CAL/OSHA Slams Vernon Frozen Food Manufacturer, Staffing Firm

LONG BEACH, CA — Cal/OSHA announced Wednesday it has issued citations to frozen food manufacturer Overhill Farms Inc. and its temporary employment agency Jobsource North America Inc. with over $200,000 in proposed penalties to each employer for failing to protect hundreds of employees from COVID-19 at two plants in Vernon.

Labor activists are calling the move the largest health and safety citation in the U.S. connected to the coronavirus pandemic.

The employers did not take any steps to install barriers or implement procedures to have employees work at least six feet away from each other and did not investigate any of their employees' COVID-19 infections, including more than 20 illnesses and, in the case of Overhill Farms, one death, according to Cal/OSHA Chief Doug Parker.

"It is critical that employers evaluate the workplace and take proactive measures to prevent the transmission of COVID-19 in the workplace," Parker said.

In April, a worker at Overhill died of COVID-19, igniting concerns over health and safety inside a plant. UFCW 770 filed a complaint with Cal/OSHA and these workers have cooperated with investigators over several visits to Overhill Farm facilities. At least 25 Overhill workers, at both Vernon plant locations, have become infected with COVID-19.

“We have been experiencing these poor conditions first-hand for months," Hilda Morales, a worker at Overhill Plant #1 said. "It has been scary working through this pandemic and watching co-workers get sick while wondering if I will be next. I’m glad to see Overhill being held accountable, and more importantly, hopeful that we will have safer conditions at work moving forward.”

"If a COVID-19 illness occurs, employers must investigate the case to determine if additional protective measures should be taken and report the serious illnesses and deaths to Cal/OSHA. Employers should also notify workers of possible exposure and report outbreaks to county public health officials."

Cal/OSHA opened inspections of Overhill Farms and Jobsource on April 28 after receiving complaints of hazards related to COVID-19. The inspections included visits to two facilities in Vernon where Overhill Farms employees and workers from Jobsource manufacture a variety of frozen foods.

Cal/OSHA found hundreds of employees were exposed to serious illness from COVID-19 due to the lack of physical distancing procedures among workers, including where they clock in and out of their shift, at the cart where they put on gloves and coats, in the break room, on the conveyor line and during packing operations, Parker said.

At the larger of the two facilities Cal/OSHA identified 330 employees of Overhill Farms and 60 employees of Jobsource were exposed to the virus from the lack of physical distancing, Parker said.

At the smaller facility, Cal/OSHA found 80 Overhill Farms workers and 40 employees of Jobsource did packing operations, worked in the marinating area and processed raw poultry without any distancing procedures or protective barriers in place, according to Parker.

Other violations that put workers at risk of exposure to COVID-19 include the failure by both employers to train employees on the hazards presented by the virus and failure to investigate any of the more than 20 COVID- 19 illnesses and one death Cal/OSHA uncovered amongst their employees.

The employers did not adequately communicate the COVID-19 hazards to their workforce, and Overhill did not report a COVID-19 fatality to Cal/OSHA, Parker said.

The COVID-19 related violations cited at both plants include $222,075 in proposed penalties to Overhill Farms and $214,080 in proposed penalties to Jobsource, with an additional $14,450 in proposed penalties for Overhill Farms for non-COVID related violations, according to Parker.

Cal/OSHA also issued citations to both employers from inspections of two accidents in February, after one worker at each of the two facilities was injured when their hands got caught in unguarded conveyor parts.

These accident inspections resulted in citations with $103,780 in proposed penalties to Overhill Farms, including for repeat violations due to a similar accident in 2016, and $29,700 in proposed penalties to Jobsource, according to CAL/OSHA.

CAL/OSHA found the following hazards during the investigation:

• Employees unable to physically distance while at work
• No injury and illness prevention plan that addresses COVID-19 as required by law
• Failure to investigate approximately 25 COVID-19 illnesses, including one fatality
• No effective training and instruction on how the virus is spread or how to safely use cleaners and disinfectants
• Insufficient measures were taken to avoid infection
• Failure to provide and maintain proper records to Cal/OSHA

Overhill issued a statement to Patch Thursday in response.

“The health and safety of our employees is our first priority," according to a company spokesperson. "We strongly disagree with Cal/OSHA’s erroneous allegations and major factual deficiencies, and will strongly contest this report. The claims of this single agency do not in any way reflect the input that we have received from the Vernon Health Department and the other agencies with COVID-19 jurisdiction who we work with."

The company argues they are following health codes and guidelines.

"Overhill Farms has not only taken steps in line with the constantly evolving federal, state, and local guidance, we have gone above and beyond those recommendations as we developed our employee safety procedures," a company spokesperson told Patch. "As just two examples of the inaccuracies from Cal/OSHA; they claimed we failed to provide plexiglass dividers or report COVID-19 cases to county public health officials. Both claims are false: we have installed over 144 plexiglass dividers and we have made reports to both the LA County and Vernon Health Departments on no less than a weekly basis. We believe our results speak to the success of our actions and the excellent implementation by our employees.”

Overhill is one of several food processing and packing plants in the Vernon area where coronavirus outbreaks have happened among workers, including 153 cases at a Farmer John plant in May.

Food workers are 9.5 times more likely to die on the job than workers in other industries, according to an Emory University study. The job was already risky before the pandemic, but the conditions have put workers at even more risk.

Following the high number of infections at the Overhill plant, union members formed a COVID-19 committee in July to address and find solutions to workplace safety concerns. About 200 workers are represented by the committee and now have the authority to implement safety and health precautions, including stopping the line during a shift if they see safety and health violations.

“It should not be so dangerous to go to work every day. I commend the leadership of the workers at Overhill for speaking up in the face of atrocious safety violations at the plant and for creating an innovative safety committee at Overhill. Without their leadership even more workers would be sick,” said John Grant, president of UFCW Local 770. “Now the state of California has weighed in with meaningful citations that show just how dangerous the working conditions were.”

The United Food and Commercial Workers International Union, which represents 1.3 million workers, has warned of the growing danger workers face in the pandemic.

As of September, 250 food workers have died from COVID-19 and more than 36,000 food workers were infected or exposed in the U.S. This includes at least 115 meatpacking worker deaths and more than 17,700 meatpacking workers infected or exposed to the virus.

At least three workers at a Santa Monica Whole Foods tested positive for the virus in July.

A Pasadena Whole Foods employee died from COVID-19 in May.

A Ralphs employee in Culver City and another in Sherman Oaks were hospitalized and died from COVID-19 in May.

- City News Service and Patch Editor Nicole Charky contributed to this report.

Editor's Note: This story was updated to include a statement from an Overhill company spokesperson.

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