The position reports to the Safety and Occupational Health Manager, Facilities Management Service of the Eastern Colorado Health Care System. The incumbent serves as the Environmental Protection Specialists serving a wide geographic area encompassing all sites supported by the ECHCS. Environmental protection programs deal with the environmental impacts of human activities on air, land, water, and other media.

Duties

Major duties include but not limited to: Managing safety or occupational health program elements. Developing and recommending safety and occupational health policy to higher levels of management. Applying safety and occupational health laws, regulations, principles, theories, practices, and procedures to advise on or resolve technical matters dealing with occupational safety and health requirements. Developing safety and occupational health standards, regulations, practices, and procedures to eliminate or control potential hazards. Developing or implementing programs to reduce the frequency, severity, and cost of accidents and occupational illnesses. Analyzing or evaluating new and existing jobs, processes, products, or other systems to determine the existence, severity, probability, and outcome of hazards. Designing or modifying workplaces, processes, products, or other systems to control or eliminate hazards. Inspecting or surveying workplaces, processes, products, or other systems for compliance with established safety and occupational health policies or standards and to identify potential new hazards. Training of workers, supervisors, managers, or other safety and occupational health personnel in safety or occupational health subjects. Work in occupational fields such as industrial hygienist, safety engineer, fire prevention engineer, health physicist, and occupational health nurse Work Schedule: 07:30am to 4:00pm M-F Position Description/PD#: Lead Safety & Occupational Health Specialist/PD134030 Relocation/Recruitment Incentives: Not Authorized Critical Skills Incentive (CSI): Not Authorized Permanent Change of Station (PCS): Not Authorized Financial Disclosure Report: Not required Physical Requirements: Work may require some physical effort (e.g. walking, standing, crawling, climbing, carrying light items such as boxes, tools, equipment, or driving or traveling by motor vehicle). The work environment involves everyday risks or discomforts that require normal safety precautions typical of such places as offices, training rooms and libraries. Work area is adequately lighted, headed, and ventilated. There may be occasional exposure to moderate risks or discomforts in storage areas or hazardous waste sites. Time-In-Grade Requirement: Applicants who are current Federal employees and have held a GS grade any time in the past 52 weeks must also meet time-in-grade requirements by the closing date of this announcement. For a GS-12 position you must have served 52 weeks at the GS-11. The grade may have been in any occupation, but must have been held in the Federal service. An SF-50 that shows your time-in-grade eligibility must be submitted with your application materials. If the most recent SF-50 has an effective date within the past year, it may not clearly demonstrate you possess one-year time-in-grade, as required by the announcement. In this instance, you must provide an additional SF-50 that clearly demonstrates one-year time-in-grade.

