[Congressional Record Volume 153, Number 21 (Monday, February 5, 2007)]
[Senate]
[Pages S1552-S1554]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                              MINE SAFETY

  Mr BYRD. I thank the Chair.
  Mr. President, the great labor leader--and I mean great labor 
leader--and legendary president of the United Mine Workers of America, 
John L. Lewis, pleaded the cause of America's working men and women, as 
he said, ``not in the quavering tones of a feeble mendicant asking 
alms, but in the thundering voice of the captain of a mighty host, 
demanding the rights to which free people, free men are entitled.''
  This was the voice of a true coal miner. I know that voice. I grew up 
in the coalfields of southern West Virginia. My dad--not my father, my 
dad--Titus Dalton Byrd, was a coal miner. He belonged to the United 
Mine Workers, then district 29, now district 17, local union 5771. My 
coal miner dad worked in the coal mines with my father-in-law, my 
wife's father, Fred James. My wife's brother-in-law was killed by a 
slate fall in a coal mine. My wife's brother-in-law died of 
pneumoconiosis, black lung.
  I--yes, I--married a coal miner's daughter. You have heard the song 
``I'm a Coal Miner's Daughter.'' By whom? By Loretta Lynn.
  I married a coal miner's daughter a long time ago. We were married 
when we were 19. She was 19; I was 19. That marriage lasted almost 69 
years, until her death. And today she is in heaven. She is in heaven. 
Yes, she is in heaven today. I believe that.

  Together, my wife Erma and I--mostly Erma--ran a grocery store, yes, 
in Sophia, WV. Our customers were coal miners for the most part. Our 
neighbors were coal miners. Our friends were coal miners and others, 
but coal miners, surely.
  Today my constituents in West Virginia, the core--certainly, the core 
in my viewpoint, but my constituents--includes coal miners. When I 
speak about coal miners and their safety underground, I am speaking 
about coal miners, my people, my family. I am speaking from the bottom 
of my soul when I speak about coal miners. It is a different breed of 
people, coal miners. Yes, they would leave the open air and sunshine 
and go back into the bowels of the Earth to search for their brothers, 
their brother coal miners--Black or White, it doesn't make any 
difference. They are all black when they come out of that mine. But 
they are all coal miners. They are West Virginians. I am talking about 
my constituents. I am speaking from the heart because that is the heart 
of my background, the coal miners.
  I know what it is to stand at the mouth of a mine after an explosion. 
I know what it is to see the widows and the children who are left to 
shed their tears and to bury their loved ones. I know. I have helped to 
carry coal miners who had died around the mountainside. Their coffins 
are very heavy. I am no big man, never was, but I have helped to carry 
those coffins. And they are heavy, especially when we are walking on 
hillsides, yes. So I know what I am speaking about, and I am speaking 
from my heart. That is where I grew up. I expect to be buried there, 
yes, in the mountain soil of West Virginia.
  The coal miner is proud--yes, you better believe it--of his 
profession. He is patriotic in that he mines the coal that fuels the 
American economy. You see those lights up there that are lighting this 
wonderful, beautiful Chamber of the Senate, the only Chamber of its 
kind in the world, the Senate, yes. The miner fuels those electric 
lights that surround this Chamber.
  He, the coal miner, is religious in that he trusts in almighty God to 
keep him safe in his dirty, dangerous job; and he trusts in that God to 
keep and protect his family, while he, the coal miner, is away. He is 
courageous--you better believe it--in that he goes underground every 
day, even though he is surrounded by life-threatening hazards; they are 
overhead. I have been in the mines. I was not a coal miner, but I was 
in there with my dad--not my father but my dad. I have been in those 
mines. I heard the timbers, the tree trunks holding up the tons and 
tons and tons of earth and rock overhead to keep those rocks from 
crashing to the Earth and killing the miners. I could hear those 
timbers cracking. When I was in there, I heard the timbers--these 
trees, as they were. They are cut off, and they are 8, 10, 12, 15 feet, 
whatever the height of the covering earth is from the floor there; they 
were coming down. I heard them timbers cracking under that weight.
  Coal miners provide so much for my country, for your country, for 
their country. And we--Robert Byrd, Senator Rockefeller, and other 
Senators and Members in the House--owe them, the coal miners, our best 
efforts in securing safer working conditions. Not as their alms but 
their right.
  In 1977, the Congress passed--I was in this Senate in 1977--what is 
arguably the toughest worker safety law in the history of the world, 
the Federal Mine and Safety Health Act. I helped to write that law. I 
helped to champion its enactment in the Congress of the United States. 
It created the Mine Safety and Health Administration, MSHA, within the 
U.S. Department of Labor--MSHA, the Mine Safety and Health 
Administration, was in the Department of Labor--and the position of 
Assistant Secretary of Labor for Mine, Safety, and Health. I helped. I 
was here.
  The opening passages of the MINE Act tell us all we need to know 
about what MSHA's priorities ought to be:

       The first priority and concern of all in the coal or other 
     mining industry must be the health and safety of its most 
     precious resource: the miner, the coal miner.

