WILTON – Town officials are scrambling this month to correct 114 occupational safety and health violations that, if not addressed could cost the town more than $9,000 in penalties.

The violations were discovered in September when a state Bureau of Labor Standards inspector did a routine walk-through of town offices and buildings.

Problems range from misplaced electrical cords to not having an exit sign over a door; from having a bottle of eyewash solution that expired in 1995 to not having an emergency plan and not keeping written records for things like medical testing.

The Department of Labor sends inspectors to check workplace safety every five years or so, said David Wacker, director of Workplace Safety and Health. Since the Wilton case is ongoing, he couldn’t discuss the specifics on Wednesday, but Wacker said in general it’s normal for towns to have violations.

“Ninety-eight percent of the towns get some violations,” he said. Often, when towns correct the problems and use the money they would have spent paying fines to the state to buy necessary equipment, the dollar amount of the penalties even goes down – or are sometimes dropped entirely.

“The idea is we’re out there to keep people safe,” Wacker said. “The intent is not to take money, but to protect the employees. But if (the violations) are not corrected, we will meet with them, and take their money,” he said.

When required to pay a monetary penalty, he added, smaller towns pay less than bigger ones. “Wilton would not have the same penalty that Portland would get,” he said.

Wilton is taking the violations very seriously, Town Manager Peter Nielsen said Wednesday. Since receiving a letter from the state detailing the violations, 76 have been corrected. Nielsen is meeting with town department heads and employees on a weekly basis, checking off completed fixes and discussing how to fix the remaining 36.

One violation he is unsure how to fix is providing running water and an eyewash station for the transfer station, which is unheated except for a wood stove lit only when people are using it. That might take some time to figure out, he said.

But, he cautioned, it’s important to take even the smaller issues seriously. “They’re all big deals,” he said. “We want a safe workplace for our employees. We’re going to cooperate and do a good job.”

Selectmen, who were alerted to the violations at Tuesday night’s meeting, seem to be backing the town manager solidly.

“I think we’re getting a pretty good handle on that,” Selectman Norman Gould said Wednesday. “He’s taken care of, I think 76 violations, and I think there were 114. They were minor infractions, but things that could be corrected right off quick.”

“I think he’s done a good job,” Gould said.

For the next month, Nielsen said he’d keep on plugging away and getting each violation taken care of. It can be fun, sometimes, he said, having guys pop their heads in every couple days with a few more violations to check off the list.

“By the end of the month, I’m going to show them we’ve made one heck of an effort here,” he said.