By Rick Kupchella, KARE 11 News

Many see workers’ compensation as a program designed to help workers injured on the job. But it is a program with some glaring gaps.

Minnesota Senator John Marty is trying to close those gaps and make employers more accountable for willful workplace safety violations.

Maximum penalties in this country for corporations that deliberately scam investors or pollute - are far greater than what a company would face if they willfully violate safety rules resulting in the death of a worker.

Federally, it’s not even a felony.

In Minnesota, only one worker’s comp case was ever charged as a crime. The employer pled to a lesser-charge and paid a $3,000 fine.

Companies are protected in civil court too. Families of those killed by companies violating safety rules cannot bring a case in court.

A bill before the state legislature this year would change that.

More than 300 people were killed or seriously injured on the job in Minnesota over the last five years. In the vast majority of those cases, employers were found to be breaking the safety rules designed to protect the worker.

Most commonly, the workers were crushed to death in accidents that weren’t all that “innocent.”

There were 175 survivors - suffering burns, amputations, electrical shock and other horrible injuries.

It sounds like torture. The truth is the injuries and deaths are often gruesome. They’re also, often preventable.

Some in our state legislature think there ought to be greater incentive for employers to follow the law.

This story is about why.

Jeff Steffenhagen is a reason.
The 33-year-old father of three was a hard-worker. His sister called him a “likeable guy” with a lot of friends.

His job at Mid-America Dairy in Zumbrota, in 1995, was to force giant blocks of cheese through an enormous grater that was seven feet square. It was a dangerous job, which his employer made more dangerous, by violating the federal safety rules designed to protect him. They removed the safety shield so he could push more cheese through - faster. He was working alone over top of the grater the day he fell through.

It’s something his sister still doesn’t want to talk about.

“It gives me nightmares,” she said.

There was nothing left of Jeff Steffenhagen.

Another example:
Patrick Randel, 19, was working his way through college with a road crew from Buffalo Bituminous when he was sent into a manhole where there was no oxygen. He didn’t last long.

Again, there are federal rules in place to keep this from happening, but the company wasn’t following them.

His mother acknowledges, “They didn’t try to kill my son. I know that, but he’s dead. And it’s because of their not following through on the safety codes and the OSHA regulations.”

Like most mom’s, Margaret wanted to make the company pay.

She told herself she could keep this from happening to someone else’s child.

Her attorney, Ray Peterson, explained to her that she could not. “If you pointed out the limitations in workers compensation and point out this extraordinary protection employers get in these specific circumstances to most people on the street they’d think you were lying,” Peterson said.

Circumstances by and large don’t matter.

Even if a company flat-out violates OSHA regulations, there is no consequence beyond insurance payments and what’s often a small fine by OSHA.

The company remains otherwise unaccountable to survivors.

Cheyenne’s Story:
In Bemidji, Audrey Thayer still cannot believe it. She can’t believe the law.

She can’t believe the privilege it gives to companies.

And she can’t believe her favorite photo of her little boy, Cheyenne, in full native dress at the age of nine, would turn out to be a picture of him at middle age.

“He’s an example of businesses that fail to protect the worker, fail to protect human life,” she said. “They violated the law.”

Cheyenne and his brother Charlie were temporary laborers on the job of an industrial tear-down on the shores of Lake Bemidji. The first day of work in the summer of 2003, Cheyenne, without any of the required safety equipment, fell more than 25-feet to his death. His younger brother Charlie was the first one to his side.

“Immediately I just started praying in my brother’s ear,” he said. “I just kept telling him to hang on that I was there.”

Cheyenne died that day. One life gone, leaving so many others in shambles. They buried him in a traditional Indian grave on the White Earth Reservation.

Despite OSHA regulations requiring simple things like a harness, Cheyenne Devlin died because his employer, Hanson Manufacturing of Lancaster, in northwestern Minnesota, disregarded that.

The OSHA fine, about $30,000 - the accountability, lacking.

