SARAH MCCAMMON, HOST:
This month, the Biden administration finalized a rule that would make some coal companies pay more for their miners' black lung disease treatments and workers' comp. Advocates say it closes a loophole that had allowed bankrupt companies to push those costs onto taxpayers. Wyoming Public Radio's Chris Clements reports.
CHRIS CLEMENTS, BYLINE: Black lung disease is a lung condition that miners can get from inhaling toxic dust. It's not curable, and miners wind up needing medical treatment indefinitely. There is a federal trust fund that was set up decades ago to help miners pay for those health services, funded in part by taxpayers. But it was meant as a safety net in case the coal company operators who are on the hook for those health services go bankrupt.
CHRIS GODFREY: Unfortunately, because of the current status of the coal industry, several of the mining operators have gone out of business.
CLEMENTS: That's Chris Godfrey, director of the U.S. Office of Workers' Compensation Programs, which handles the Black Lung Fund. He says those bankruptcies mean more money has to come out of the fund, which is already more than $6 billion in debt.
GODFREY: So what's happened is the liabilities that should have been paid out by the responsible mining operator are then paid out by the taxpayer.
CLEMENTS: With the new rule, coal companies that are self-insured will need to shell out more money to the feds so that if they go belly up, the debts owed to their miners won't have to come out of that trust fund. Rebecca Shelton is the policy director for the Appalachian Citizens' Law Center, which represents coal miners and their families on issues related to black lung and mine safety. Her organization supported the new rule and says it's good for miners.
REBECCA SHELTON: They worked for their employer for many years, and it was because of the failure of that employer to protect them that they got this disease. And they think that the company should be accountable for that.
CLEMENTS: A spokesperson for the National Mining Association, a coal industry trade group, said in an emailed statement that the Black Lung Fund was set up to cover these kinds of medical costs. They said, quote, "the across-the-board, excessive requirements under this new rule can only be interpreted as yet another page in the administration's playbook to crush the industry," unquote. But if the fund keeps going deeper into debt, lawmakers could lower the monthly dollar amount miners get, says Richard Miller. He's a retired policy director for the House Committee on Education and Workforce.
RICHARD MILLER: All of the variables that contribute to rising levels of red ink in the Black Lung Benefits Trust Fund create pressures that historically were resolved, in part, by rolling back benefits.
CLEMENTS: A recent study from the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health found that the number of miners who get black lung disease is on the rise. Congress or President-elect Donald Trump's administration could overturn the new rule. For NPR News, I'm Chris Clements in Laramie.
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