Workers' comp snag may extend session

By Karin Miller for The Associated Press
The Commercial Appeal
May 10, 2004

NASHVILLE - State lawmakers had hoped to finish up their business this week and head home.

Most of them need to get back home to raise money and campaign for re-election, but House Speaker Jimmy Naifeh warned them the session could be extended.

The hangup? A power struggle between Gov. Phil Bredesen's administration and some senators over workers' compensation.

The governor wants significant changes to the system that will lower costs for businesses, in hopes of stemming the flow of manufacturing jobs out of Tennessee.

But that is alienating some in his own Democratic party who want to protect workers and their own campaign war chests.

Under the current system, injured workers typically are represented by trial lawyers, who are among the biggest financial supporters of Democratic lawmakers and the biggest losers in the governor's bill.

Also, some senators whose ideas about transforming workers' compensation differ from the governor's proposal don't believe he's given them enough thought.

Senate Commerce Committee Chairman Jerry Cooper, D-Morrison, adjourned a meeting abruptly last week without voting on the governor's bill. There currently aren't enough votes to pass it or any piece of legislation, Cooper said.

Also, Cooper said, the administration hasn't given a fair hearing to Sens. Mark Norris, R-Collierville, and Larry Trail, D-Murfreesboro, both of whom are attorneys who have represented labor and business in dozens of workers' compensation cases.

Cooper said the two "know more abut workers' comp, I guarantee, than a lot of people in the administration." He said his committee wants to work with the governor, "but we will not be a rubber stamp."

Norris said he could support the administration's bill because he believes something must be done now. He also said the proposal is fairly balanced among business and labor interests, and may be more slanted toward injured workers than the governor realizes.

But he believes Bredesen is too focused on one provision: lowering the "multiplier" that determines how much money an injured employee who returns to work receives in benefits.

The governor's plan to reduce the multiplier from 2.5 to 1.5 is by far the most controversial aspect of his proposal.

Norris and Trail would like to tighten the definition of workplace injury. They say it would significantly lower the number of workers' compensation cases that could be filed and save businesses untold millions of dollars.

For example, a worker who throws out a disc in his back bending over to tie his shoe did not get hurt because of his job and should not be reimbursed, Trail says. Also, some states don't consider repetitive motion injuries such as carpal tunnel syndrome to be compensable.

Bredesen said there have been many meetings about alternative proposals and he remains open to those that improve the bill, but he isn't interested in efforts to water it down.

"I think we've got to pass something that's got some real teeth in it if we're going to keep jobs in our state," the governor said.

He agreed that changing the definition of injury is an alternative but believes it to be "a much riskier strategy."

"This is about convincing business people that we're doing something about the work comp problem. A change in the multiplier is very visible."