The advisory committee says studies show a large number of cancers, including blood, digestive, skin, oral and respiratory diseases, are directly linked to dust at the World Trade Center after the September 11th attacks. Yet cancer was left out of the Zadroga health care bill despite dedicated advocacy from people who fell ill after breathing toxins at Ground Zero. The administrator of the program wanted more conclusive evidence.

If the government approves the recommendations, cancer victims would be eligible to apply for a share of the $2.8 billion compensation fund. The panel is scheduled to present its findings on April 2.

Yet Feal noted that even when the panel’s recommendation is made, a bitter political fight could remain. “Once it gets down to deciding what cancers to add, that becomes political — when people debate what can be afforded or not,” he said. “That’s what we have to fight against.”

Read more details here about 9/11 compensation.

If you are suffering from any occupational illness or work injury and need professional assistance to recover your workers compensation benefits from the Department of Labor and Industries, contact an L&I Lawyer at Emery Reddy today. We represent clients who want to appeal a denied L&I claim, or who have been required to complete an independent medical examination. Our knowledgeable and experienced Workers Compensation Attorneys and Seattle employment attorneys provide guidance to workers experiencing any difficulty with an L&I claim.

Hazards common to cleanup and recovery work can include illness from exposure to contaminated water or food, downed electrical wires, carbon monoxide and electrical hazards from generators, slip and fall hazards, being caught in unprotected excavations or confined spaces, burns, lacerations, back and neck injuries, exposure to hazardous materials, and being injured by traffic or heavy equipment.

Workers and employers participating in storm or tornado recovery efforts can call OSHA’s toll-free hotline at 800-321-OSHA to speak with representatives in their areas who offer on-site assistance. Fact sheets, quick cards and other educational materials on workplace safety and personal protective equipment are available on the agency’s Tornado Recovery Web page at http://www.osha.gov/dts/weather/tornado/index.html.

While tornadoes are almost unheard of in Washington State, we have our fair share of heavy storms each winter, and many Washington workers find themselves in harm’s way during the recovery efforts. If you are suffering from a work injury, need help recovering your workers compensation benefits from the Department of Labor and Industries, or want to appeal a denied L&I claim, contact an Employment attorney at Emery Reddy today. Our experienced L&I Attorneys and Seattle Workers Compensation Lawyers  can also help workers who have been required to complete an independent medical exam, or who have other difficulties with their L&I claim.

OSHA’s Houston Area Office held a safety inspection this past September following worker complaints and reports from employment attorneys that numerous employees had nearly suffered amputation incidents while operating machinery. OSHA’s investigation determined that not only did the company fail to have an energy control program in place, but its machines were also left plugged into electrical power sources prior to maintenance and servicing. This poses a serious threat of workplace injury or death.

The willful violation citation was issued for failure to create, document and adopt an energy control program. A willful violation is one that is committed with deliberate, knowing or voluntary disregard for the established legal requirements, or with simple disregard for workplace safety and employee health.

The serious violations include failure to provide required machine guarding on sprockets and chains; failure to cover floor holes and openings; and neglecting to properly mark exit doors. A serious violation arises when there is significant probability that death or serious physical harm could result from a hazard of which the employer is aware.

The other violations that do not fall into the “serious” category involve poor recordkeeping of injuries and illnesses on the OSHA log. An “other-than-serious violation” is one that relates to job safety, but would not itself likely cause death or serious physical harm.

In a statement released by the director of OSHA’s Houston South Area Office, Mark Briggs said that “This company exposed its workers to injuries, including possible amputation hazards, by failing to develop, document and utilize an energy control program during the maintenance and servicing of machinery. Employer disregard for worker safety will not be tolerated.”

The company has two weeks from receipt of the citations to either comply, request an informal conference with OSHA, or contest the citations and penalties before the independent Occupational Safety and Health Review Commission.

To ask questions, obtain compliance assistance, file a complaint, or report workplace hospitalizations, fatalities or situations posing imminent danger to workers, the public should call OSHA’s toll-free hotline at 800-321-OSHA (6742), the agency’s Houston South office at 281-286-0583 or its Houston North office at 281-591-2438.

