In your cover story entitled “L&I grants Wal-Mart, Safeway ergonomics exemption,” you write “But the legislature, with the support of Locke and Moore, imposed one for our state over the objections of the federal government that is even more stringent than the one the feds abandoned.”

This is incorrect. The Legislature never imposed the ergonomics rule upon businesses in our state — it was a rule imposed by the state Department of Labor & Industries. In fact, Republicans joined conservative Democrats (namely Sen. Tim Sheldon) in offering bills to repeal the ergonomics rule (SB 5882 and others during the 2001-02 Legislative session).

Furthermore, the Association of Washington Business has filed suit accusing Labor & Industries of stepping beyond legislative intent in imposing these rules.

The Department’s position was upheld in the Thurston Superior Court but AWB is planning to appeal that decision.

Janelle Guthrie
Director of Republican Communications
Washington State Senate
Olympia

(Editor’s Note: We stand corrected. The rule was imposed by L&I with Locke’s support. This was corrected in the original draft of the story, but due to a computer file error, the original version ran, not the corrected one.).