Monday, June 15, 2009
On April 14, 2009, President Obama appointed Thomasina V. Rogers to be Chair of the Occupational Safety and Health Review Commission, an independent, quasi-judicial agency responsible for hearing appeals from decisions made by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA), the federal agency responsible for enforcing workplace safety standards. She was confirmed by the Senate on May 1 and sworn in May 13.
Rogers witnessed the early days of the civil rights movement while growing up in Montgomery, Alabama, during the 1950s. She earned a B.A. in Journalism from Northwestern University and a law degree from Columbia University School of Law. In the mid-1980s, she worked as legal counsel in the Department of Education Office for Civil Rights. Rogers also served for seven years in the Federal Government’s Senior Executive Service (SES). During her time in the SES, she served as Legal Counsel to the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, where she had primary responsibility for managing the development of the Americans with Disabilities Act employment regulations.
After the election of Bill Clinton to the presidency in 1992, she served as Associate Director of the White House Office of Presidential Personnel, which recruits senior political appointees. Starting in 1994, she served as Chairman of the Administrative Conference of the United States until its dissolution at the end of 1995. In 1998, President Clinton appointed her to the Occupational Safety and Health Review Commission. She served as Chairman from 1999 to 2002, and was reappointed to the Review Commission in 2003 by President Bush. On the Commission, she gained notice for vigorous dissents in two cases that she believed undermined worker safety: a 2003 decision that cut an OSHA penalty for willfully exposing untrained workers to asbestos from $1.14 million to $658,000; and a 2007 case that limited OSHA’s ability to cite construction contractors for unsafe conditions they create for a subcontractor’s employees.
Rogers is an officer of the Board of Directors of Children’s National Medical Center in Washington, D.C., as well as the American Arbitration Association, and is also active in the American Bar Association and the National Bar Association.
Rogers is married to Gregory M. Gill, a lobbyist and executive vice president with the firm of Cassidy & Associates. The couple has one daughter. A Democrat, Rogers donated $7,100 to Democratic candidates and organizations between 1996 and 2008.
- Matt Bewig
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