Requirements

Qualifications

To qualify for this position, applicants must meet all requirements by the closing date of this announcement, 04/17/2024. Safety and Occupational Health Management Series 0018 has an Individual Occupational Requirement. Undergraduate and Graduate Education: Major study -- safety or occupational health fields (safety, occupational health, industrial hygiene), or degree in other related fields that included or was supplemented by at least 24 semester hours of study from among the following (or closely related) disciplines: safety, occupational health, industrial hygiene, occupational medicine, toxicology, public health, mathematics, physics, chemistry, biological sciences, engineering, and industrial psychology. OR, Specialized Experience (for positions above GS-5): Experience in or related to safety and occupational health that provided the specific knowledge, skills, and abilities to perform successfully the duties of the position. Examples of qualifying specialized experience include, Managing safety or occupational health program elements. Developing and recommending safety and occupational health policy to higher levels of management. Applying safety and occupational health laws, regulations, principles, theories, practices, and procedures to advise on or resolve technical matters dealing with occupational safety and health requirements. Developing safety and occupational health standards, regulations, practices, and procedures to eliminate or control potential hazards. Developing or implementing programs to reduce the frequency, severity, and cost of accidents and occupational illnesses. Analyzing or evaluating new and existing jobs, processes, products, or other systems to determine the existence, severity, probability, and outcome of hazards. Designing or modifying workplaces, processes, products, or other systems to control or eliminate hazards. Inspecting or surveying workplaces, processes, products, or other systems for compliance with established safety and occupational health policies or standards and to identify potential new hazards. Training of workers, supervisors, managers, or other safety and occupational health personnel in safety or occupational health subjects. Work in occupational fields such as industrial hygienist, safety engineer, fire prevention engineer, health physicist, and occupational health nurse. OR, Certification as a Certified Safety Professional (CSP), Certified Industrial Hygienist (CIH), or Certified Health Physicist (CHP), or similar certification that included successful completion of a written examination meets the requirements for GS-5. Applicants may also qualify for higher grade levels based on their education and/or experience. In addition to the Individual Occupation Requirement, you must meet the specialized experience listed below. Specialized Experience GS-12: You must have one year of specialized experience equivalent to at least the next lower grade GS-11 in the normal line of progression for the occupation in the organization. Examples of specialized experience would typically include, but are not limited to: Knowledge of a wide range of safety, occupational health, fire protection, and construction safety principles, practices, and regulations permitting the independent performance of complex, recurring assignments to identify, evaluate, and control or eliminate a wide variety of hazards and administratively manage program elements. Demonstrate skill in written communication sufficient to prepare written reports, memoranda, pamphlets, brochures, and other written products in conjunction with the Safety and Occupational Health Program of the Medical Center. Must have skill in oral communication sufficient to effectively conduct meetings, briefings, training, orientation, and other oral presentations. Responsible for independently planning and carrying out assigned program elements and for resolving most conflicts and hazardous situations. Work is coordinated with principal organizational representatives, and initiative must be taken to interpret safety and occupational health policies, standards, regulations, and codes to meet objectives. Meets with a variety of individuals during performance of duties. Positioned to discuss problems and corrections with any employee or supervisor within the ECHC, to include Union officials. Ability to establish effective work relationships in meeting and dealing with others throughout the ECHCS and representatives from the private sector and/or other agencies. Ensure that the organization's strategic plan, mission, vision, and values are communicated to the team and integrated into the team's budget, strategies, goals, objectives, work plans and work products and services. The Lead is responsible ensures that the work assignments of the other employees of the team are carried out by performing a range of duties. Distribute and balance the workload among employees in accordance with established workflow or job specialization, assure timely accomplishment of the assigned workload, and assure that each employee has enough work to keep busy. Make day-to-day adjustments in accordance with established priorities, obtaining assistance from the supervisor on problems that may arise. Instruct employees in specific tasks and job techniques and make available written instructions, reference materials and supplies. Experience in a wide range of work operations and environmental conditions involving a diversity of hazards and a wide variety of independent and continuing assignments in construction safety, fire and life safety, occupational safety and health that have exacting technical requirements. Ability to identify, generate analysis, and correction of hazards, determining degree of risk involved with noted safety problems, follow-up of all hazard situations, ensuring that all safety and occupational health directives are complied with, recommending, initiating, and following up on all corrective measures to abate hazards. Plans, schedules, and conducts inspections in establishments and worksites where there is a strong probability of encountering hazardous work processes and materials, and unsafe environmental conditions, involving substantial numbers of employees. Knowledge to perform occupational safety, fire safety, and construction safety inspections and surveys of the Medical Center, Community Based & Extended Care sites, and Contract Patient Care Sites, as well as complete reports on findings and take action to mitigate hazards. Basic knowledge in hazardous materials, industrial hygiene, and emergency preparedness is required to assist and facilitate these programs in the CB&EC sites. Provides on the job training to new employees. Assist subordinate staff on procedures, policies, directives, etc. and obtain needed information or decisions from supervisor on problems that come up. Check on work in progress or spot check work not requiring review (e.g., filing, or direct services) and review completed work to see that supervisor's instruction on work procedures, methods, and deadlines have been met. Ability to independently select the appropriate guidelines for a specific situation, interpret and apply the guideline and make minor modifications and adaptations to the guidelines when necessary to cover specific hazards. Experience in performing inspections at the VA Eastern Colorado Medical Center, Community Based & Extended Care (CB&EC) sites, and affiliated operations. Inspections and surveys are conducted to assure that areas inspected conform to applicable standards as dictated in VA manuals and policies, National Fire Protection Association (NFPA) Codes, OSHA Regulations, The Joint Commission (TJC) and other applicable safety regulations.

Education

A transcript must be submitted with your application if you are basing all or part of your qualifications on education.

Note: Only education or degrees recognized by the U.S. Department of Education from accredited colleges, universities, schools, or institutions may be used to qualify for Federal employment. You can verify your education here: http://ope.ed.gov/accreditation/. If you are using foreign education to meet qualification requirements, you must send a Certificate of Foreign Equivalency with your transcript in order to receive credit for that education. For further information, visit: https://sites.ed.gov/international/recognition-of-foreign-qualifications/.

Experience refers to paid and unpaid experience, including volunteer work done through National Service programs (e.g., Peace Corps, AmeriCorps) and other organizations (e.g., professional; philanthropic; religions; spiritual; community; student; social). Volunteer work helps build critical competencies, knowledge, and skills and can provide valuable training and experience that translates directly to paid employment. You will receive credit for all qualifying experience, including volunteer experience.

Note: A full year of work is considered to be 35-40 hours of work per week. Part-time experience will be credited on the basis of time actually spent in appropriate activities. Applicants wishing to receive credit for such experience must indicate clearly the nature of their duties and responsibilities in each position and the number of hours a week spent in such employment.

For more information on these qualification standards, please visit the United States Office of Personnel Management's website at https://www.opm.gov/policy-data-oversight/classification-qualifications/general-schedule-qualification-standards/.

Contacts

• Address Eastern Colorado HCS Denver 13611 E. Colfax Ave Aurora, CO 80045 US
• Name: VISN-HR Contact Center
• Phone: 719-227-4600
• Email: [email protected]