June 14, 2011
Hon. Joseph N. DiVincenzo, Jr.
Essex County Executive
Hall of Records, Room 405
465 Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Blvd.
Newark, NJ, 07102
Re: The Essex County Deathtrap
Notice of Unsafe or Unhealthful Working Conditions
Dear Mr. DiVincenzo:
Attached, please find the New Jersey Department of Labor and Workforce Development (DOLWD) Office of Public Employees' Occupational Safety and Health (PEOSH) Notice of Unsafe or Unhealthful Working Conditions issued yesterday regarding the County-owned 50 South Clinton Street, East Orange building.
The State DOLWD, at the behest of CWA Local 1081, conducted inspections of the building on May 25, 2011 and June 1, 2011. Our Union filed the complaints with the State which precipitated the inspections based upon long-standing dangerous conditions within the site as highlighted by the May 18, 2011 area wide electrical blackout that left the 50 South Clinton Street facility totally without emergency lighting for its halls and exits due to a defective generator upon the roof.
Within its Order to Comply, the State cited five (5) "Serious" violations and three (3) "Other Than Serious" violations that, if not corrected before August 15, 2011, will cost the County's taxpayers a minimum of $16,600.00. Much more importantly than the money, were these cited violations not expeditiously corrected the safety, and indeed the very lives, of the County and State employees assigned there as well as that, and those, of their clients consisting of men, women, children and those of them the disabled will be placed in further considerable jeopardy.
Our Union has oft asserted, only half jokingly, that were grass or Astroturf placed upon the surface of the roof of this direly decrepit edifice your administration would well declare it a "park" thus afford it the requisite attention and upkeep.
Instead, the employees and clients assigned to this deathtrap in disguise need depend upon their Unions and the State to compel your Administration to pay minimally significantly scanter attention and resources than you have historically paid upon the animals within your apparently far more precious zoo.
To paraphrase H.G. Wells from his 1896 novel The Island of Doctor Moreau, "What is the law? Are we not men (and women)?" The story explores different kinds of respect. Respect is defined: “To feel or show deferential regard for.” The villagers respect their master, Moreau, but the respect is more based on fear than earned admiration or esteem. The villagers feared the “house of pain” and the “fire that kills” and obey Moreau to avoid these things.
The employees and clients assigned to the County-owned 50 South Clinton Street fear your "house of pain" and the potential "fire that kills" therein were conditions not immediately remediated. And we, as Moreau's creations, shall someday soon return to our true nature and shake off the feckless shackles of fear and intimidation.
Sincerely,
David H. Weiner, President
CWA Local 1081