Workers’ Comp in Holding Pattern Pending Reshuffle

Mark Kahn measures his progress in feet. When he became the presiding judge of the Workers’ Compensation Appeals Board in Van Nuys last October, there were 83 feet worth of unopened mail and boxes of files lining the hallways. To reduce the number of backlogged workers’ compensation cases to a more manageable level, Kahn brought in volunteers to help sort the mail, and the stacks have slowly been reduced to about 15 feet.

Kahn and fellow judges also speeded up the processing of cases to trim the backlog, and that’s helped. The time it takes for a case to go to trial after a final meeting with a judge has been cut from a year to two months.

But now with two big changes in the workers’ compensation system set to go into effect in January, Kahn is in a holding pattern. “Right now it’s kind of ridiculous on my part to do anything because everything’s changing,” he said.

Last week Gov. George Deukmejian signed legislation that will overhaul the state workers’ compensation system: Among other things, 12 new judges will be added statewide, and up to 80 arbitrator positions will be created to try and reduce judges’ workloads. The arbitrators will be attorneys who will hear cases and try to persuade the disputing parties to settle without going to trial. In theory, that means that judges like Kahn, who now preside over these preliminary conferences, will be free to handle only trials.

But while Kahn might see his staff increased due to the new legislation, he might also lose workers. That’s because the Department of Industrial Relations, the state agency that overseas the workers’ compensation boards, as part of its own reorganization plan will open a new board in Pasadena in January, 1990, and will move the Ventura board to Agoura by April. These moves are part of a plan to deal with the surging population in the Los Angeles area by having more, smaller-sized boards.

Although some of the Van Nuys caseload might be shifted to Pasadena and Agoura, to staff those offices, some judges and support workers will be transferred from other boards, including Van Nuys.

Said Kahn: “I don’t mind my staff being cut, as long as the caseload is cut more than proportionately. If they cut me to eight judges and take 30,000 files, I might get the best of the deal.”

One thing is clear. Kahn can use all the extra help he can get.

Ranks 5th

With about 98,000 cases pending, Van Nuys ranks about fifth in size among the state’s 22 workers’ compensation boards. It accepts cases from the San Fernando, Santa Clarita and Antelope valleys, and averages about 1,400 new cases a month.

The Van Nuys board now has nine judges, 10 secretaries, seven court reporters and 12 clerks. Like many of the state’s big-city boards, the Van Nuys board is overworked. “They are understaffed at the judicial level, the secretarial level, the reporter level and the clerk level,” said Ronald Feenberg, a Panorama City attorney and president-elect of the Sacramento-based California Applicants Attorneys Assn.

Not surprisingly, the workers’ compensation board in Van Nuys is also short on space. Room has become so scarce that Kahn has given up his office to his secretary and uses a room reserved for conferences as his office.

The 75-year-old workers’ compensation system allows employees to file a claim with the Workers’ Compensation Appeals Board if their employer or employer’s insurance company disputes their claim that they are entitled to benefits because of an injury suffered from work. Though it costs nothing to file a claim, employees often hire lawyers to represent them. These attorneys work on a contingency basis, and judges award them 9% to 15% of an injured worker’s permanent disability award.

Under Fire

The California system has been under fire because it has become a bureaucratic maze, and state legislators and administrators have long acknowledged that the system is highly inefficient.

The strain on the system has been compounded because these days 16% of all disputed cases involve workers who claim that their injuries were caused by job-related stress. These cases are complex and difficult to resolve because they involve subjective factors, and because employers are typically unwilling to concede any responsibility. It also adds to the workload for judges such as Kahn.

“I’m handling 30 conferences a day,” Kahn said. “By all logic, it should be 15.”

So each day Kahn tries his best to move cases through the system as fast as he can. On a recent day at the Van Nuys board, Kahn sped through a series of conferences with attorneys representing injured workers, local companies and insurers. These meetings typically lasted no more than 15 minutes, and Kahn kept pressuring the parties to settle.

Typical Disputes

One argument erupted between an attorney for a TV studio and lawyers representing a studio employee who had suffered a stroke on the job. Another dispute concerned a worker who claimed to have suffered numerous physical ailments from his job, but who also been seen surfing recently. In both cases, Kahn interrupted the arguments and chided the attorneys to find a compromise.

The state plans to send a special review staff to Van Nuys later this year to sort through its files and decide which cases should be reassigned elsewhere. At the moment, the guessing is that Kahn might lose two of his judges who would be transferred to the new Pasadena board.

Meanwhile, Kahn tries to keep working down the backlog of cases. “I think everybody’s been aware of the problems in this system. My job is to do my best to make whatever they give me work.”