Pete Reveles was a handyman.
“He did everything for everybody,” said his wife, Covina.
The couple were high-school sweethearts, married for 23 years, but on February 2nd, everything changed.
The 47-year-old father of two was working at a Buckeye cattle ranch as a day laborer, digging the footing for a new concrete wall. A nearby retaining wall collapsed, crushing him and another worker, 55-year-old Oliberto Vasquez, beneath cement blocks, according to an investigation by the Arizona Division of Occupational Safety and Health (ADOSH).
Paramedics arrived, but the men were already dead.
An ADOSH report said the incident “could have been prevented if the employer-provided training for employees on the hazards associated with the type of work.”
ADOSH cited the employer, Arlington Cattle Company, for safety violations and fined the company based on the seriousness of the violations. But ADOSH then gave the company a 70% discount, according to records, from about $22,000 to just under $7,000.
The company was eligible for such a discount – which ADOSH refers to as an “adjustment” factor – because Arlington Cattle Company was a small business with 15 employees.
Turns out, such discounts aren’t unusual.
An ABC15 investigation found ADOSH routinely gives companies with fewer than 250 employees a reduction on their fines, under a federal Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) policy designed to minimize the financial impact on small businesses.
Families of those Arizona workers are now speaking out, calling for an end to these discounts.
Covina Reveles attended the public meeting in June where the proposed safety violations and fines for Arlington Cattle Company were approved by the Industrial Commission of Arizona. Sitting next to her was the family’s attorney, Anthony Ramirez. They wanted to learn more about what happened the day Pete Reveles died. They were shocked to learn the fines were discounted.
“Anybody dying, it should not be discounted,” Covina Reveles told ABC15 in an interview. “It's like basically saying their life wasn't worth anything. And that’s not fair.”
Ramirez said the fines aren’t large to start. Reducing them even further sends a bad message, he said.
“And I think that that message is, you know, if we get in trouble, if we're a small company, then ADOSH is going to discount this fine that we receive,” he said.
The Arlington Cattle Company did not respond to phone calls and emails from ABC15 seeking comment.
We reviewed three years’ worth of ADOSH records and found these types of discounts are routinely given to small companies.
For example, ABC15 found ADOSH fined 13 companies in 2022 for safety violations where workers died. All those companies were considered small and they all got discounts, ranging from 20-60% based on the number of employees. The fewer the employees, the larger the discount.
- In one instance, a worker fell off a two-story apartment building and died. ADOSH slashed the fine from $9,500 to $3,800.
- In another case, a bale of hay fell on a worker and killed him. ADOSH cut the fine from $12,500 to $7,650.
- A worker at a metal scrap wholesaler died after an excavator crushed him. ADOSH reduced the fine from $5,000 to $2,000.
Arizona is one of 22 states that operate their own worker-safety programs with permission from federal OSHA. In Arizona, ADOSH enforces workplace safety and health standards. A workplace fatality triggers an ADOSH inspection, where inspectors conduct interviews and check to see whether the employer violated safety standards. Employers can be cited and fined.
Both federal and state worker-safety programs must consider company size when assessing fines, said Jordan Barab, a former deputy assistant secretary of labor for OSHA.
“There are small employers who just may not be able to tolerate the high penalties without having a serious impact on their ability to do business,” he said. But he said “consider” is the key word, he said. Exceptions can be made in cases where workers die.
“OSHA has already low penalties,” he said. “If they get reduced even more, you know, families do get upset and understandably so.”
ADOSH declined to sit down for an interview with ABC15 about the discounted fines. In a statement, officials said there are factors, such as company size, that are “used to calculate the penalty amount” and are “not a reduction.” ADOSH said those guidelines are laid out in the federal OSHA Field Operations Manual.
Several years ago, however, ADOSH had a different approach.
We obtained public meeting minutes from 2016 where an ADOSH assistant director explained fine reductions aren’t given on safety violations that caused or contributed to the fatality.
It’s unclear when that practice changed.
ADOSH recently got a new director, Mark Norton, after the previous director resigned. The governor appointed new leadership earlier this year to the umbrella state agency over ADOSH, the Industrial Commission of Arizona. Dennis Kavanaugh is the new chairman of the Industrial Commission, and Guy Testini is the new director.
Given the new leadership, we asked whether the state agency was reconsidering discounts.
In a statement, ADOSH said that while OSHA says penalties are assessed giving consideration to factors - such as company size - the OSHA Act also provides for exceptions.
“Chairman Kavanaugh, Director Testini, and ADOSH Director Norton all bring new perspectives to the agency helping to advance the (Industrial Commission’s) mission to protect the life, health, safety, and welfare of Arizona’s workforce,” the statement said.
For the Reveles family, no fine is great enough. But they hope state officials will stop giving discounts on fines and send a strong message that Arizona takes workplace safety seriously.
“He just went to work,” Covina Reveles said about the last time she saw her husband.
He had worked at the cattle ranch in the past, doing jobs the family never envisioned would be dangerous.
“He got up that morning, got dressed, went to work,” said his daughter, Kaylie Reveles.
“We never thought he was not going to come home.”
Email ABC15 Investigator Anne Ryman at anne.ryman@abc15.com, call her at 602-685-6345, or connect on X, formerly known as Twitter, and Facebook.
