2006-007. Municipality of Anchorage and Ward North America Appellants vs. David N. Syren Appellee.

• Case Date: March 07, 2006
• Court: Alaska

Alaska Workers Compensation Decisions 2006. Workers' Compensation Appeals Commission 2006-007. Municipality of Anchorage and Ward North America Appellants vs. David N. Syren Appellee Alaska Workers' Compensation Appeals Commission Municipality of Anchorage and Ward North America, Appellants, vs. David N. Syren, Appellee.Decision No. 007 March 7, 2006WCAC Appeal No. 06-003 AWCB Case No. 200319873MMemorandum Decision and Order on Motion for Extraordinary Review Motion for Extraordinary Review from the Alaska Workers' Compensation Board Decision No. 06-0004; Rebecca Pauli, Chairman; David Kester, Member for Management; John Abshire, Member for Labor. Appearances: for Appellants Municipality of Anchorage and Ward North America, Trena Heikes; for Appellee David N. Syren, Chancy Croft.Before: Jim Robison and Philip Ulmer, Commissioners, Kristin Knudsen, Chair. By: Kristin Knudsen, Chair. This motion for extraordinary review raised questions relating to the structure of discovery in workers' compensation proceedings, the board's obligations, and the commission's powers. Our decision in Eagle Hardware v. Ammi,(fn1) sets out in detail our reasons for asserting the authority to exercise review of non-final decisions, and we see no reason to add to that discussion here. However, our ability to undertake extraordinary review of an interlocutory decision is limited and we will not exercise it lightly. The commission will grant review if the commission can confidently find that the issue presented by the motion is sufficiently compelling to outweigh the sound policy favoring appeals from final decisions for a reason stated in 8 AAC 57.076(a). We do not find that policy is outweighed here. Of the several issues presented by the motion, one issue was of such concern that we considered extraordinary review. After close examination of the facts, however, we conclude review would be premature. According to Ms. Heikes' statement to the commission in oral hearing, unchallenged by Mr. Croft, the board issued, on the employer's behalf, a subpoena of certain records, and the employer served the subpoenas on records custodian for MONY.(fn2) The MONY records custodian refused to deliver all the subpoenaed records as directed by the subpoena.(fn3) Alaska Regional, served with a release, refused to provide records directly to the employer, due to...