Under the Occupational Safety and Health Act of 1970, employers are responsible for providing safe and healthful workplaces for their employees. OSHA’s role is to ensure these conditions for America’s workforce by setting and enforcing standards, and providing training, education and assistance. For more information, visit http://www.osha.gov.

The Department of Labor and Industries website also has useful information on workplace safety and L&I Claims.  If you are struggling to recover benefits from a workers compensation case, or want to appeal a rejected L&I claim, contact the L&I lawyers at Emery Reddy for help.

Peggy Klaus, a consultant to executives and organizations on leadership and communication, was recently invited to give a lecture for the Disabled Students’ Program at the University of California, and wrote about initial feelings of anxiety and discomfort at the prospect of speaking to an audience made up solely of people with disabilities.

After admitting her misgivings to Paul Hippolitus, the director of the program and a 30-year veteran of the Office of Disability Employment Policy of the federal Labor Department, she learned that her response was “Perfectly normal.”  As Hippolitus pointed out, “In this culture, nearly everyone is uncomfortable with disability” – including people with disabilities as well. Constantly subject to a public that stares at them or reacts with unease, people with disabilities can be made to feel highly self-conscious and develop a lack of self-confidence.

Students at the Berkeley School of Disabilities are no exception. This is the reason, according to Hippolitus, that many forego graduate school, and as a result delay opportunities to enter the work force.

Today, more than 20 years following the passage of the Americans With Disabilities Act, the percentage of full employment among the population of people with a disability is only 17.9 percent. This compares with 63.7 percent for Americans without disabilities.

What might account for this lack of progress? It has been suggested that some employers fear that “reasonable accommodation” of the disabled will require extra time, resources and money. The federal Job Accommodation Network, however, shows that theses fears are baseless; many accommodations cost nothing or run just a few hundred dollars.

Rather than waiting for society to change, Mr. Hippolitus has developed a course on Professional Development and Disability, which focuses not only on the principles and practices of disability employment but also on strategies for navigating the 21^st century American workplace.

For nearly any job candidate, excelling in the interview can be crucial to landing a job.

It is unlawful for employers to ask about an applicant’s disability. However, when disabilities are visible, they may still have concerns. Since applicants themselves are under no restrictions, many opt to simply address employers’ potential reservations head-on — an approach that is addressed in the Berkeley course. This not only diffuses those lingering misgivings, but also opens a space to talk about the skills required to manage a disability, like strategic planning and time management.

Peggy Klaus shared some of these hypothetical exchanges:

“To start with a line like, ‘You may be wondering how I could manage to travel as part of the job,’ means that job applicants can elaborate on how they manage the rigors of travel, given their limitations. In addition to talking about their work and academic experience, they can offer up ‘brag nuggets’ and stories — talking about the preparations they needed for a trip to Europe, for example, or to make an 8 a.m. class.”

If more Americans began to view disability as both a challenge and an asset, we would make some important steps toward fully utilizing the job skills of all workers.

If you have experienced disability discrimination or any other form of employment discrimination, contact an employment attorney at Emery Reddy today.

For legal advice and assistance with your L&I claim, contact a Seattle Workers’ Compensation Attorney at Emery Reddy. If the Department of Labor & Industries has required you to complete an Independent Medical Exam, we urge you to consult with an attorney prior to attending the IME. Finally, if your claim has been rejected, it is in your best interest to work with an experienced L&I attorney to appeal denied L&I claims.

In 2011, the Washington State Legislature passed several major workers’ compensation reform acts.  Engrossed House Bill 2123 permits workers, employers or the Dept of Labor & Industries to open and negotiate structured settlement agreements to resolve claims for qualified injured workers age 55 and over.

A structured settlement agreement is defined as an agreement between a worker, his or her employer, and L&I that seeks to resolve future non-medical benefits on a claim. For the majority of structured settlements, claims are closed and workers receive a fixed compensation payment in installments as laid out in the agreement.

As explained by Dustin Dailey, Program Manager: “Structured settlement is another option for those injured workers who want to pursue work or retirement goals independent of the system.”

