State's L&I director visits Grant County

Weeks' initiatives designed to improve worker system

MOSES LAKE — Last week's visit was the first for Gary Weeks into the city.

In his 16th month as director of the state's Department of Labor and Industries, Weeks' visit was part of his trek to various L&I offices throughout the state. He arrived in the county Thursday night, and left Friday mid-afternoon.

Weeks explained he has spent the spring and summer talking with staff members about how their work is going and the initiatives he has for the department. He also uses the visits to meet local legislators, talk with the media and to schedule time at manufacturing plants, orchards or farms to talk with people in business about how they see the department and its services.

"These trips throughout the state are the most interesting part of the job, to be honest," Weeks said. "That's where you really find out how things are going and whether the programs that you are working on are making a difference, how the staff feel about their work. It's where you learn what the staff need to do their job better."

While Weeks didn't have any business visits scheduled for his time in Moses Lake, Ron Langley, in his newly created position as small business liaison for the state, met with the Moses Lake Chamber of Commerce and Big Bend Community College's Small Business Development Center.

As part of the visit to the area, Weeks looked over the Microsoft data center site in Quincy. No staff were on hand, he said; he just looked at how construction was coming along and he planned to make arrangements to return and take a tour through the site and visit staff.

"That was very tragic; a worker was tied off to a bundle that was a moveable bundle," he said of the fatality which occurred at the Quincy site July 25. "That shouldn't have been done. You're supposed to tie off to something that doesn't move. And so when the comealong pulled that bundle along and it dropped through the trusses, it dropped through with the worker. That was a very tragic accident that was preventable. We don't want to see anything else like that happen, and so we're going to work with the businesses that are constructing these buildings for Yahoo! and Microsoft. We want to do it in a way that doesn't impede their opportunity to do business, but makes them aware that they've got to build these buildings safely."

Weeks said the Moses Lake office gave him good feedback about a number of changes made, including in the safety and health program, where he is trying to extend more judgment on the part of inspectors when they evaluate where the most serious problems that could potentially cause injury or a fatality. He is also receiving positive feedback to the directive to perform regulatory duties in a way where the business community will respect officers for doing their job.

"I think there's a very good feeling from the staff here at this area about how well they're doing and some of the successes we're having," Weeks said, pointing also at the area's fraud program, going after those people who are not paying their worker's compensation premium, contractors that fail to register and unlicensed electricians.

"This is what the business community really wants from us, frankly, is that they want a fair and level playing field," he said. "They want to know that if they're bidding on a job, their competitors are bidding knowing that they have to pay worker's comp, they have to pay the Washington's minimum wage, they have to pay prevailing wages if it's a public project."

Weeks is placing an emphasis on four main areas as part of his initiatives — increasing safety in the work place, stopping fraud, improving the worker's compensation system and better serving small businesses. Weeks considers these the key elements of the worker's compensation system.

"I think they are the most influential parts of a worker's comp system, safety and health at the front end, a good return to work and compensation system when somebody does get hurt, and then making sure you minimize the fraud in the system, which gives an unfair advantage to some employers over other employers," he said.

His small employer initiative is also at the top because the state is largely comprised of small employers striving to make payroll every month, he said. Because they are so busy operating, the department has to connect with them to help keep the business safe and healthy, and know the steps necessary in case somebody does get hurt. That's one reason Weeks hired Langley, the first small business liaison the state has ever had.

"His job is to find ways to work between the department and small businesses," Weeks said. "As we look at programs, rules and statutes, his job is to think about, 'how does this affect small business?' … We've never had anybody representing that perspective."

The department wants to be in a position to help encourage the small businesses to survive, grow and prosper, Weeks said, pointing at three ways to encourage safety and health — education and training, compliance and consultation, providing small businesses the opportunity to invite L&I safety consultants in and go through their businesses together.

"It's sort of counterintuitive for a lot of businesses to say, 'Oh yeah, I'm going to invite L&I into my business,'" Weeks said. It's hard to overcome that sentiment, he is well aware, but he advised that most employers want to do the right thing, and the department's job is to show them how. There's no cost to a consultation, and no citations are written.

"If we find something that's really dangerous, you have to fix it right away," he said. "And any business that we do consultation for, we take them out of the rotation for a compliance visit."