The Omaha Area Office and McCarthy Construction VA Ambulatory Care Center
Partnership Achieves Successful Results Promoting Safety and Health

Project Overview:

The Omaha VA Ambulatory Care Center is a 157,000-square-foot, three-story, outpatient facility for veterans. With nearly 40,000 veterans being treated in Omaha annually, the new facility includes seven primary-care units, an outpatient surgery suite, and a specialty medicine unit allowing 400 additional outpatients to visit the clinic each day, as well as a dedicated women’s health clinic area. McCarthy Building Companies, Inc. and OSHA entered into the Partnership Program on July 9, 2018. The new facility will open to patients in August 2020.

OSHA Partnership Delivers Positive Results:

Outstanding safety results were achieved by putting safety at the forefront. Creation of a site-specific safety plan at the beginning of the project helped set the tone for the duration of the job. The McCarthy team delivered consistent communications around the safety program and expectations throughout the project. From the beginning through the onboarding process, McCarthy and OSHA personnel worked together to achieve buy-in of all stakeholders. This was critical to achieving a genuine safety culture on site. Providing positive reinforcement to trades personnel grew their trust in McCarthy and in turn allowed greater collaboration with other subcontractors. These efforts created a great outcome for the entire team. Safety highlights from the project include:

• The Partnership maintained the Total Case Rate at zero on a challenging project with more than 500,000-man hours worked
• More than 1,325 employees received approximately 4,124 hours of training
• Good communication and collaboration between contractors to achieve a common goal
• First OSHA Partnership for the Omaha OSHA Office with McCarthy’s Omaha Office
• On-site Trenching and Excavation training provided to OSHA Compliance Personnel
• Partner participated in the OSHA Stand Down for Fall Protection week and Safe and Sound Week
• Commitment to a genuine safety culture from the tradesmen up the chain to project executives

Increased Safety Training and Improved Safety and Health Management Programs Lead to Reduced Injury and Illness Rates:

Increased training was a key component of the OSHA Safety Partnership. More than 1,325 employees received approximately 4,124 hours of training on topics including: site safety orientation, respiratory protection, silica, electrical hazards, excavation/trenching safety, fall protection, amputations in construction, slips, trips and falls in construction, falls from heights, and struck by hazards. All employees on the project attend a 2-hour safety orientation where the site safety plan is reviewed, two task videos were shown on the orientation and how to complete task hazard analysis. This was followed up with a 25-question exam. McCarthy tradesmen were enrolled in the NET (New Employee Training) program for onboarding into the McCarthy’s genuine safety culture. The NET program is based on a 4-month period when the new worker shows up at the site at which point the worker is under constant evaluation from their foreman.

Impacts of COVID-19:

The COVID-19 outbreak created unique challenges to the partners daily processes. Limitations on group meetings and social distancing reduced the partners orientation size as well as their daily contractor huddles. The partners team put in place a variety of protective measures to respond and plan for this evolving situation. The partners implemented the following on the site and in their offices:

• Strict Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) guidance, including directing team members who feel sick or have health-related concerns to stay home.
• An online health screen questionnaire by all workers is conducted prior to being permitted on the work site
• Face coverings are required for all workers and site visitors
• Physical distancing and recommended personal hygiene practices
• Reduced worker concentrations
• Increased sanitation and cleaning throughout the project site including high traffic areas, which are sanitized multiple times per day. Those areas are further monitored to ensure appropriate social distancing. Hand wash stations and sanitizers are available throughout the project site
• Implementation of a COVID-19 Compliance Team to ensure adherence to local, state and national laws/recommendations
• Increased monitoring to further ensure compliance amongst all workers
• Staggered start times to minimize the quantity of workers entering the project at the same time
• Working with customers and trade partners to adjust workflows as necessary
• Implementation of teleconferencing where applicable
• Large group activities were suspended March 16

Adam Linhardt, Sr. Safety Director, E&K of Omaha

“The partnership created on the Omaha VA Ambulatory Care Facility project has been a positive collaboration between contractors, employee participation, and involvement in safety at all levels. At E&K we greatly value a strong focus in safety from our General Contractors because we understand that it takes a combined effort from the GC and all trades to truly create safe work environment. McCarthy and the teamwork they helped bring together has excelled in this effort. Not only have we built a long-lasting care facility for our nation’s veterans, we’ve also built a long lasting safety culture that all tradesmen can take back to other projects for years to come.”

Dan Wiek, Project Manager and Scott Love, Safety Director, Miller Electric

Safety was number one goal for McCarthy on the VA Outpatient Care Facility. Caring attitude and communication helped to attain their goals.

As COVID-19 became prevalent across the world, Miller Electric and its building partners continue to complete projects safely and on time. Work on the VA Hospital’s new Outpatient Care Facility, located on the VA campus in Omaha, was no different, and thanks in big part by McCarthy Building Companies. As general contractor for this new healthcare building, the McCarthy team acted quickly and was one of the first in Omaha to require wearing masks mandatory to protect workers on their jobsite. Once site guidelines for mitigating COVID-19 were in place, communication was key to implementing and auditing those procedures.”

“McCarthy’s site-management and our guys did a great job addressing everyone’s concerns and making sure progress continued safely,” says Miller Electric Project Manager, Dan Wiek.

Another example of McCarthy’s commitment to safety was instituting the replacement of all standard stepladders to 100% platform ladders. Not only are platform ladders proven to be safer, but Miller crews were soon complimenting the comfort of standing on a platform as opposed to a step of a stepladder.

“I’m confident the industry will soon follow McCarthy’s lead using platform ladders,” says Scott Love, Miller’s Safety Director. Scott adds, “I’m sure over time we’ll see positive ergonomic effects helping field employees deter common feet and back problems normally associated with long-term use working on step ladders.”

Injury and Illness Data