Under the agreements, embassies from these nations will work with regional offices of the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) and the Wage and Hour Division (WHD) to spread information regarding the minimum wage, overtime pay, child labor rules and other regulations. People from these nations residing in the United States will be able to report workplace abuses to their consulates. Solis also committed the WHD to enforcing labor regulations for immigrant workers in the hospitality, agricultural and other industries with large numbers of low-wage workers.

“This is basically about information,” says Migration Policy Institute (MPI) policy analyst Madeleine Sumption. Because the U.S. labor rights system is based on complaints, she says, migrant workers are faced with language barriers and a lack of knowledge of their rights under U.S. law.

But restrictionist organizations and conservative media have condemned Solis and the administration for signing the agreements, arguing that they benefit undocumented immigrants. The conservative Daily Caller questioned Solis about her intent to “protect illegal workers” at a breakfast event on Wednesday:

“I protect all workers here in this country,” [Solis] told The Daily Caller at a breakfast hosted by The Christian Science Monitor. “I have a vested interest in protecting all workers that work here in the U.S. Period.”

Critics of illegal immigration say Solis’ deals and statements show that she doesn’t value American workers more than foreign workers, and that she’s undercutting U.S. workers’ marketplace clout.

The article also quotes Dan Stein, president of the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR), and Mark Krikorian, president of the Center for Immigration Studies (CIS), two of the most prominent restrictionist organizations in Washington. Stein accuses Solis of “pandering to a political ethnic bloc,” and Krikorian says that the administration is “ambivalent about American sovereignty … [and] distinguishing between Americans and foreigners,” and that seeking Hispanic votes is a “practical manifestation of this broader ambivalence.”

Phil Kent, a spokesman for Americans for Immigration Control, tells Fox News that, “Obviously everyone wants workers protected in the workplace, that’s not the issue … The problem is the bending over backwards to help and promote black market labor.”

However, it’s by no means definitive that enforcing labor rights for undocumented migrant workers promotes unauthorized immigration. Failing to promote and protect the same labor regulations for unauthorized immigrants could also undercut legal workers by making migrant workers effectively cheaper and easier to exploit by employers, a view that Sumption calls the “demand side” perspective of immigration enforcement. It stands in contrast to the “supply side” perspective, which she summarized as, “If you make life pleasant for the unauthorized than they will stay.”

“My suspicion is that the demand side will be more important,” Sumption says, pointing out that low-skill immigrant workers, having come a long way for a low-wage job, are probably willing to put up with a lot in terms of labor rights infringement.

A July MPI report (PDF), argues that, “The presence of vulnerable workers, including those without immigration status, influences labor standards compliance, as does the necessity of many businesses to cut cost,” and that, “labor standards abuses occur at high rates in certain industries that employ heavy concentrations of low-wage immigrant workers, including those without immigration status.” This suggests a connection between lax enforcement of labor rights and demand for unauthorized immigrants.

The report calls for increasing the number of federal government personnel devoted to labor rights enforcement, which decreased under the Bush administration and has reverted to 2001 levels under the Obama administration. Ultimately, the attention placed upon the signing ceremony by conservative publications may be unwarranted, as the agreements merely extend the role of the consulates in what is an already ongoing process by the Labor Department to increase its labor rights enforcement efforts.

“I wouldn’t describe it as radical,” Sumption says.

Hallmark workers at the site of an oil spill cleanup operation. (Michigan Messenger)

In July, a 30-inch oil pipeline burst in Battle Creek, Mich., near a tributary of the Kalamazoo River. The cracked pipe leaked an estimated million gallons of oil into the water, and at the time, Enbridge Energy, the Canadian company that owns the pipe, promised a complete cleanup and rigorous review of its practices. “This is our responsibility,” said Patrick Daniel, Enbridge’s chief executive officer. “This is our mess. We’re going to clean it up.”