“Those people need something awful to happen to them,” Cheyenne’s mother said. “I sometimes think about that, where is the justice?”

Roofing accidents among most common

Then there’s the story of Nolan Keane:
He went through a roof on a California job site while working for a Minnesota company, Single-Ply Systems. It was two weeks to the day after his brother went thru the same roof on the same job and survived.

In an email to KARE 11 news, Single-Ply Systems called Nolan’s death ‘tragic’ and ‘regretted.’ But they said ‘the company believes the accident did not result from (their) safety practices.”

Still, California’s OSHA investigators slapped the company with three safety violations, two of them ‘willful,’ which CAL/OSHA tells us are the ‘most egregious’ citations they can issue.

Nolan’s mother says “It’s like a huge cement wall that just circles these employers. Like they’re in a castle, inside these big walls and you cannot get to them. So what we have to do is make a hole in the wall.”

For Liz Lambrecht, Nolan’s mother, this has become a mission. She quit her job as a banker. She’s about to graduate from law school with the singular focus of changing state law.

“By going to law school and changing the laws and helping others, hopefully as a lawyer, I can hope this doesn’t happen to anybody else,” she says.

She has found an ally in Minnesota senator John Marty.

Marty says, “If you kill someone with a gun you’re going to serve your life in prison or at least a long period of time. If you kill someone by breaking worker safety laws you might get a fine of $40,000 and that’s a high fine.”

Marty is proposing a new law that would make employers prone to lawsuits if they violate safety rules resulting in the serious injury or death of their workers.

He’s tried it before. But he keeps failing, largely because the business lobby, namely the Minnesota Chamber of Commerce, keeps shutting him down.

They say Minnesota is not unique.

The Chamber maintains the existing law is part of a historic deal - a grand compromise at the turn of the last century. Workers are guaranteed benefits if they’re hurt or killed on the job regardless of who’s to blame. In return, workers’ compensation is the exclusive remedy under the law.

Tom Hesse, vice president of governmental affairs at the Chamber, says, “the exclusive remedy is a critical part of Minnesota’s workers’ comp law and every other state’s system and we just don’t think it should be changed.”

In this legislative session, the business lobby will argue employers should not be held accountable in civil court even when they “willfully” violate OSHA rules and a worker dies as a result.

They say that would destroy the no-fault workers’ comp system which comes with its own courts designed to pay everybody something and keep liability limited. The alternative, they say, is that workers’ comp goes away altogether. And workers would be hurt in the end.

The way it works right now, the only time you can go after your employer in civil court in Minnesota, is if you can prove they intended to kill or seriously injure you. The survivors we’re talking to say that’s not enough.

They want to go after the companies in court if they can prove the company willfully violated the safety laws designed to protect you.

Workers are already being kicked out of the system. It doesn’t happen often. But if the employee violates certain company rules, they can be left with nothing. It’s only fair they say that if company violates safety rules and you’re seriously hurt or killed you should be able to sue.

The employer’s perspective is clear - and the perspective of countless mothers, brothers, and sisters is becoming clearer. These survivors are pushing for something more.

Their heavy hearts have found hyper focus.

As Senator Marty puts it, “I’m just saying if you break the law, you should suffer.

John Marty’s bill is ambitious, there’s nothing like it in America.

In fact, several states don’t even exempt intentional acts of murder by the employer from workers’ comp law.

Minnesota does.

And now, some final notes.In the case of the man who went into the cheese grater, his family did sue. They lost the case in court but the company did make a payout during the appeals process.

We asked all of the employers involved here to talk with us. Single-Ply Systems was the only one to respond.

By Paul Pinkham, The Times-Union
Thursday June 26, 2008

He Had Formerly Been Acused Of Bias Against Injured Workers! It’s About Time The California WCAB Took Their Example & Cleaned House!

A year after receiving a formal report accusing a Jacksonville workers compensation judge of bias, Gov. Charlie Crist has decided not to reappoint the judge to a second term.

