Thursday, July 19, 2007
Jul. 19, 2007 (McClatchy-Tribune Regional News delivered by Newstex) --
Pass Christian attorney Horace 'Topper' Thompson III was recently appointed by President Bush to chair a national agency that has the final say over cases resulting from Occupational Safety and Health Administration citations to employers.
'It's a big responsibility, but I can't imagine anything I would rather be doing right now,' said Thompson.
News of the president's nomination came two weeks after Hurricane Katrina flooded Thompson's Bayou Portage home, he said.
'At that time I had just gotten a FEMA camper on my property,' said Thompson.
Unable to practice law during the nomination process, which included confirmation by the Senate, Thompson lived in the trailer and worked on rebuilding his home. He moved to Washington, D.C., last year as a member of the Occupational Safety and Health Review Commission. His designation as chairman of the organization was announced at the end of June.
The commission has 65 employees, including 14 regional judges. Thompson said the agency is like the 'supreme court' for OSHA cases. When an employer is issued a citation, the company can pay the fine, negotiate a settlement with OSHA or contest the citation. Commission judges decide the contested cases. The three commissioners review the decisions and hear appeals.
'We decide about 70 cases a year and issue decisions,' said Thompson.
A lifelong Gulf Coast resident, Thompson plans to return to Pass Christian at the end of his six-year term.
'We rented our house to a good friend,' said Thompson. 'We'll be back.'
Thompson's qualifications for the job include a 38-year career as an attorney concentrating his practice in labor and employment law, with a focus on occupational safety and health law. Most recently he served as co-chair of the Labor and Employment Law Practice Group of the law firm of Watkins Ludlam Winter & Stennis and worked in the firm's Gulfport and New Orleans offices.
After graduating from Tulane University in 1986, Thompson was a member of the Labor Law Section of Jones Walker Waechter Poitevent Carrere & Denegre of New Orleans. He co-founded the New Orleans-based labor relations and employment law firm of McCalla Thompson Pyburn & Ridley and for more than two decades was a member of its management committee.
From 1979 to 1984, he served as management co-chair of the Occupational Safety and Health Law Committee American Bar Section on Labor and Employment Law.
Thompson's nickname, 'Topper,' emerged from the childhood endearment 'cotton top,' a reference to his light-blond hair and his initials, H.A.T.
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