Occupational and Industrial Safety: Lead Training and Certification

The Department of Labor & Industry must be informed when working with lead-based paint. This requirement applies when the paint will be removed or abated in a way that will last more than 20 years in housing where children under 6 years old are present, and isn't part of a renovation. It also applies when the paint will be removed or abated in housing built before 1978.

Occupational and Industrial Safety: Lead Training and Certification

Lead Abatement Notification

Act 44 of 1995 and its regulations require that the Department of Labor & Industry (Department) be notified of work where lead-based paint is present and that persons certified by the Department perform this work whenever the following will occur:

  • Lead-based paint is to be removed or abated using a method that will last greater than 20 years from housing in which children (less than 6 years old) are present and this removal is not taking place as part of a renovation/alteration of housing.
  • Lead-based paint is removed or abated using a method that will last greater than 20 years from "target housing" --- any housing constructed prior to 1978 , except housing for the elderly or person with disabilities (unless any one or more children age 6 years or under resides or is expected to reside in such housing for the elderly or persons with disabilities) or housing units that lack bedrooms. (If the removal is part of a renovation/alteration project, no notification is required.)

Note: There is no threshold for this notification based on the amount of lead-based paint present. If lead-based paint is present and will be removed in the dwellings described above, notification must be sent, and certified individuals must perform the abatement work.

When notification is required, a contractor must complete the Department of Labor & Industry's Lead Abatement Notification Form (LIBI-600L).

This form must be emailed to calbois@pa.gov, faxed to 717-705-0196 or mailed to the Department at least five (5) days (Monday-Sunday) before the date that abatement work will begin. The Department’s mailing address is as follows:

PA Department of Labor & Industry
Certification, Accreditation & Licensing Division
651 Boas Street, Room 1623
Harrisburg, PA 17121

If an emergency situation exists, this five (5) day requirement may be waived. To obtain a waiver, call the Department of Labor & Industry at 717-772-3396 between 8 a.m. and 4 p.m., Monday through Friday. If the waiver is granted, directions will be provided for faxing or emailing the notification form. This office's email address is calbois@pa.gov and fax number is 717-705-0196.

Please read and follow the directions for each category listed below.

All but the contractor certification application forms require the applicant to include her/his latest training information and the certificate for this training. For applicants who took training in Pennsylvania, the application must be submitted and certification obtained within six months of completion of training (interim date listed on the training certificate). For applicants who took training in another state, the initial training certificate and all subsequent refresher certificates must be submitted with the application to show there has been no lapse of training. Applications that lack this information or the course certificate(s) will not be processed.

Applicants must provide information pertaining to any enforcement actions taken against him/her.

All applicants must pay the specified certification fees, unless they are employees of and perform abatement work exclusively for the following entities: a federal, state, local government or not-for-profit agency. Fees are based on the anniversary date of the training certificate.

Applicants for the Building Inspector, Risk Assessor or Supervisor certification should note carefully the information found in Section E, regarding the special exam which they must pass in Pennsylvania before certification can be obtained.

Certification is issued through the training certificate’s anniversary date. For example: If you apply for your PA Lead Worker certification on May 1, 2009, with your training certificate, which was issued on January 1, 2009 and valid through January 1, 2012, then your Pennsylvania certification will be issued as valid through January 1, 2010. In January of 2010, you would apply again with the same training certificate and would be issued a certification valid through January 1, 2011. You would do this again in January 2011 for certification through January 1, 2012. Prior to January 1, 2012 you would need to take a refresher course and use that training certificate for the number of years it is valid.

For Contractor Certification: Initial and Renewal

  • Complete the Lead Contractor Certification Application (LIBI-613L).
  • Provide payment via check or money order made payable to the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. (Same fee applies to initial or a renewal certification.) Click here for the fee schedule.
  • Mail these items to:
    PA Department of Labor & Industry
    Certification, Accreditation & Licensing Division
    651 Boas Street, Room 1606
    Harrisburg, PA 17121

Note: This application must contain the certification number and name of an individual in this company that has been certified in the category "Supervisor" by the Department of Labor & Industry. The contracting firm will not be certified if an employee in the company has not been so certified.

