Workers' Memorial Day Commemorated at Mass. State House
BOSTON/State House - Over 200 union members, allies, and family members representing the 47 Massachusetts workers who died on the job over the last year gathered in front of the Mass. State House yesterday to commemorate Workers' Memorial Day. Many attendees carried placards that read “Mourn for the Dead, Fight for the Living” - paraphrasing the early 20th century labor leader Mother Jones.
Sal Salvati, whose father, Gerardo Salvati, died on the job last June, said, “My dad died in a preventable senseless workplace accident. He worked in a building that was dangerous but the owners didn't care. He took tremendous pride in waking up each and every day going to work, dreaming that someday he and my mom would enjoy some of the fruits of his labor in his retirement years. Unfortunately, that day never came.”
Photos by Jason Pramas. Creative Commons BY-NC-SA 2011 Jason Pramas.
Gerardo Salvati's name was read along with 46 others in a solemn ceremony by laying flowers beneath a wreath at the gate in front of the State House.
“Every year we have to remind ourselves of the importance of safety. Nothing is more important than having our loved ones return home for dinner each evening,” said Robert Haynes, president of the Mass AFL-CIO.
Both Robert Haynes and Carl Proper, Communications Director at UNITEHERE New England Joint Board, referred to New York's Triangle Shirtwaist factory fire, which occurred a hundred years ago last month. In that fire 146 women, mostly young Italian and Jewish immigrants, died. Their employers had locked the fire escapes “to prevent theft.” New Yorkers, including Francis Perkins who later became Secretary of Labor under President Franklin D. Roosevelt, watched in horror as flaming bodies leaped from the top three stories of the building. Perkins later called that the first day of the New Deal. A vibrant new labor movement along with an outraged public and allies in government passed sweeping reforms to ensure fire and other workplace safety standards. Proper noted, “Just last week seventeen people died in a garment factory in China. Employers couldn't hide so easily when it happened on the streets of New York.”
Speakers called upon state legislators to pass the Employment Agency Reform Bill (House Bill 1393) filed by Rep Dorcena Forry and Senator Jack Hart. The law proposes to close the gap in regulatory oversight
over temporary employment agencies which has allowed fly-by-night operations to cheat workers out of pay and evade taxes. The new law would require agencies to provide written notice of key details of job
assignments such as the name of the agency, the worksite employer, the type of work to be done, and the wages. It also requires disclosure of how to reach the Department of Occupational Safety and the right to
workers' compensation.
This Workers' Memorial Day coincided with a study released by the Mass. Coalition for Occupational Safety and Health, "Dying for Work in Massachusetts," which summarizes some of what can be learned from the forty-seven workplace deaths that occurred in Massachusetts in the last year. Highlighted causes of death include transportation accidents, falls, commercial fishing, and workplace violence. Also, “for every worker killed on the job, ten more die from occupational disease.” the study reports.
Marcy Goldstein-Gelb, Executive Director of MassCOSH, reminded the crowd that it is only the 40th anniversary of the US Occupational Safety and Health Administration. “OSHA has greatly reduced workplace injuries and deaths, but more needs to be done to strengthen OSHA” and partnering institutions. The average final penalty 2010 Massachusetts employers paid for a workplace fatality was just over $5,800. Furthermore, Massachusetts' 350,000 public sector employees are not protected by OSHA. “Workers without unions are at greatest risk,” Goldstein-Gelb added. “We need stronger unions.”
The event wrapped up with spirited chanting and a simple message: Mourning families don't want another year of sympathy from legislators - they want action.
