Services: cities | fall protection | OSHA grants | Safety Grants
Over the last twelve years, CHESS has helped a small municipality receive more than $54,000 in MN OSHA safety grants for projects ranging from gear for firefighters to improved security.
One of those grants was for fall protection. To get onto the roof of a city building to work on the air handler, Public Works employees used an access door less than five feet from the unprotected edge. They would have to go onto the roof year-round, including when the roof was icy and slick. A stumble could have them falling 20 feet to the ground. CHESS brought this hazard to the city’s attention. We helped them identify the options for protecting their employees (requiring employees to wear fall protection or fall restraint PPE, moving the air handlers, or installing guardrails). We suggested vendors for each option.. We then worked with the city to prepare a successful OSHAsafety grant application for nearly $10,000 (half the cost) to install guardrails.
Another city has received more than $64,000, for security projects, ventilation systems, and even vehicle hoists. For both cities, CHESS helped the city identify hazards that could be abated with the grants, wrote the hazard surveys and the grant applications for the cities.
CHESS has written more than 60 OSHA grant proposals for cities, netting the cities over $300,000 in grant funding as of 2020. We’ve helped the cities obtain traffic control devices, fall protection, valve exercisers, improved security systems for city halls, exhaust ventilation systems, vehicle lifts, confined space entry equipment, trench boxes, and even a device to lift glass panels for a hockey rink. Our grant requests have helped fire departments, community centers, public works, city halls, and police.