Document J3DjDdMOg24m2YkYO1Z3v5LNK

TO: Distribution Interoffice Communication FROM: DATE: SUBJ: T. G. Grumbles November 2, 1990 ABERDEEN COMMUNITY ACTIVITIES Attached is a copy of the article that appeared in October's Occupational Hazard's magazine. This is a national publication with a relatively large circulation. Several people mentioned this article to me at a national industrial hygiene conference last week. T. G. Grumbles dlj .204 Attachment Distribution: Executive Management R. J. Andersen, J. D. Burns, J. R. Ball, J. A. DeBernardi, G. G. Draper, R. T. Ferrell, H. R. Flammer, N. C. Frost, R. D. Gamblin, T. H. Huffman, B. E. A. Larsen, M. J. Schneider, W. J. B. Vogel, J. J. Weidner, D. L. Cohen, J. C. Ledvina-Houston V. W. Weiss-Austin PLANT MANAGERS R. W. Seymour-Aber, L. R. Bauer-Balt, G. D. Williams-Blane, J. Pavao-Hmd, J. Friend-LCCP, J. W. Ware-LCLAB, R. A. Conrad-LCVCM, H. D. Garrison-Okc, P. L. Foote-Prem, V. W. Weiss-Austin VVV 000011402 Vista Chemical: Tuning In To The Community obert Seymour, manager of Rthe Vista Chemical plant in the small town of Aber deen, Miss., can't walk through a downtown store without having someone stop to tell him how much they appreciate the open ap proach Vista has taken with the community. Comments like these are a re flection of Vista's efforts over the past two years at improving risk communication for its employees and its neighbors in the commu nity. Vista Chemical, a Fortune 500 company with facilities world wide, manufactures chemicals used to make household deter gents, cosmetics, and hygiene products. Vinyl chloride monomer (VCM) is manufactured at Vista's plant in Lake Charles, La., and shipped to the Aberdeen plant for use in the production of polyvinyl chloride (PVC) resins and com pounds. These materials are sold to firms manufacturing a wide va riety of products, including water and sewer pipe, cable coatings, auto trim, and food packaging. The Aberdeen plant employs about 250 workers, 60 percent of whom are local residents. As one of the largest companies in the Aberdeen area, Vista's economic officials wanted to be ready for the impact on the community is sig worst possible public response to nificant. data about Vista materials. The Seymour says the reporting re best strategy, they agreed, would quirements of SARA Title III, Sec be to provide as thorough an ex tion 313, were the driving force planation of the data as possible. behind the company's efforts to "People weren't familiar with improve communication channels some of the things that we were with employees and the sur doing or what kind of emission rounding community. SARA re levels we had," Seymour says. "We quires facilities to provide officials expected that there might be an and citizens with data on the types outcry from the public saying, of hazardous materials used and 'Nobody ever told us any of this.' manufactured on site, the amounts We knew that putting out those on hand, and their specific lo numbers without some expla cations. Under Section 313, Vista is nation to go along with them required to report emissions for might be upsetting." approximately 60 chemicals at all In beefing up its risk communi plant locations. cation policy, Vista added an addi Seymour says he and other Vista tional member to its corporate communications staff, and pro vided plant managers with in creased media and communica tions training. In addition, the company developed a new envi ronmental policy which allows for programs designed to protect en vironment, health, and safety throughout the life of its products. The first of ten principles of the new policy is: "Vista will inform and educate its employees, sur rounding communities, carriers, customers, contractors, and gov ernment agencies of the health and environmental hazards of the chemicals we make, use, and sell." The first step, says Seymour, was the assembly of employee and community groups to help the October 1990/Occupational Hazards 81 company tune in to public con cerns. "When we began back in April 1988 to talk about communicating SARA Section 313 information to our employees and to our neigh bors in the community," remem bers Seymour, "we said first off that we needed to know what their concerns were, and what ques tions or comments they had about the plant and its operations." The result was two "focus groups," one for local community residents living near the plant and one for employees and their spou ses. In an effort to promote more open discussion, representatives from the public relations and envi ronmental industrial hygiene de partments at corporate headquar ters in Houston were called in to discuss issues with the employee group rather than plant officials. The strategy, says Seymour, was that people would speak more frankly with company representa tives than with local management. "We tried to select a good cross- section in the employee group," says Seymour. "We had some mi norities, some women, hourly peo ple, salary people, we tried to rep resent the whole workforce. We talked to them about what their concerns were about the plant, and got some feedback." Included in the community fo cus group were residents who lived near the plant and local busi ness representatives. The primary concern of many of the residents, says Seymour, was the white PVC resin dust that discharged from the plant and settled on property throughout the area. In response, the plant invested in engineering methods to control this release of dust. Beyond the concerns over the dust, says Seymour, the commu nity knew little about the com pany or its corporate restruc turing. In 1981, Conoco Chemical Inc., located in Aberdeen, was ac quired by Du Pont. Vista was formed in 1984 by a leveraged jyout from some of Conoco's re maining assets. "People were not knowledge able about us at all," he says. "They basically said that what Conoco had done before, and what Vista was now doing, was not telling the community anything, and that we kept our cards pretty close to our vest," says Seymour. "They knew we had some chemicals over here, but they didn't know anything about them. They were glad to have us in the community, because we're a good employer, but they had some concerns." Immediately following the dis cussions in the focus groups, Vista set up four SARA communications teams. The teams, each consisting "(Residents and local merchants) were glad to have us in the community . . . but they had some concerns." Robert Seymour Plant Manager Vista Chemical of eight to 12 employees, included Seymour, the plant's employee re lations director, superintendent, safety director, frontline super visor, and several hourly employ ees. "We had the folks who got the feedback from the focus groups come to meetings of the SARA communications team, and let us know what some of the concerns were that they heard about. We then set about putting together an action plan for how we'd work on them." 82 Occupational Hazards/October 1990 The team developed a commu nications plan and materials, in cluding a videocassette film to be shown at several communications events. These events included meetings of all plant employees, and an open house for employees' families to visit the plant. "The video talks about what our waste levels are and gives SARA emissions data," explains Sey mour. During meetings in the first year, he adds, "we handed out a brochure that showed how our plant operates and included pic tures of some of our plant employ ees that people would recognize as their neighbors." In the second year of the program, says Sey mour, the brochures were distrib uted with the weekly plant news paper. "We've now had 17 pre- sentations of our SARA communi cations program since May 1988," says Seymour. "Those include pre sentations for local government officials, state legislators, the local emergency planning committee (LEPC), the local rotary club, and the local trucking firm with which Vista works. The presentations usually include a group of plant people talking about our contribu tion to the community, how our plant operates, what things we're doing to improve the reliability of our plant, the quality of our prod uct, and the environmental and safety performance of the plant." Seymour's risk communication objectives for the coming year in clude the formation of a commu nity advisory panel, which would monitor community feedback to Vista's risk information campaign. "We've already had some volun teers who have expressed an inter est in participating," says Sey mour. "The strategy isn't completely mapped out yet, but there are some documents from the CMA that give some hints on how to make community advisory panels work. We belong to CMA, and we're involved in their Re sponsible Care program. That's one of the requirements of success in that program: letting your audi ence know what you're doing, and then understanding and address ing their concerns." WV 000011404 1..........