  In recent years, that obligation has been neglected. It has been 
eroded by a Department of Labor that emphasizes so-called ``compliance 
assistance'' programs and has tried to recast its role as a technical 
consultant to business rather than a protector of working men and 
women. Let me read that again. In recent years, that obligation has 
been neglected. It has been eroded by a Department of Labor that 
emphasizes so-called ``compliance assistance'' programs and has tried 
to recast its role as a technical consultant to business rather than a 
protector of working men and women; namely, coal miners.
  The Department's obligation to protect the safety of the coal miners 
has been eroded by arbitrary spending targets that are designed to 
appease the White House Budget Office rather than ensure the safety of 
the coal miners in the coal fields. These policies have fostered the 
highest casualty rates in the coalfields in more than a decade. Forty-
seven coal miners perished--died, dead--last year, half of them in West 
Virginia. In the opening days of 2006, our Nation mourned as 12 coal 
miners--yes, my darling wife was on her deathbed at that time in the 
opening days of 2006; that was last year. Our Nation mourned after a 
40-hour rescue effort was unable to save 12 miners at the Sago mine in 
Upshur County, WV. Our Nation watched with disbelief as an underground 
mine fire, days later, at the Aracoma Alma mine in Logan County, WV, 
killed 2 more miners after another exhausting 40-hour rescue effort. 
The disbelief--yes, the disbelief--soon turned to outrage as 
congressional hearings and investigative news reports revealed an 
atrocious safety record at the Sago and Alma mines. The Department of 
Labor had been lax in assessing penalties for repeat violations. When 
penalties were assessed, habitual violators were too often given minor 
slaps on the wrist or had their fines reduced or negated within the 
appeals process.
  Congressional hearings revealed the Department of Labor had abandoned 
or

[[Page S1553]]