For Worker Certification:

  • Complete the Application For Lead Occupation Certification (LIBI-607L).
  • Provide a copy of the Worker certificate(s) for your EPA or PA approved training course(s).
  • Provide information regarding any enforcement actions taken against you, following directions on page 2 of form LIBI-607L.
  • Provide the required payment via check or money order made payable to the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. Click here for the fee schedule.
  • Mail these items to:
    PA Department of Labor & Industry
    Certification, Accreditation & Licensing Division
    651 Boas Street, Room 1606
    Harrisburg, PA 17121

For Project Designer Certification:

Complete the Verification of Experience for Lead Occupation Certification (LIBI-615L) form. (See EPA 40 CFR Part 745.226 for further clarification.) Your work experience must reflect “from – to” dates as shown in the table below and all experience must be listed on the form itself (no attached resumes since this is a notarized form):

 

  • Provide information regarding any enforcement actions taken against you, following directions on page 2 of form LIBI-607L.
  • Provide the required payment via check or money order made payable to the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. Click here for the fee schedule.
  • Mail these items to:
    PA Department of Labor & Industry
    Certification, Accreditation & Licensing Division
    651 Boas Street, Room 1606
    Harrisburg, PA 17121

For Inspector Certification

  • Complete the Application For Lead Occupation Certification (LIBI-607L).
  • Provide a copy of the Inspector certificate(s) for your EPA or PA approved training course(s).
  • Provide information regarding any enforcement actions taken against you, following directions on page 2 of form LIBI-607L.
  • Provide the required payment via check or money order made payable to the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. Click here for the fee schedule.
  • Mail these items to:
    PA Department of Labor & Industry
    Certification, Accreditation & Licensing Division
    651 Boas Street, Room 1606
    Harrisburg, PA 17121

For Risk Assessor Certification:

  • Complete the Application For Lead Occupation Certification (LIBI-607L).
  • Provide a copy of the Inspector and Risk Assessor certificate(s) for your EPA or PA approved training course(s).
  • Provide information regarding any enforcement actions taken against you, following directions on page 2 of form LIBI-607L.
  • Provide the required payment via check or money order made payable to the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. Click here for the fee schedule.
  • Mail these items to:
    PA Department of Labor & Industry
    Certification, Accreditation & Licensing Division
    651 Boas Street, Room 1606
    Harrisburg, PA 17121

For Supervisor Certification:

  • Complete the Application For Lead Occupation Certification (LIBI-607L).
  • Provide a copy of the supervisor certificate(s) for your EPA or PA approved training course(s).
  • Provide information regarding any enforcement actions taken against you, following directions on page 2 of form LIBI-607L.
  • Provide the required payment via check or money order made payable to the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. Click here for the fee schedule..
  • Mail these items to:
    PA Department of Labor & Industry
    Certification, Accreditation & Licensing Division
    651 Boas Street, Room 1606
    Harrisburg, PA 17121

FAQs

Combining lead courses is prohibited. For example, a worker course may not be combined with a supervisor course and an initial course may not be combined with a refresher Course. Each discipline must be taught as a separate, distinct course.

No, since March 2020, refresher courses are permitted to be held virtually by teleconferencing as long as the training provider administering the training is approved to teach their courses virtually. Online courses (where there isn’t a live instructor teaching the course) are NOT approved in Pennsylvania.

