The New York Committee for Occupational Safety and Health (NYCOSH) was founded in 1976 to advocate for safe and healthy workplaces. NYCOSH bases much of its advocacy on the Occupational Safety and Health Act of 1970 and has helped spearhead successful efforts to preserve the Federal Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA).
The Occupational Safety and Health Act of 1970 established rules and regulations governing health and safety standards in American workplaces. In the mid-seventies, the Federal Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) funded several educational programs under the auspices of Cornell University's Labor Studies Program. These programs increased health and safety consciousness among health care professionals. Out of these programs, a group of individuals organized NYCOSH in 1976 as an independent organization to advocate safe and healthy workplaces. NYCOSH's began as a strictly volunteer organization which solicited membership from labor unions and individuals. Initially, NYCOSH's budget consisted of funds collected in member dues. Eventually, NYCOSH began supplementing its budget with grant monies from city, state, and federal offices as well as private foundation grants.
The steering committee represented the central body around which NYCOSH worked, with a number of single issue committees designed to address specific topics faced by members. The committees included the health and technical, reproductive rights, workers' compensation, and political education. The most active of these committees were the health and technical, workers' compensation, and political education committees. The health and technical committee collected information regarding health and safety issues for a variety of occupations and organized educational forums, fact sheets, pamphlets, and other tools designed to inform workers of potential health and safety risks associated with their jobs. The workers' compensation committee helped individuals in their pursuit of compensation for injuries and illness resulting from their work. The committee produced a pamphlet describing all of the steps necessary for successful completion of workers' compensation disputes. The committee also drafted and lobbied for strong workers' compensation legislation at all governmental levels. The political education committee lead most of NYCOSH's lobbying initiatives, including regulations for saving OSHA legislation, asbestos, and right to know laws.
NYCOSH provided four basic services for its members, technical support, educational services, political education, and a task force addressing the special needs of minority workers.
Ronald Reagan's election in 1980, represented a serious threat to OSHA legislation. Numerous other COSH organizations, environmental organizations, and other politically oriented groups, and unions, joined NYCOSH forming a national coalition to fight attempts to weaken OSHA legislation. NYCOSH played a major role coordinating what would become the Committee to Save OSHA and efforts to persuade federal officials, senators and congressmen that OSHA must be maintained as it was and, in the future, strengthened. For the duration of the Reagan Administration, NYCOSH would reinstate the coalition to address threats to the legislation. Other topics that NYCOSH addressed in the 1980s included toxic substances and reproductive hazards and attempts to regulate women's work based on these issues. NYCOSH published its first reproductive hazard curriculum in 1980. Asbestos hazards became a major concern for the organization also. The health hazards workers and communities faced from asbestos remains a central issue in NYCOSH organizing. The first of a number of conferences addressing the issues related to asbestos hazards was staged in 1980.
In 1981, NYCOSH busied itself with a large number of conferences and activities. The growth of the organization demanded that it hire a full-time and part-time staff person to facilitate its services and activities. Joel Shufro, a board member, became the executive director of the organization, and continues to lead NYCOSH. Over the course of the year, NYCOSH held several conferences on topics such as toxic substances, hazardous wastes, and workers' "right to know." Work also began on a major conference devoted to the problems of minority workers called the Harlem Occupational Health Conference and on one about hazards in the office. Legislation which NYCOSH began working on in 1981 included the asbestos compensation, longshore and harbors workers' compensation and New York State workers' compensation bills. Legislative lobbying for occupational safety and health continued to be one of NYCOSH's major functions. In 1982 the longshore and harbors workers' legislation passed even though NYCOSH and other organizations lobbied strongly against it.
In 1984, because of major lobbying efforts by NYCOSH, the New York State Senate established the Committee on Occupational Health and Safety. NYCOSH also organized all of its fact sheets and published a list of publications it produced and made available to the public. Part of this organizing effort resulted in a resource guide and a library for membership and public use. This year also began NYCOSH's work to pass an asbestos control law in New York City. This effort was successful in 1986 with the passage of the law.
NYCOSH's worked continued with the Asbestos Task Force and video display terminal (VDT), right to know, and workers' compensation issues at the forefront of its efforts. These efforts culminated in 1988 with the passage of the asbestos control legislation in New York City, the NYC Community Right to Know law, and the nation's first VDT law passed in Suffolk County. In 1989, NYCOSH's lobbying efforts passed the Workers' Compensation Reform bill in New York State.
Recently, NYCOSH has been involved in the struggle to gain medical screening and care for 9/11's first responders and cleanup workers. NYCOSH's longtime Executive Director, Joel Shufro, retired in 2014.
