WSIA's Week 7 Legislative Update (Action as of Feb. 26th)
Friday February 26th marked the deadline in the legislative session for non-fiscal bills passed by one chamber to receive a committee vote in the opposite chamber. Monday, February 29th marks the deadline for the bills with fiscal impact to get a vote in committee to keep moving.

In workplace safety issues, there are no bills still moving at this point.

In workers' compensation, similarly, no bills of real consequence are still moving. A Labor & Industries request bill (HB 2444) to change the classification codes for the Right to Know assessment is still moving and likely to pass.

However, when the Senate's version of the state's supplemental operating budget was released last week and ultimately voted off the floor of the Senate on Friday, it contained two new and interesting directives to Labor & Industries by way of budget proviso, or specific appropriation with instructions:

  •  Convene a task force to study and report back on Independent Medical Examination issues, surveying stakeholders, and focusing on communications with injured workers, and between claims administrators and medical providers, among other things. This budget proviso proposes a slightly thinner version of a legislative task force proposed earlier in the session in bill form, which in turn followed comments earlier in session by the Self-Insurance ombuds about IME-related concerns coming before that office.
  • Starting a state fund pilot program on catastrophic claims management, requiring contracting with an outside vendor for a limited number of claims. This is also a proposal that has floated around for a few years, championed primarily by Paradigm, a provider of claim and medical management in catastrophic cases. Labor & Industries has generally resisted using an outside provider for state fund claims management.

Both budget-driven proposals, the IME task force and the catastrophic claims pilot, will have to survive the negotiation of the final budget between the House and Senate over the course of the next week.

The session is scheduled to adjourn on March 10th.