Berg Helps Capital Metro Protect Employees From COVID-19

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Using Berg’s new COVID-19 service offerings, Capital Metro carefully manages complex guidance from OSHA, CDC and City of Austin to reduce COVID-19 exposure and infection

AUSTIN—June 23, 2020— Berg Compliance Solutions, experts in helping businesses ensure environmental, health and safety regulatory compliance, today announced that Capital Metropolitan Transportation Authority (CapMetro), the Austin public transportation provider, has leveraged Berg’s new COVID-19 Assessment and Control Plan Services to carefully manage guidance from OSHA, CDC and City of Austin regarding COVID-19. Working with Berg, CapMetro can help reduce risk from COVID-19 infections and ensure compliance with government guidance and regulations, avoiding costly penalties while improving safety.

In response to employee COVID-19 infections and Austin’s Stay Home – Work Safe order, CapMetro looked for expertise to develop an infectious disease response plan that ensured compliance with all local and national regulations, guidance and recommendations. In late April, CapMetro selected Berg’s team of health and safety experts to quickly develop a job hazard analysis for bus operators, on-demand drivers and maintenance personnel to assess all tasks and control measures, taking into account CDC and OSHA guidance for essential businesses, including PPE, administrative and engineering controls.

More recently, CapMetro worked with Berg to create a return-to-work office and facility assessment project, assessing all six Austin area office and operations facilities. This included a disinfectant evaluation and face shield training for employees to ensure employee confidence that their workplace and job are safe.

“The safety and well-being of the CapMetro family and our customers is our number one priority as we continue to deliver a critical service during this public health emergency,” said Gardner Tabon, vice president of safety, risk management and accessible services management, CapMetro. “With our understanding of the virus changing on a day-to-day basis, it is difficult to identify the right path forward. Berg has helped us identify that path. They have been extremely responsive, available and dedicated to making sure we are putting the proper measures in place to help ensure the safety of our communities.”

Berg is now offering these new COVID-19 and outsourced environmental, health and safety compliance services on-site and remotely to businesses across the nation as part of its overall compliance offerings, helping businesses return to work or continue to offer critical services. Recently, OSHA has stated that during an enforcement inspection, compliance safety and health officials will assess an employer’s efforts to explore all options to comply with applicable standards, including virtual training or remote communication strategies. Berg provides companies with the virtual customized OSHA health and safety compliance services they need to meet these recommendations and reduce the risk of regulatory penalties.

As the country continues the process of re-opening the economy, Berg will stay up-to-date with the latest COVID-19 guidance efforts in order to help employers better address issues that arise managing compliance, prevent additional COVID-19 exposures and infections, protect employees and gain confidence that workplace and job tasks are safe during the pandemic.

“Making sense of complex and rapidly changing requirements can be an extensive, complicated and technical process for businesses, and this is made even more challenging in the midst of this pandemic,” said Russell Carr, president, Berg Compliance Solutions. “That’s why we are dedicated to equipping both existing essential business clients and new clients everywhere with the tools they need to help prevent and control the spread of the coronavirus across our globe.”

About Berg Compliance Solutions
Berg Compliance Solutions specializes in helping small companies manage environmental, health and safety regulatory compliance and risk. Since 2003, Berg has helped businesses keep workplaces safe, minimize environmental impact and maintain compliance with OSHA, EPA, TCEQ, DOT and Hazardous materials regulatory compliance laws. Based in Austin, TX, Berg works with companies across the United States. For more information, visit www.txsteelfabsafetyconsulting.com

Media Contacts
Stacy Tung
Ketner Group Communications (for Berg Compliance Solutions)
stacy@ketnergroup.com
(512) 794-8876

By Russell Carr|2020-06-29T17:10:56-05:00June 24th, 2020|COVID-19 & Coronavirus|Comments Off

About the Author: Russell Carr

How A Sales Guy Transformed Into An Environmental, Health & Safety Expert & Advocate For Small Businesses I've spent my entire 30+ year career working within the manufacturing and “industrial services” sectors. The first 15 years of my career focused on sales of hazardous materials related products and services to the manufacturing sector, then for the last 16+ years transitioned into entrepreneurship, founding 3 small industrial services related contracting businesses. As you’ll see below, running these companies eventually lead me to found yet a 4th business, but more on that in a minute…. Here’s a brief description of the first 3 companies: Berg Environmental Services, Inc.: hazardous waste disposal & transportation services, founded in August of 2003 3rd party wind energy operations & maintenance services provider to utility scale wind farms throughout the US, founded in September 2007 3rd party oil & gas exploration & production services provider, founded in August of 2011 Each of these companies operated in extremely dangerous working conditions and exposed my employees to a wide range of serious health & safety hazards on a daily basis. To complicate matters, 2 of the companies also exposed the environment to significant potential harm. In other words, I learned very early the critical importance of managing environmental, health and safety issues so as to ensure the safety of our employees and the environment, as well as minimizing related risks. But I also learned how incredibly difficult and challenging this endeavor can be due to the wide range of complicated and continually changing environmental, health and safety rules and regulations that impacted the companies. To summarize the challenges: First I had to determine which regulations applied to each company, then I had to build compliance programs to meet those regulations, and finally I had to ensure that the programs were being managed and followed by our staff on a daily basis. All while trying to run and grow 3 profitable businesses…. It was overwhelming and I always struggled to keep up. To make matters worse, throughout this time I also witnessed the devastating price that companies, management and ownership can pay for failing to manage EHS compliance. This included seeing one of my hazardous waste management clients get sent to jail over environmental issues, another client’s management team threatened with jail time, a direct competitor get fined $378,000 by OSHA fine after an employee was nearly killed, and many others face major fines and penalties. Full disclosure, one of my companies got fined by OSHA at one point, & another was cited by TCEQ, so I know how it feels. In summary, I learned first hand how incredibly difficult it is for small companies to manage EHS compliance due to a common lack of the critical expertise, time and resources that are needed to keep up, and how this situation then ends up exposing them to these potentially catastrophic risks that can literally destroy lives and businesses. This later inspired me to found my 4th company, Berg Compliance Solutions in 2012, which is dedicated to helping other small businesses, and business owners, to manage EHS compliance and risk. Education BA, Philosophy, University of Colorado, Boulder, December, 1990. Summary of Professional Experience & Qualifications: 30+ years serving the manufacturing & industrial services sectors 30+ years of sales and marketing experience 16+ years as small business owner & entrepreneur: Founded and operated 4 small businesses since 2003. Environmental, Health & Safety Compliance & Program Related: 19 plus years of hazardous waste management including EPA, TCEQ & RCRA regulations 8 years of DOT/FMCSA compliance experience, including hazardous materials transportation 8 years of combined experience implementing and managing OSHA health and safety compliance programs for 2 high risk energy services businesses Successfully implemented and gained ISO 9001 Quality Management Certification and OHSAS 18001 (Occupational Health & Safety Advisory Service) Certification for wind energy maintenance business. Regulatory Enforcement Related Experience: Served as expert witness in criminal environmental compliance enforcement cases Superfund-CERCLA OSHA enforcement inspections, investigations and resolution in following industries: industrial services, manufacturing & construction. TCEQ enforcement inspections, investigations and resolution in manufacturing.

Berg Helps Capital Metro Protect Employees From COVID-19