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OSHA Fines Smithfield for Failing to Protect Workers from COVID-19

The Smithfield meatpacking plant in Sioux Falls faces a fine for failing to protect employees from the coronavirus. The Occupational Safety and Health Administration has levied the maximum penalty allowed: $13,494.

OSHA cites the company for failing to provide a workplace safe from “recognized hazards that can cause death or serious harm.”

B.J. Motley is head of the union that represents many of the plant’s 3,700. In an interview this summer, he said Smithfield management was slow to respond to worker’s concerns about COVID-19.

“In the beginning they wasn’t too keen on trying to get any protective [measures] in place, until we had a certain number of employees that came down with the positive.”

An OSHA statement says more than 1,200 employees contracted the virus and four died. That’s higher than the two previously reported deaths of Smithfield employees.

The company has 15 business days to pay the fine.

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Jackie is based out of SDPB's Sioux Falls Studio.