If reporter Tori Yorgey wasn’t on live television when she was hit by an SUV on the night of Jan. 19 there’s a good chance the incident never would’ve been reported to the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA).
When she was struck she was working as a multimedia journalist (MMJ) for WSAZ in West Virginia performing duties as a reporter and live camera operator alone during the 11 p.m. show.
The Radio Television Digital News Association (RTDNA) says MMJs currently make up about 12 percent of the staff members in an average local TV news department, and that MMJs comprise the highest percentage of newly-hired TV news employees. By comparison, traditional TV news reporters, who work with a designated photographer instead of by themselves, make up about 7 percent of an average news department’s staff. The RTDNA’s latest survey done in conjunction with Syracuse University found that there is a total of about 28,000 TV news employees nationwide, an all-time high.
The use of MMJs has skyrocketed over the past decade and a half according to the research. In 2007, the study found that about 22 percent of U.S. TV newsrooms reported “mostly using” MMJs. In 2021, 60 percent reported mostly using them.
“The figures are only approximations, and they’re pretty rough,” Bob Papper, the Syracuse University adjunct professor who oversees the study, told Discrepancy Report. “Many news directors just put reporters down when they’re really MMJs. I’m confident that the total number of MMJs is considerably higher than it appears.”
The Union Membership and Coverage Database estimates 6.7 percent of news analysts, reporters, and journalists are union members. That includes broadcast, print, and digital reporters.
The incident involving Yorgey prompted calls for change, particularly to the practice of solo reporting/MMJ work, from the president of the Society of Professional Journalists (SPJ), the Screen Actors Guild – American Federation of Television and Radio Artists (SAG-AFTRA), and the nonprofit Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) as well as several current and former journalists.
Discrepancy Report has discovered the federal government doesn’t track data on injuries related to solo reporting in part because employers are not required to report many incidents and because databases used by regulators don’t include subcategories for solo reporting or even distinguish whether journalists are working in the field or not at the time of an injury.
“The incident was observed on television by OSHA staff, and an investigation opened as a result,” Leni Fortson, a spokesperson for the U.S. Labor Department, which OSHA is part of, told Discrepancy Report on Feb. 4. “We are handling the investigation at this time as an inquiry, which means we present the concerns about the hazard to the employer, and provide them a timeframe to respond about their actions to remedy the hazard.”
On Feb. 28, Joanna Hawkins, an OSHA spokesperson, said, “Information regarding the employer’s incident investigation and actions were received and reviewed as a result of the inquiry. No citations were issued.”
Hawkins would not say what information the agency received. She said more details would be available in the complete OSHA report that Discrepancy Report asked for in a Freedom of Information Act request.
OSHA released the report in the form of a redacted PDF on March 14. It shows the agency relied solely on the account of WSAZ’s general manager in its investigation of the case.
Yorgey was reporting on weather conditions and a water main break at the time. WSAZ, which is owned by Gray Television, aired a follow-up story the next day. In it, Yorgey explained that she was on the pavement of an apartment complex and not on the road when the collision happened.
“My boss took me to the hospital, and I did get checked out. Everything is OK,” she said. “I am good, little bit sore but nothing major and no broken bones!”
WSAZ’s news director did not immediately respond to four emails and a voicemail seeking comment.
‘One of the biggest threats to safety’
OSHA has the authority to create new safety standards for workplaces.
But Hawkins said, “OSHA is not considering a rule or standard related to this issue at this time.”
She would not explain why.
“OSHA does not have standards specific for the journalism/media industry,” Kimberly Darby, another OSHA spokesperson, explained. “However, the Occupational Safety and Health Act requires employers to comply with all applicable OSHA standards. They must also comply with the General Duty Clause of the OSH Act, which requires employers to keep their workplace free of serious recognized hazards.”
OSHA does have specific standards for other industries including construction, agriculture, maritime, and more.
Recommendations for standards may also come from the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH), which is part of the Department of Health and Human Services.
Stephanie Stevens, a NIOSH spokesperson, said the agency is currently not investigating solo reporting or health hazards for journalists in general. That despite concerns voiced by Rebecca Aguilar, the SPJ’s president, SAG-AFTRA, which after the incident called for the practice of solo live shots to end, and Lucy Westcott, emergencies director for the nonprofit Committee to Protect Journalists, who told Discrepancy Report Yorgey’s story “again highlights the huge gap that needs to be filled across the country in terms of safety information.”
Westcott said a 2019 CPJ report she co-authored identified solo reporting “as one of the biggest threats to safety” for female reporters in the U.S. and Canada.
“Every occupation has risks and NIOSH doesn’t have the resources to study and address all those risks,” Stevens explained. “Hence, we have adopted the burden, need, and impact approach to more systematically allocate our resources to the areas of greatest need. In an effort to make sure that resources are spread across different industries, health outcomes, and special emphasis areas, NIOSH also maintains and relies on the NIOSH Program Portfolio.”
The Program Portfolio organizes the agency’s activities into several specific categories like manufacturing, construction, services, motor vehicle safety, work and fatigue, workplace violence, and traumatic injury protection.
Stevens said research priorities are influenced by the number of workers at risk for a particular injury or illness, the seriousness of a hazard or problem, and the chance that new data or approaches can make a difference.
“Burden data is typically surveillance data from various surveillance systems including reports from the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) within the Department of Labor related to occupational fatalities, injuries or illnesses within an industry or occupation,” she told Discrepancy Report. “Media reports or other anecdotal evidence may also be a data point that is considered.”
