Viewpoint: Biden’s EEOC nominee could hurt Montana’s small businesses

Lori Caplis

These are difficult occasions for Montana’s small companies. There appears to be an countless deluge of stress that small companies are dealing with.

Disruption of provide chains, employee shortages, raging inflation – to call a couple of – has compelled companies to both improve their costs, in the reduction of on providers, or each. All of this on the heels of a historic pandemic. Add within the current flood and fireplace injury in a number of Montana communities, and it’s changing into an amazing scenario.

This can be a time after we want leaders who acknowledge the challenges that small companies are dealing with. That’s why I learn with concern that President Biden has nominated somebody to a federal publish – that if confirmed – may carry an agenda that will make it harder for Montana small companies to function.

Kalpana Kotagal has been nominated to be the tie-breaking vote on the Equal Employment Alternative Fee (EEOC). The EEOC serves as the first physique overseeing federal legal guidelines geared toward stopping discrimination within the office.

Whereas the EEOC serves an vital and crucial objective, there additionally must be a commonsense method in order that small companies in locations like Montana aren’t confronted with new, overly burdensome laws and threats of litigation. That is the very last thing Montana small companies want proper now.

It seems that Ms. Kotagal has an agenda that’s far out of the mainstream for Montana. She has been a pacesetter of utilizing the specter of onerous lawsuits in opposition to companies to pursue an agenda. She has labored to erase office arbitration agreements between companies and workers, stopping disputes from being resolved utilizing a negotiated course of.

She even selected to characterize the chief of the “Defund the Police” motion who has known as the police a software of white supremacy and needs the police abolished. This seems like somebody with a big-city agenda who gained’t prioritize the distinctive challenges dealing with small companies in rural Montana communities.

I’m hoping Montana’s congressional delegation will take a detailed have a look at this nomination with small companies in thoughts.