WSIA

Today marks the end of the seventh week of the 2018 legislative session in Washington, the 47^th (out of 60) legislative day. With less than two weeks remaining in the session, deadlines for bill consideration are coming much faster, and the field of bills still in play is diminishing.

For example, today is the cutoff for non-fiscal bills that were previously voted out of their originating chamber, the House or Senate, and then referred to a policy committee in the opposite chamber, to be voted out of that committee to stay alive. Bills with a fiscal impact to state or local government, like the first responder occupational disease presumptions we’ve been working on, then have until Monday the 26^th to be considered and voted out of the fiscal committee.

And then all bills active in their opposite chamber have to pass that chamber by next Friday, March 2nd. If they were amended in the other chamber, they have to go back for concurrence or further negotiation. If not, they go to the Governor’s office to be signed into law or vetoed.

That little bit of inside baseball out of the way, here’s the latest status in the remaining workers’ com/safety bills:

Hanford

House Bill 1723, creating the broad presumption of occupational disease for workers and contractors at the US Department of Energy Hanford site finally passed this week and is now awaiting the Governor’s signature. As  you will recall, this bill creates about as broad an occupational disease presumption as possible, with lifetime presumption attaching in as little as a single 8 hour shift in various parts of the worksite, a long laundry list of presumed conditions without any effort at scientific vetting, a clear and convincing evidence standard to rebut the presumption, the possibility of refiling already adjudicated closures and denials, and of course fee shifting at the Board and in the courts.

While it was pretty clear from day one of the session that the “fix was in” on this headline-grabbing bill and it was destined to become pass in some form, WSIA raised some basic workers’ comp policy objects in both the House and Senate. Basically, this led to amendments that limited the scope of the presumption from the whole Hanford site to specifically delimited areas on the site where toxic exposures were more likely to occur.

Bottom line is the US DOE should brace for a massive uptick not only of new presumption claims, which may be difficult to rebut, but moreso the refiling of past denials under this new standard.

And the rest of us have to keep an eye out that this doesn’t become the new template for presumptive coverage statutes spreading to other occupations, now that the decades-old containment of presumptive coverage only to firefighters has been expanded.

First Responders

Speaking of that, majorities in the House and Senate do seem intent on enacting the expanded presumptions for firefighters, and new presumptions for law enforcement officers and fire investigators, that we’ve ben covering all session. The vehicles for these changes are SB 6213 (cancers, infections, cardiac events), and SB 6214 (PTSD). Both were voted out of the House Labor Committee this past week, having passed the Senate previously with wide margins. Both now presumably await consideration by the House Appropriations Committee, which must act on them by Monday, but nothing has been scheduled as of this morning.

WSIA has worked these bills hard and has won some limiting amendments – removing conditions, for example, like stroke, or winning additional sideboards like pre-employment testing -- on both, and we are still holding out hope to have further influence on both. But unless the Legislature simply runs out of time considering bigger ticket priorities, we continue to forecast both passing in one form or another.  

Pension Discount Rate split

SB 6393, the bill we are supporting to allow for a different self-insurance pension discount rate, must clear the House Appropriations Committee by Monday. Currently, it is not scheduled for any action, but at the same time the committee has not released its weekend plans on any bills. We are hopeful the bill is voted out and continues to move.

IME issues

SB 6226, the bill attempting to introduce telemedicine into IMEs and micromanaging the manner and timing in which self-insureds submit IME records, passed out of the House Labor Committee this week but not before it was amended to address some drafting issues that happened in the Senate. Because it has been changed by the House, if it does end up passing the House it will have to be voted on again by the Senate. We think this bill is a solution in search of a problem and are essentially in wait and see mode.

Social Security Offset

HB 1336, the bill to abolish the social security offset on workers who were injured after having applied for or began receiving social security retirement benefits, continues to move and is now awaiting a Senate floor vote. Forecast highly likely that this one passes into law this year.

WISHA Penalties

Likewise, HB 1953, the bill to conform state WISHA penalty minimums and maximums to federal OSHA levels, is also awaiting a Senate floor vote. This one could get lost in the shuffle of more important priorities squeezing out floor time, but without any real organized opposition this session, we would not be surprised to see it pass into law.

For the status on these and other bills, as well as links to the latest bill language, click below to download our latest bill tracking sheet.