Cooper co-sponsors workers’ comp overhaul bill
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After negotiations between the governor and Senate Democratic Leader Joe Haynes broke down over the bill, Senate Commerce Committee Chairman Jerry Cooper said Monday he and two of his colleagues, Sens. Bill Clabough and Don McLeary, agreed to sponsor it.
Cooper declined to discuss details but said the legislation will get its first hearing in Tuesday’s Commerce Committee meeting.
The governor had told lawmakers earlier in the year that he wanted to make changes to help businesses, which claim workers’ compensation costs here are much higher than in other states. He said that if lawmakers couldn’t come up with a bill, he would get involved.
Haynes, who co-chairs a workers’ compensation oversight committee, said Monday afternoon that he and the governor could not agree on a provision that would lower the amount of benefits for workers who return to the job.
The issue is the “multiplier,” which currently allows judges to increase a doctor’s determination of impairment by up to 2.5 times for an injured worker who returns to the same or a similar job. These calculations are applied to what is called a “permanent partial disability” — like losing a finger.
The complicated system is used to determine how much compensation the injured worker should receive.
Haynes said the governor was only willing to allow a multiplier of 1.5, while Haynes wouldn’t go any lower than 1.75. “I don’t believe in balancing all this on the worker’s back,” Haynes said.
Bredesen spent much of the afternoon meeting with labor leaders in an attempt to reach consensus on the legislation.
Lydia Lenker, the governor’s spokeswoman, said work on the bill was continuing and declined to comment on reports that it would be ready Tuesday.
Rep. Jere Hargrove, D-Cookeville, who co-chairs the workers’ comp oversight committee with Haynes, said he was willing to support Bredesen’s position on the multiplier if concessions made elsewhere would help workers.
McLeary, D-Humboldt, has one of the few bills that have jumped through the requisite hoops of being reviewed by a workers’ comp advisory council and the workers’ comp oversight committee.
It would:
— Increase compensation for workers who can’t return to the job but lower awards for employees who go back to work by reducing the multiplier to 1.0;
— Require benefit review conferences in all cases before they can go to trial;
— Provide penalties for late payments to injured workers.
Those issues, as well as whether the state should enact a medical fee schedule limiting doctor reimbursements, are likely to be addressed in the governor’s proposal.
Clabough, R-Maryville, is vice chairman of the Senate Commerce Committee.