Portside

CUMBERLAND — Several community members, along with local and regional officials, gathered at Cumberland City Hall on Friday to honor workers who have lost their lives or suffered illness while on the job.

The 17th annual Jim Bestpitch Workers Memorial Day was hosted by the Western Maryland Central Labor Council, AFL-CIO, the local labor council of the American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations. 

As the largest labor union in North America, the AFL-CIO advocates for social and economic justice in the workplace. 

Donna S. Edwards, president of the Maryland State and District of Columbia AFL-CIO, spoke at the event. The Cumberland native was the first woman elected to the union’s highest office in Maryland.

“It’s a somber day,” Edwards said, “but it’s also a day that we can use to reignite what we have in order to go out and make this country right.”

According to Edwards, 150 people die while on the job in the United States each day.

“To think, in the wealthiest, most powerful country in the world, there are 150 workers dying every day from a workplace fatality or a fatal illness or injury they contracted on the job,” she said.

“If that was a disease or if that was one attack, everyone would be harrowing it and talking about it and saying we have to do something, but that’s not happening. Somehow this is ignored.”

In Maryland, 92 fatal workplace injuries were reported in fiscal year 2016.

Friday’s event took place during National Worker’s Memorial Week, a week of memoriam corresponding with the anniversary of the United States Occupational Safety and Health Act, legislation passed in 1971 to ensure safe and healthy work environments. 

Even with federal regulations in place for nearly 50 years, Edwards said society has “forgotten” to advocate for safe working conditions, emphasizing that need amid an increasingly violent culture.

“We’ve forgotten,” she said, “and that’s what today is also about, recognizing that we live in a volatile society at this point.

“People are attacking health care workers and nurses because they’re told that their loved ones have to leave because their insurance payments are gone and they can’t help them.” 

Homicides and suicides on the job are at an all time high, Edwards said.

In fiscal 2016, there were 500 workplace homicides and 291 workplace suicides nationally, the largest number of workplace suicides ever reported.

“We have an epidemic, and nobody is addressing this as an epidemic,” she said. “It’s a workplace injury epidemic, and we’re here today to just recommit to those that we fought for 40 years to get on the books.”

With more than four decades of community service and political activism behind her, Edwards said she has worked on numerous bills to protect workers and workers’ rights, including Maryland’s 1999 legislation to restore bargaining rights for state employees. 

Other speakers included Larry Kasecamp, Western Maryland Central Labor Council, AFL-CIO president; Allegany County Sheriff Craig Robertson, state Del. Roger Manno, D-Montgomery; Cumberland Mayor Brian Grim, Allegany County Commissioner Bill Valentine and state Sen. George Edwards, R-Allegany, Garrett, Washington.

Proclamations were delivered by representatives of U.S. Rep. John Delaney and U.S. Sens. Ben Cardin and Chris Van Hollen.