DALTON, Ga. — Columbia Recycling has been notified of a proposed penalty of $9,959 by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) after a worker was injured in January.

According to company President Phillip Goldberg at the time of the incident, the worker suffered a broken leg. A bale of material “weighing up to 1,000 pounds” fell on the worker at the company’s facility at 1001 Chattanooga Ave., according to information from the Whitfield County 911 center,

The company was cited for a “serious” violation concerning “modifications and additions” to a forklift without approval from the manufacturer, according to OSHA’s Citation and Notification of Penalty.

“On or about Jan. 31, 2017, and at times prior, the employer exposed employees to struck-by-hazards in that the employer did not obtain approval from the forklift manufacturer prior to using the forklift squeeze attachment while employees were using the forklift to transport bales of carpet,” the citation states.

Calls to Goldberg on Thursday were not immediately returned.

According to the citation, which was dated July 28, the company has 15 working days from receipt of the citation to contest the findings and penalty. It has until Aug. 23 to document how it has addressed the violation.

This is at least the third time the company has been the subject of a proposed penalty by OSHA, which is an arm of the U.S. Department of Labor.

In November 2016, Columbia Recycling agreed to pay a settlement of $250,000 after the agency proposed fines of more than $300,000. OSHA cited Columbia Recycling’s facility at 2410 S. Dixie Highway in October 2016 for five repeated, three serious and one other-than-serious safety and health violations. The serious citations related to improper storage of compressed gas cylinders, not ensuring an employee successfully completed training to operate a powered industrial truck and not allowing sufficient access and working space around electrical equipment.

At the time of the settlement in 2016, then-President Robert Goldberg declined to discuss the specifics of the violations, but said, “Columbia Recycling is definitely proactive when it comes to safety.”

“We are a safe environment. We have been in Dalton since 1970, but we started out in Philadelphia 100 years ago,” he said at the time. “We have meetings every day on safety.”

The Chattanooga Avenue facility has been the scene of fires in the past with firefighters responding to flames in 2007, 2010, 2011 and 2012. The 2007 fire resulted in the death of a line supervisor, two employee injuries and a $41,400 fine from OSHA, which cited Columbia Recycling for 11 serious safety violations.