[Environment1] But that cleanup has itself been messy. An investigation by the Michigan Messenger – a sister site of the Washington Independent, also part of the American Independent News Network – found undocumented workers laboring in unsafe conditions at the cleanup site.

An Enbridge Energy subcontractor bused in undocumented workers to labor for up to 100 hours a week, clearing debris and cleaning up oil in unsafe conditions. In response to the Messenger investigation, Enbridge fired the subcontractor, who sent the workers back to Texas. There, the undocumented workers, awaiting cash payments for their efforts, met with local authorities – and many were detained.

The scandal has gone national, with politicians expressing dismay at the conditions at the Michigan cleanup site and the labor abuses, and authorities turning their attention to the companies doing the dirty business of getting America’s waterways clean.

An Unsafe Cleanup

After the Michigan oil spill, Enbridge hired contractor Garner Environmental Services to aid in the cleanup of the river. Garner, in turn, hired Texas-based Hallmark Industrial to supply workers. Last month, Hallmark bused scores of undocumented workers to the cleanup site. Living in hotels, the workers spent 12 to 14 hours a day cleaning oil-soaked islands and shorelines along the Kalamazoo River. The workers received $800 per week in cash for their efforts.

After receiving an initial tip from a Hallmark worker who asked not to be identified for fear of reprisals, the Michigan Messenger visited a rally site where the workers were picked up every morning. Half of two dozen men interviewed there admitted to being undocumented workers. All of them asked not to be identified.

Photographs supplied by a whistle-blower showed clear violations of safety standards. In those photos, undocumented workers were seen covered in oil and mud getting food and water. In one photo, a worker covered in oil sits on the white cooler from which workers get their water.

Last week, after the Messenger investigation, Garner fired Hallmark. The workers were put on charter buses back to Texas.

Workers, Seeking Pay, End Up Detained

The buses stopped in Winnie, Texas, behind a bank. Reportedly, the workers on the buses were expecting cash payments from Phillip Hallmark, the head of Hallmark Industrial. Soon after, neighbors complained to the police about the buses, which were blocking a street. When sheriffs arrived, the men held in the buses ran.

Local authorities took custody of 59 of the Battle Creek workers, and about 40 men got away. Authorities say 42 of the 59 detained workers were undocumented, and they were sent to a detention facility in Houston. Legal residents were released and allowed to collect their belonging from the buses. Authorities continue to search for men who escaped during the detention process.

Chambers County Sheriff Joe LaRive spoke with the Messenger after the incident. “The [charter bus] drivers were told to drive them to this small house in our little community,” LaRive said in a phone interview. “They were to meet Mr. Hallmark once they got there. Of course, he was nowhere around when we showed up.”

LaRive indicated that law enforcement is looking for Phillip Hallmark. “I’m sure the federal authorities will be very interested in talking to him,” he says.

Enbridge Pushes Back

In the wake of the Messenger investigation, the firing of Hallmark and the detention of its workers, Enbridge Energy — the company repsonsible for the spill — has claimed no responsibility for the workers cleaning it up.

Last week, Enbridge officials said there was no official proof that the undocumented workers were in any way connected to the spill cleanup in Michigan. “This is an issue between law enforcement, Hallmark and Garner,” said Terri Larson, Enbridge spokesperson. “There is no direct connection between Enbridge and Hallmark.”

Larson stressed that contractor agreements with Enbridge contained “very strict” provisions about following all applicable state and federal laws. Asked if the Hallmark situation would impact the Garner contract, Larson said, “That’s something I cannot discuss.”

Larson referred many questions to Garner Environmental, which has consistently failed to return media inquiries.

A Broader Investigation

But the Messenger investigation is ginning up broader questions about Enbridge’s labor and safety practices. A look at the company’s record reveals a pattern of problems with worker safety including multiple worker deaths in recent years.

