A years-long effort to make it safer to work for the city of Keizer safer culminated in a rare designation for City Hall recently.

The city successfully recently completed a special state program aimed at driving down workplace injuries.

No other city in Oregon has done so, graduating from SHARP – the Safety and Health Achievement Recognition Program managed by Oregon OSHA.

The result, according to an OSHA press release, is lower injury and illness rates, decreased workers’ compensation costs, increased employee morale, lower product losses, and community recognition.”

The effort involved every corner of city government, resulting in the city posting a low score that is calculated by considering work days lost to injury with total employee hours worked.

That so-called DART score calculated for 2023 came in at 2.1 for Keizer. That’s below the state average of 2.7 and the national average of 3.1.

Jeff Heyen is the city’s IT administrator. But he also served for years as chair of the city safety committee that drove the effort.

The SHARP success is significant, Heyen said.

“There is no other city in Oregon that’s done it,” he said. “It shows a commitment of the city, that it cares enough about employees to implement something like this to drive down accident-related things.”

For the city, that could mean lower insurance costs, he said.

Keizer earned its graduation after a final survey by consultants to OSHA, who chronicled the city’s efforts in a three-page summary.

“The City of Keizer has consistently followed through with all evaluations, training, programs and procedures for both safety and health of all employees,” the report said.

In 2023, “a walk-through of City Hall and the Police Department identified several hazards which were corrected in a timely manner,” the report said.

The consultants noted that city officials installed eye wash stations at water pump stations in case of a chemical splash.

“This certainly showed follow through and commitment to safety and health protection for city workers,” the report said. “This was not the only solution but it was the best for the workers that added chemicals to the water.”

The city also updated its respiratory protection program and implemented safety protocols for using ATVs.

The consultants recommended the city refine its building evacuation plans and update its safety manual.

They also said that by the end of June, the city should “develop a workplace violence and de-escalation protocol for use when interacting with non-employees.”

Heyen said there has been a “generalized concern” among city workers that there should be “a standardized approach to dealing with hostile people.”

Each city department has its own practice but the city will move to a single policy “that says if this happens, you can do this or this is your next step,” Heyen said.

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