WASHINGTON — U.S. Secretary of Labor Thomas E. Perez issued the following statement about the February 2015 Employment Situation report released today:

"The economic winds remained at our back in February, with the addition of 295,000 new jobs.

WASHINGTON — U.S. Secretary of Labor Thomas E. Perez issued the following statement about the March 2015 Employment Situation report released today:

Employer name: Menards Inc., 4777 Menard Drive, Eau Claire, Wisconsin

Investigation site: Menards Inc., operating as Midwest Manufacturing, 4801 N. 264th Street, Valley, Nebraska

On Sept. 29, 2014, the U. S. Department of Labor's Occupational Safety and Health Administration's Omaha Area Office initiated a fatality inspection after a 54-year-old forklift operator was fatally injured while moving trusses in a warehouse owned by home improvement store, Menards Inc.

BIRMINGHAM, Ala. — If his employer had protected him properly as he worked in a 12-foot-deep trench to connect a new home's plumbing to the main sewer line, 31-year-old LeDonte McCruter could have returned home at day's end to spend time with the young nieces and nephews he adored. Instead, a kind man known for his quick smile died at a Birmingham work site when the trench around him collapsed and buried him alive on Aug. 31, 2014. Rescue workers tried for more than six hours to save McCruter, a day laborer.

DENVER — The death of a 52-year-old man, killed when a scrap metal baler started while he worked inside, could have been averted if his employer, Atlas Metal and Iron Corp., had made sure the machine was shut down properly, the U.S. Department of Labor's Occupational Safety and Health Administration has determined. After a September 2014 inspection that followed the incident, OSHA investigators found 12 safety violations at the Denver-based scrap-processing facility.

CHICAGO HEIGHTS, Ill. — Two temporary workers injured in an explosion at Polychem Services Inc., were unable to return to work for months after being hospitalized with first and second-degree burns after their work site was ignited by a gas-powered forklift.

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — Since 2013, 294 workers have been killed by falls: a deadly fact that one roofing contractor appears willing to ignore as it was found putting the safety of its employees at risk by U.S. Department of Labor Occupational Safety and Health inspectors once again.

Who: Aurora Office of the Occupational Safety and Health AdministrationSauk Valley Community College

What: OSHA Safety Day Training Conference

When: Tuesday, March 10, 7:30 a.m. – 3 p.m. CST

Where: Sauk Valley Community College 173 Illinois Route 2 Dixon, IL

PHOENIX — An employee who raised concerns that a truck driver employed by Core-Mark International of Phoenix had exceeded the legally allowed maximum number of driving hours must be reinstated immediately and paid more than $230,000 in back wages and compensatory damages, the U.S. Department of Labor's Occupational Safety and Health Administration has ordered.

SEATTLE — When an employee raises concerns about the dangers of asbestos in a school, you would expect them to be commended and not terminated. After questioning whether the timeline of a construction project at a school in Idaho Falls School District 91 allowed for safe removal of asbestos, a district employee was out of a job. Now, the U.S. Department of Labor's Occupational Safety and Health Administration has stepped in to protect that worker's rights.

DALLAS — Living on the minimum wage is tough enough when workers are paid for all hours worked and harder still for employees who work off the clock and are not paid fully for their labor. Unpaid wages leave workers and their families to confront difficult choices, like buying medicine for a sick child or purchasing food.

PR Drywall of Hillsboro, Oregon, underpays 7 workers in wages and overtime

Employer underpays staff, denies employment to qualified domestic workers

Employer: Device Inside Inc., which provides mobile device testing and other related services for Samsung.

Site: Corporate office in Dallas, Texas and a branch office in Bellevue, Washington

Employer name and location: Seldat Distribution Inc., 15 Thatcher Road, Dayton, New Jersey.

Date investigation initiated: The U.S. Department of Labor's Occupational Safety and Health Administration initiated an investigation on Sept. 11, 2014, in response to a referral from the South Brunswick Fire Marshall reporting that an employee was electrocuted by an improperly wired, powered conveyer system.

Employer name: Toledo Refining Company LLC

Investigation site: 1819 Woodville Road, Oregon, Ohio

Date investigation initiated and what prompted inspection: On Sept. 2, 2014, the U.S. Department of Labor's Occupational Safety and Health Administration's Toledo Area Office initiated an inspection of the petroleum refinery after a fire occurred in a heater at the facility, used to process crude oil. The refinery sustained some minor damage but no injuries were reported.

Employer name: D&J Enterprises, Inc.

Inspection site: 2151 Interstate Drive Opelika, Alabama 36801

Date inspection initiated: The Occupational Safety and Health Administration initiated the Jan. 14, 2015 inspection as part of the agency's National Emphasis Program on Trenching and Excavation.

Company ignores fall safety with 41 citations since 2011

NEW YORK — All a receptionist at Salon Zoë hair salon wanted to do was make her fellow employees aware of health hazards associated with products containing formaldehyde that were regularly used by haircutters and stylists at the business in the Riverdale section of the Bronx. Her employer responded by firing her.

GUNTOWN, Miss. — Raymond Marvin Reece was a husband and father who enjoyed pleasures like family boating trips, camping and stock-car racing. Tragically, the 46-year-old maintenance worker at H.M. Richards Inc. was fatally electrocuted on Oct. 1, 2014, as he disconnected wiring on a saw at the company's temporary facility on Towery Road in Guntown.