The decision thrilled officials with two of Jacksonville’s largest unions, who had complained that Compensation Claims Judge William Dane favored employers in workers comp cases.

Crist’s general counsel wrote Dane on Tuesday, informing him of the governor’s decision. The letter, obtained Wednesday by the Times-Union, says Dane can remain on the bench until Crist appoints a successor, a process the governor’s office said generally takes about 90 days.

Dane, who handled about 1,400 disputed workers compensation claims last year, didn’t respond to an e-mail Wednesday night. Like most judges, his telephone number and address are unlisted.

“I think it’s great,” said Jacksonville Association of Fire Fighters President Randy Wyse, when notified of Crist’s decision. “He showed some bias and now hopefully we can get somebody in there who will look at each case on its own merits. We know we won’t win them all, but we just want a fair and unbiased hearing.”

Jacksonville Fraternal Order of Police President Nelson Cuba said he hopes Dane’s departure sends a message to any judge or official who shows bias against workers.

“At the end of the day, this is a victory for the working person,” Cuba said.

Dane was criticized in a report by the chief of Florida’s Division of Administrative Hearings last June that was requested by Crist after he received bias complaints from Cuba and four lawyers who practiced in front of Dane.

The report didn’t recommend that Crist remove Dane but concluded his actions created at least the appearance of prejudice against workers. Among its findings was a phenomenon known as the “Dane factor,” in which workers with cases before the judge were advised to settle because they couldn’t win before him.

“It led to a lack of confidence,” said Jacksonville lawyer Jake Schickel, a frequent workers compensation mediator interviewed in the report. “All of us that are practitioners and citizens want the judge to be of the very highest quality and standards. If for any reason that doesn’t happen … it reflects on the system.”

Formal complaints about Dane first surfaced in April 2007, when Jacksonville lawyer Marc Hardesty testified against him before a judicial nominating panel. He and three other Jacksonville lawyers took the rare step of filing formal complaints that led to Dane recusing himself from any case handled by Hardesty’s law firm.

Like other lawyers, Hardesty was reluctant Wednesday to offer further criticism. “I stand by the evidence I offered in the formal process,” he said.

Dane’s first term expired last fall, but he remained on the bench pending reappointment. Administrative judges are part of the executive branch, serving at the discretion of the governor, and aren’t subject to discipline by the state Supreme Court like those in the judicial branch.

Crist’s office notified the Statewide Commission for Judges of Compensation Claims on Tuesday of the impending Jacksonville vacancy. It has 30 days to recommend up to six names, and the governor then has 60 days to choose a replacement.

By Dunstan McNichol, The Star-Ledger
Tuesday June 24, 2008

Maybe California Should Follow New Jersey’s Lead In Doing Right By Their Injured Workers! They Seem To Understand The “True” Meaning Of The Word “Reform”!

A package of bills that make the first significant changes in nearly 30 years to New Jersey’s $1.8 billion Workers’ Compensation insurance system won final legislative approval yesterday.

By overwhelming votes, the Assembly and Senate finished work on six reform bills, including one that empowers Workers’ Compensation judges to seek contempt-of-court orders against insurers or attorneys who delay benefit claims (S1913) and another (S1914) that makes failing to provide Workers’ Compensation coverage a criminal offense.

Other pieces of the reform package require fast-tracked hearings on urgent medical claims (S1916) and a bill (S1917) that gives labor unions and business organizations a voice on the insurer-dominated panel that sets the cost of Workers’ Compensation insurance policies.

The measures were prompted by a series of articles in The Star-Ledger in April that showed how bureaucratic red tape, uncooperative insurers and political entanglements have left thousands of workers waiting months and even years for benefits.

They mark the first substantial reform to the Workers’ Compensation system since 1979, when the current version of the program was put in place.

Yesterday’s final approvals came with no discussion and little dissent in either the Assembly or Senate.