This summer the Department of Labor’s Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) cited Enbridge for “willful” and “serious” violations after a chemical release at a company natural gas processing plant in Texas resulted in the death of a worker. According to OSHA one employee died and another was left in critical condition on Jan. 10 when hydrogen sulfide was released as workers replaced a faulty valve on a waste heat boiler in the sulfur plant.

Federal officials say Enbridge failed to develop and implement safe work practices for workers exposed to hydrogen sulfide and failed to provide the workers with respirators — required personal protection equipment.

These violations were committed, they said “with intentional, knowing or voluntary disregard for the law’s requirements, or with plain indifference to employee safety and health.”

OSHA also cited Enbridge for failing to review current operating procedures, failing to inform contract workers of the known potential fire, explosion or toxic release hazards related their work and not requiring the use of necessary flame resistant clothing. The agency assessed $152,100 in fines for these violations.

In August, the Department of Transportation’s Pipeline Hazardous Materials Administration fined Enbridge $2.4 million for safety violations involving worker safety and failure to conduct required monitoring and maintenance.

DOT officials said that two Enbridge workers died in a crude oil explosion in Clearbrook, Minn., as they worked to make repairs on the Lakehead pipeline, and they cited Enbridge for failing to safely and adequately perform maintenance and repair activities, clear the designated work area from possible sources of ignition, and hire properly trained and qualified workers.

The agency also ordered Enbridge to revise and implement certain pipeline maintenance and repair procedures and to train and requalify its employees.

While work seems dangerous for Enbridge employees — overall, from 2004-2008, 395 injuries were recorded by Enbridge and then reported to management according to the Canadian environmental group the Polaris Institute — actual statistics are probably much higher because 80 percent of Enbridge workers are non-union and have little protection against discrimination if they report a problem.

“Officially, Enbridge provides on the job health and safety training as mandated by federal and provincial jurisdictions, and has established health and safety committees at each site,” Polaris writes. “However, the only collective agreement negotiated with the company to include specific provisions regarding proactive health and safety precautions, training and remedial action is between Enbridge Gas Distribution and the Communications Energy and Paperworkers Union in Ontario.”

Many workers involved in direct cleanup of the Kalamazoo River spill were hired by subcontractors who were required only to provide on site lectures about hazardous substances and personal protection gear.

Under Michigan regulations all employers at a multi-employer job sites share responsibility for ensuring that proper safety ruled are followed, according to Michael T. Mason, safety and health manager for the Michigan Occupational Safety and Health Administration.

Inspectors at the Enbridge oil spill cleanup site on a daily basis, conducted “walkarounds” of the job site and asked workers if they had been trained, Mason said. “We can tell by interviews and by watching them we can tell if [workers] have been trained.” Mason acknowledged that direct observation can be difficult at a 25-mile job site such as the cleanup area along the Kalamazoo River.

Political Attention in the Wake of the Spill

And the Michigan and Texas incident has garnered the attention of politicians as well.

For one, politicians in Michigan are incensed that Enbridge did not use local workers, as the state has the second-highest unemployment rate in the country. Rep. Mark Schauer (D) sent letters to the administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency as well as the Secretary of Labor calling for an investigation of Enbridge, due to the Messenger investigation.

“Enbridge needs to live up to the commitment it made to our community, be a good neighbor, and start hiring qualified Michigan workers to clean up the spill,” Schauer said. “Our community repeatedly asked the EPA and Enbridge to use local labor, and the fact that Enbridge allowed one of its contractors to hire illegal immigrants is appalling.”

In an interview with the Michigan Messenger, Schauer took aim not only at the undocumented worker hiring scandal, but also the whole culture of using independent contractors to skirt the law.

“I have worked for some time on the independent contractor fraud that goes on. This is when, typically in the construction trades — and this situation on the river clean up sort of classically fits the mold — where companies will hire workers as independent contractors, as 1099 independent contractors. It’s specifically done to evade paying taxes,” Schauer said, noting independent contractor payments do not have any federal or state taxes deducted from them.

