After all the weather related emergencies taking place around the country it’s not like employees of the United States Forest Service don’t have enough on their minds. In regions of Oregon, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration has found that, apart from the floods and the fires and the droughts, some of the service’s employees cannot count on a safe work environment.

Over the last decade, repeat inspections of forests in the state have led investigators to hand the Forest Service citations for “rampant and repeated” violations, specifically in the eastern part of the state at Malheur National Forest. In the past five years there have been 200 citations to the state’s various offices.

When inspectors were at the sites they found there were repeated electrical hazards, circuit breakers and electrical junction boxes were uncovered. They found fall hazards due to faulty ladders and guardrails. There were compressed gas storage hazards, chemical safety issues and fire hazards among others.

The Forest Service is a government organization so they will not be fined by another government organization. But I hope they are taking this very seriously since inspectors found violations in 90 percent of their visits. They are not a public company but that does not mean they shouldn’t protect workers or they should not be held to the same standards.