Businesses work to soften effects of Scaffold Law

While business groups have lobbied to repeal or reform the Scaffold Law, there seems little prospect of a change in the law, so other efforts are being made to mitigate its effects on insurance claims.

“As a way to ease the often contentious claims process, some carriers and contractors are turning to alternative dispute resolution” as a way to potentially mitigate the confrontational consequences of liability disputes, said John Frizalone, vice president of The Risk Management Planning Group Inc., a York Risk Services Group Inc. unit in Uniondale, New York, who also manages a safety group for the New York State Builders Association and the Queens & Bronx Building Association.

“Clients have gone to ADR, video surveillance and more drug testing to work through the effects of the Labor Law,” said Kevin Dolan, senior vice president for Alliant Construction Services Inc. in New York.

Attempts at bringing employers and labor representatives closer together on the issue have made little progress.

Some progress seemed to have been made through the Lawsuit Reform Alliance of New York, an association of businesses, health care providers, trade associations and others, which made the case that the Scaffold Law regime is costly and inhibits commercial building activity, but that momentum appears to have stalled, said Karen Reutter, head of construction for Zurich North America in Schaumburg, Illinois, which is a member of the group.

“There appears to be little movement to modify Labor Law in any meaningful way,” said Kelly Kinzer, head of construction broking in Willis Towers Watson PLC’s corporate risk and broking segment in Minneapolis.