Iowa lawmakers advance workers’ comp overhaul

DES MOINES - Labor squared off with business and industry Wednesday over the future of Iowa's workers' compensation system, which would be overhauled under legislation backed by GOP majority lawmakers.

Under the workers' compensation law, most employers are required to provide medical or disability payments - or both - to workers who are injured on the job.

But it's absurd the GOP is pushing for an overhaul, according to Kellie Paschke, a former House GOP staffer who's now a trial lawyer.

'A few short years ago we had workers' compensation legislation before this committee,” recalled Paschke, speaking on behalf of the Association for Justice. 'At that time, House Republicans indicated the system was not broken and nothing that needed to be fixed.”

And the Iowa Association of Business and Industry ran commercials saying Iowa's workers' compensation system was a model for the nation, she said.

'And yet here we are today, basically turning our workers' compensation system on its head,” she said at a House Commerce subcommittee hearing on House Study Bill 169.

Mike Ralston of the Association of Business and Industry agreed the Iowa system was the premier worker's comp system - then.

'The goal of this bill is to get it back to that premier status,” he said in a committee meeting packed with union members, trial lawyers and lobbyists.

'In just a few years, Iowa has gone from having some of the lowest workers' comp premiums for employers, the richest benefits in the country for employees,” said Ralston, whose association has 1,500 member companies with 330,000 employees in Iowa. 'Now we're in the middle of the pack with increasing premiums and still some of the richest benefits for employees.”

Although the rate employers pay dropped 4.7 percent last year, Ralston said, the rates over several years actually have increased more than 7 percent.

HSB 169 is needed to 'ensure the protection of the system and the protection of Iowa's workers who need benefits from the system,” he said.

The bill is 'fair for employers and employees, in fact, generous compared to benefits of our neighbors,” he said.

A Senate Commerce subcommittee hearing on similar legislation, Senate Study Bill 1170, drew a full room later in the day. Of the subcommittee members, Republican Sens. Michael Breitbach of Strawberry Point and Bill Anderson of Pierson signed off on the bill. Sen. Nate Boulton, D-Des Moines, did not.

Both the House and Senate Commerce committees plan to run their respective bills in full committee Thursday.

According to the Iowa Federation of Labor AFL-CIO, the bill would reduce benefits for common workplace injuries; eliminate benefits based on an employee's loss of earning power in some cases; discriminate against older workers by requiring an employee's age to be used to calculate available benefits; and limit benefits available to employees 67 and older when injured. For workers permanently and totally disabled by a job injury, their benefits would cease at age 67, the group said.

The issue is personal to Rep. Scott Ourth, D-Ackworth, a heavy equipment operator.

'We work tired, we work hot, we work sore and we work stiff, and we're proud of it,” he said. But 'people get hurt and they get hurt badly through no fault of their own.”

This legislation could affect him and his family 'and I'm having a hard time with it.”

Rep. Peter Cownie, R-West Des Moines, said the first goal is to avoid injuries to workers. But there will be injuries, and workers injured on the job deserve benefits.

However, there has been abuse and it is the responsibility of the Legislature, which created the workers' comp system more than 100 years ago, to review it.

He and subcommittee Chairman Gary Carlson, R-Muscatine, signed off on the bill.

l Comments: (319) 398-8375; james.lynch@thegazette.com