ustxtxb_obs_1957_08_30_50_00004-00000_000.pdf

MARTIN ELFANT Business phone CA 4-0686 Residence phone ID 3-1210 Sun Life Assurance Company Of Canada Suite 201 Century Building 2120 Travis, Houston 2, Texas \(Dion Rogers Headquarters for the B. R. Parking Lot Marker Rent-a-Tool Co. “Let Our Tools Work for You” SALES RENTALS PARTS 709 Quitman St. Phone CA 4-2879 Houston NewWork Health Rules constitutes no limitation on the kind of place which may be entered.” Against this weighty legal backdrop the health department promulgated, on Sept. 1 of last year, its first “regulations” for industrial establishments. These set out required safeguards against radiation exposure, a relatively minor industrial hazard in Texas. During the year the department issued various advisory bulletins concerning cotton gin wastes and “economic poisons,” or toxic pesticides. They do not have the status of regulations. The division cooperates with the Texas Medical Assn., the Texas Assn. of Osteopathic Physicians and Surgeons, and the Industrial Nurses Assn. in planning programs and dispensing information to local doctors and health authorities to reduce occupational health hazards. The New Rules The new “occupational health regulations,” also called “environmental standards for employee health in industrial establishments,” supercede the old Board of Health’s 1943 “advisory standards on industrial sanitation.” “Consult local health departments and physicians for information and advice on methods of control over health hazards to all workers and industrial diseases and injuries,” the regulations pamphlet suggests. The regulations apply “to all industrial establishments” and “prescribe minimum environmental requirements for the protection of the health of employees.” In the definitions is found this unequivocal item: “10. Shall. Where `shall’ is used for a provision specified hereinafter, that provision is intended to be mandatory.” The imperative “shall” is used in discussion of 53 areas of requirement. Copies of the complete regulations are available from the health department. The most important mandatory provisions are reviewed here. “All places of employment” \(de. fined as “any place where two or more persons are directly or inshall be kept “clean and sanitary.” Floors shall be clean and “so far as possible” dry. Cleaning and sweeping shall be doneif possible outside of working hours in a way to minimize air contamination. Working places shall be kept free from nails, splinters, holes, loose boards, or obstructions dangerous to workers. Spitting on walls, floors, workplaces, or stairs “shall not be permitted.” Cuspidors, “undesirable,” shall be cleaned at least once daily if used. Receptacles for p erish able wastes shall be kept in sanitary condition and shall have tightfitting covers. Wastes shall be removed in a manner that does not menace health. Reasonable precautions shall be taken against rodents, insects, and vermin of any kind. Places of work shall be ventilated in accordance with local requirements. \(If there are none, the regulations recommend 20 cubic feet of outside air per minute per person in places with less than 200 cubic feet of room air space per person and smaller quantities for more commodious Potable water shall be provided in adequate supply. \(It “should” be available within 200 feet of fountains shall be of a type approved by the state agency or local health authorities. If water is cooled by ice, the ice cannot come in direct contact with the water. Barrels, pails, or tanks, as well as the common drinking cup, are prohibited. If industries provide water from their own water systems, the regulations require periodic testing of the water for potability. Non-potable water outlets shall be clearly marked. There shall be no cross-connection or possibility of back-flow between potable and non-potable water supplies. Nonpotable water shall not be used for bathing or washing any part of the person or clothing, aishes, or premises, except as specifically permitted by health authorities. Toilet facilities shall be adequate for each sex and shall be “readily accessible.” “Toilet facilities so located that employees must use more than one floor-tofloor flight of stairs to or from them are not considered as readily accessible.” They “should” be within 200 feet of working locations. Water closets shall be provided for each sex according to this table: one for one to nine persons; two for 10 to 24 persons; three for 25 to 49 persons; four for 50 to 74 persons; five for 75 to 100 persons; one for each additional 30 persons over 100. Water closets shall be well supplied. Each shall have adequate washing facilities_ Toilet facilities shall be private in accordance with specified standards. When chemical closets or privies are permitted they shall be of a type approved by local health authorities and shall be maintained in a sanitary condition. Adequate facilities for personal cleanliness shall be provided. At least one wash basin with hot and cold water shall be provided for every 20 employees up to 100 and one more for every additional 25 employees or a portion thereof. If employees are exposed to skin contamination in their work, one wash basin shall be provided for every five employees. Rest for Women One shower bath with hot and cold water shall be supplied for every 15 workers or a smaller number who are exposed to excessive heat or to skin contamination. Individual hand towels of cloth or paper shall be provided. If workers customarily change from street clothes or have to change work clothes because their work involves exposure to excessive dirt, heat, fumes, vapor, or moistures, separate change or dressing rooms with individual clothes facilities shall be provided. If work may contaminate work clothes, facilities “should” be available to keep street and work clothes separate. If work clothes become wet, steps shall be taken to