Does North Carolina require a safety program or committee?
Yes, once your experience modifier reaches 1.5. North Carolina runs its own OSHA program, and its safety and health program rule is tied to the workers' compensation experience rate modifier rather than to headcount alone. Above 1.5 you need a written program with named elements, quarterly inspections against a written checklist, an annual self-audit, and, at 11 or more employees, a safety and health committee.
What the rule says
The rule is 13 NCAC 7A .0600 through .0606, published by the North Carolina Department of Labor's OSH Division.
The rules apply to “all North Carolina employers with a workers' compensation experience rate modifier of 1.5 or above.”
| What the rule requires | |
|---|---|
| Threshold | An experience rate modifier of 1.5 or above. Employers with no modifier applied are outside the rule. |
| Written program | Management's responsibilities, how the plan is communicated, how rules are enforced, how accidents and near-misses are investigated and corrected, how hazards are identified, analyzed and controlled, written compliance plans for the standards that apply (hazard communication, lockout, confined spaces), a written checklist for quarterly inspections, an annual self-audit, the committee's purpose and operation, and how all of it reaches other employers and subcontractors on the site. |
| Committee | Required at 11 or more employees: one for each mobile crew of 11 or more, or one for each fixed location with 11 or more. Under 11, a company safety officer conducts the annual self-audit instead. |
| Inspections | Quarterly, against the written checklist, with the list kept at least two years. |
| Records | A comprehensive record of each accident investigation and each near miss with findings and corrective action; the self-audit findings and remedial actions, kept at least two years; documentation of how the committee was selected. |
| Training | Committee members trained for their duties; a training system for all employees, delivered by someone trained to recognize, evaluate and control hazards. |
Read it yourself: 13 NCAC 7A .0600 through .0606.
What applies to every crew regardless
Federal OSHA's construction rule does not mandate a meeting by name. It requires you to instruct each employee in recognizing and avoiding unsafe conditions and the regulations that apply to the work (29 CFR 1926.21(b)(2)), and a documented talk is how most contractors show they did. A general contractor, a prequalification platform and an insurer ask for the same thing, and none of them lowers the bar for a state without its own meeting rule. Every state, on one page.
Questions we get asked
Our modifier is 1.3. Does the rule apply?
No. The rule starts at 1.5. The federal duties and your general contractor's prequalification still apply, and a modifier that is climbing is the reason to start the records before the rule arrives.
We are eight people with a 1.6 modifier. Committee?
No committee under 11, but the written program, the quarterly inspections and the annual self-audit all apply, and a named company safety officer does the self-audit.
Is a weekly toolbox talk required?
Not by name. The federal rule requires instruction in recognizing and avoiding hazards, and the program rule requires a training system for all employees. A documented weekly talk is the usual proof of both.
How long do we keep the records?
The quarterly checklist and the self-audit findings are kept at least two years. Keep the investigation records with them; a GC or a carrier asks for three years of history.
How Tailboard handles it
The written program lives where the crew can open it
The safety program is a document in the account, dated and versioned, that every person on the roster can read on their phone and that the office hands to an inspector or a GC without a search.
Inspections with a checklist and a date
Weekly walk-around, ladder, excavation, PPE and vehicle checks, pass or fail on every line, with a photo where it failed and a repair opened where a line failed.
A committee with its own minutes
Tailboard keeps the committee: who sits on it, when it met, who chaired, attendance and the items, each meeting sealed with a code. The year's committee meetings print into the prequal packet with everything else.
The weekly talk is the record
Every closed meeting records the date, the topic and its OSHA reference, who ran it, which crew and who signed, in one sealed record you can print or hand over. That is the training record every state asks to see.
Inspections and the certification register are on Fleet at $199 a month; the committee, the program and the documents are on Company at $89 and on Fleet; the weekly meeting record is on every tier from $29. Crew members never need an account and never cost you anything; they tap their name and sign.
This page describes published law and is not legal advice. Whether a rule applies to your operation, and whether you have met it, is between you, the N.C. Department of Labor and your own safety professional. The OSH Division offers a template program and free on-site assistance.