Lawsuit challenges workers' comp law

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. -- More than 70 labor groups filed suit Wednesday challenging the constitutionality of Missouri's new workers' compensation law, claiming it reduces the rights of employees so greatly that it denies them justice for their injuries.

The lawsuit asks the Cole County Circuit Court to strike down a law revamping the nearly 80-year-old workers' compensation system by generally making it harder to prove injuries are work-related.

The new law, which took effect Aug. 28, "is an immoral assault on every working family in Missouri," Sherwood Smith, president of the Missouri State Council of Firefighters, said while announcing the lawsuit outside a fire station near the state Capitol.

It "tosses aside previous fundamental protections and shifts the cost of workplace injuries to the employee and his or her family," said Smith, of Kansas City.

The workers' compensation system was created as a way to resolve injury claims through administrative proceedings rather than the courts. But the lawsuit contends the "drastically altered" law diminishes workers' rights to the point that the administrative system no longer is an adequate substitute for suing in court.

It alleges multiple due process violations of the state and federal constitutions, as well as equal rights violations for allegedly discriminating against older workers and others. The lawsuit claims that new drug testing policies violate rights against unreasonable searches. And it claims new legislative and executive branch control over administrative law judges who hear workers' compensation cases violates the constitutional separation of powers.

The revamped law was one of this year's top priorities for Republican Gov. Matt Blunt and the GOP-led Legislature, who argued it would help reduce the rising workers' compensation insurance premiums paid by businesses, and thus improve Missouri's business climate.

But the lawsuit claims the measure is unconstitutionally arbitrary -- lacking a rational connection to the supporters' claim of reducing insurance rates.

Top Republicans and business groups suggested labor leaders simply are upset the legislation passed, after similar efforts had stalled during Democratic Gov. Bob Holden's tenure.

"This is somewhat a case of sour grapes," said Michael Grote, the chief lobbyist for the Missouri Chamber of Commerce and Industry.

Lead legislative sponsor, Sen. John Loudon, R-Chesterfield, called the lawsuit's claims "silly" and "hyperbole."

"We've put Missouri on a path for job growth, and these people want to maintain chaos and keep us jeopardy," Loudon said.

Blunt spokesman Spence Jackson called the lawsuit a "reckless attempt to interfere with a good law that has restored balance to the system and has been cited by companies that have recently chosen to invest or reinvest in Missouri's working families."

Among other things, the new law requires work to be the "prevailing factor" for people to be compensated for an injury, instead of the previous standard of a "substantial factor." It also redefines a qualifying accident as "a specific event during a single work shift" as opposed to the previous allowance for a "series of events."

People suffering occupational diseases and repetitive motion injuries also must be able to show work is the prevailing reason, rather than aging and normal day-to-day activities.

Jim Kabell, business manager of Teamsters Local 245 in Springfield, said he knew of three cases where workers already have been denied compensation under the new law for things such as muscle pulls or strains or repetitive injuries.

The new law gives preference to objective medical findings instead of subjective complaints of pain, and it denies compensation for injuries indirectly resulting from "idiopathic causes."

The lawsuit claims that provision could be used to deny compensation to an older employee with osteoporosis who falls on a waxed floor and breaks a hip, because a younger worker may only have gotten bruised.