspections - up to 2 years on initial certification, with renewals of up to 3 years |
| Voluntary Protection Programs (VPP) | Employers with mature systems, in site-based, mobile workforce, and corporate categories | Sites are not subject to OSHA programmed inspections while VPP status is maintained; onsite evaluation by safety and health experts, with reapproval reviews every 3 to 5 years |
| Strategic Partnerships and the Alliance Program | Industry groups, trade associations, unions, employers | Formal cooperative agreements to address a specific hazard or industry |
| Safe + Sound | Any employer | An annual national campaign promoting the seven core elements |
CRITICAL DISTINCTION: Exemption from programmed inspections is not immunity. A SHARP or VPP site is still inspected in response to a fatality or catastrophe, a formal employee complaint, a referral, or imminent danger - the first three enforcement priorities. Programmed (targeted) inspections are the only category removed.
Multi-Employer Worksites: Four Employers, Two Steps
Most general industry plants host contractors, and OSHA's Multi-Employer Citation Policy (CPL 02-00-124) lets the agency cite an employer whose own employees were never exposed. The policy sorts every employer at the site into one or more of four categories, then applies a two-step test.
The Four Categories
| Category | Definition | How the employer avoids a citation |
|---|---|---|
| Creating employer | Caused the hazardous condition that violates a standard | Do not create it. A creating employer is citable even if only another employer's workers are exposed. |
| Exposing employer | Its own employees are exposed to the hazard | If it did not create the hazard and cannot correct it, it must ask the responsible employer to correct it, inform its own workers of the hazard, and take feasible alternative protective measures. In extreme cases it must remove its employees. |
| Correcting employer | Engaged at the site specifically to install and/or maintain safety equipment, or otherwise responsible for correcting the hazard | Exercise reasonable care in discovering and correcting the violation, including inspecting at appropriate frequency |
| Controlling employer | Has general supervisory authority over the worksite, including the power to correct violations, whether by contract or in actual practice | Exercise reasonable care to prevent and detect violations - a lesser standard of care than the duty owed to its own employees, scaled to the size and complexity of the project, the nature of the work, and the subcontractor's safety history |
The Two-Step Process
- Step One: Determine which category or categories the employer falls into. An employer can occupy more than one - a contractor that creates a hazard its own crew is exposed to is both creating and exposing.
- Step Two: Determine whether the employer's actions satisfied the obligations attached to that category. The obligations differ by category, so an employer that satisfies its role-specific duty is not cited even though a violation existed at the site.
EXAM FOCUS: The controlling employer is the concept most often tested, because it reaches the host or general contractor who never touched the hazard. The measure is reasonable care, not the strict duty an employer owes its own workers - and a controlling employer may rely to some degree on a subcontractor with a strong safety record while still being expected to conduct periodic inspections and follow up on identified hazards.
Note the hand-off between this policy and the standards themselves: HazCom's multi-employer paragraph (1910.1200(e)(1)(iii)), LOTO's outside-contractor paragraph (1910.147(f)(2)), PSM's contractor element (1910.119(h)), and PRCS host-contractor duties all impose their own coordination obligations on top of CPL 02-00-124.
A general contractor with supervisory authority over a plant turnaround never touched an unguarded floor opening created by a subcontractor, and none of its own employees were exposed. Under OSHA's Multi-Employer Citation Policy, what is the general contractor's exposure?
Which statement accurately describes OSHA's On-Site Consultation Program?
A manufacturer has achieved SHARP certification. A former employee files a formal written complaint alleging an unguarded press. What happens?
Which of the following is one of the seven core elements of OSHA's Recommended Practices for Safety and Health Programs?