Clark Construction stirves to keep Biosciences construction workers safe
Martha Yoder, MIOSHA Director, was the first to sign the contract for the Clark Construction and MIOSHA partnership on Wednesday morning.
With construction on the Biosciences building heading into winter, Clark Construction Company has partnered with the Michigan Occupational Safety and Health Administration (MIOSHA) in an attempt to keep their workers safer on the job.
Martha Yoder, Director of MIOSHA, stated that the ultimate goal of the partnership was to make the Biosciences construction site an accident free area.
“(MIOSHA) is the state agency that oversees safety and health in the workplace,” Yoder said. “The whole idea (of the partnership) is stepping up workplace safety and health for the workers who are working here on building this new project.”
Other partnering employers on site included the Department Licensing and regulatory Affairs, Tri-City Acoustical and nine others.
“We are proud of having one of the best safety records of any company in the industry over the past decade,” said CEO of Clark Construction Charles Clark in a press release. “This partnership with MIOSHA will allow us to provide additional training and safety instruction to the subcontractors and their employees working with us on the CMU Biosciences project.”
President of Clark Construction Sam Clark spoke on behalf of the company. He said a partnership with MIOSHA would ultimately benefit the workers employed under Clark Construction.
“We always reach out to MIOSHA because we get to have them come out (to sites) and do inspections which are imputative,” Clark said. “(MIOSHA employees) walk the cite, they look at job site specific safety plans and requirements for the job, and they also walk the job to make sure that rebars aren’t sticking up without caps or anything like that.”
Under their partnership, Clark said he hopes to set a zero accident policy for the continuation of the project.
“We (achieve zero accidents on site) with our BRAVO program which is a program that we designed that stands for Be Resistant Against Violations Openly,” Clark said. “It’s about being accountable for one another, looking out for one another, and if (a worker) sees someone doing something unsafe we want to empower them to plan.”
The partnership with Clark Construction would stand to be MIOSHA’s 10th successful current partnership.
“Clark Construction Company has made it clear that it is dedicated to proving the highest level of protection to its workers on this major project for CMU,” Yoder said. “MIOSHA is proud to partner with a company that so strongly exemplifies the importance of having an effective safety and health management system.”
Yoder also spoke of MIOSHA releasing several wintertime related PSAs and a website dedicated to keeping workers aware of winter related accidents such as frostbite and black ice on sites.
The meeting concluded with a complimentary luncheon for the on-site workers.
The state-of-the-art Biosciences building is set to finish construction in Sept. 2, 2016 and open for classes by January the following year.