had withdrawn countless safety standards prior to the Sago and Alma 
tragedies, leaving coal miners underground with outdated emergency 
breathing and communications equipment. How would you like to be a coal 
miner in those conditions? Emergency preparedness and rescue training 
had been allowed to fall by the wayside, as the safety of coal miners 
became a secondary concern to what? To rising corporate profits. Shame, 
shame. This is the lives of men and women underground, in the bowels of 
the Earth.
  The Department of Labor had allowed the Federal budget for mine 
safety to be squeezed by lesser priorities, reducing the number of coal 
mine safety inspectors by 217 since January 2001. The Government 
Accountability Office--the General Accounting Office--had warned as 
early as 2003 about the timeliness of inspections, and the Mine Safety 
and Health Administration, which was created to be an ever-vigilant 
advocate for the safety of coal miners, had been failing in its duty. 
Mine safety budgets and regulations had been allowed to erode at the 
Sago mine.
  MSHA could have required better communications. That alone might have 
saved those miners. It could have mandated better emergency 
preparedness. It could have been more vigorous in its inspections and 
assessments of penalties. If MSHA, the Mine Safety and Health 
Administration, had used its authorities under the Mine Act to the 
fullest extent possible, those miners who perished at Sago and Alma 
might have survived. They might have been alive today. Who knows.
  Coal mining communities across Appalachia were outraged by these 
findings, and they demanded action. They marched through the Halls of 
the Congress carrying pictures of their husbands, their brothers, their 
sons who had perished in the coalfield.
  In response, my illustrious colleague, Senator Jay Rockefeller, and 
I, along with the entire West Virginia delegation in the House of 
Representatives--two Democrats and one Republican--introduced mine 
safety legislation to force the Department of Labor to act. The 
chairman and ranking member of the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and 
Pensions Committee, Senators Mike Enzi and Ted Kennedy, rallied to our 
cause. Our offices began to craft, to shape, to write important and 
much needed mine safety legislation.
  By the end of May--May, O May, when the flowers bloom--the Senate had 
passed legislation to add the first new safety requirements to the Mine 
Act since 1977. The MINER Act required additional oxygen. Oh, I can 
only live with oxygen. You can only live with oxygen. You, Mr. 
President, can only live with oxygen. You can't live without it. No, I 
mean by that, without it, a few minutes. Oxygen. It has been around 
since Adam and Eve inhabited the Garden of Eden.
  The MINER Act required additional oxygen supplies underground. It 
required emergency wireless communications within 3 years. It required 
improvements in emergency preparedness, rescue teams, and accident 
notification.
  Separately, I worked to secure $36 million in the fiscal year 2006 
Iraq supplemental for the Mine Safety and Health Administration, MSHA, 
to hire additional mine safety inspectors and for the National 
Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, NIOSH, to expedite the 
introduction of emergency breathing and communications equipment into 
the coal mines.
  Who am I? I am a member of the Senate Appropriations Committee. Yes, 
I am the chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee. So I worked 
to do that.
  By June--the merry month of June--the Congress had passed the MINER 
Act and added $36 million to the Federal budget for mine safety. By the 
end of the summer, the Department of Labor had pledged, with the funds 
that I, a coal miner's boy, had secured, to hire 170 new coal 
inspectors by the end of the fiscal year 2007. By the end of calendar 
year 2006, the coal mining industry had at last focused on getting 
emergency communications and breathing equipment into the coal mines. 
That's late, isn't it? By the end of the calendar year 2006, while coal 
mining has been going on for decades--yes, yes, back beyond the 
beginning of the 20th century until now--by the end of the calendar 
year 2006, the coal mining industry had at last focused on getting 
emergency communications equipment and breathing equipment into the 
coal mines of America.
  The question before the Congress now--do it here, do it now; do it 
here, do it now. Have you heard that on the radio or TV? Do it here; do 
it now. The question before the Congress now is, what happens next?
  We know that extensive oversight will be required by the Congress not 
only to ensure that MSHA fulfills its duties under the MINER Act but 
also to ensure that the coal operators meet their duties. So we know 
that extensive oversight will be required by the Congress not only to 
ensure that MSHA fulfills its duties under the MINER Act but also to 
ensure that the coal operators meet their duties.
  The House and Senate appropriations and authorizing committees have a 
significant role to play in this regard. We must do all--we must do 
all--that we can to ensure that the deadlines set by the MINER Act are 
met. We must do all that we can to ensure that wireless communications 
are available to coal miners within the next 2\1/2\ years, after all 
the many years that have gone before. If that means providing more 
funds to NIOSH to expedite the development of wireless communications 
and tracking and prodding the industry along to purchase and install 
that equipment, count on me. As the old Bible says: Here am I, send me. 
Here am I, send me.
  We know also that several issues have not yet been addressed by the 
Congress from last year. The Congress has not yet addressed the issue 
of refuge chambers. The MINER Act required NIOSH to study the issue and 
report back by the end of this year. About what? Refuge chambers.
  The Congress must require MSHA and NIOSH to find a way to make refuge 
chambers. What does ``refuge'' mean? A place to go. Refuge chambers, a 
place to go for refuge, for safety after an explosion. During the 
explosion, that's a big wind, a big explosion.
  The Congress has not yet addressed the issue of whether belt air 
should be used to ventilate the working areas of underground mines--
belt air, a conveyor belt that comes along, a belt, a wide belt that 
comes on rollers and comes into the mine.
  Given how the use of belt air and inadequate safety precautions at 
Alma Mine resulted in the death of two coal miners last year, this is 
an issue that will not go away with yet another study and yet another 
report to the Congress. The Department of Labor must reconsider the 
belt air rule issued in 2004.
  We know that the low level of penalties remains an ineffective 
deterrent for too many coal operators. I am not against coal operators. 
We have to have them. They invest money, their money. They invest 
money. We know the low level of penalties remains an ineffective 
deterrent for too many coal operators. I know many of them personally. 
I like them. They like me, I think. Penalties are not commensurate with 
the seriousness of violations.
  The Department of Labor recently informed my office that the accident 
at the Jim Walters Resources Mine in Alabama that killed 13 miners in 
2001 will be punished with a fine as little as $5,000--$5,000. That is 
disgusting. That is disgusting. It is clearly a signal to the Congress 
that the penalty system demands further improvement.
  Last October, MSHA issued its procedural instruction letter to revise 
the structure for how penalties are assessed by its inspectors. That 
procedural letter implemented the minimum penalty provision of the 
MINER Act. However, if higher fines are being assessed by inspectors 
but continue to be reduced or negated within the appeals process, then 
MSHA's procedural letter is almost irrelevant.
  How much time do I have remaining, may I ask the Chair?
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator has 19 minutes remaining.
  Mr. BYRD. I thank the Chair.
  Mr. President, we need to find a way to ensure that fair penalties 
are assessed by administrative law judges and the Mine Safety and 
Health Review Commission within the appeals process.
  We must continue to review and ask questions about the structure of 
mine rescue teams and the changes codified by the MINER Act last year. 
Here is

