10 MI Businesses Cited for COVID-19 Violations, Including an Entire City

Last month, the state of Michigan fined 19 businesses across the state for violating COVID-19 protocols in the workplace. This past Friday, the state said 10 more businesses have been given citations, including an entire city!

Upon conducting investigations, Michigan Occupational Safety and Health Administration (MIOSHA) said these businesses had "serious violations" by failing to have rules in place to protect workers from contracting coronavirus.

Deficiencies included a lack of health screenings, face coverings, employee training, cleaning measures and overall preparedness plans.

Some businesses included restaurants, a gas station, construction companies, and a car rental company. Two of them are in West Michigan:

• Brandon Martinez (Grand Rapids) - a residential construction company fined $2,100 for failure to require face coverings, no plan in place, failure to train employees. The inspection was done on a job site in Plainwell.
• Musselman Home Improvements, LLC (Kalamazoo) - Fined $2,100 for not having face mask requirements when social distancing could not be maintained, failing to train employees, and no preparedness plan in place.

The biggest fines were of $6,300 to Hertz in Freeland and the entire city of Port Huron. The city didn't make face masks a requirement nor did they conduct daily health screenings or have records of screenings. In addition the city didn't train their employees on COVID-19.

You can see all the businesses that were fined here. All have 15 days from the citation date to fight the penalties if they can prove they have corrected all the things they were fined on.

A couple weeks ago, the Boatwerks Restaurant in Holland was fined by the Ottawa County Health Department. The Holland Sentinel says that while no specifics were provided, the restaurant was not following COVID-19 guidelines.

The state has a COVID-19 workplace safety guidelines for all employers to follow and enforce. Guidelines are divided into different industries as well.

People can file a health and safety complaint with MIOSHA here.