To request approval to teach virtual courses that are already approved to be taught in person, the training provider must submit their plan to our office stating the type of technology to be utilized and how they will comply with the following requirements:

  • Training provider must record the entire training session and be prepared to make the recording available to L&I or an L&I representative upon request.
  • Students must understand and consent to, prior to the start of the course, the recording of the course and their participation in the course.
  • Instructor must ensure that each course is conducted without prejudice nor harassment.
  • All students and the trainer must have video capability.
  • All participants must have a good internet connection.
  • Training provider’s chosen teleconferencing technology must allow phone call-ins in case the audio cuts out (instructor must maintain video feed from student).
  • Instructor must provide quality instruction which includes interactive participatory training methods (not lecture only), similar to an in-person course. All students must actively participate in classroom discussion.
  • During instruction time, students may not talk to people who are not in the class, take telephone calls, text, surf the internet or read materials unrelated to the class.
  • Students cannot have distractions (people interrupting, telephones ringing, excess background noise, etc.) during the course.
  • Class materials must be provided to all students.
  • Font size of all presented materials must be large enough to be easily legible.
  • Training provider needs to address how attendance will be taken throughout the training, including after breaks and lunch.
  • The number of students for each class cannot exceed the capability of the teleconferencing platform being used and be no more than 25 students per class.
  • Training provider must issue a training course certificate to each student that completes the teleconferenced course in its entirety. The course certificate must designate that the course was completed virtually.
  • L&I employees must receive real time access to all teleconferenced courses
  • All requirements for courses remain as far as notifications, revisions, cancelations, course materials, approved instructors, paperwork (except that a course attendance list can be submitted in lieu of a course sign-in sheet), etc. Access information to the teleconferenced course must be sent in along with the course notification.

Initial training course notifications must be submitted five (5) days (Sunday – Saturday) prior to the start of the course. Revisions (including relocation of training) and cancellations of training course notifications must be submitted to our office by email or fax as soon as the decision is made. They may be sent by email to CALBOIS@pa.gov or by fax to 717-705-0196.WHen 

The training course sign-in sheets/evaluation forms must be submitted to our office within five (5) days of the completion of the course. They may be sent by email to CALBOIS@pa.gov, by fax to 717-705-0196 or by mail to:

Department of Labor and Industry
CAL Division
651 Boas Street, Room 1606
Harrisburg, PA 17121

Yes, if you plan to teach the course that year. Training providers need to renew courses every year they plan to teach them and should submit an application for training course accreditation in a timely manner so as not to interfere with their training schedule. NOTE: The Department has thirty (30) days, starting from the time our office receives the completed application, to review training course accreditation applications.

To add a new instructor to an approved training provider, email our office at CALBOIS@pa.gov with your request to add a new instructor and a copy of the individual’s resume and other applicable documentation showing how they meet EPA’s instructor requirements (EPA 40 CFR Part 745, §745.225). An instructor cannot teach a course until they are approved by our office to do so.

When a guest instructor will be acting as a principal instructor for a training provider on a course, they must be added as a new instructor and must be approved by the Department for that training provider prior to providing instruction. The instructor should be listed on the course notification for the course they are instructing.

When, instead, the guest speaker is only providing their expertise on a particular subject within the training course, for a short duration while the principal instructor of the entire course is present, the use of the guest speaker does not require prior approval by the Department and does not need to be listed on the course notification form. If the training provider chooses to list a guest speaker of this nature on the notification form, it should be clearly noted on the form who will be the principal instructor and who will be the guest speaker as well as what topic(s) the guest speaker will cover.

To update the training manager for an approved training provider, email our office at CALBOIS@pa.gov with your request to make this change and a copy of the individual’s resume and other applicable documentation showing how they meet EPA’s training manager requirements (EPA 40 CFR Part 745, §745.225). The request should detail the start date of the new training manager as well as if they are to be named the contact person for the training provider.

Any proposed change to training materials must be submitted to our office at least ten (10) days prior to its proposed implementation date. The documentation must clearly state the course it is for and may be sent by email to CALBOIS@pa.gov or by fax to 717-705-0196. Our office will notify the training provider once the materials have been reviewed.

​If the instructor teaching the training course signs the sign-in sheet for each session of the course (i.e., morning and afternoon for each day, as applicable) and completes an evaluation form for themselves, they can receive credit for the course, receive a training certificate for the course, and use it to apply for Pennsylvania certification for that particular discipline.

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PA Department of Labor & Industry Certification, Accreditation & Licensing Division 651 Boas Street, Room 1623 Harrisburg, PA 17121

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