Preventing Injuries, Improving Workplace Practices

By Suzy Frisch

Eden Prairie has a clear-cut focus when it comes to workplace safety: ensuring that all employees make it home without injury every day. As it works to meet federal requirements, the city emphasizes creating a culture of safety that encourages buy-in across departments.

The U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) requires employers with more than 25 workers — including municipalities — to operate a safety committee. Small cities often assume that they don’t meet this requirement. However, they typically do because volunteer firefighters are included in the count, said Kate Connell, loss control field manager for the League of Minnesota Cities Insurance Trust (LMCIT). As a result, most Minnesota cities are required to operate committees focused on employee safety.

Mandy Zimmermann, a human resources representative for Eden Prairie, is responsible for the city’s workplace safety efforts. Creating awareness around safety is the primary objective underpinning this work.

“My ultimate goal for safety, and the committee’s goal, is to be proactive because we want every single employee to go home safely at the end of their shift,” Zimmermann said. “It’s also creating an environment where folks feel comfortable coming to you if they see something or if they made a mistake. We want to learn from mistakes and change course so that it doesn’t happen again.”

The role of safety committees

Safety committees play an integral role in supporting citywide safety efforts, identifying potential hazards, and building a shared responsibility for keeping all city staff safe. And though the committees are often required, cities can go beyond simply checking a box. Instead, focusing on best practices helps ensure safety efforts lead to meaningful results.

“The main goal of safety committees is to help reduce workplace injuries and prevent losses, ensure legal compliance with OSHA, and identify and address hazards,” Connell said. “Safety committees engage employees in safety efforts, help reduce workplace accidents incident rates, and help create a good safety culture in the city.”

Committees also help promote a culture of safety by bringing new perspectives to the work. Rather than viewing risk as a compliance issue, Connell encourages a mindset rooted in care and concern. For example, if an employee is working on trenching or excavation, the message should go beyond rule enforcement.

“The new mindset is to get out of the trench because I care if you get hurt,” Connell added. “Yes, we have to comply with the rules, but we can take it one step further and say that I want you to go home safely at the end of the day and I don’t want you to get hurt. A good safety committee helps create that mindset for safety culture.”

Best practices

There are many steps cities can take to get the most out of their safety committees. From membership and meeting agendas to preparing for OSHA inspections, these practices can help cities operate effective committees and prevent employee injuries.

Committee membership
Committee size should reflect the size of the city. Smaller municipalities should aim for committees with at least three members, while larger cities should cap their rosters at 12, Connell said. Keeping the committees appropriately sized helps them run more efficiently and effectively.

It’s also important to include representatives from all city departments, including police, fire, parks, administration, and public works. Connell recommends drawing from multiple levels of the organization, including management, supervisors, and front-line staff.

“That helps make sure that you are getting a different set of eyes from each department at meetings,” she said. “It’s good to have a mix of management and employees, because employees are the ones doing the work day-in and day-out, seeing the hazards and the safety issues.”

Meeting structure
Effective safety committees meet on a regular schedule and use agendas to stay on track. Establishing a consistent meeting date — such as the first Wednesday of each month — helps members plan ahead and attend consistently. In Eden Prairie, Zimmermann sends a reminder a couple days before each meeting and keeps the gatherings to about 30 minutes.

The city also rotates its meeting locations, allowing committee members to visit sites they may not regularly visit, such as the fire station or community center.

“It’s good for the members to see all the different environments that the city has to offer,” Zimmermann added. “It provides good understanding for committee members. Then when we talk about a situation, they have been there and have a sense of what we’re talking about.”

In addition, Zimmermann works to keep meetings fresh. She gets committee members even more engaged by having them take turns presenting about a safety topic of their choosing. The committee has learned about engineering field hazards, water safety, sleep, mental health, and more.

Communication
Cities with effective safety programs communicate regularly with employees about their committees’ work. Newsletters, employee emails, and posters can help cities share information about hazards, committee priorities, and other safety reminders, Connell said.

Committee members also should relay information from meetings back to their departments and leadership teams.

“Sometimes safety committee members will talk amongst themselves, but don’t bring information back to their departments,” Connell said. “We have seen success in cities that bring the safety information that the committee talked about back to their departments.”

Joining forces
For smaller cities, meeting safety requirements can feel daunting, but collaboration can help. Many communities band together through regional safety groups to share resources and ideas, said Justin Sorensen, chief of the Waconia Fire Department and the city’s safety coordinator. Each month, Sorensen represents Waconia on the West Carver Regional Safety Group and also oversees the city’s internal safety committee, which meets quarterly.

“The regional groups support the smaller cities that don’t have the resources of the larger cities, but we all learn from each other,” Sorensen said. “It’s a networking tool for us to bounce ideas off of each other and see how other cities have dealt with something. It’s always a good use of time.”

These regional safety groups, often coordinated by the Minnesota Municipal Utilities Association (MMUA), help support small cities with tasks like completing required OSHA training. Typically, three to six cities meet monthly or every other month and work with the association on training and other safety initiatives, Connell said.

Getting into the details

Looking at safety challenges from both broad and detailed perspectives is another way committees help protect city employees. These committees often conduct safety audits or inspections at different locations, such as playgrounds or public works shops to identify potential hazards and then address them, Connell said.

This is when it’s especially helpful to have committee members from different departments.

“At a park, a committee member from the police department or fire department is seeing something that the parks person isn’t seeing because they see it all the time,” Connell said. “They have a different set of eyes.”

At regional safety group meetings, MMUA staff or committee members often share recent experiences with OSHA inspections, including which violations inspectors had focused on, Sorensen said. That information helps cities prepare for their own unannounced inspections, such as fixing known issues and conducting mock inspections.

Cities also can improve safety by reviewing workers’ compensation claims. Eden Prairie’s safety committee reviews monthly data on injuries and liability claims and determines whether the incidents warrant further action. Zimmermann also worked with LMCIT staff on a pattern analysis to identify the most common types of incidents.

In the city’s case, the biggest category included slips, trips, and falls. This information prompted Eden Prairie’s safety committee to focus on promoting safer work practices related to those risks.

“These small, proactive responses can really help avoid these situations in the future,” Zimmermann said.

Whether it’s through regional groups or city-based safety committees, regular attention to safety helps ensure employee well-being remains a priority.

“Being involved and staying involved keeps everyone accountable,” Sorensen said. The regional meetings serve as a monthly reminder to get busy taking care of the things you haven’t taken care of yet. We’re all taking this seriously together.”

Suzy Frisch is a freelance writer.