Former Monsanto exec is Bush’s OSHA choice
Former Monsanto exec is Bush’s OSHA choice
Foe of ergo rule calls him good friend’
President Bush has announced his intent to name John L. Henshaw, MPH, as his pick
for the assistant secretary who will head the Department of Labor’s Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA).
Henshaw, 51, is currently serving as director of environment, safety, and health for Astaris LLC,
a joint venture of a Monsanto spin-off called Solutia Inc. and a second company called PMC. Henshaw served for 16 years in the Air National Guard as a bio-environmental engineer, and he came to St. Louis-based Monsanto as an industrial hygienist in 1975.
According to press accounts, Henshaw’s nomination has been sought by Sen. Kit Bond (R-MO), a harsh critic of the ergonomics rule. That rule was an early casualty of the Bush administration. Bond has called Henshaw "a good friend" who would be "a credit to the administration."
Because Henshaw "knows the subject" of industrial hygiene, "it won’t take him long to be brought up to speed" on the proposed TB rule, says Mandy Edens, MPH, the industrial hygienist at OSHA who has served as chief architect of the rule. That could mean relatively swift action on the rule, assuming that Henshaw is confirmed as the new chief.
Confirmation hearings on new appointees might be bogged down in partisan disputes, now that the Senate has slipped from Republican control, thanks to the recent defection from the party by Sen. Jim Jeffords of Vermont. Plus, OSHA —
a relatively small federal agency with just 2,300 employees nationwide — is more or less at the end of the Labor Department line when it comes to appointments, notes Edens.
"Three or four other senior appointments have to be made first," she notes.
All this suggests the TB rule will continue gathering dust for the foreseeable future.
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