“I am extremely pleased that in a six-week period we moved a package of six bills,” said Sen. Paul Sarlo (D-Bergen), chairman of the Senate Labor Committee. “I really believe we made the Workers’ Compensation system better.”

The reform package now goes to Gov. Jon Corzine for his consideration. Besides the measures approved yesterday, lawmakers have asked Corzine to authorize a Bar Association review of candidates for Workers’ Compensation judgeships.

That would address the complaint that judges appointed as much for their political pedigrees as for their professional backgrounds can cause delays in the handling of complex injury cases.

The Star-Ledger review of the 45 Workers’ Compensation judges in place this spring, for instance, found that 37 had previously held elective office or appointed public positions, or were directly related to an officeholder.

Corzine’s office declined comment on the Workers’ Compensation bills last night.

The Workers’ Compensation system, set up almost a century ago, promises medical treatment and partial wage replacement to workers who are hurt on the job. In return for the coverage, workers give up the right to sue their employers for injuries they suffer on the job.

Each year the system touches about 100,000 injured New Jersey workers. Benefit payments total about $1.3 billion a year, while insurers collect about $1.8 billion annually in premiums. Many of the cases are resolved smoothly, but for thousands of injured workers, payments or medical treatment are delayed by bureaucracy and a cumbersome court system.

Thousands more injured workers discover each year they have no coverage at all because their employers have ignored the state law that requires all business owners to purchase Workers’ Compensation coverage for their employees.

The measures passed yesterday include two that would increase penalties against employers that fail to purchase workers’ compensation coverage.

By Charles Schillinger
Staff Writer, The Times Tribune
06/24/2008
BLAKELY, PA - A volunteer firefighter with the Wilson Fire Company who suffered a heart attack at the scene of a fire has been denied Workers’ Compensation. Assistant Fire Chief William Saxe responded to a 2 a.m. fire at Fiorelli Plaza in Peckville on March 31, where he had a heart attack that left him in critical condition at Community Medical Center. He is now back home, but declined to comment, citing legal matters involving his case.

Blakely officials confirmed Mr. Saxe filed for Workers’ Compensation through the borough, but the borough’s insurance carrier, the State Workers’ Insurance Fund, denied Mr. Saxe’s claim.

The insurance fund is managed by a state board made up of Sandi Vito, secretary of the Department of Labor and Industry; Joel Ario, the insurance commissioner; and state Treasurer Robin Wiessmann. Officials with the State Workers’ Insurance Fund declined to comment on the claim.

Borough Council President Robert Munley discussed the issue recently, concerned about the misconception that council had some say in the matter.

“The Borough Council is excluded from the Workers’ Compensation process. Just like a typical insurance policy, we pay a premium to the insurance company for coverage,” he said. “Council has no input on the determination or award of benefits. The insurance provider makes this determination.”

He couldn’t say why the carrier denied the claim.

Firefighter John Chichilla said he was astounded when he heard the news.

“I don’t know the details, but it seems to me like he should have been and should still be compensated,” Mr. Chichilla said. “He wasn’t looking for a golden goose. Just to recover what I think is rightfully his.”

Imagine you are an attorney in Massachusetts looking for a little work. The Office of Labor and Workforce Development (OLWD), a state agency, hires you and 10 other attorneys to examine applications for unemployment insurance. Normally, this work would be performed by state employees, but the combination of cost-efficiency lay offs and a bad economy has caused a surge in applications. The state pays you through a 1099 form. You are responsible for your own taxes. And you soon find yourself in the middle of a story concocted by Franz Kafka.

In a parallel operation (bordering on a parallel universe), Governor Deval Patrick has announced a crackdown on employers who commit fraud by misclassifying workers to avoid paying workers comp insurance, plus state and federal taxes. The governor creates an Underground Economy Task Force to ferret out abuses of the independent contractor designation. The task force resides…in the OLWD.

