Stamp of approval

LAKEVILLE -- The 66 employees at the Lakeville-Middleborough postal carrier annex can rest assured their work environment is safer than most: The facility is one of a select group that has earned a distinguished "Star" award from the US Labor Department's Occupational Safety and Health Administration, which recognizes work sites where employee safety standards significantly exceed what is required by federal law.

Frank Bowen , postmaster for Lakeville and Middleborough, said the annex is the first postal operation in Southeastern Massachusetts to earn the award. Only 1,600 work sites of any kind nationwide carry the designation.

Bowen said the annex, where mail for Middleborough and Lakeville is sorted and bagged for carriers, opened at its location off Route 105 a year ago. Prior to that, carriers and sorters in Middleborough and Lakeville worked in cramped buildings in their respective towns.

The new facility offered management and employees a unique opportunity to examine how things were done and devise ways to improve the system. The attitude of the workers was good from the start, Bowen said, so it wasn't much of a challenge to get everybody behind the effort to improve the workplace.

"It doesn't work everywhere," Bowen said. "The people have to want to do it. The people here wanted to."

Following the guidelines in OSHA's Voluntary Protection Program , a team of managers, sorters, and carriers was appointed to head the effort. "I initiated it, but then I was second fiddle," Bowen said. Mike Lundstedt , a letter carrier, took over as coordinator of the effort.

"We found out we were doing very well, but getting into this program still taught us a lot," Bowen said.

According to Lundstedt, workers at the facility belong to three unions, and each voted to back the program. Carriers were asked to put together a list of their most difficult deliveries; it could be that a mailbox was too high or too low, or that the surrounding ground made the box difficult to reach.

"What we found was we were putting people in situations where they could have an accident," Bowen said. Letters were sent to customers outlining the problem with their mail delivery site. "In four months, we changed the locations [for mail delivery] for 300 customers, and we didn't get a single complaint," he said.

Improvements were also made to the building and equipment. "We went over every single way an employee could get hurt and found ways to avoid it," said Bowen. For instance, aisles that must remain open at all times are marked off with yellow tape.

Lundstedt said some of the problems were caused by outdated equipment. "The postmaster allowed us to order what we needed," he said.

Workers now have ergonomic mats to protect them from the effects of standing all day on a concrete floor and spring-loading carts to protect their backs. Platforms have been tailor-made for more diminutive sorters, so they don't have to reach up when slotting the mail, possibly damaging a shoulder joint.

One of the challenges at the facility is an aging staff. "The workforce is getting older without a lot of backfill of younger people," Bowen said, because more and more of the operation has become automated. A large percentage of the carriers and sorters are older than 50, and some are within a few years of retirement.

The carriers were supplied with several items to protect them from on-the-job injury. "We bought carriers individual hand carts to put in their trucks for heavy packages, and supplied them with hand warmers and foot warmers, and specialized cleats for winter," Bowen said. "We have 13,000 deliveries every day. The mail is important, but people are more important. We do not make an unsafe delivery."

When the Voluntary Protection Program team -- Marie Pentz , Darlene Gobbi , Ken Packard, and Bob Shurtleff , along with Bowen and Lundstedt -- felt the facility was ready, they invited OSHA representatives to put it to the test. Federal safety inspectors checked out the facility and randomly interviewed 20 employees.

"Most people hear 'OSHA' and they think 'Be afraid of them,' " Bowen said. Such scrutiny by a government agency is not usually requested. But in this case, it paid off.

"Our review found that the Lakeville facility's safety and health management system is consistent with the high quality expected of VPP participants, and its illness and injury rates remain well below the industry average," wrote Marthe Kent , OSHA's New England regional administrator, in announcing the facility's Star award.

Bowen said motor vehicle accidents involving postal carriers are down as a result of moving mail boxes in hazardous locations . "The first year I was here, there were six motor vehicle accidents," he said. "Right now, we haven't had an accident since May of 2005." And the facility has always had a very strong record for few absences due to illness or injury, Bowen said.

Lundstedt said OSHA wants to make certain the safety improvements become permanent . "A lot of it is attitude," he said. "They want to make sure it's not just a one-month thing." He said everyone at the facility is completely on board with the effort. "We're not just employees here," he said. "We're like family."

Standing testament to that assertion is a large bulletin board, in the middle of the annex, featuring photos of family members and friends of the employees. Bowen pointed to a photo of his daughter.

"It reminds us that this is why we're doing what we do," he said.

Christine Wallgren can be reached at clwallgren@aol.com.