Region 9 News Release:   USDOL: USDL-142 October 8, 1999 Contact: Maria Barcos-Wallace PHONE: 415-975-4302 OAKLAND UNION AWARDED $141,000 OSHA TRAINING GRANT SAN FRANCISCO -- A training program operated by the Health Care Workers Local 250, SEIU, has been awarded $141,000 as it’s share of more than $4 million in Susan Harwood Training Grants announced by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration today to conduct safety and health training programs for more than 50,000 workers, supervisors and employers nationwide. At the Shirley Ware Education Center, 560 20th St. in Oakland, Health Care Workers Local 250 of the Service Employees International Union will conduct an ergonomics injury prevention program for nursing home workers and a program to educate health care workers about blood borne pathogens, needle stick prevention and the new California law to prevent sharps injuries. Both programs will be presented as train-the-trainer courses so that additional workers can be trained. "The SEIU program at the Shirley Ware Education Center will leverage resources by training those people in the best position to train others," said Steve Roberti, Secretary of Labor Alexis M. Herman’s regional representative in San Francisco. "SEIU was an aggressive proponent of the state needle-stick legislation and these training funds will allow them to take the next step -- providing the training." "The Susan Harwood training grants are instrumental in helping achieve the Secretary’s goal of a safe and healthful workplace for all Americans," said Frank Strasheim, OSHA regional administrator in San Francisco. "They provide needed resources to those programs most likely to have direct, dramatic impact on reducing workplace hazards." Forty grants are being awarded. Sixteen of the grantees -- including the Oakland program -- were selected in a national competition open to all nonprofit organizations. The remaining 24 awards are one-year extensions of existing grants. The grants are named in honor of the late Susan Harwood, a former director of the Office of Risk Assessment in OSHA’s health standards directorate, who died in 1996. During her career, Harwood helped develop OSHA standards to protect workers exposed to blood borne pathogens, cotton dust, benzene, formaldehyde, asbestos and lead in construction. # # # The text of this news release is on the Internet World Wide Web at http://www.osha.gov/index.html. Information on this news release will be made available to sensory impaired individuals upon request. Voice phone: 202-693-1999. | USDOL | CONTACT INFORMATION | DISCLAIMER |