BBuilt by Cambria Iron Works from 1909 thru PPurchased by Bethlehem Steel in 1936 CCompletely integrated steel plant. BBlast Furnace – Not at JWT SSteel Making – Not at JWT BBillet Mills CCleaning Capability WWire Drawing HHeat Treating EElectroplating (1936) NNail and barbed wire manufacturing BBethlehem shut the operations down in 1992.

 Prior to the shut down, Bethlehem sold the rod mill equipment to Casey Equipment for resale.  JWT purchased the remainder of the Wire Mill in 1992 and began production in December of that same year.  JWT is a Union shop and the employees are represented by the United Steelworkers.  JWT employs 52 Salary and 210 Union Employees.

 JWT is comprised of nine departments.  Each department or group of departments has a manager.  The Quality Department operates under the Director of Quality.

 The nine departments at JWT are:  Shipping/Receiving/Heat Treating  Cleaning Lines/Wire Drawing/Bundling  Plating  Maintenance  Quality Assurance  These departments operate under five managers. Some managers have multiple departments.

 Due to increasing cost of workers compensation insurance, our increasing OSHA recordable accident rate, and a fatality, JWT formed their Joint Safety Committee in  The original committee consisted of:  Vice President of Operations  Two (2) from Human Resources  Five (5) Department Managers  Fourteen (14) Hourly Employees from the 9 units.

 In late 2009, our insurance carrier suggested that the joint safety committee become a state certified safety committee. This certification would lower our insurance premiums.  JWT received it’s certification in  The state certification must be renewed annually and this requires a two (2) hour recertification class.

 Since the committee became State Certified, the actual committee only consists of four people.  There are two from management and two from the Union workforce.  The employees not chosen to be on the State Certified Committee still function as a part of the Joint Safety Committee as guests and also participate in the meetings.

 In fact, we try to get three of the four different employees annually to serve as members of the State Certified Committee with the Safety Manager always on the committee.  We felt that this would keep the committee fresh and the same people would not have to serve every year unless they choose too.

 Reduce the OSHA recordable accident rate to “0”.  We also received a mandate from our company President. “If there is an accident that is borderline recordable I want it recorded and turned in to OSHA”. I don’t want any gray areas in reporting.  Make the mill at JWT a safe place to work.

 The top three Leading Indicators for Preventable Accidents by frequency were as follows:  Strains and Sprains 28%  Lacerations (Cuts) 19%  Eyes injuries 16%

 Top three (3) leading injuries by cost were as follows:  Lifting (strains)  Lacerations  Contusions

2014 JWT ACCIDENT RATES HoursOSHA Lost Work All InjuryLost Work Severity Worked Recordab leAccidents Days Rate Accident s (Rest. Work)(Time Off) (Rest. Work)(Time Off) (Rest Work) (Time Off) (Rest. Work) (Time Off) , , , , , , , ,

 The first task the committee took on was training.  Every new hire begins with a week long safety orientation, which includes a truck safety course that ends with fork truck state certification test.  Every hourly employee at JWT is a certified lift truck operator.  Week two, covers all OSHA required training and Zero (0) Tolerance policies on Harassment, Work Place Violence and Drug /Alcohol training, prior to being placed on a job.

 Once assigned to a department, the new hire spends another two days learning our HAZ COM Policy, our SOP’s and JHA’s.  After completing the required training, the new employee will be assigned with an experienced lift truck operator or job they will be assigned to and trained to do a particular job.  The employee will be evaluated by the department manager after the two week period.  If additional training is required, the employee(s) receive it.

 Secondly, the safety committee developed SQP meetings.  Safety  Quality  Production  These meetings are held monthly.  Comprised of the Department Manager,Safety Manager and all hourly employees.  These meetings allow the hourly workers to address any safety, quality or production concerns that they have directly to the Department Manager and to the Union Safety Committee member.

 The third thing the joint safety committee developed was a list of ten (10) safety topics that are delivered by the Department Managers and Safety Manager, at their monthly SQP meetings.  These classes include all OSHA required training.  Point of Interest:  Our insurance carrier periodically sends a representative to our safety meetings. This is a good source of obtaining information, videos and power point presentations to help with our training.