L&I oversees current negotiations with injured workers and State Fund employers who insure through L&I. The agency is not involved with structured settlement agreement proceedings for self-insured employers.

Although a worker may enter into a structured settlement agreement, he or she may still receive prescribed medical treatment for conditions covered by their claim.

The proposed rules concern the implementation of the legislation, and are available under L&I rules at the Structured Settlement website.

Public hearings on the proposed rules will be held at:

• Vancouver, Feb. 21, 10 a.m., Red Lion at the Quay, 100 Columbia St., 98660
• Tukwila, Feb. 21, 1 p.m., L&I Tukwila office, 12806 Gateway Dr. S., 98168
• Tumwater, Feb.22, 10 a.m., L&I Tumwater building, 7273 Linderson Way S.W., 98501
• Spokane, Feb.22, 10 a.m., Center Place Event Center, 2426 N. Discovery Place, 99216

Written comments will be accepted until 5 p.m., Feb. 24. You can submit written comments to Nancy James at Nancy.James@lni.wa.gov

Fax: 360-902-4960
Mail: Department of Labor & Industries, P.O. Box 44208, Olympia, WA 98504
Hand delivery: L&I, 7273 Linderson Way SW, Tumwater, WA  98501.

Washington’s State Fund is the seventh largest workers’ compensation insurer in the country. It provides insurance to employers and workers at no profit; the money to pay claims comes from premiums and investment income. The State Fund does not get any money from state taxes that go into the state General Fund or from the federal government.

For legal advice and assistance with your L&I claim, contact a Seattle Workers’ Compensation Attorney at Emery Reddy. If the Department of Labor & Industries has required you to complete an Independent Medical Exam, we urge you to consult with an attorney prior to attending the IME.

Am I required to attend an Independent Medical Exam?

Appeal a denied L&I claim: If your claim has been rejected, it is in your best interest to work with an experienced L&I attorney to appeal denied L&I claims. The Dept of Labor and Industries has established time limits for appealing rejected injury claims, so we encourage you to consult an Emery Reddy attorney for assistance right away.

Pereda v. Brookdale Senior Living Communities, Inc. addressed the question of whether a first-year employee – in other words, a worker who had not yet reached eligibility for FMLA leave – had job protection when she requested leave that would begin after she became eligible (i.e., her anniversary date).  The appeals court responded in the affirmative, giving protection from termination to a worker who did not technically meet the statute’s definition of an “eligible employee.” This decision makes the Eleventh Circuit the nation’s first to rule on the issue.

The plaintiff in Pereda began employment at Brookdale Senior Living Communities in October 2008. Then in June 2009 announced she was pregnant; at this time she also notified her employer that she planned to request FMLA leave after giving birth to her child in late November 2009.  Under the FMLA, an “eligible employee” must be employed for at least 12 months and complete at least 1,250 of service during the previous 12-month period.  The plaintiff had not yet gained the status of an “eligible employee” in June 2009 when she announced her intention to take FMLA leave later that year.  Nor was she an eligible employee in September 2009 when Brookdale managers fired her. But the appeals court re-interpreted the definition of “eligible employee,” reasoning that because the worker would have been an eligible employee at the time she had planned to take leave, she was protected from termination under the FMLA.  The court wrote that concluding otherwise “would violate the purposes for which the FMLA was enacted,” creating “a loophole . . . whereby an employer has total freedom to terminate an employee before she can ever become eligible.”

The Eleventh Circuit Court’s most persuasive reasoning, perhaps, appears when citing a section of FMLA that mandates “employees” (but not necessarily “eligible” employees) to provide their employers with a minimum of 30 days’ notice before taking anticipated leave based on an upcoming birth.  The court determined that an alternate decision in this case would entrap some employees in a lose-lose situation where they had to choose between complying with the notice requirement (but subjecting themselves to risk of retaliatory termination), or waiting for the anniversary date to arrive (but NOT complying with the notice requirement).

