Michigan Employment Security Act (MESA) confidentiality exception for workers’ compensation claims; MCL 421.11(b)(1)(i); Paschke v Retool Indus; Storey v Meijer, Inc.; Interested-party definition; MI Admin Code, R 421.201(1); Subpoenas in workers’ compensation proceedings; MCL 418.583; Limits, costs & confidentiality; MCL 421.11(b)(6); Unemployment Insurance Agency (UIA); Workers’ Disability Compensation Appeals Commission (WDCAC); Worker’s Disability Compensation Act (WDCA)

In an issue of first impression, the court held that MCL 421.11(b)(1)(i) requires the UIA to make unemployment records available to employers in workers’ compensation proceedings as “interested parties,” and it affirmed the WDCAC’s orders denying the UIA’s motions to quash. In three consolidated WDCA matters, defendants-employers subpoenaed UIA records concerning their employee-claimants. UIA moved to quash on the ground that MESA confidentiality barred disclosure or, alternatively, that the subpoenas were overbroad and burdensome. Magistrates denied the motions (and in two cases found UIA in contempt). The WDCAC reversed the contempt findings but otherwise affirmed, reasoning that UIA “essentially points to the parts of the MESA that encourage confidentiality and ignores the provisions that permit disclosure when, as here, demanded,” and that MCL 421.11(b)(1)(i) is a “statutory mandate” requiring that information that “might—not would, but might—affect a workers’ compensation claim” must be available. On appeal, the court agreed, emphasizing that Storey and Paschke construed the pre-1996 statute in the context of using unemployment determinations in later civil litigation. It concluded the Legislature’s 1996 addition of a specific WDCA exception after Paschke signaled an intent to allow disclosure for workers’ compensation purposes even when UIA is not a party, particularly because the statute uses the broad term “might affect” and commands that information “must be available” regardless of “whether the unemployment agency is a party.” The court further held that employers defending WDCA claims are “interested parties” under Rule 421.201(1) because their “statutory rights or obligations might be affected,” and limiting “interested party” to chargeable employers in unemployment proceedings would render the WDCA exception largely nugatory. As such, it rejected UIA’s attempt to cabin Rule 421.201(3) to defeat disclosure in the workers’ compensation context and reiterated that when a rule conflicts with clear statutory language “the statute controls.” Finally, the court upheld the WDCAC’s refusal to narrow production or to add explicit cost and confidentiality directives because UIA did not substantiate undue burden, the subpoenas were not improper “fishing expedition[s]” given the potential relevance of work-search and employment-capacity evidence, and MCL 421.11(b)(6) already restricts use and redisclosure while the court rules provide mechanisms for copying costs and protective orders that UIA did not meaningfully pursue.