Issue:

The U.S. Department of Labor (DOL), in response to a lawsuit filed by the AFL-CIO and United Food and Commercial Workers International Union in January, has agreed to issue a long-awaited final rule on employer payment for personal protective equipment (PPE).
 

n January, the unions asked the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit to compel the Occupational Safety and Health Administration to complete rulemaking on the issue within 60 days. The unions argued in the lawsuit that the agency's failure to issue the rule eight years after it was formally proposed in 1999 constitutes "an egregious example of unreasonable delay."
 

The secretary of labor filed documents in the D.C. Circuit March 14 agreeing to issue the final rule by November. In its motion, DOL asked the court to hold the case in abeyance pending publication of the final rule.