Philadelphia Worker and Community Right-to-Know Act
The Philadelphia Worker and Community Right-to-Know Act requires employers that use any of 450 chemical substances to file Material Safety Data Sheets with various local government agencies. (An additional list of 99 chemicals will trigger the filing requirement if they are emitted from the workplace.) Material Safety Data Sheets must be made available to the public, upon request, through the governmental agencies where they are filed. Containers of these chemicals must be clearly labeled. (This was the first municipal right-to-know law.)
Cry Wolf Quotes
Not only is disclosure of this confidential trade secret data unnecessary to safety and health protections but raises serious questions regarding the taking of private property without compensation and due process in violation of Constitutional rights.
It would require us to mail out forms and get information on 450 or more chemicals from 7,500 firms. We think that would require another 15 people [and $300,000 more in costs].
This bill is the greatest piece of idiocy to come down the pike in quite a while. You know, people wonder why we’ve lost 145,000 jobs from Philadelphia in the last 20 years. If people would spend as much time trying to help develop industry in this city as they have trying to fight it, we’d be a lot better off.
Finally, you should be appraised of the need for security and secrecy to research and develop products. In many, many instances, such security would be unattainable under Bill 270. The lack of privacy and security would strike the hardest at our great and large corporations which research and develop most of the new products which enhance our health and quality of living.
Backgrounders & Briefs
Dying To Know: A Historical Analysis of the Right-To-Know Movement
This survey provides a sweeping analysis of the right-to-know movement in America.
