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During today’s Subcommittee on Workforce Protections hearing on the Department of Labor’s updated silica rule, Ranking Member Frederica S. Wilson (FL-24) applauded DOL’s long-awaited rule to limit workers’ exposure to crystalline silica dust, a long-known human carcinogen that causes silicosis, lung cancer, respirable illnesses such as COPD, and kidney disease.

“The science is clear. Since 1974, the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health has called for OSHA to cut the permissible exposure limit for general industry from 100 micrograms per cubic meter to 50. It took 42 years for OSHA’s rule to catch up with the science,” Rep. Wilson said in her opening statement.

Around 50 members of the International Union of Bricklayers and Allied Craftworkers attended the hearing to demonstrate strong support of OSHA’s updated silica rule. Three members, Dale McNabb, Tom Ward, and Tim Brown submitted statements for the record recounting their experiences with exposure to silica dust.

“I loved my job and I took a lot of pride in my work. I would still be doing it today if my doctor hadn’t told me I couldn’t and that I might never work again because I breathed in silica dust,” writes Dale McNabb, a tile setter from Warren, Michigan and a member of Bricklayers Local 2 Michigan. “When I get exposed to dust now – and not just silica dust – it feels like I have a plastic bag over my head and someone’s pulling it shut.”

Tom Ward, a bricklayer from Detroit, Michigan and a member of Bricklayer Local 2 Michigan, shared his storing of losing his father to silicosis at thirteen. “We got the official diagnosis – silicosis – when he was 34 years old. The hardest memory to live with is the last day he worked – he came in the door, fell to the floor and started crying. He said ‘I can’t do it anymore.’” Tom writes, “It took just 5 years for silicosis to kill him. It was a slow and very painful process for my dad to experience at far too young an age, and for me, my sisters and for my mother to witness. In the end, his disease suffocated him.”

In his statement for the record, Tim Brown, a bricklayer from Milwaukee, Wisconsin and a member of Bricklayer Local 8 Wisconsin and Wisconsin Administrative District Council, emphasized the need to protect future generations of workers. “We must prevent this from happening to any other bricklayers, to my fellow union members, and to my unorganized colleagues. No worker should suffer what I have,” writes Tim. “The [previous] standard did not protect me. But if we enforce the new comprehensive rule, what happened to me will not happen to other bricklayers. We cannot let others suffer and become ill just for doing an honest day’s work.”

Following the hearing, Rep. Wilson spoke with workers about their experiences “To hear these workers’ stories, to listen to their words, is to understand the importance of this final rule. You cannot put a price on the life, happiness, or survival of a worker. I applaud the department and administration’s efforts to finalize this long-awaited rule. The 2.3 million workers, mostly in construction, who will gain protection under OSHA’s updated rule deserve our full support of OSHA’s updated silica standard.”

Click here to read Congresswoman Wilson’s Opening Statement.

Congresswoman Frederica S. Wilson is a third-term Congresswoman from Florida representing parts of Northern Miami-Dade and Southeast Broward counties. A former state legislator and school principal, she is the founder of the 5000 Role Models for Excellence Project, a mentoring program for young males at risk of dropping out of school. Congresswoman Wilson also founded the Florida Ports Caucus, a bipartisan taskforce that coordinates federal action in support of Florida’s harbors and waterways.