WSIA

Today marks the end of the third week of Washington’s legislative session.

The introduction of bills on our issues has slowed somewhat this week. Key action included:

• Negotiations over SB 5217, the wage calculation bill: That bill is likely to move in the Senate in some form, but exactly what form is yet to be determined. We have our next community meeting this coming Wednesday at 11am here at WSIA. Please refer to earlier e-mail about that.

• SB 5474, our fix to the Dolph decision on serving department-issued closing orders so as to definitively start the appeals clock, is scheduled for public hearing in the Senate on Monday morning at 10:00 a.m.[Update: Hearing rescheduled to 02/07 at 8:00 a.m. due to weather.] Earlier elements of SB 5474 such as requirements for SI issuance of allowance orders, and a business/labor working group on penalties, have been removed from the bill for purposes of Monday’s hearing. It’s just a clean Dolph fix. The bill’s House companion, HB 1682, is scheduled for hearing on February 7th at 8:00 a.m. in the House Labor Committee. As utterly innocuous as this bill proposal is, it won’t be immune to the hostage-taking and political games that get played during a session, so we’ll be working to try to safeguard it through the process. 

• Firefighter/police occupational disease presumptions: A bill is probably days away from introduction on this issue. We have been negotiating with the police and fire unions attempting to limit the scope of the proposed expansion to presumed conditions and occupations. We also appear to have agreement on a scientific advisory panel to inform the Legislature on any future proposed conditions being added. A sticking point at the moment is language that might limit employers’ evidentiary options on defense of these claims, which we are attempting to fix hopefully prior to introduction of a bill.

• Hanford occupational disease presumptions: The House and Senate bills (HB 1490/SB 5507) that would effectively eliminate the cancer pre-screening requirements from last year’s DOE contractor/subcontractor occupational disease presumption have both moved out of their committees and appear poised for swift passage.