Coal miners to get more of the shaft [View all]

[packman]

West Virginia and Kentucky cutting back on state coal mine inspections, letting federal gov. pick up that bag of responsibility - AND we all know what is going on in the Trump administration about safety and regulations.

"..backers of those proposals argue that state inspections can afford to be cut in part because federal officials do their own inspections. Under federal law, the Mine Safety and Health Administration, which is part of the Labor Department, inspects every active coal mine at least four times each year.


But Kentucky and West Virginia have long had their own safety programs as well, under the rationale that the states share an obligation to protect miners and prevent disasters like the one at Upper Big Branch, which claimed 29 West Virginia miners in 2010. Advocates like Oppegard argue that the state inspections are essential to keeping mines safe, since federal officials alone don’t have all the resources and legal powers necessary to adequately monitor all the nation’s mines.


If anything, federal policing of the coal industry will probably be scaled back under the Trump administration. President Donald Trump and congressional Republicans have been rapidly peeling back all manner of regulations on businesses, including coal companies. Trump’s new commerce secretary, billionaire investor Wilbur Ross, owned the Sago mine in West Virginia in 2006 when an explosion there cost the lives of 12 miners."


http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/coal-country-republicans-state-mine-inspections_us_58c85cade4b022994fa2eeca?xdu59we7862p22o6r&