[[Page S1554]]

another area where the rules issued by MSHA in recent years have 
contradicted the intent and spirit of the 1977 Mine Act.
  We must continue to probe whether enough has been done. Two deaths 
last month in southern West Virginia serve as a macabre reminder that 
the crisis in the coal fields is not yet over--will probably never be 
over--but we have got to work at it. It is not yet over. We must be 
innovative. It is time for us to stop simply addressing mine disasters 
as they happen. We must seek opportunities to get ahead of the dangers. 
We must use foresight as well as hindsight.
  Last month, I met with the Assistant Secretary of Labor, Mine Safety 
and Health, Richard Stickler. Mr. Stickler is in his current position 
because of a recess appointment in October 2006. He has not been 
confirmed by the Senate, and so his appointment will expire at the end 
of this year. I am hopeful that he will prove himself a friend of the 
coal miner. He has a dedicated team at MSHA, which includes many former 
coal miners who would like to see MSHA do better. I am convinced that 
more can be done. The question is whether the Department of Labor and 
the White House will let MSHA do what needs to be done. The Congress 
will get some insight into that question as it reviews the President's 
budget request for mine safety, which was delivered today.
  As chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee, and as a Senator 
who will have some say about the Federal budget for mine safety, hear 
me when I say that the days of cheating the safety and well-being of 
our Nation's coal miners are over. The Senate Appropriations Committee 
will examine the various mine safety accounts, and the Senate 
Appropriations Committee will make its recommendations to the Senate 
about where improvements can be made. That process has already begun 
with the inclusion of $13 million above--above, on top of, over--the 
President's request in the continuing resolution for the fiscal year 
2007 for MSHA to hire and train additional coal safety inspectors. I 
and other Senators have encouraged the President of the United States--
hear me--to include additional funds to retain those inspectors in his 
mine safety budget request for the fiscal year 2008, and I am glad that 
the President appears to have done so.
  This is an issue that is close to my heart, and I pledge to do all 
that I can to increase congressional oversight in the coal field. As a 
son of the coal fields, the Appalachian coal fields, as the son of a 
coal miner, I am determined, yes, determined to be the ``captain of a 
mighty host demanding the rights to which free men''--free men--coal 
miners--``free men are entitled.'' And women. Free men and women are 
entitled.
  Mr. President, that concludes my prepared speech.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Virginia.
  Mr. WARNER. Mr. President, I say this to the distinguished Senator 
from West Virginia. I have been privileged to be here but a small 
fraction of the time that he has, 29 years here and well over 40 for my 
colleague from West Virginia, but in that period we have worked many 
times on behalf of coal miners.
  Mr. BYRD. Yes.
  Mr. WARNER. As the Presiding Officer recognized, my fellow colleague 
from Virginia, our States are joined.
  Mr. BYRD. Yes.
  Mr. WARNER. Those mines have a great deal of comparability, those in 
Virginia and those in West Virginia.
  Mr. BYRD. Joined at the hip.
  Mr. WARNER. They are joined. The plight of the miners and their 
families has been a subject that no Senator in the modern history of 
this Senate has fought harder for than the senior senator from West 
Virginia, and very often you have involved me and my colleagues, 
whoever they might be. I have served with three now, the distinguished 
Harry Byrd, Jr., whom you will recall, Senator Robb, and Senator Allen. 
All of us have worked on this subject.
  I hope to join you on this, and I hope the Presiding Officer, 
likewise, will work on this subject of coal mine safety. So I thank my 
friend.
  Mr. BYRD. I thank the distinguished, the very distinguished senior 
senator from the great State of Virginia. I thank him.
  Mr. WARNER. Mr. President, I thank my colleague, and we will work 
together.

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