This leaves the individual responsible for those taxes. “Now that’s cheating the taxpayer, but it’s also creating an unfair advantage for these companies that are hiring workers as independent contractors rather than full employees.”

This of course is an issue tied to undocumented workers, Schauer noted. In an interview with the Messenger, Hallmark said his independent contractors were not required to fill out I-9 federal forms. Those forms verify that a person is legally eligible to work in the United States.

“In this case this seems to be a loophole in which the employer is claiming they don’t have to check the legal status of these workers and require them to complete I-9 forms,” Schauer said. “So there’s tax fraud and there’s also a violation of the law by hiring undocumented workers, it appears.”

Schauer says this unfair advantage the independent contracting process allows, combined with the lack of legal status verification, makes it hard for Michigan workers to compete.

“It’s outrageous and disgusting that our local workers — including many who have hazmat training and certifications — have been cheated out of these opportunities to do this work,” Schauer said. “This is another example of a company cutting corners ad cheating our workers out of an opportunity to support their families.”

Schauer said he has been trying “since the very start” of the spill to connect local workers with Enbridge Energy Partners. But those attempts have failed.

Schauer said the allegations of safety violations and the hiring of undocumented workers will become part of a scheduled Sept. 15 House Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure hearings on the July 25 oil spill.

He says the oil spill was a violation of the people of Calhoun county and “it shouldn’t have happened.”

“What people are looking for is fundamental fairness and that appears to have been violated here,” he said.

Further Allegations About Hallmark

The incident is also shining a light on Phillip Hallmark and his company’s labor practices. The Texas Independent reports Hallmark is already under indictment by a Chambers County jury for insurance fraud and theft in a previous, unrelated case.

Hallmark’s attorney Joseph C. “Lum” Hawthorn said last week he had recently been in touch with his client and was aware of Hallmark’s whereabouts. When asked where Hallmark is, Hawthorn cited attorney-client privilege, saying, “That’s none of your business.”

Hawthorn said Hallmark was not currently in custody, that he was aware of.

Regarding the charge involving insurance fraud and theft, Hallmark has a court date set in Anahuac for Oct. 1. He was originally slated to appear in court Friday, Aug. 27.

Allegedly, in July 2006, Hallmark’s accomplice Joe Collins claimed to State Farm Insurance Company that Collins’ 2003 Ford F-150 was stolen from a parking lot, when Hallmark and Collins were hiding the truck, according to grand jury indictments from December 2009.

Hallmark’s wife Holly is an insurance agent in Port Arthur for Farmers Insurance Group. She is not named in court documents.

In 2004, Hallmark was fined $1,000 after pleading no contest to election code violations involving campaigns for Port of Port Arthur commissioner. Hallmark was charged with failing to report newspaper advertisements that he paid for to the candidates he supported or to authorities. Hawthorn also represented Hallmark during the 2004 case.

Hallmark is the son of former Jefferson County Commissioner Waymon Hallmark, who retired in 2009.

The Michigan Messenger’s Todd Heywood and Eartha Jane Meltzer, the Florida Independent’s Travis Pillow and the Texas Independent’s Patrick Brendel contributed reporting and writing to this story.

Workers at a cleanup site near the Kalamazoo River in Mich., where an oil pipeline burst.

An investigation by the Michigan Messenger, TWI’s sister publication, has found possible labor-law abuses and definite safety concerns in the cleanup of a major oil spill in the Kalamazoo River in south-central Michigan. After the Messenger story went online, the company contracting for the cleanup job fired the subcontractor.

[Environment1] A source says that Garner Environmental Services Inc., hired by Enbridge Energy after its pipeline burst on July 26, fired Hallmark Industrial, a subcontractor. Hallmark had bused in undocumented workers to toil for 12 to 14 hour days, seven days a week, for just $800 a week. The workers were helping to sop up oil and remove debris. The July pipeline break leaked more than 1 million gallons of oil into a stream that feeds into the Kalamazoo – the worst oil spill in midwest history.

Hallmark, a Texas-based firm, brought hundreds of undocumented workers to Battle Creek, Mich., for cleanup, putting them up in hotels and putting them to work cleaning oil-soaked islands and shorelines along the Kalamazoo River. The workers toil for long hours in return for cash payments, a hotel room and food while on the job sites.

After receiving an initial tip from a Hallmark worker who asked not to be identified for fear of reprisals, the Michigan Messenger visited the rally site on Saturday where the workers are picked up every morning. While speaking to about two dozen men there, half of them admitted to being undocumented workers. All of them asked not to be identified.

On Sunday, a busload of 150 new workers arrived by bus from Texas. The immigration status of these new workers is unknown, but the conditions under which they will work was confirmed by Hallmark workers and by multiple photographs of the worksite.

Workers are kept on the river for 12 to 14 hours a day, every day of the week. Photographs show what appear to be a number of violations of safety standards. In those photos, undocumented workers are seen covered in oil and mud while receiving food and water. In one photo, a worker covered in oil is seen sitting on the white cooler from which workers get their water.

Messenger submitted the photos, which one oil spill certified worker has identified as proof of violations of OSHA rules, to the Environmental Protection Agency and Enbridge for comment. The EPA is the lead agency in the cleanup response.

In an e-mail responding to the submitted photos, David Polish, spokesperson for the EPA wrote, “Thank you for bringing your concerns about worker safety to our attention. The United States Environmental Protection Agency takes the issue of worker health and safety very seriously. We have instructed Enbridge to investigate the circumstances surrounding these pictures. Once they complete their review, we will direct corrective actions if warranted.”

Enbridge spokesperson Terri Larson said, “We definitely identified a few things that we consider safety issues. Some were minor, some were more important.” As a result, Larson said worker safety specialists would be working to address those safety concerns promptly.

In addition, workers told Michigan Messenger that they are forced to use the bathroom in the wooded areas they are cleaning up. Portable toilets are not placed on the islands, and supervisors refuse to ferry workers to a worker rallying point where they have access to toilet facilities.

Hallmark company officials say that all the workers are legal. However, when pressed, Phil Hallmark, a supervisor on site for the company, admitted none of the workers were required to fill out I-9 or other immigration verification documents.

Hallmark said the workers merely provided their names, addresses and social security numbers. They were not required to show identification nor were they required to show verification they had completed federally mandated cleanup training. Hallmark said the workers are not submitted to the E-verify system, which determines immigration status.

“They are independent contractors, they don’t have to fill out any of that paperwork,” Hallmark said in a phone interview. “We get their name, address and social security number. We verify that everyone has one.”

He declined to discuss how those verifications were made, citing privacy concerns for the contractors. Hallmark said his workers are recruited by former contractors and word of mouth. Hallmark did admit the company pays some workers in cash “because they don’t have banks or any way to cash a check here.”

The rally point for workers is a half mile from both a Walmart and a Meijer, both of which offer paycheck cashing services.

Enbridge officials say they reviewed Hallmark’s hiring paperwork on Sunday, and “as far as they could tell it was legitimate.” Enbridge was not allowed to have copies of the W-9 documents filled out by workers or the documentation of required hazardous material training certifications, and Larson said that was because of privacy concerns for the workers.

This is not the first time Hallmark has come under scrutiny about immigration issues.

Hallmark admitted that the Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) visited Florida operations during the company’s cleanup work after the BP Deepwater Horizon explosion earlier in the year.

“They did an audit of our process and looked at our sign in sheets,” said Hallmark. “Nothing came of that, that I know of.”

Workers in Battle Creek say they were obligated to sign non-disclosure agreements, and provided with a card directing media to contact an 800 number if they were approached by reporters.