insure that they dry before they are worn again. If ten or more women work in Daniel Plans Lobby Curb master plan by a to-be-created division of the State Board of Water Engineers. A “well-paid engineer,” probably to be known as the state water planning en gineer, will head this division. Daniel wants the new division to go to work at once, working with federal, state and local agencies, because, “if the state government does not initiate its own water planning program, one of Either the federal agencies will do our planning and determine one of the few states in the nation without any water plan at all..” The Daniel water plan also recommends that the legislature au contract with the federal government for water storage space in federal reservoirs to be paid for out of future revenues. The state There is about $500,000 unused in funds of the Texas Prison Systern, set up as insurance against a possible failure of the 1957 cotton crop, now pretty well in. He believes this money can be made available. There was a veiled threat in the Governor’s statement on his water plans aimed at the legislature’s anti-federals: Referring to Sen. Lyndon Johnson’s call for the Bureau of Reclamation and the Corps of Engineers to come up with a comprehensive statewide water plan means, Daniel said, that the federal government will take over Texas water if the state shows no leadership. L.J. a place at one time, at least one “retiring room” has to be provided “with the understanding that it is to be used only for rest and emergencies and not for smoking or recreation purposes.” Where less than ten women. work and a rest room is not furnished, an equivalent space that can be properly screened for privacy shall be provided. At least one couch or bed shall be provided where more than ten women are employed. The number of beds required: one for 10 to 100 women, two for 100 to 250, and one for each 250 additional women. Lunch rooms shall be clean, and they shall be at least this large: eight square feet per person for 25 persons or less; seven for 26 to 74 persons; six for 75 to 149 persons; five for 150 to 499 persons; and four for 500 or more persons. IN HOUSTON BELL INSURANCE AGENCY 2307 CAROLINE STREET CA 8-4469 ALL KINDS OF INSURANCE SINCE 1929 SDEC Slams Labor Leaders AUSTIN The State Democratic Executive Committee mounts a bitter attack on the Texas State AFL-CIO and its leaders, Jerry Holleman and Fred Schmidt in its Aug. 21 “Texas Democratic Newsletter.” Wrote the state committee: “It is an open admission by leaders of both the AFL and CIO that the main reason why these two organizations have merged is because of the added political power it might give organized labor. Repeated statements by both Jerry Holleman, new president of the AFL-CIO in Texas, and Fred Schmidt, secretary-treasurer, reflect that one of the primary rea “This past month the …. committee received letters from both Speaker Sam Rayburn and Senate Majority Leader Lyndon Johnson … for action taken in sending the balance of last fall’s campaign funds to the National Democratic Commit t e e. Said Speaker Rayburn: ‘Certainly your committee has done the generous thing.’ Senator Johnson commented that he thought the matter had been handled properly.” The newsletter, which presumably is being written by Jake Pickle, the full-time organizer of the committee, also belabors The Texas Observer as a “mouth organ” and seeks to reason that since the Observer has criticized Sen. Ralph Yarborough on specific points of issue, there is “dissension in the DOT ranks.” \(See page The entire paragraph reads: “DOT CROWD FEUDING? The Texas Observer, mouth organ of the labor-ultra-liberal-egghead triumvirate, has been taking some surprising pokes at Senator Ralph Yarborough. ‘Surprising’ for two reasons: first, the Observer is owned by Mrs. Frankie Randolph, longtime Yarborough booster; and second, some of the strongest jibes at Yarborough have been thrown by Lyman Jones, his press agent for several years up to a few weeks ago when Jones came back from Washington and became associate editor of the Observer. Jones intimated in the July 26 issue that Yarborough had double-crossed the Negroes. There have been rumblings of dissension in the DOT ranks since labor organizers took open control in their May convention, and the signs of behind-thescenes feuding are becoming more evident as time passes.” THE TEXAS OBSERVER Page 4 Aug. 30, 1957 COMPLETE INSURANCE SERVICE HALL’S WIGINTON-HALL LEAGUE CITY INSURANCE AGENCY INSURANCE AGENCY INSURANCE AGENCY Dickinson, Texas Alvin, Texas League City, Texas thorize the board of Water Ensons of consolidating their forces gineers \(whose tangled affairs was to bring about a greater imDaniel promised he would “perpact at the ballot box, and pa,. tivities next September.” SDEC notes from the Texas State AFL-CIO Report that the Dallas AFL-CIO Council plans to would hold this storage until a hire a full-time director of wom ll local agency or a city needed and en’s activities to assist in a poll could pay for it. r tax campaign, and comments: “While addition to the money for While the paid labor organplanning, Daniel will seek about izer are planning these statewide $500,000 with which to match the movements with paid workers, what are the rank and file Demo topographic amount in federal funds for oats in each county doing to see topographic mapping \(which the federal government will do with that the party machinery con section of Texas Democrats rather than becoming a satellite of such labor organizers? It is not too early to be thinking about fighting the extremists who in the money? There are, he said, several “examples of possibilities.” He has some $300,000 available in emergency funds; he would not hesitate to use these. “I consider this an emergency.” sist on control for selfish reasons.” Also noted is a commendation of the SDEC by Sam Rayburn and Lyndon Johnson: