time they got caught abusing the foreign student visa program to get fearful, compliant workers that they could abuse:
"PALMYRA, Pa. – The U.S. Department of Labor's Occupational Safety and Health Administration has cited Exel Inc. for nine (including six willful) workplace safety and health violations at the Eastern Distribution Center III, a facility in Palmyra owned by the Hershey Co. and operated by Exel. Proposed penalties total $283,000. OSHA also has cited the SHS Group LP, doing business as SHS Staffing Solutions, for one violation with a proposed penalty of $5,000.
The agency's inspection was conducted in response to a complaint filed by the National Guestworker Alliance on behalf of a group of foreign students who were performing summer jobs at the Palmyra facility under the U.S. Department of State's J-1 visa program. Their visas were sponsored by the nonprofit organization Council for Educational Travel-USA. The complaint alleges a number of abuses of the visa program, which is designed to promote cultural exchange, as well as exploitative and unsafe conditions in the workplace.
Under a contract with Exel, SHS Staffing Solutions hired the students to work at the Palmyra site repackaging Hershey candies for promotional displays. Exel is a contract logistics provider headquartered in Westerville, Ohio, with more than 40,000 employees at more than 500 sites in North America.
Exel was responsible for record keeping in the Palmyra facility. OSHA has cited the six willful violations with penalties totaling $280,000 for failing to record injuries and illnesses on the OSHA 300 log for four years, evaluate the accuracy of the 300 logs before certifying them for three years, and develop and implement an effective hearing conservation program. A willful violation is one committed with intentional knowledge or voluntary disregard for the law's requirements, or with plain indifference to worker safety and health. "
https://www.osha.gov/pls/oshaweb/owadisp.show_document?p_table=NEWS_RELEASES&p_id=21852
= new reply since forum marked as read