This morning, the contractor that hired Hallmark “made an independent decision to end that contract,” Enbridge spokesperson Larson said. “It’s fair to say – and I think it’s fair for people to make the leap – that this was because of allegations related to their business practices.”

In addition to the ending of the contract for Hallmark, Messenger’s source said Garner has issued a directive to all contractors that they are forbidden from talking to the media, and that doing so will be grounds for immediate termination. Larson said Garner had said not talking to the media was its corporate policy.

Meanwhile, some workers were left in Battle Creek with an uncertain future in the cleanup and unsure if they will receive the pay due them for their work on the Kalamazoo River on Monday – before the contract with Garner was terminated.

The Hallmark employees have boarded buses and are headed back to Texas.

Michigan politicians are calling for an investigation into the affair. Rep. Mark Schauer (D), who represents Bedford Township, today called for investigations into allegations that Hallmark Industrial hired undocumented workers in letters to the Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Lisa Jackson and Secretary of Labor Hilda Solis.

Last week, the House Democrats unveiled their version of the $825 billion economic stimulus package.

The proposed bill provides billions of dollars for roads, schools, global warming research, information technology upgrades, food stamps, and unemployment insurance. However, it also allocates more than half a billion dollars for digital-to analog converter box coupons. From the report accompanying the bill (pdf):

DIGITAL-TO-ANALOG CONVERTER BOX PROGRAM

Digital-to-Analog Converter Box Coupons
Recovery funding: $650 million
Funding provides for additional implementation and administration of the digital-to-analog converter box coupon program, including additional coupons to meet new projected demands and consumer support, outreach and administration.

That’s a lot of money for coupons. To put that figure in perspective, that’s more than last year’s entire budget for the Occupational Health and Safety Administration (OSHA).

Analog television broadcasts are set to cease Feb. 17, when TV stations drop their analog simulcasts as part of the Congressionally mandated switchover to digital television. The change won’t affect digital televisions or analog sets hooked up to cable or satellite. However, consumers with analog TVs and “bunny ears” will need to buy a digital-to-analog converter box in order to continue receiving free programing.

Even before the stimulus, American households could apply for up to two $40 coupons for the purchase of converter boxes through a program administered by the U.S. Department of Commerce. The units typically sell for about $40-$70 each. As of May 2008, 10 million households had already requested coupons, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. The deadline to apply for a coupon is March 31.

In one sense, the converter box subsidy is a laudably progressive program. By law, all TVs sold in the United States since 2005 must have digital tuners. So, the only people who will benefit from the coupons are those who have older TVs, no cable, and the inclination to apply for their coupons instead of replacing their sets. By far the greatest beneficiaries will be poorer and older Americans, who are less likely to have digital television or cable.

On the other hand, the government has already spent $1.34 billion on the converter box program, according a story in the Washington Post last week. The government has struggled to get coupons out to applicants. The Post reports that 1.7 million people who requested coupons have yet to receive them, and are unlikely to get one before the Feb. 17 transition date.

My question is this: What are they going to spend $650 million additional stimulus dollars on, if there are fewer than two million people on the waiting list, and less than three months left to apply for the coupons?

Only 13 million households in the United States relied exclusively on analog TV without cable, according to a Nielsen study published in early 2008. There may be even fewer today. If 10 million have already applied and all but 1.7 million of those applicants have already gotten their coupons, that means there are fewer than 5 million American households at risk of losing their free TV reception next month. The converter coupons have been available for over a year. So it’s probably fair to assume that a good chunk of the eligible non-applicants are never going to apply, perhaps because they’ve already upgraded their TVs, or because they just aren’t interested. But even if every one of those nearly 5 million households applied for the maximum of two $40 coupons — an unlikely scenario — the coupon program would have a total price tag of less than $400 million. The numbers don’t add up.

