BILL CRACKS DOWN ON DRUG USE IN MINES

CHARLESTON - Drug abuse inside West Virginia's coal mines is an issue
one southern lawmaker says must be addressed in the final weeks of
this session.

A new bill offered before the House of Delegates deadline by Delegate
Eustace Frederick, D-Mercer, would insist on drug and alcohol testing
of workers applying for jobs as miners.

Once hired, miners would have to submit to periodic retesting to see
if any abuse is occurring.

As coal operators scramble to find enough workers to fill mining jobs
in a workforce that is rapidly aging, Frederick said drug problems are
evident among fresh applicants.

"Now, as they're getting applicants for coal mining, they're having
great difficulty coming up with folks that aren't using drugs,"
Frederick said before Friday's floor session.

"In coal mining, you can't be drugged and work. You're going to have
to be alert all the time."

Frederick is no stranger to the industry, having devoted his working
career as an engineer.

His bill calls for testing, "at a minimum," for concentrations of
alcohol and such controlled substances as marijuana, cocaine,
phencyclidine, amphetamines and opiate metabolites.

Frederick wants the Board of Coal Mine Health and Safety to produce
rules that set impermissible concentrations for drugs and alcohol.

Coal operators would pay for the testing, his proposal
stipulates.

No one could look at a miner's drug and alcohol test results through a
Freedom of Information Act filing.

Mine safety has become an intense study matter for the Legislature
this year in the wake of tragedies and accidents that killed 16 miners
in a 32-day stretch, beginning Jan. 2 with an explosion that trapped
13 workers in an underground mine in Upshur County.

"I think it's a vital safety item for coal mine folks to be in the
best shape they can be in," Frederick said.

"We should require this testing. Before someone is allowed to work,
they should be tested. And as you go along on the job, you need to be
tested again."