Sorry guys, but I think you are wrong.
In April, the New York State Inspector General’s office published an investigation into the state’s crane operator licensing system, which is overseen by the Department of Labour and operated largely by the International Union of Operating Engineers. The report calls the current operator practical test biased in favour of IUOE members for three main reasons:
1. Assessors had complete discretion to pass or fail students without reference to any written criteria whatsoever – not even what constitutes a passing mark. They grade reports in pencil.
2. At IUOE testing locations [almost all of the testing centres in the state], applicants who were IUOE members got extra prep time.
3. All of the members of the state’s ruling authority, the Crane Board, have IUOE connections.
(Neither the IUOE or the Department of Labour responded to requests for comment.)
The testing of crane operators matters because crane accidents happen through human error; and the lack of training can really count. The report came about because of an earlier investigation into Department of Labour employee and Crane Board member Frank Fazzio, who issued more than 200 crane licences to people who did not deserve them.
This sad story convinces me that the NCCCO test should be rolled out to all 50 states. And I’m not the only one: a June report from the construction research body of the union confederation AFL-CIO recommends the same thing (see story, p07).
The NCCCO system has been designed to separate training from testing, to reduce the potential for bias, and has been validated through proper testing research. The system was recently accredited by ANSI. It is the most rigorous large-scale form of crane operator certification in the world today, as far as I know.
