Gov. Rick Scott says he wants to get Florida back to work, but things aren't working out so well at the Bureau of Rehabilitation and Re-employment Services, which is tasked with helping injured employees get back on the job.
Effective Friday, the BRRS will lose 55 of its 82 staff positions and see its funding reduced by two-thirds. Regional offices are being consolidated, leaving some residents hundreds of miles away from services.
Sunshine State News' calls to the BRRS went unanswered or unreturned. Its overseer, the state Department of Education, offered only a boilerplate recitation of the bureau's duties.
Downsizing and administrative shuffling should be the least of taxpayers' concerns, says Frances Ford, head of ReEmployAbility, a private service that helps injured workers return to the workplace.
"It's a bureaucratic black hole," Ford said of BRRS from her Tampa office. "They didn't do anything for the injured worker when they had money. They got what they deserved."
Rick Morales, an attorney with Florida Workers Advocates, which represents injured workers, was slightly more charitable. He said he has had good experience working with with BRRS' Miami office, but gets poor results from other district offices.
"Cutting the staff won't help the employment situation in the state," Morales said. "Step by step, benefits are being taken away from workers who are trying to get back to work."
One public school employee, who was injured by a special-education student and then ticketed for termination after a physician listed her with a 10 percent disability, told Sunshine State News that BRRS was no help.
"I made several calls and was put on hold to listen to recordings of Governor Scott talking about getting Florida back to work," said the ex-employee who requested anonymity.
"The phone messages stated that the offices were open between 8 a.m. and 5 p.m., and then said to call back during business hours," the worker related.
Frustrated by the automated brush-off, she finally contacted the governor's Citizens Services office and, after two days, was routed to a live BRRS worker, who could offer no help.
"Unfortunately, this is very typical of the system," said Ford.
An unknown number of Florida workers who have sustained less-than-debilitating injuries on the job remain unemployed after being terminated. Some collect small disability payments or workers' compensation, but many more are left to fend for themselves.
Because the "accommodation" requirements of the federal Americans With Disabilities Act are superseded by workers' comp laws, employers are not required to retain an employee if they cannot accommodate the worker.
After two weeks of administrative "light duty," the school employee was informed by the workers' comp doctor that she had reached "maximum medical improvement." The district then scheduled her for termination on July 29. She was also told she could apply for other positions, along with the rest of the general population.
Even with her experience, exemplary work record and glowing references, the school employee, who holds a college degree and earned only $11.88 per hour, has yet to be interviewed for any of the dozens of qualified positions for which she applied.
The BRRS is supposed to facilitate transitions for injured workers through retraining, re-education and job-placement services. But the program received heavy criticism from lawmakers who said they could not get straight answers from bureau director Reginald Watkins.
In a post-session blog, Ford wrote: "The BRRSis in turmoil and carriers requesting state retraining services should anticipatedenials.The bureau was inefficient and ineffective before and they wont improve with less money."
Watkins did not return a call from Sunshine State News.
As long as Florida's workers' comp law provides for retraining services, the BRRS cannot being completely dismantled. Meantime, however, the bureau's performance has not earned stellar ratings from injured workers or professionals who deal with it.
"Some states have nothing at all, but of the states that do, we are one of the worst," Ford said.
Now, in an ironic twist, up to 55 BRRS workers will be counting themselves among the newly unemployed on Friday -- apparent casualties of self-inflicted bureaucratic bungling.
Gov. Scott's office declined to comment.
--
Contact Kenric Ward at kward@sunshinestatenews.com or at (772) 801-5341.
