State Labor Issues Part 2

State Labor Issues Part 2. I’m Greg Martin with today’s Fruit Grower Report.

Scott Dilley, Public Policy Analyst with Washington Farm Bureau is hoping a state Senate bill will be passed that will help to make some changes in the workers comp system. If not he says that taxpayers could be on the hook to help bail out one of the labor funds.

DILLEY: So it’s better to go ahead and deal with the issue right now. Senate Bill 5566 that would allow for these voluntary negotiated settlements, it’s estimated that this bill and this process could save the system $1.2 billion dollars over the life of these claims so this is the kind of thing, it’s a voluntary approach. There are no mandated benefit cuts and this is the kind of thing that we need to look at right now to avoid that catastrophic failure that could be coming.

Dilley adds that so far there is not a time frame attached to this issue other than the sooner, the better.

DILLEY: The State Auditor has of course looked at the fund and has tried to project out how much longer it’s going to be. Usually those projections are just a couple years out but in the meantime all of our employers are on the hook for paying into the system that’s leaving a lot of claims open. It’s pensioning a lot of those claims out . Our time loss duration is staggering. We’re out of the norm, out of the mainstream for other states. We’re basically paying out a lot more and our system just isn’t working like the systems in other states.

He says now is the time to step in and fix the problem.

That’s today’s Fruit Grower Report. I’m Greg Martin on the Ag Information Network.