January – HAZ COM/GHS June – PPE/Fall Protection February – Truck/Hoist/Crane July – Ladders March – Lock Out/Tag OutOctober – Fire Extinguishers April – Confined SpaceNovember – Propane Safety May – Blood Borne PathogensDecember – Arc Flash August and September were set aside for any employee that have missed any of the Safety topics throughout the year and to review key issue about safety that has occurred throughout the year.

 The fourth thing that the Safety Committee developed was the weekly walk through.  The Department Manager and the hourly member of the Joint Safety team would walk through their department and document anything that was unsafe.  These findings are then discussed at the Joint Safety committee monthly meeting.

 See handouts

 The walk through consisted of the following:  General Condition – aisles, mirrors, floors  Materials – rod coils, waste disposal  Labeling – secondary container labeling  Equipment –guards, safety switches, trucks  Emergency Equipment – AED, first aid Blood Bourne Pathogen kits  Personal Protective – hard hats, glasses, hearing, respiratory protection  Housekeeping – general condition of departments

 Most items that are found during the walk through are corrected that day or within a reasonable time frame.  If there was a larger safety item, like a bad floor area that required some extra cost or extra manpower, these are placed on a action list.  Any item that makes the action item list, must be corrected within 30 days.

 The weekly walk through the mill also benefited the safety team. It gave the hourly employees that were not on the safety team a chance to talk with management and their union representative, and get any of their concerns addressed at the safety meeting.  The weekly walks are the best fit for JWT because we operate around the clock.  Several departments operate 365 days per year.

 Finally, In conjunction with the walk through, our company President insisted that the Department Managers do semi-annual safety observations.  The observations were just the department manager watching an employee do a part of his job and see if he was doing it safely.  We currently do these observations and report the good with the bad.  Due to the success of the program, lately we report more good than bad.

 See Handout

 So, how did we measure if the system was working?  Compensation Rates  OSHA Recordable Accidents  Severity Rates of Accidents  Lost Time Accidents  Restricted Work Accidents

 Again by the efforts of the Joint Safety Committee, our Safety Manager, Department Managers and the Union Workers on the floor we lowered our All Injury Rate from 31.0 in 1995 down to 6.2 at the lowest in 2010 and averaging 8.0 through OSHA reportable accidents from 76 in 1997 to 20 in We have had a few set backs over the years but continually strive to make JWT a safer work place.  Again our goal is “ZERO”.

 Strains & Sprains  Most of these occurred while removing carriers from a stack.  Our receiving foreman came up with the idea of reducing the amount of carriers in a stack.  This simple change reduced accidents in this area by 20 %.

These are called carriers.

These carriers are used to hold the wire when it comes off of a drawing machine.

These carriers used to be sent to us with six carriers in a pack.

With six carriers in a pack the carriers had to be pried apart. This prying and pulling action is what caused most of the sprain and strain injuries.

The solution to our injury problem was very simple. Order the carriers to be shipped with no more than five carriers per pack. This simple change reduced this type of injury by 90%.

 Eye Injuries  In 2012, a team looked at safety glasses that fit tighter to a person’s face, especially under the eye where it meets the cheek, also all safety glasses are paid for by the company.  The team also had windshields installed on all of the trucks in the mill.  This simple change reduced accidents in this area by more than 50%.

 Lacerations/Burns  We have seen a upward trend in cuts over the last year.  In 2014, a team recommended that all employees cutting banding must wear long sleeves or kevlar arm guards. The committee accepted the recommendation. We are very confident that implementing these action items we can reduce our cuts and lacerations.

 With the efforts of the Joint Safety Committee working with our Insurance Company and our hourly workforce at the end of 2013, we received a dividend from our insurance carrier due to the fact that our accident rates have dropped and stayed below the industry average.  Although in 2014 we have had some set backs in our All Injury we are working together to make JWT safer place to work for all employees.

 Finally, by becoming a “State Certified Safety Team”, we also saved an additional 5% per year on our Worker’s Compensation Insurance premium. With these saving we re-invest for training and better equipment, to provide a safer work place for all of Johnstown Wire employees.