‘Likely underreported’
Most if not all of the data sets NIOSH uses, including BLS’s, categorize journalists broadly as “news analysts, reporters, and correspondents” or “news analysts, reporters, and journalists” which Stevens said, “is itself a small population.”
The latest BLS estimate says about 41,580 Americans fit into the category. That includes people who work inside and outside as broadcast, print, and/or digital content creators amid a variety of conditions.
Each year the BLS publishes a Survey of Occupational Injuries and Illnesses (SOII) to track nonfatal workplace injuries and illnesses, but the BLS admits, “Research indicates that the number of injuries and illnesses is likely underreported in the SOII.”
The BLS requires the approximately 230,000 employers selected for the survey annually to keep OSHA logs for the entire year they’re being sampled. In the logs, they must record qualifying injuries and illnesses.
A 2020 BLS article profiles an agency study that found many employers did not keep the logs as required. In the “Information” industry, which includes television broadcasting, the BLS found that 53 percent of employers did not keep OSHA logs.
Nicole Dangermond, a BLS economist, said the agency could not offer more detailed information showing the number or percentage of employers in television broadcasting in particular who did or did not keep required OSHA logs. Dangermond repeatedly cited the BLS’s confidentiality policy, though the information Discrepancy Report requested would not contain the names of employers.
“Directly identifying employers is not the only way to risk disclosure,” Dangermond explained. “Employer disclosure can also be at risk, for example, if cell sizes are too small or if there is other publicly available information that would allow one to compare and logically unravel the content of a cell even if displayed in an aggregate format.”
“While the BLS Survey of Occupational Injury and Illnesses (SOII) data does have limitations,” Stevens said, “SOII data indicates news analysts, reporters, and correspondents generally have fewer than 100 injuries resulting in days away from work each year and in many recent years their injury rates are less than one-fifth of the rate for all occupations combined.”
Incidence rates of nonfatal occupational injuries and illnesses involving days away from work 2016 – 2020 (… by jmdglss on Scribd
Some employers are only required to keep OSHA logs during the time they’re selected for the SOII. The policy determining them is based on data that are more than a dozen years old.
The rules for logs involve a distinction between what’s considered reportable and recordable by OSHA.
An incident is reportable or required to be reported to OSHA if it is work-related and resulted in a death, hospitalization, amputation, or loss of an eye. An incident is recordable on an OSHA log (Form 300) if it was work-related, is a new case, and results in days away from work, restricted duty or transfer to another job duty (because the worker cannot perform their original duties), or received more than “first aid” for treatment of the injury/illness.
Some employers including those in television broadcasting and news syndication are exempt from having to regularly record incidents on OSHA Form 300 because their rates of injury and illness are too low. The decision to exempt those employers is based on BLS injury and illness data from 2007-2009.
If an employer fails to keep required OSHA logs they could be cited as a non-responder and face a fine of up to $14,502. Two OSHA spokespeople did not immediately respond to two emails asking how often employers are fined for such a violation.
Colin Emberland, a BLS economist, said fatality data for news analysts, reporters, and journalists were last publishable in 2018 when there were three deaths, two of them homicides, and one due to a “roadway incident.”
That year, a gunman killed four journalists and a sales assistant at the office of a newspaper in Maryland. In its reports, the BLS apparently categorized the other two journalists killed as editors.
The roadway incident apparently marks the death of a news anchor who along with a photographer was killed when a tree fell on their vehicle in North Carolina.
The BLS defines news analysts, reporters, and journalists as people who narrate or write news stories, reviews, or commentary for print, broadcast, websites, or other communications media like newspapers, magazines, radio, or television. They may work as columnists, correspondents, film critics, or news anchors.
“We do not have any publishable data for journalists that specify indoor or outdoor injury,” Emberland explained.
The BLS does track “transportation incidents” that result in nonfatal injuries. It says there were 20 involving news analysts, reporters, and journalists in 2020, making up a third of the category’s total injury and illness cases that year. Additionally, the BLS says there were 130 transportation incidents involving news analysts, reporters, and journalists in 2018, 20 in 2017, 30 in 2016, and 80 in 2014.
Number of nonfatal occupati… by jmdglss
“We also use other data sources (besides BLS’s) to inform research priorities,” Stevens said regarding NIOSH’s methodology. “We have an in-house occupational supplement to the National Electronic Injury Surveillance System (NEISS-Work) that captures emergency department-treated injuries from a national sample of hospitals. We also analyze workers’ compensation data. These are the most commonly used datasets for nonfatal injury surveillance, however other approaches are used and we are always looking at new sources and approaches to surveillance. For example, there are projects that used media scraping as a means to collect real-time data on topics such as workplace violence. The National Health Interview Survey is another data source that could potentially help us identify a broad industry or occupation group where there is a problem that warrants further investigation.”
OSHA has in place a process for workers to file a confidential safety and health complaint and request an OSHA inspection of their workplace if they believe there is a serious hazard.
“An employee can report anonymously,” Fortson explained. “Workers are protected under OSHA’s Whistleblower Protection Program. It is illegal for an employer to fire, demote, transfer, or otherwise retaliate against a worker who complains to OSHA and uses their legal rights. If you believe you have been retaliated against in any way, file a whistleblower complaint within 30 days of the alleged retaliation.”
More about the process is available here.
