BURSTThe City of Revelstoke is working to formalize employee safety measures at its wastewater treatment plant after incurring a five-figure administrative penalty from the provincial worker compensation board.
An occupational safety inspection by WorkSafeBC last December led to it imposing a $33,839 fine on April 7 for the city failing to establish and communicate health and safety measures for workers handling toxic chlorine gas at the plant.
The city’s public works department operates the facility in Industrial Park and employs 42 to 60 staff.
Provincial occupational safety officers Timothy Crowe and Clay Fredin found that the department wasn’t operating a joint health and safety committee, despite being required to as per Section 44 of B.C.’s Workers Compensation Act.
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Public works wasn’t giving workers adequate information, instruction, training or supervision to protect their health and safety, including not preparing or documenting educational materials, Crowe and Fredin found.
“This is further supported by an incident that occurred in December related to a chlorine exposure,” Crowe wrote. “We discussed the situations where a worker is at risk of chlorine gas exposure, such as when entering the chlorine gas enclosure, changing a tonner, completing tasks in the mixing room, bump testing chlorine alarms and monitors.”
Revelstoke’s wastewater plant contains four tonners. No labels or colour-coding were present in December for the piping that carries chlorine from the tonners to the mixing room, leaving the hazardous product unidentified.
The city told Black Press Media that the worker involved in the exposure was wearing appropriate personal protective equipment.
However, it confirmed that WorkSafeBC’s inspection found gaps in formalized and documented safety, such as for respiratory protection requirements, hazardous material labelling and supervision for handling chlorine.
WorkSafeBC reported that public works wasn’t reviewing its exposure control plan for chlorine, and only had a draft version of the document. It lacked key written information about worker responsibilities, risk assessment and controls, and procedures for alarm testing, emergency evacuation and worker rescue.
“The employer has failed to develop and implement an exposure control plan,” Crowe noted. “The risk assessment indicates a risk of adverse health effect to workers from exposure to a toxic process gas.”
The department had no procedures either for handling chlorine monitors or delivering chlorine gas cylinders. Should there have been a major release of chlorine at the wastewater plant during work, staff were reportedly unaware of where to assemble or how to evacuate.
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Crowe and Fredin found workers also weren’t receiving health and safety orientations when switching between departments or locations — an essential step for newer and younger workers, Crowe said.
Moreover, public works hadn’t reviewed its respirator protection program for more than a year, and workers hadn’t been assessed on their fitness for at least a full year.
Altogether, WorkSafeBC described these shortfalls as “repeated violations” by the city.
“The City of Revelstoke takes worker health and safety seriously and acknowledges the findings identified by WorkSafeBC following its inspection of the municipal water treatment facility,” it responded in its statement.
The city noted that it’s not contesting the penalty, instead focusing on strengthening safety programming and complying with WorkSafeBC. Between the December inspection and the penalty in April, it described taking myriad corrective actions to address all “deficiencies.”
This included formalizing a respiratory protection program, fit-testing respirator users, implementing a comprehensive exposure control plan for chlorine, adding consistent labelling for pipes and systems with hazardous materials, increasing training and supervision for workers handling chlorine, and forming a health and safety committee for public works.
The department said it would hold its first health and safety meeting March 26, and evaluate the committee each year.
The city is expected to write out emergency procedures for chlorine and conduct annual emergency drills, and by February was working to implement a mechanism for supervisors to check workers are adequately trained for new tasks.
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As of Feb. 26, Crowe said he’d advised the city it must still “do more to demonstrate that workers will be provided with adequate information, instruction, training and supervision necessary to ensure the health and safety of those workers in carrying out their work and to ensure the health and safety of other workers at the workplace.”
But following up again in April, WorkSafeBC concluded that the city was fully complying with orders by providing workers with necessary information and education, and hiring additional supervisor positions for safety training.
“The health and safety of City employees and the public remains a priority, and the City is committed to maintaining a safe work environment at all of its facilities,” it responded.