(FORTUNE Small Business) – Now that Congress has repealed the ergonomics standard, are small businesses off the hook? Not exactly. The Occupational Safety and Health Administration can still levy fines and demand workplace changes if too many of your workers are getting hurt. According to the original 1970 worker safety law, employers must furnish employees with places of employment "which are free from recognized hazards that are causing or are likely to cause death or serious physical harm." The latter includes crippling back and muscle injuries and repetitive stress disorders like carpal tunnel syndrome. OSHA rarely invokes its general safety clause to go after ergonomics violators, citing just 22 firms in the past five years.

Still, companies with high workers' comp claims due to ergonomic injuries could find an OSHA official on their doorstep. Investigators visited 86,000 work sites last year, with special investigations aimed at 4,200 companies. How were these firms chosen? They had accident records at least two-and-a-half times the national average of three "lost-time" accidents for every 100 employees. The list included a number of small business nursing homes, manufacturers, and package handlers with unusually high ergonomic injury rates.

It's hard to argue with employees who need to spend more time with family, especially when they've got a new child or a loved one who's sick. That's one of the reasons why the Family and Medical Leave Act, which grants up to 12 weeks of unpaid leave to workers of companies with 50 or more employees, was signed into law in 1993. Until now, very small businesses were unaffected and many considered the FMLA's unpaid leave to be reasonable.

That could change as more states move to make family leave accessible to more people. Data from the Department of Labor shows that 19 states have proposed paid leave initiatives on top of the FMLA that would include businesses of all sizes. New Jersey is one state that has proposed a paid leave initiative, and since the state will elect a new governor in November, debate there has been especially hot. If the state's proposal gains momentum, New Jersey could be the first state to enact paid leave legislation. Many business advocates there say that could start a trend that would cripple small businesses, especially during a time of such economic uncertainty.

Donna Myers has taken a stand on the issue, as the owner of marketing communications firm DHM Group and president of the New Jersey Association of Women Business Owners. She says passing this legislation could deter employers from hiring women of childbearing age and give all employees in a small firm an incentive to take time off. "When leave is paid," she says, "everyone is going to take it. We're opening a real Pandora's box here."

Baltimore's Tom Kiefaber wants his 62-year-old Art Deco movie house to be considered a classic, not an anachronism. It's a distinction that's less about vanity than about the survival of his Senator Theatre. Like thousands of independent cinema owners, Kiefaber, 49, has watched his would-be patrons fill up competing multiplexes. Even adding occasional live concerts hasn't done enough.

But help might be on the way from the National Trust for Historic Preservation. On June 25, the trust will announce its annual list of America's 11 most endangered places. In consideration is Kiefaber's Senator and three or four other single screen, historic movie houses that the trust views as national treasures. Says trust president Richard Moe: "If [making the list] doesn't literally save these places, it may bring public attention to the situation, which can help."

Like the Senator Theater, the situation is dire for many historic movie houses. Despite the bankruptcy of some big chains--Loews and United Artists among them--the competition for screening rights to Hollywood blockbusters is fierce. For Kiefaber, the ability of nearby General Cinema's eight screen theater to nab big-budget films is threatening to dim his 40-foot screen and empty his 928 seats permanently. As it is, his revenues are down from $1.4 million in 1999 to $817,000 last year. But Kiefaber, whose grandfather opened the Senator in 1939, isn't giving up. "I was born for this job," he says. Unfortunately, making a living at it is proving more difficult.

In FSB's May issue, several errors related to our profile of Name.Space's Paul Garrin appeared. His lawsuit against Network Solutions was filed in 1997, and his name was incorrectly listed in FSB's table of contents. Also, ICANN Chairman Vinton Cerf's name was misspelled. FSB regrets the errors.