Baltimore Sun Op-Ed: Baltimore Employer of Smothered Worker Should Be Held Criminally Accountable
This op-ed originally ran in the Baltimore Sun.
On June 5, a 19-year-old construction worker named Kyle Hancock was smothered to death when a deep trench where he was working collapsed. R.F. Warder Inc., the construction company that hired Hancock to help fix a leaking sewage pipe, and the bosses it employed are responsible for his death, plain and simple. Their failure to shore the trench to prevent a collapse was grossly negligent, readily foreseeable, eminently preventable and, therefore, criminal.
The scene of the incident was gruesome. To recover Hancock's body, emergency responders from the Baltimore Fire Department first shored the trench to protect themselves and then worked painstakingly until 1:30 a.m., digging with hand shovels 20 feet down. Before they began the rescue effort, they had to order two other workers out of the hole. We can assume from this fact that Hancock was not an isolated employee who acted recklessly. Rather, had the company provided even rudimentary safety training to its employees, supervisors would have known better than to allow more men to risk their lives after Hancock was buried alive.
In fact, trench collapses have been well-known hazards since Roman times. Regulations written by …
This op-ed originally ran in the Bay Journal. Reprinted with permission.
Science is hard, environmental policy is complicated and regulatory science can seem endlessly confounding.
It does not have to be. Earlier this year, the Chesapeake Bay partners stepped into a time-worn trap, heeding calls from overly cautious states to wait for more refined scientific modeling of climate change impacts before taking action to eliminate pollution in the Chesapeake Bay and its tributaries. Having punted action until 2021 at the earliest, the Bay Partnership needs policies to prevent further delay. An innovative policy tool called "stopping rules" could be the answer.
Chesapeake Bay Program scientists have determined that Bay states need to eliminate an additional 9 million pounds of nitrogen pollution and 500,000 pounds of phosphorus to offset the impacts of climate change and ensure that dissolved oxygen standards can be met in the Bay by …
Tuesday afternoon, three CPR Member Scholars – William Buzbee, Lisa Heinzerling, and Rena Steinzor – will be among the experts featured at a major symposium on the threats facing our system of regulatory safeguards. The symposium, The War on Regulation: Good for Corporations, Bad for the Public, was organized by the Coalition of Sensible Safeguards (CSS), which CPR co-leads as an executive committee member, and will include a keynote address from Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) and closing remarks from Maryland Attorney General Brian Frosh.
The goal of the symposium is to shine a spotlight on the concerted attacks being launched against our regulatory system during the Trump era, both from the Trump administration and conservatives in Congress. In addition to Senator Warren’s and Attorney General Frosh’s remarks, the War on Regulation symposium will include two panel-led discussions. The first will feature Professor Heinzerling and will examine the …