The expanded definition of “eligible employee” resulting from this case generates many unanswered questions about the circumstances under which employees are protected under FMLA.  Hunton Employment and Labor Perspectives imagined the following scenarios:

• What if an 11-month employee says during Thanksgiving week that he is “leaning toward” having surgery on his trick knee after the New Year, likely keeping him on FMLA leave for a month or so?
• What if a just-hired employee says in January of Year 1 that she and her husband have applied for adoption of a Russian child, a lengthy process that will, if they are approved (a questionable proposition), necessitate their going overseas for a couple of months in the middle of Year 2.  What if the individual had shared this during the pre-hire process?
• What if an 11-month employee shares that she and her sister are deciding which of them will take three months off from work next year to care for their mother, who is scheduled at that time to move out of a nursing home?  What if the employer elects to terminate the employee the following week, and the mother dies the week after that?

If you or someone you know is the victim of wrongful termination, workplace discrimination, or retaliatory practices, contact a Seattle Employment Attorney for assistance with your case.  Our L&I attorneys also represent employees who seek workers compensation benefits or who need any other assistance with work injury claims through the Department of Labor and Industries.

Read here for more news on FMLA, sick leave and employment law.

This was yet another unfortunate case of unintended consequences: a law designed to restrict excessive “doctor shopping” had ensnared an unsuspecting worker with a legitimate injury and a legitimate cause for requesting a second transfer of care.

Originally, Arkansas Workers’ Compensation Commission CEO Alan McClain stated that administrative solutions were available for the worker, but projected that it could take 3 to 6 months to resolve the issue.

The case generated some heated discussion on the LinkedIn group Workers’ Compensation Roundtable. McClain responded to critics on the site to further clarify the issue and exonerate his agency. He wrote that the law may have prevented the Workers Compensation board from selecting an alternate physician, but “as long as the employer has not denied medical benefits then the injured employee is entitled to medical care, arranged and paid for by the employer/carrier, regardless of the agency’s administrative ability to select a treating physician.” While the meaning here was not entirely clear, McClain seemed to be suggesting that this law was not an obstacle for an uncontested claim. Some commentators speculated that there were additional circumstances affecting Eason’s injury claim since the denial from the state was so emphatic.

Nonetheless, the Arkansas WCC has followed up on the controversy with an advisory that covers the initial issue. On Monday, they issued AWCC ADVISORY 2012-1, which states:

“When the physician named in a Change of Physician Order by the AWCC has passed away while actively treating the claimant for a compensable injury (or prior to releasing the claimant from treatment) or is known to the Commission to no longer be in practice without having made adequate provisions for the continued treatment of the claimant’s compensable injury, the Change of Physician Order shall become null and void and shall no longer be considered the claimant’s one time change of physician.”

Such a case has yet to arise within Washington’s department of labor and industries; yet while it is unlikely that most injured workers will find themselves in such extraordinary circumstances, many do face insufficient injury benefits or medical coverage, a denied L&I claim, a requirement to undergo an independent medical examination, or simply need help navigating the complexities of their L&I claim. If you need assistance with any issue related to workers compensation benefits or your negotiations with the department labor and industries more generally, contact an L&I lawyer or Seattle Employment attorney today.

2010’s rate is the lowest recorded in Washington since 2003, when the injury rate stood at 6.9. 2003 was the year when L&I adopted the North American Industry Classification System (NAICS), which is also used by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS).

Within private industries themselves, Washington’s injury and illness rate is still above the average national rate. Injuries among Washington workers stood at 4.8 per 100 full-time employees in 2010, while the national rate was 3.5.

Nearly every major industry in Washington showed better numbers in 2010. Injury and illness rates among construction workers, for instance, fell from 8.2 per 100 in 2009 to 7.2 in 2010. Nursing and Residential Care Facilities experienced a decline of 11.4 injuries per 100 workers in 2009 to 9.4 injuries last year.

Another significant change in this latest survey was the occurrence of “serious injuries” – injuries severe enough to prevent a worker from performing their usual job duties. In 2010, half of workers who were injured or became ill were in need of time off or modified work duties during recovery. That rate represented a drop of a few percentage points from the 2009 rate.

