HomeMy WebLinkAboutAB553_20180910_DalyCity of San Luis Obispo, Office of the City Council, 990 Palm Street, San Luis Obispo, CA, 93401-3249, 805.781.7114, slocity.org
September 17, 2018
The Honorable Edmund G. Brown
Governor, State of California
State Capitol, First Floor
Sacramento, CA 95814
VIA Email: Leg.Unit@gov.ca.gov
RE: AB 553 (Daly) Workers’ Compensation: Return-To-Work Program As Amended
08/17/2018 - Request for Veto
Dear Governor Brown,
The City of San Luis Obispo must respectfully request your veto on Assembly Bill 553, which would require the
Department of Industrial Relations to distribute $120 million annually to injured workers from the Return to
Work Program (RTW Program) and shift administration of the progr am from the state to employers.
The Return-to-Work program was created as a compromise between employers and labor, and the purpose of
the program is to provide a financial boost to injured workers who had a high loss of earnings capacity, but low
permanent disability rating. The administration of the program was never intended to be the responsibility of
employers, and regulators implemented the program in its current form largely over the objections of the
employers who fund it. AB 553 would place a tremendous administrative burden on cities by shifting the
responsibility to administer the program away from the state and on to employers and their insurers.
The Commission on Health and Safety and Workers’ Compensation (CHSWC) released data and analysis on the
RTW Program in 2016. The data suggests that utilization of the fund is already growing substantially. Between
2015 and 2017 the number of applications grew from 3765 to 13,695 and payments grew from $16.3 million to
$68.4 million. The RTW Program appears to be on a trajectory to reach the upper limits of the program’s $120
million statutory cap.
The City of San Luis Obispo is concerned that AB 553 will lead to a benefit that varies year-to-year based on
the number of applicants. This means that the benefit will rise and fall depending on the number of applicants,
but the fund will always be spending to the maximum which simply was not intended. Under this construct the
benefit becomes somewhat arbitrary, and the cap will need to be increased if the benefit level falls due to
oversubscription of a benefit that was never meant to be widely accessed.
For these reasons, the City of San Luis Obispo respectfully urges you to veto AB 553 (Daly).
Sincerely,
Heidi Harmon
Mayor
City of San Luis Obispo
cc: The Honorable Tom Daly, California State Assembly, District 69
assemblymember.daly@assembly.ca.gov
Camille Wagner, Legislative Affairs Secretary, Office of Governor Brown Leg.Unit@gov.ca.gov
Dave Mullinax, dmullinax@cacities.org
Meg Desmond, League of California Cities, cityletters@cacities.org