Valley Electric apprentice Shane Wright cuts pipe. Photos courtesy of Valley Electric

Valley Electric’s incident rate has been in a down trend for the past three years — including a drop of 43 percent in 2000 while the number of worker hours shot up by nearly 500,000.

Valley’s goal is to reach a zero accident level. That lofty goal is being addressed from the top down — every quarter management reviews the safety policies and procedures in the corporate safety manual to make improvements.

Valley gives bi-monthly safety training to its foremen on a number of subjects, such as new hire orientation, excavation, trenching and shoring, and accident investigation. The meetings also provide a sounding board for the foremen to compare safety concerns on their jobsites and work out solutions together.

All workers at the company are encouraged to voice any safety concerns or issues to their supervisor or the safety director. Employees can also voice their concerns to company safety representatives who make weekly jobsite visits and conduct safety walks.

This year, Valley held three behavior-based safety seminars for all of its foremen, general foremen and project managers. Workers were able to comment on the company’s safety program at those meetings.

Also this year, the company revised its safety recognition program for its field crews. The program enables workers to earn one safety point for each hour they work without an injury claim. Prizes range from flashlights to watches to custom golf clubs.

Last year, Valley went high-tech with its hew hire safety orientation process by creating an interactive CD-ROM that features employees using the safety program on a variety of jobsites. Part of the CD-ROM requires new hires to score 80 percent on a test in order to start working.

Once new hires have passed the test, they are given company safety rules in a book they can carry with them on the jobsite. New hires must also pass a drug test.

Another way Valley encourages safety is through its labor superintendent safety committee, a group comprised of superintendents from each of the company’s departments and several local unions. The committee meets monthly and reviews accidents, brainstorms on improving the safety program and conducts a jobsite inspection.

Last year, Valley’s safety record improved dramatically: the OSHA recordable rate went from 6.9 to 3.9, and the experience modification rate went from .98 to .85 — all while logging in over 1 million worker hours.