Lawyer is gone from Oklahoma attorney general’s office after giving bad advice to commission

July 31--The assistant attorney general blamed for giving incorrect Open Meeting Act advice to the Workers' Compensation Commission no longer works for the attorney general and will no longer be advising the commission.

"Ted Rossier is no longer employed at the attorney general's office," Aaron Cooper, spokesman for Attorney General Scott Pruitt, said in a terse statement Wednesday. "I can't comment any further as this is a personnel issue."

Rossier declined to discuss circumstances surrounding his leaving the office.

"I don't care to comment," he said.

The announcement came five days after the attorney general's office issued a statement acknowledging that some of the advice given to the commission about the Open Meeting Act was wrong.

Meanwhile, The Oklahoman has learned that a report calling for Rossier's firing and the termination of commission Executive Director Rick Farmer was sent Monday to Gov. Mary Fallin by two attorneys who served on Fallin's Commission on Workers' Compensation Reform.

The report was authored by longtime workers' compensation attorneys Bob Burke and Tim Cooley.

Burke, a former state secretary of commerce, has represented injured workers for 34 years and Cooley has represented employers and insurance companies for 37 years.

"The current general counsel should be replaced," the report said. "It is apparent that his advice on the Open Meeting Act was wrong and caused great embarrassment for the commission. The attorney general can advise the commission on legal matters in the future and keep the commission out of trouble on such simple issues as obeying the Open Meeting Act."

Continuing on, the report said, "the executive director should be replaced with a person with substantial experience in claims handling or administering a workers' compensation delivery system."

Contacted Wednesday, Farmer declined to comment on the portion of the report that called for his ouster as executive director.

About the report

In the report, Burke and Cooley rip the performance of Oklahoma's new Workers' Compensation Commission, which began work Feb. 1.

The commission was created by the Legislature to shift Oklahoma from a workers' compensation court system to an administrative system.

"The new administrative workers' compensation commission has failed...to substantially achieve any of its goals," Burke and Cooley claim in the report.

They identified those failed goals as providing quicker resolutions to disputes between injured workers and employers, reducing litigation, and getting workers back to work quicker.

Administrative law judges employed by the commission have taken 30 days to issue some of their initial orders, while judges under the old court system normally issued orders in four to five days, the report complained.

Complaint downplayed

Farmer downplayed the complaint, saying the new administrative law judges know they are setting precedents with their initial orders so they are taking great care and time to make sure they are thorough.

Farmer said he expects they will pick up the pace in the future.

Burke and Cooley also criticized the commission as being "top-heavy in administration," with 13 employees having compensation packages in excess of $100,000. Meanwhile, the commission only employs three counselors with limited workers' compensation experience to serve as counselors for injured workers seeking assistance in navigating the system, they complained.

Farmer disputed that criticism, saying he believes three counselors are enough to handle the current caseload, which is relatively small given the commission's short existence.

"In terms of top-heaviness, most of the staff that was hired by the commission are positions that are required by law and they're required to be senior professionals," he said.

Governor's response

Fallin issued a statement defending the commission's performance.

"The new system, which has only been in operation less than six months, calls for a complete re-imagination of how we process workers' comp claims," Fallin said. "It is normal for a change like this to come with challenges. No reform process is immune from growing pains."

She painted a more positive picture of the commission's accomplishments.

"Despite just being nearly six months old, the new system has experienced considerable successes," she said. "According to the Independent Insurance Agents of Oklahoma, it has already reduced the overall cost to business by as much as 14 percent, allowing those businesses to focus on job creation instead of litigation and legal fees. Employers' first notice of injury filings are down 30 percent and employee claims for compensation are down 75 percent, according to the findings."

"While there are some questionable statements in the Burke-Cooley report, I appreciate their interest," Fallin said. "I'm asking our workers' compensation commissioners to carefully examine them and consider adopting those that would improve this new system."

The commission is scheduled to meet at 2 p.m. Thursday to discuss how to be more open and transparent. The attorney general's office has been reviewing commission acts that may have violated the Open Meeting Act to see if additional actions need to be taken.

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