If you have been injured at work or have developed a work-related illness and need help with your L&I Claim, contact a Washington Workers Compensation Lawyer for assistance with your case. Our attorneys also provide confidential legal advice and professional observers to accompany workers during the independent medical examination process.

The OFCCP’s prospective rule would bolster affirmative action requirements set forth in Section 503 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973, and obligate federal contractors / subcontractors to give equal employment opportunities to qualified workers with disabilities. The potential regulatory changes also include particular actions that contractors would be required to take in recruiting, training, record keeping and policy dissemination — much like those already required to foster workplace equality for minorities and women.

In an announcement released by the Labor Department, Secretary of Labor Hilda L. Solis stated that the proposed rule represents “one of the most significant advances in protecting the civil rights of workers with disabilities since the passage of the Americans with Disabilities Act. President Obama has demonstrated a commitment to people with disabilities. This proposed rule would help federal contractors better fulfill their legal responsibility to hire qualified workers with disabilities.”

While Section 503 policies have already been in place for decades, people with disabilities are presently experiencing an unemployment rate of 13 percent, which is one and a half times higher than those without disabilities. Even more alarming is the data released last week by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, which confirms blatant disparities for working-age Americans with disabilities, with 79% completely outside the labor force, compared to 30% of those without disabilities.

“For nearly forty years, the rules have said that contractors simply need to make a ‘good faith’ effort to recruit and hire people with disabilities. Clearly, that’s not working,” said OFCCP Director Patricia A. Shiu. “Our proposal would define specific goals, require real accountability and provide the clearest possible guidance for employers seeking to comply with the law. What gets measured gets done. And we’re in the business of getting things done.”

Setting a 7% hiring goal for hiring Americans with disabilities provides a tool for contractors to assess the effectiveness of various affirmative action efforts. The proposed rule would also improve requirements for data research and documentation to enhance accountability. Additionally, it would institute annual self-reviews of employers’ outreach and recruitment efforts, and include a new requirement for contractors to post job openings to broader pools of qualified candidates.

Learn more about Disability Benefits through the Labor and Industries website.

If you believe you are the victim of employment discrimination, contact a Seattle employment attorney for help with your case. Emery Reddy also represents Washington workers with L&I claims and workers compensation claims.

Governor Rick Snyder pressed ahead in late May with his effort to trim State costs.  Among the many moves to downsize State bureaucracies and streamline government services and efficiency was the creation of the Michigan Compensation Appellate Commission.

According to Compnewsnetwork, “Gov. Snyder issued Executive Order 2011-6, which transfers the authorities and responsibilities of the Workers’ Compensation Appellate Commission and the Employment Security Board of Review to the new Michigan Compensation Appellate Commission.”

“With this reorganization, Michigan becomes a model of efficiency for appellate decisions in these two case areas,” Snyder said. “It provides greater flexibility in addressing fluctuating caseload levels and variations.”

The Michigan Compensation Appellate Commission will now consider appeals of decisions issued by magistrates and administrative law examiners, specifically in the realm of unemployment and workers’ compensation claims.

The most important, and perhaps most troubling, part of the creation of this new Commission, is that it takes on the workload that was previously performed by two separate Commissions: The Workers’ Compensation Appellate Commission and the Employment Security Board of Review. Although our economy is slowly recovering, what is striking about this consolidation of Commissions is that it does not seem to acknowledge the massive increase in unemployment and workers’ compensation claims the recession has engendered.

Further, while the Executive Order issued by the Governor requires that the new appellate commissioners be evaluated under defined standards to ensure that appeals are handled in a timely, knowledgeable and appropriate manner, the Order also requires that the commissioners adhere to productivity and timeliness standards.  In short, the effort here is to move claims and reviews through the Commission quickly, and as such, the important scrutiny that each individual injured worker’s claim should receive might be compromised.

Every experienced Washington workers compensation attorney is watching these developments across the country to ensure that injured workers in this state will continue to receive all the protections afforded to them by constantly evolving Labor & Industries law. Injured workers should first seek medical attention, then seek out the advice of an experienced L & I attorney at Emery Reddy as they pursue their claim.