The past year and a half has not failed to provide society with various crash courses on industry and science.During March and April 2020, our first lesson was on the unreliability of lean supply chains during the Great Toilet Paper Shortage. It seems appropriate that we have now come full...
By National Association of ManufacturersNow that all American adults are eligible for vaccination and largely have easy access to vaccines, it’s even more important to convince those still on the fence about getting their shots.To help manufacturers convince their hesitating employees, The Manufacturing Institute has partnered with the Center for...
Sometimes being first isn’t good.Such is the case with legislation making Washington the only state to ban natural gas in new homes and commercial buildings. Thankfully, the legislators ended their session in Olympia and left that bad idea on the table. However, it is destined to come back next year.The issue...
Was there really a federal internment camp in Benton County during the second World War? (No, but there was a federal prison camp near Horn Rapids. It housed federal prisoners who were sent to harvest the orchards and other crops left when residents were ordered out to make room for...
The Biden Administration’s approach to energy is the last thing America needs – especially when the United States is already leading the world in emissions reductions.President Biden is forcing our nation to adopt global standards the rest of the world is already failing to meet while eliminating opportunities for hard-working...
Every year on Arbor Day school children across the United States are told about the many benefits trees provide to people and the environment.To drive the point home, schoolchildren are given saplings to plant, so they can watch them grow and feel a connection to the environment. Invariably there are...
From time to time, it is important to take stock of our own personal liability exposure and find ways to mitigate it.Liability exposure can creep into our lives in subtle ways that can have profound effects on our financial security. One such way that a person can expose himself or...
Let’s face it – the Tri-Cities is a car town, or set of car towns.The number of miles Tri-Citians travel daily owes its origins to the settlement of not one, but three cities, or four, counting West Richland, in an area that has some distance between the communities. There are...
Washington state has adopted a first-of-its-kind law that both provides a new long-term care benefit and pays for the new benefit with a new tax collected by employers.Its formal name is the Long-Term Services and Supports Trust Program.Many employers and employees are scrambling to understand the implications of this new...
An act of God. Or, among lawyers, a force majeure.Many contracts have force majeure clauses to govern what happens when faced with circumstances beyond anyone’s control. The global Covid-19 pandemic certainly falls into this category.How much did Covid-19 affect Hanford’s cleanup mission?Not much in the big picture.Some tank waste pumping...