These two worlds collided when someone (presumably a state employee affiliated with the unions who lost employees in lay offs) dropped a dime on OLWD, complaining that the 11 attorneys hired as “independent contractors” were performing the job duties of regular employees. So now OLWD is being scrutinized by its own task force. We can only hope that members of the task force are state employees, and not “independent contractors” who have signed on to carry out a short-term project: an image arises of a dog furiously pursuing its own tail.

Management Conumdrum
Many employers face the conundrum embodied in this situation: when you have more work than you can handle - especially on a short-term basis - it’s convenient to hire temporary “independent contractor” consultants to carry out the work. Hiring is much easier; there are no long term commitments. When the work has been completed, you simply terminate the contracts.

Because there is such widespread abuse of the “independent contractor” designation (did someone say “FedEX”?), these convenient arrangements are now routinely challenged. At OLWD, the questioners themselves have been called into question.

Suzanne Bump, the state’s secretary of Labor and Workforce Development, is not using the word “investigation” to characterize her examination of this particular form of outsourcing. She points out that the practice began in the prior (Republican) adminstration, which had enthusiastically reduced the size of the state’s workforce, only to discover they did not have enough people to do the necessary work.

“We are taking steps to reverse this practice and are looking to hire more review examiners on a permanent basis when possible,” Bump stated. This in itself raises a problem: by creating regular, full-time positions to handle the jobs, the state will have to grow the budget. Regular employees cost more than “independent contractors” because you have to pay for insurance and taxes (which is one of the reasons they hired independent contractors in the first place).

What used to be routine HR functions have become enormously complicated. I am sympathetic to all employers who have to work through these often paradoxical issues. When it comes to managing a business in these challenging times, we find ourselves lost in a dimly lit, endless corridor, characters in a Kafka story, looking for the room where all the answers are rumored to reside. Like the good folks at OLWD, we eventually conclude that the room does not exist.

By David R. Butcher
Apprehensive about going to work? Filled with anxiety once you’re there? You may simply be stressed out from your workload. Or these signs could be indicative of something far more insidious. Bullying in the workplace is a lot more common than many people realize.

In what’s considered the largest scientific study conducted in the United States on the topic, 37 percent of American workers said they have experienced workplace bullying. That’s nearly 54 million people who have been bullied on the job. Yet bullying in the workplace is a global epidemic, albeit a “silent” one. Unlike the playground bully who often resorts to physical threats, the work bully’s tactics are often subtle.

Workplace bullying is generally defined as “repeated, malicious, health-endangering mistreatment” of one or more employees or employers directed towards another employee or employees, which is intended to intimidate and create a risk to the health and safety of the employee. It can take the form of verbal abuse; offensive conduct/behavior that is threatening, humiliating or intimidating; and/or work interference - sabotage - which prevents work from getting done.

In March, University of Manitoba researchers reported that the emotional toll of workplace bullying is more severe than that of sexual harassment.

Many such situations involve employees bullying their peers, rather than a supervisor bullying an employee. However, very often this type of harassment stems from an abuse or misuse of power. According to the massive survey mentioned above, from the Workplace Bullying Institute (WBI) and research firm Zogby Interactive, the stereotype is real: most bullies are bosses. While 55 percent of those bullied are rank-and-file workers, 72 percent of bullies are bosses.

In today’s corporate culture, supervisors may condone bullying as part of a tough management style. To help determine if you are a target of workplace bullying, Dr. Gary Namie, cofounder of the WBI and author of the book Bully at Work, offers the following telltale signs:

• Agenda-less meetings where you’re humiliated;
• Unwarranted or invalid criticism;
• False accusations of incompetence (blame without factual justification);
• Never being left alone to do your job;
• Exclusion or social isolation;
• Excessive monitoring;
• People feeling justified screaming or yelling at you in front of others, but you’re punished if you scream back; and
• Everything done to you is arbitrary and capricious, based on a personal agenda that undermines the employer’s legitimate business interests.

