Officials from Kingdom Projects Inc. and Occupational Safety and Health Administration will meet next week in St. Louis to discuss resolution of several workplace safety violations, according to Lon Little, Kingdom Projects director.
The three "serious" category violations were discovered when OSHA inspectors came to the Fulton recycling facility after the death of an employee on April 7, according to a statement from OSHA official Rhonda Burke. Three citations were presented to the company on June 24 with a deadline of July 18 to contact OSHA to contest the violations or schedule an informal conference.
The three violations included tripping and fire hazards, failure to address the potential hazard of employees being struck by vehicles, and failure to cover a hole in the floor near fixed machinery or equipment. OSHA proposed a penalty of $10,500, according to Burke.
A 42-year-old recycling sorter was struck by a truck April 7 and died of his injuries soon afterward at Fulton Medical Center.
"We did have an accident, and we were not found at fault," Little added. "Whenever you have a workplace accident, OSHA has a right and responsibility to come in and investigate."
A loss of limb or life calls for a full-scale OSHA inspection, according to Little, and the violations were found at that time.
"They spent a day looking at our paperwork and doing a walk through," he said.
By using photographs showing the problems were corrected, the amount of the penalty can be reduced, he added.
"We fixed the physical things," Little said, adding the death of the employee was a terrible event. "We try to provide employment to the disabled. Something like this never happened before."
Kingdom Projects, located on North Bluff Street, was incorporated in 1976 as a non-profit that provides services such as recycling, janitorial services and mowing.