Spending an additional $650 million dollars to extend the lives of old televisions seems like a misallocation of resources, relative to other potential targets for stimulus spending. Besides, in terms of “bang for the buck,” isn’t it counterproductive to spend stimulus money on something that will discourage consumers from buying televisions and, you know, stimulating the economy?

President George W. Bush (WDCpix)

It’s something of a tradition– administrations using their final weeks in power to ram through a slew of federal regulations. With the election grabbing the headlines, outgoing federal bureaucrats quietly propose and finalize rules that can affect the health and safety of millions.

The Bush administration has followed this tradition and expanded it. Up to 90 proposed regulations could be finalized before President George W. Bush leaves office Jan. 20. If adopted, these rules could weaken workplace safety protections, allow local police to spy in the “war on terror” and make it easier for federal agencies to ignore the Endangered Species Act.

Illustration by: Matt Mahurin

What’s more, the administration has accelerated the rule-making process to ensure that the changes it wants will be finalized by Nov. 22.

That’s a key date, Nov. 22. It is 60 days before the next administration takes control — and most federal rules go into effect 60 days after they have been finalized. It would be a major bureaucratic undertaking for the Obama administration to reverse federal rules already in effect.

“The Bush administration has thought through last-minute regulations much more than past administrations,” said Rick Melberth, director of OMB Watch, a nonprofit group that tracks federal regulations. “They’ve said, ‘Let’s not only get them finalized; let’s get them in effect.’”

So what are the new rules?

The Washington Independent has highlighted five regulations notable for their potential effect and the way they slipped through the regulatory process. Four could to be finalized by Nov. 22. One was already — on Election Day.

1) The Dept. of Labor proposed a regulation Aug. 30 that changes how workplace safety standards are met. Labor experts contend that the administration, which previously issued only one new workplace safety standard and that under court order, is trying to make it a bureaucratic nightmare for future administrations to make workplace safety rules.

Here’s what it would do:

Currently, if the Occupational Safety and Health Admin. or the Mine Health and Safety Admin. want to introduce a new safety standard on, say, the level of exposure to toxic chemicals, it issues what is called a notice of proposed rule-making. This notice is published in the Federal Register and then debated by labor, business and relevant federal agencies.

The new regulation would add an “advanced notice of proposed rule-making,” meaning OSHA and MSHA would have prove that, say, the said chemical was seriously harming workers.

This would open the door for industry to challenge the validity of the risk assessment and then, if necessary, the actual safety standard that may come from that risk assessment.

“The purpose of this sort of rule is to require agencies to spend more time on a regulation which gives them less of a chance to actually regulate,” said David Michaels, a professor of workplace safety at George Washington University, “You’re adding at least a year, maybe two years, to the process.”

The regulation has not been finalized.

2) The administration proposed a rule that changes the employer-employee relationship laid out in the 1993 Family and Medical Leave Act.

Here’s what it would do:

The Family and Medical Leave Act says that employers must give their workers 12 weeks of unpaid leave if they are sick or need to take care of a family member or newborn. The employer’s health-care staff can check the legitimacy of the family or medical leave claim with the employee’s doctor or health-care provider.

The proposed regulation would allow the employer to directly speak with the employee’s doctor or health-care provider. The employer could also ask employees to provide more medical documentation of their conditions.

Why such a rule — which may threaten an employee’s privacy– is needed is unclear. The only study the Labor Dept. has done on the act was in 2000. The department collected comments from employers before issuing the proposed regulation, but a report analyzing the comments was never issued.

The regulation also would gives employees the right to waive their rights under the Family and Medical Leave Act, making it the first national labor law to be optional. A worker, for instance, cannot waive his right to earn a minimum wage or get paid more for overtime.

The regulation was finalized on Election Day.

3) The Dept. of Health and Human Services proposed a rule Sept. 26 that would expand the reasons that physicians or health care entities could decline to provide any procedure to include moral and religious grounds. The language of the regulation says the department hopes to correct “an attitude toward the health-care profession that health-care professionals and institutions should be required to provide or assist in the provision of medicine or procedures to which they object, or else risk being subjected to discrimination.”

