Stemming the California Workers’ Compensation “Gold Rush”: AB 1309

As the Sports and Entertainment Law Insider has detailed in a prior article, California remains a popular site for current or former professional athletes to file workers’ compensation claims with its relaxed rules on the filing of cumulative trauma-type claims.  However, this may be coming to an end shortly.

As recently estimated by Gary Toebben, President and CEO of the Los Angeles Area Chamber of Commerce, 4,500 claims have been filed with up to another 5,000 claims pending, resulting in nearly $750 million in workers’ compensation payments with more payments on the way.  Mr. Toebben cites multiple examples of athletes receiving large pay-outs in California, despite the fact that they played out their careers elsewhere, including Terrell Davis of the Denver Broncos ($199,000) and Michael Irvin of the Dallas Cowboys ($249,000).  (See Too Easy of a Score).

Assembly Bill 1309, however, continues to wind its way through the legislative process in attempt to curb this practice.  The bill as originally introduced on February 22, 2013 would have provided that a “professional athlete,” including both major and minor league athletes, would have been precluded from receiving California Workers’ Compensation benefits where: “(A) [t]he employer has furnished workers’ compensation insurance coverage or its equivalent under the laws of a state other than California” and “(B) [t]he employer’s workers’ compensation insurance or its equivalent covers the professional athlete’s employment while in this state.”  In such cases, the claimant was limited to recovery in that other state.  Additionally, a professional athlete was deemed to be temporarily within the state if he or she performed less than 90 days in California.  The bill also provided that if the athlete spent the last year of his or her work in the occupation which exposed him or her to the cumulative injury, the employer would not be liable assuming conditions (A) and (B) above applied.

In the most recent version of the bill, an exception was included to allow athletes to file claims in California where they were employed for 8 or more consecutive years by a California-based employer and 80% of the athlete’s employment “occurred while employed by that California based-employer against whom the claim is filed.”

Ultimately, the fate of hundreds, if not thousands of claims, by professional athletes who have played in California hinges largely upon the passage of this bill.  Workers’ Compensation practitioners and other states with workers’ compensation systems favorable to cumulative-trauma type claims would do well to follow this law and any subsequent challenge thereto.  To follow AB 1309 further, California’s Legislative Information provides a comprehensive history, click here.

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