Forty-five percent of bully targets suffer stress-related health problems, psychological-emotional injuries and other financial effects, according to last fall’s WBI-Zogby survey and other research. Problems can include cardiovascular problems (hypertension to strokes and heart attacks), immunological impairment (more frequent infections of greater severity), fibromyalgia, chronic fatigue syndrome, panic attacks, clinical depression and even post-traumatic stress disorder. Victims of bullying can also experience reduced self-esteem and increased self-blame, musculoskeletal problems, sleep disturbances, digestive problems and, due to absence, financial problems.

At the same time, companies should be concerned about bullying, “if for no other reason than its potential to damage the bottom line,” notes Monster.com.

Bullying can lead to such heavy tangible costs as those brought by downtime and Workers’ Compensation awards, as well as turnover (Who wants to work in a toxic and hostile workplace?) and resultant new-recruitment time and fees.

Yet there are also those intangible costs: tainted reputation, staff resistance and even sabotage by fearful employees who know no alternatives when management fails to punish or purge the bully.

What can companies do to prevent this kind of abuse in the workplace? “As with any form of harassment, management’s vigilance is key,” with the employer close enough to day-to-day operations that such harassment is recognizable, says Monster.com.

Yet even this will not necessarily end abuse.

Several states in the U.S. have introduced - so far without any real success. In fact, America lags far behind the rest of the Western industrialized countries both in acknowledging bullying at work and in legislative measures that address it on a societal level. Currently, there is no anti-bullying law in any U.S. state.

Business groups often argue that existing laws are adequate to protect workers. But bullying generally transcends sex, age or race, which have protected status in the courts. Instead, many hostilities in the workplace occur simply because one person doesn’t like another.

Fortunately, increasingly more employees and employers are acknowledging this epidemic and trying to understand and fight it. As recent as May 2008, a paper titled “Nightmares, Demons and Slaves: Exploring the Painful Metaphors of Workplace Bullying” was the most downloaded article for the journal Management Communication Quarterly.

Workplace Bullying Resources

Half of Working Americans Affected by Workplace Bullying
Workplace Bullying Institute and Zogby Interactive, Aug. 30, 2007

Bullying More Harmful Than Sexual Harassment On the Job
The University of Manitoba (via American Psychological Association), March 8, 2008

Workplace Bullying: What Everyone Needs to Know
Washington State Dept. of Labor and Industries, April 2008

Bullying Defined
Workplace Bullying Institute

How Employers Pay for Bullying
Workplace Bullying Institute

Negative Health Impact on Bullied Targets
Workplace Bullying Institute

Workplace Bullying: What Can You Do?
by John Rossheim
Monster.com, Jan. 20, 2007

Workplace Bullying: Who’s Your Bully?
by John Rossheim
Monster.com, Jan. 20, 2007

Psychiatric Distress and Symptoms of PTSD Among Victims of Bullying at Work
by S.B. Matthiesen and S. Einarsen
British Journal of Guidance & Counselling, August 2004

Nightmares, Demons and Slaves: Exploring the Painful Metaphors of Workplace Bullying
by Sarah J. Tracey, Pamela Lutgen-Sandvik and Jess K. Alberts
Management Communication Quarterly, 2006

When contractors fail to pay into the correct Workers’ Compensation pool by not reporting hours accurately, they increase the cost of doing business for legimate contractors.

By John Lewis, Organizer
International Association Of Bridge, Structural, Ornamental and Reinforcing Iron Workers, Local Union 751

On every State of Alaska construction project it is a requirement to fill out the certified payrolls so as to verify the workers are receiving the correct pay for the class of work they are performing, be it ironworker, carpenter, electrician, etc. Unscrupulous contractors have learned that the state and unions watch these payroll records to ensure compliance with state law, so as a result misclassification in this manner is uncommon since it only amounts to a few dollars a week.

The area a contractor is able to make or “save” thousands of dollars is through the misclassification of workers on their Workers’ Compensation insurance. I’ll use my craft as an ironworker as an example. Every job in the country is given a classification code by the National Council on Compensation Insurance (NCCI). Each code has a cost assigned to it for every $100.00 paid in wages.

