IG: Mine safety agency purposefully allowed dangerous mines to skip review

A top mine safety official told inspectors last year to skip reviews of some of the most dangerous mines in the country, according to an inspector general’s report released this week.

The Mine Safety and Health Administration (MSHA) had identified a number of projects suspected of routinely disregarding safety standards, but the head of the agency's coal division told regional offices to ignore many on the list, the Department of Labor's Office of Inspector General (OIG) found. The agency simply lacked the resources to perform all the reviews, MSHA said.

The findings added fuel to the push by some top Democrats to revamp the nation's mine safety laws after an enormous blast killed 29 West Virginia miners in April. The mine owner, Massey Energy, has a long history of racking up safety violations at its projects, leading many lawmakers to wonder why MSHA hasn't taken more aggressive steps to shut down some of those operations. 

Rep. George Miller, chairman of the House Education and Labor Committee, said the OIG report "raises very serious concerns" about the effectiveness of the nation's miner protections. The California Democrat, who had requested the OIG investigation, said he plans to introduce "significant reforms" to mine safety laws "in the coming days."

Sen. Jay Rockefeller (D-W.Va.) agreed, calling the findings "deeply troubling and unacceptable." He, too, is urging new legislation to ensure the safety of the nation's miners. 

Under current law, MSHA can shutter mines when inspectors can identify a "pattern of violations" (POV). In 2007, MSHA launched a program designed to identify operations with a history of disregarding federal safety standards, setting a course for putting those mines on POV status. But in March 2009, when the head of MSHA's coal division sent district managers the list of dangerous mines, it came with a qualifier: "Select no more than one mine on the initial screening list per field office and a maximum of 3 mines per district."

"We were told this guidance was necessary to address resource limitations," the OIG wrote this week. "However, this instruction set a limit that was inappropriate for this enforcement program."

The OIG was quick to add that a lack of resources is no excuse for allowing potentially deadly projects to stay running.  

"We are very concerned about mines removed for reasons other than appropriate consideration of the health and safety conditions at those mines," the agency wrote, adding a warning about the current status of those projects that eluded review. MSHA, OIG cautioned, "does not have evidence that they had reduced their rate of significant and substantial violations. As a result, miners may be subjected to increased safety risks."

Miller and Rockefeller both vowed to address the funding issues surrounding MSHA. Rockefeller said he will "insist on a full assessment of their resource gaps." 

"Agency resources should not be a factor when MSHA determines whether or not to take enforcement action to protect miners from safety violations," he said in a statement. 

Labor Secretary Hilda Solis also weighed in on the OIG report, calling the POV process "badly broken."

"It's clear that we need to scrap the current system and put a new system in place that is focused on protecting miners' safety and health," Solis said in a statement.

The agency is already moving toward that goal. Earlier this year, MSHA announced it would propose new rules for using its POV authority. Those guidelines are scheduled for release in January.