"Washington County wreath-making company fined nearly $16,000 for worker housing violations,"

The Maine Department of Labor contacted its federal counterpart last fall with concerns about the living conditions of workers at Worcester Resources, the family-owned Washington County company that supplies wreaths for the nonprofit Wreaths Across America.

There were allegations that Worcester Resources was housing migrant laborers beneath the factory floor of its wreath-assembly facility in Topsfield, where smoke detectors weren’t functioning and debris was falling into the kitchen and sleeping quarters, according to documents obtained by The Maine Monitor. 

Next door, thirty additional workers were allegedly living in two small, unsanitary bungalows, without access to potable water, according to federal records describing the complaint...

This isn’t the first time that the for-profit company has been flagged for labor violations. Over the past four years, Worcester Resources has racked up more than $50,000 in federal fines, according to OSHA data, including for violations related to a COVID-19 outbreak that spread among 80 workers and left one employee dead...

When an OSHA inspector visited the Worcester Resources facilities a month after the state referral, on Dec. 2, the agency found that the company was housing 71 laborers on the lower level of the factory and in two exterior trailers, and that “none of the sleeping quarters met the spacing requirements.” 

Workers had an average of 30 square feet per person in their sleeping quarters — a little bit more than the size of a double mattress — and some slept in bunk beds that were just inches from the ground, according to the OSHA report. The agency requires that occupants of temporary labor camps be given at least 50 square feet of floor space and that beds be at least a foot off the ground...

In response to questions from The Maine Monitor, an official with Worcester Resources refuted the allegations in the state referral, claiming that the complaint stemmed from a neighbor and that the OSHA inspector “found all the complaints to be unfounded and erroneous.”...