The cost code for structural steel erection is 5059 in Alaska; the cost for this work is set at $53.15 for every $100 in wages paid. In contrast, the cost code for sheet metal work is 5538 and only $11.07 cost per $100.00. By recording an incorrect cost code contractors are able to “save” $40.00 between these codes. (Ironworkers wage is currently $49.57) These numbers are higher here in Alaska due to the added risk involved in our line of work and conditions unique to our state. It is fair to say it cost $25.00 - $35.00 to insure an ironworker every hour on the job. These rates are for the year 2007.

If a contractor fails to pay into the correct Workers’ Compensation pool by not reporting hours accurately, then they are driving the cost of doing business up for all the legitimate contractors. These legitimate contractors must make up the difference in order to make the claims filed by injured workers doing steel erection match that of what is being paid in insurance premiums.

At the same time the illegitimate Workers’ Compensation reporters are artificially reducing the base cost of Workers’ Compensation for those involved in sheet metal work. This also leads to a staggering amount of loss revenue to our insurance companies, who in turn must pass this loss on to other contractors by raising insurance rates.

The result of this type of misclassification can be seen by the cost codes over the last year alone. Steel erection (5059) has increased from $53.15 to $55.83 and sheet metal (5538) has decreased from $11.07 to $8.61 for every $100.00 in payroll.

Our insurance companies are not the only victims when a contractor fails to pay his fair share of Workers’ Compensation. Every contractor that bids a job with numbers that are a true reflection of the class of work done by their workers is also affected due to them being unable to “win” a bid with legitimate numbers when an unscrupulous contractor in effect “steals” a contract through deceptive bidding practices, which can only be described as fraud.

The problem is that it is impossible for others at this point to verify that our workers are correctly being protected with adequate Workers’ Compensation insurance since this information is not required to be made public, and with no public disclosure the door is open to commit fraud.

I encourage all business owners to sign the online petition at www.thepetitionsite.com/petition/708953941 and write to the Director of Insurance, Linda Hall and ask her to consider the following options.

1. Make a statutory change that would require NCCI codes and hours billed to each code be listed on certified payrolls.
2. Require copies of these certified payrolls are also mailed to the insurance carrier so as to allow them to police compliance instead of the State of Alaska.
3. Require that the Division of Insurance send its current investigators out to job sites to check compliance with the current laws.

These records are already required to be kept by business owners in order to pay the correct Workers’ Compensation rates and by making these documents a matter of public record it will greatly reduce the amount of fraud in Alaska.

Sunday, June 22, 2008

Maybe California should follow New Jersey’s lead in how they try to fix their WC system!

Trenton lawmakers have made a respectable start on reforming New Jersey’s ailing workers’ compensation system. Bills are advancing that, among other things, will speed claims, give compensation judges more power to enforce their orders and penalize employers who don’t carry the mandatory insurance.

These important overhauls are part of a broad workers’ comp overhaul package that forms the most far-reaching changes to the system in decades. They are scheduled for final legislative votes tomorrow. Every lawmaker should vote yes.

Many injured workers face indefensible delays and procedural hurdles in their quest to get medical treatment or compensation payments. Many employers flout the law requiring them to carry compensation insurance. These bills go a long way toward addressing those problems. But legislators and Gov. Jon Corzine must not stop there.

Lawmakers and Corzine should act on a bill by Sen. Stephen Sweeney (D-Gloucester) that would create an ombudsman’s office to help injured workers navigate the arcane compensation system. And Corzine should move to have the bar association begin vetting compensation judge nominations.

The process for selecting compensation judges has long focused more on politics than legal expertise. Many comp judges are notable more for their party connections than their skill or expertise in what is a highly technical legal field.

The state can raise the caliber of comp judge nominees by using the same system that boosted the reputation of the Superior Court many years ago: The state bar reviews all Superior Court nominations to ensure that candidates have the proper qualifications. Comp judge nominations deserve the same degree of scrutiny.

