Deukmejian’s Proposal to Abolish Cal-OSHA

You printed three letters (Feb. 23) that I believe Gov. George Deukmejian should read. The letters written against his proposal to cancel the California Occupational Safety and Health Administration, might possibly remind him of those who voted him into office; those he would be endangering by going through with his proposal.

The state of California has had something to be proud of in its Cal-OSHA program. The worker-safety program has helped to save many lives and prevent countless numbers of possibly fatal accidents. Having a safe place to work is, and should be, of prime concern to all those who are employed within this state.

While Gov. Deukmejian may not be intending to dismantle the program altogether, but merely hand it over to the federal government to take care of, who does he think he’s kidding? The federal government is in enough trouble without adding California’s worker-safety concerns to its list. The federal program will in no way be able to do the effective job that the state program has. How could it? It would have the state of California’s problems 50 times over to worry about. If the entire state is only 2% of the federal program’s worry, how thorough a job can we expect?

As one of the safety-concerned workers of this state, I pray for another means of cutting down the state’s spending. It’s too bad that the money that is now needed to be saved in the state’s budget couldn’t be that which was used to fund the mudslinging campaigns for the state officials last year, which merely succeeded in insulting the intelligence of most of us. If the safety of this state isn’t important enough to our state leaders to keep, it only makes one wonder about the priorities of those we have chosen to elect to state office.

LARA J. LISTAVICH

Stanton