Worried about OSHA silica compliance? Not if you’re in one of these five states by D.A. Duggar, John Martin | Ogletree, Deakins, Nash, Smoak & Stewart, P.C. sponsored by BUSINESS TIP With the Occupational Safety and Health Administration’s (OSHA) sil- ica standard already in effect for the construction industry and about to go into effect in June of 2018 for general industry, many employers are anxious about whether their programs will pass muster with fed- eral and state OSHA officials. But if you’re in Maryland, worry not. Two years after then-Secretary of Labor Tom Perez heralded the issuance of a final rule on Occupational Exposure to Respirable Crystalline Silica at the International Union of Bricklayers and Allied Craftworkers’ John J. Flynn BAC/IMI International Training Center in Bowie, Maryland, the “Old Line State” has still not adopted a corresponding silica standard. Section 18 of the Occupational Safety and Health Act (OSH Act) provides that states may choose to develop and enforce their own occupational safety and health stan- dards. Localized oversight of work- place safety is permitted so long as the state occupational and safety health plan is “at least as effec- tive in providing safe and health- ful employment and places of employment”as the federal stan- dards. Though state health and safety stan- dards often sim- ply emulate corresponding federal health and safety standards, states can seek to implement standards that are more stringent than their federal counterparts. California’s recently enacted Process Safety Management for Petroleum Refineries is one example of a more stringent state standard. But what happens when states fail to imple- ment any corresponding health and safety standard? Maryland’s decision Not much, apparently. In the case of OSHA’s silica standard, the administration gave states six months from the March 25, 2016, issuance date to adopt their own respective silica standards. Noting the numerous delays announced by OSHA in the enforcement date of the construction silica standard, FLAT FAST FINISH 28 TileLetter | May 2018