So far, the governor has been surprisingly mum on this issue. A Corzine spokesman says only that the governor is reviewing the idea. Let’s hope this isn’t Trenton-speak for “We don’t want to give up one of our major patronage plums.” Workers’ needs must outweigh petty political considerations.

Meanwhile, an ombudsman for injured workers would do more than simply help workers protect their legal rights and aid them in resolving delays, difficulties obtaining medical care and the like. An ombudsman would also provide broader oversight for the workers’ comp system, reporting to legislators and the governor each year on the system’s flaws and suggesting fixes.

Continuing attention is needed. History shows that otherwise the comp system simply isn’t on Trenton radar. The current reform efforts came only after a comprehensive series of articles this spring by Star-Ledger reporters John Martin and Dunstan McNichol spotlighted the system’s many flaws.

The reforms to be voted on tomorrow, together with the initiatives to improve the compensation bench and create a compensation ombudsman, will help injured workers get the aid they need more quickly and with less unnecessary red tape. “

By: Johnell Johnson
June 18, 2008
CHARLOTTE — Some North Carolina police officers say they are not getting what they deserve when it comes to Workers’ Compensation. Wednesday, the April 5 Organization held a news conference on the issue to call for change. Heidi Hazrati started the group after her husband - former CMPD Officer Kayvan Hazrati - was shot in the head while responding to a SWAT situation. The two is in litigation to get money they feel they deserve.

“A shot to the head… there’s going to be a lot of repercussion from that and denying anything that a doctor says is needed is wrong,” said Heidi Hazrati.

While Kayvan Hazrati didn’t wish to discuss his pending case, other officers did talk about their experiences after injuries in the line of duty. Gary Mills was hit by a car while chasing a suspect. “This is a job I wanted to keep doing, but I can’t,” said the injured Salisbury officer.

Some officers say they received a devastating blow when they tried to get help from the state through Workers’ Compensation but were denied. Many were told their local risk management departments’ were only following state orders, but they feel not everything should be just black and white when officers are concerned.

“Doing what the law requires… is that always enough? Sometimes you have to use common sense and common sense tells you that if someone is willing to put themselves on the line for you then you need to go the extra mile for them,” said Officer Scott Geiler of the Fraternal Order of Police.

The officers hope that highlighting their problems will help their push for change.

Tara Stottlemyer says after her back injury, she is no longer able to care for her children the way she used to and she feels the city she once protected has turned its back on her. “They threw me away like a piece of garbage,” she said. “And I am sure glad that I didn’t treat the city like it was a piece of garbage.”

Risk management officials did not wish to comment on camera because they do not discuss issues involving pending litigation. They did say though that they only follow the state guidelines.

Stottlemyer did originally win her case, but the City of Charlotte is appealing.

A computer technician struck by a car while crossing a street to purchase cigarettes and snacks is entitled to medical and temporary disability Workers’ Compensation benefits, a New Jersey appeals court ruled last week. In 2003, the technician, Carlos Cruz, was driving a company van en route to a client when he parked across the street from a delicatessen to take his “usual morning break,” according to court records in the case of Carlos Cruz v. Micros Retail Systems Inc.

The deli was about five blocks off the direct route from his employer’s office, where Cruz began his trip, to the client’s site. While crossing the street to the deli, a car struck Cruz and he suffered severe injuries, court records state.

Micros denied that the injuries arose while Cruz was within the scope of his employment, and a witness testified that company policy required employees to go directly to their work sites.

A Workers’ Comp judge, however, ruled that off-premises employees enjoy the same ability to deal with basic needs, such as lunch and coffee breaks, as do on-premises employees. Cruz’s stop for snacks was a minor deviation from his mission on his employer’s behalf, the judge found.

Micros appealed the judge’s decision, but the Superior Court of New Jersey, Appellate Division, agreed with the reasoning of the Workers’ Comp judge.