Joint comments on OSHA’s NPRM on tracking workplace injuries. Letter to OSHA from CPR Member Scholars Tom McGarity and Sid Shapiro and CPR Policy Analyst Katie Tracy opposing provisions that would roll back requirements in the 2016 final rule, Improve Tracking of Workplace Injuries and Illnesses, September 28, 2018.

More than 30,000 workers have died as a result of on-the-job injuries since 2009, many because their employers failed to follow safety procedures -- violations for which OSHA imposed fines. But a report from CPR finds that OSHA is routinely discounting those fines, greatly diminishing any deterrent value.

Remarks of Katie Tracy on 11(c) Whistleblower Protections at OSHA Stakeholder Meeting, May 14, 2019.

The Center for Progressive Reform with 66 organizations and individuals on comments to OSHA recommending improvements to its administration of whistleblower protection provisions under Section 11(c) of the Occupational Safety and Health (OSH) Act, May 7, 2019.

Read a joint letter from 100+ organizations, including CPR, in support of the Asuncion Valdivia Heat Illness and Fatality Prevention Act (HR 2668), directing OSHA to issue a standard on the prevention of excessive heat in the workplace, July 17, 2019.

Coalition letter requesting extension of comment period on OSHA risk assessment policy, signed by more than 40 policy experts, including CPR's Rena Steinzor

February 9, 2010,

CPR Comments to OSHA on its Hazard Communication standard

CPR comments on proposed OSHA rule on respirable silica, encouraging OSHA to act with a sense of urgency

'Michael Patoka's Testimony on Maryland's SB 774, Occupational Safety and Health Prequalification for construction firms before entering bids for public contracts

Matthew Shudtz' testimony at OSHA Hearing on Proposed Standard for Respirable Silica Dust, April 3, 2014

With DuPont, OSHA's tough talk falls faint, op-ed by Rena Steinzor

Joint comments on draft OSHA Guidance: Recommended Practices for Preventing and Addressing Retaliation.

Worker Deaths Should Lead to Punishment for Companies, Executives, op-ed by Rena Steinzor and Katie Tracy

June 30, 2016,

Letter to OSHA on Federal Civil Penalties Inflation Adjustment Act Catch-Up Adjustments from Martha McCluskey, Thomas McGarity, Sidney Shapiro, and Katherine Tracy, July 11, 2016.

OSHA Penalties Are Too Low for Serious Workplace Violations, op-ed by Martha McCluskey

July 29, 2016,

Letter to OSHA's Voluntary Protection Programs, co-signed by CPR's Thomas O. McGarity, Sidney Shapiro, Rena Steinzor, Katherine Tracy, September 15, 2017.

CPR was one of 30 organizations writing in support of a petition from the AFL-CIO calling for an OSHA emergency temporary standard for infectious disease to address the Coronavirus epidemic. March 13, 2020.

CPR joined with 48 public interest organizations on a letter endorsing passage of the COVID-19 Health Care Worker Protection Act of 2020, a vital bill to require the Occupational Safety and Health Administration to issue an emergency temporary standard to protect healthcare workers from COVID-19.

Writing for FairWarning and the Sacramento Bee, Rena Steinzor and Katie Tracy point to recent on-the-job deaths that resulted from employer negligence and call for prosecution of companies, supervisors and executives who cut corners at the expense of their employees life and limb.

Writing for The Huffington Post, Rena Steinzor and Matthew Shudtz call on President Obama to focus more energy on OSHA's obligation to protect workers on the job from a range of safety hazards.

Comment letter to OSHA ahead of its Whistleblower Stakeholder Meeting on May 12, 2020, providing recommendations on how the agency can address key issues and improve its administration of the Whistleblower Protection Program.

Katie Tracy’s testimony to OSHA, delivered virtually, during a Whistleblower Stakeholder Meeting, recommending several improvements the agency should make to its Whistleblower Protection Program.

The "re-opening" of the American economy while the coronavirus that causes COVID-19 is still circulating puts workers at heightened risk of contracting the deadly virus. In some blue-collar industries, the risk is particularly acute because of the inherent nature of the work itself and of the workplaces in which it is conducted. And the risk, for a variety of reasons, falls disproportionately on people of color and low-income workers. With governors stay-at-home orders and other pandemic safety restrictions, CPR Member Scholars Thomas McGarity, Michael Duff, and Sidney Shapiro examine the federal government's many missed opportunities to stem the spread of the virus in the nation's workplaces, and make recommendations for what needs to happen next to protect employees on the job.

Even as COVID-19 continues to rage across the United States, governments and industries are "reopening" the American economy. As a new report from the Center for Progressive Reform shows, in the absence of sufficient safeguards, this puts workers and the general public at heightened risk of contracting the deadly virus.

The nation's workplaces are not nearly as safe or healthy as they need to be to protect all workers, and workers lack the power they deserve to speak up against exploitation without fear of significant retaliation. Fixing the current system requires an updated and vastly improved labor law that empowers workers to speak up about health and safety hazards, rather than risk their lives out of fear of losing employment and pay. It also requires that workers be empowered to fight back when government agencies fail to enforce safety and health requirements. The authors propose guaranteeing all workers a private right of action to enforce violations of the law, coupled with incentives for speaking up and strong whistleblower protections.

Over the last several decades, U.S. workers have been systematically disempowered and silenced. A new report from the Center for Progressive Reform explains that because of this, the nation's workplaces are not nearly as safe or healthy as they need to be, and workers lack the power they deserve to speak up against exploitation and abuse without fear of significant retaliation. Read the news release accompanying CPR's report, OSHA's Next 50 Years: Legislating a Private Right of Action to Empower Workers.

CPR joined unions, public health professionals, advocates, workers, faith leaders, and Maryland residents across the state calling on Governor Hogan to issue an executive order requiring the Maryland Occupational Safety and Health (MOSH) division of the Department of Labor, Licensing and Regulation to adopt an emergency standard to protect workers from the novel coronavirus.

Workers presently have no right to bring a lawsuit against employers under the federal Occupational Safety and Health Act (OSH Act) or equivalent state laws when employers fail to provide safe and healthy working conditions. This gap in the law has been especially troubling during the COVID-19 pandemic, as workers across the United States have faced a massive workplace health crisis without any meaningful support from OSHA or most states or territories. Even with an incoming OSHA that is more supportive of workers’ rights and expected to better enforce standards, providing workers a “private right of action” will bolster the agency’s activities. In our March 5 webinar, attendees heard from attorneys who support legislative measures to empower workers by providing them a “private right of action” to enforce the law.

CPR joined workers' rights, occupational safety and health, academic, and faith organizations and leaders in a letter to President Joe Biden, the White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB), and the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) urging approval of OSHA's long overdue Emergency Temporary Standard to protect frontline workers from COVID-19.

On October 26, 2021, CPR Vice President Sidney Shapiro testified about the need and legality of the Biden administration's COVID-19 vaccine standard for workplaces. Shapiro presented his testimony to the Workplace Protections and Civil Rights and Human Services Subcommittees of the House Education and Labor Committee.