The Department of Labor’s Office of Inspector General will examine a federal program that recognizes “model workplaces” and exempts them from regular inspections, the office’s audit plan for the coming fiscal year shows.

The assessment comes as an Occupational Safety and Health Administration task force is conducting its own review of the agency’s Voluntary Protection Programs — the subject of a recent Center for Public Integrity investigation.

The Center found that, since 2000, more than 80 workers have died at sites OSHA deemed the nation’s safest. But even when investigators found serious safety violations related to the fatal accidents, OSHA rarely used its authority to remove sites from the program.

About 21 months ago, a proposed list of widely used chemicals that may pose health risks landed at the White House’s Office of Management and Budget for review.

It’s still there.

An attempt by the Environmental Protection Agency to create a “chemicals of concern” list — part of the agency’s larger plans to improve what administrator Lisa Jackson has called an outdated and dysfunctional system for regulating toxic substances — remains stuck in the OMB’s Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs (OIRA).

The proposal has sparked heavy resistance among industry groups, some of which have met with White House officials and argued that releasing the list could harm the economy. By executive order, OIRA should finish such reviews within 90 days — or, in some cases, 120. Instead, it’s had the EPA list for 638 days — and counting.

“The reason is political pandering,” said Rena Steinzor, a law professor at the University of Maryland and president of the Center for Progressive Reform. “OIRA is a politicized place where rules go to die.”

OMB spokeswoman Meg Reilly said in an emailed statement that the office doesn’t comment on regulations under review, but “it’s not uncommon for review periods to be extended for regulatory actions that require additional time for consideration of public comment and analysis by OMB and all the affected agencies.”

Since OIRA received the proposal on May 12, 2010, it has hosted eight meetings about the list — six of them with companies and industry groups. By comparison, OIRA officials have met once with public health and environmental groups and once with staffers for Democratic Sens. Frank Lautenberg and Sheldon Whitehouse, sponsors of legislation to reform regulation of toxic chemicals.

Fishing states meeting in Santiago, Chile, left the way open for fleets to catch jack mackerel far beyond the 390,000-metric ton limit that scientists say is vital to protect the already decimated species. In all, the actual catch could reach a whopping half-million tons.

Asian, European and Latin American nations agreed to limit catches to 40 percent of 2010 levels, a total of about 300,000 metric tons in 2012. But Peru claimed rights to an extra 120,000 metric tons within its exclusive 200-mile zone.

In addition, Chile might not be able to honor its proposed limit because government and industry had already agreed on a much higher quota. And nobody knows what Ecuador will do. The country landed almost 70,000 metric tons in 2011 but took no part in the recent South Pacific Regional Fisheries Management Organization (SPRFMO) negotiations in Santiago. The SPRFMO — an intergovernmental organization charged with protecting fish stocks — has not been ratified, so it cannot impose binding limits.

The International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) reported on Jan. 25 that fleets in an essential free-for-all have reduced jack mackerel from around 30 million metric tons to less than three million in two decades. The bony, bronze-hued jack mackerel is a key component of fishmeal for aquaculture. It can take more than 5 kilos of jack mackerel to raise a single kilo of farmed salmon.

Publication of a landmark government study probing whether diesel engine exhaust causes lung cancer in miners — already 20 years in the making — has been delayed by industry and congressional insistence on seeing study data and documents before the public does.

A federal judge has affirmed the right of an industry group and a House committee to review the materials and has held the Department of Health and Human Services in contempt for not producing all of them.

The much-anticipated study of 12,000 miners exposed to diesel fumes carries broad implications. If the research suggests a strong link between the fumes and cancer, regulation and litigation could ramp up — with consequences not only for underground mining, but also for industries such as trucking, rail and shipping.

Exposure isn't limited to workers; people who live near ports, rail yards and highways also are subjected to diesel exhaust laced with carcinogens such as benzene, arsenic and formaldehyde.

But for the time being, at least, the results of an $11.5 million investigation by the National Cancer Institute and the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health are under lock and key.

Richard Clapp, emeritus professor of environmental health at Boston University, is among several public health experts who called the situation unusual.

"I've never heard of an industry group demanding manuscripts from a government agency before a study has been accepted for publication," Clapp said. “My guess is it would give the industry a chance to prepare their rejoinder early. They want to delay anything that’s going to implicate them in liability for lung cancer.”