Here’s what it would do:

The rule change seems to apply to abortion. But they are already several rules that say physicians or health-care entities can deny an abortion request. Some women’s health advocates contend that the proposed regulation’s broad language is meant to increase the number of physicians who not only don’t provide abortions but don’t provide contraception.

“Contraception is certainly the target of this rule,” contends Marylin Keefe, director for Reproductive Health at the National Partnership for Women and Families. “The moral and religious objections of health-care workers are now starting to take precedence over patients.”

The regulation is notable for another reason. A rule involving an employee’s religious rights must be referred to the Equal Employment and Opportunity Commission, yet the commission was never told of this proposed regulation.

A bureaucratic battled erupted when EEOC’s legal counsel, Reed Russell, wrote a regulation comment (pdf) blasting both the substance of the proposed rule and its disregard for the rule-making process.

The regulation has not been finalized.

4) On July 31, the Justice Dept. proposed a regulation that would allow state and local law enforcement agencies to collect “intelligence” information on individuals and organizations even if the information is unrelated to a criminal matter.

“This is a continuum that started back on 9/11 to reform law enforcement and the intelligence community to focus on the terrorism threat,” said Bush homeland security adviser Kenneth L. Wainstein in a statement.

Critics say it could infringe on civil liberties.

Here’s what it would do:

“It expands local law enforcement’s ability to investigate criminal activity that it deems suspicious,” said Melberth of OMB Watch. “But what’s suspicious to you may not be suspicious to me. They could be investigating community organizations they think are two or three steps away from a terrorist group.”

The regulation has not been finalized.

5) Before a federal agency approves any construction project– anything from building a dam to a post office — government officials must consult the Fish and Wildlife Service and the National Marine Fisheries Service. These two agencies enforce the Endangered Species Act, and they can veto any project that adversely affects an animal on the endangered species list.

Here’s what it would do:

A regulation proposed by the Interior Dept. Aug. 12 would end this approval process. “It destroys a system of checks and balances that have been in place for two decades,” claimed Bob Davison, senior scientist at Defenders of the Wildlife. “[A federal agency] wants to go forward with a project that [it wants] to do. So you need an independent agency to look at the decision.”

Davison is not the only conservation advocate up in arms. The Interior Dept. has received 200,000 public comments, which may affect the final rule.

Or not — the department shortened the comment period from 60 to 30 days in its effort to get the regulation finalized.

In May, White House Chief of Staff Josh Bolten vowed that the administration would propose no regulations after June 1. He and White House spokesman Tony Fratto have repeatedly stated their contempt for what they call “midnight regulations.”

Yet with the exception of the Family and Medical Leave changes, each of these regulations were proposed after June 1. And if finalized, they will effect worker’s safety, women’s health-care choices, local police powers and endangered species.

“It was a pretty resounding election,” said Keefe of the National Partnership for Women and Families. “But this administration acts like it still has a mandate.”

The nonpartisan, nonprofit group issued a “report card” grading 15 federal agencies on their communication policies. Some agencies, it found,  “stifle communication” even if their policies encourage free speech. Other agencies simply have weak policies regarding communication with the media.

The Centers for Disease Control, for example, was found to have the best media policy, one that allows scientists to state personal views and review press releases about their own research. But the agency poorly implemented the policy.

According to the study released today, the agencies with the best communication policies, and which most effectively implemented them, were NASA, the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Association (NOAA). The Union of Concerned Scientists has commended NASA for improving its media policy after a political appointee in the agency reportedly censored leading climate scientist James Hansen, director of NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies.

The agencies with the worst policies include the Environmental Protection Agency, the Fish and Wildlife Service (within the Dept. of Interior), the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) and the Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC).

The report card is below. The full report can be found here (pdf).