The big headlines for this session might be about the state budget debate, but for us at WSHA, the session has been memorable because of the productivity of our partnerships. The development of our legislative agenda always has our members’ experiences at the center of it. We are focused on how proposed—or needed—legislation will affect... Read More >>

Telemedicine Although you might have already seen it in “Weekly Report,” we are thrilled to share with you that our telemedicine bill passed the House last week and is on its way to the Governor’s desk. The bill was passed unanimously by the Senate and by a huge majority in the House. As Scott Bond... Read More >>

Senate Budget Proposal on Hospital Safety Net Assessment Program   WSHA is still working to clarify the Senate proposal for the hospital safety net program, but it’s becoming clear that some of our information was incorrect, and that the picture for hospitals is significantly worse than it initially appeared.   In order to maintain their... Read More >>

The Washington State Senate released its budget proposal today. One of the biggest pieces of news out of the Senate budget is the treatment of Hospital Safety Net Assessment funds.   The assessment is levied on hospitals and used to leverage federal dollars to help pay for services provided to Medicaid patients. The program was... Read More >>

The state House of Representatives released its proposed operating budget today, with a lot of good news for health care. This is one of the best budgets we have ever seen for mental health funding, and a good one for health care overall. There are new investments in the system, especially in work force and... Read More >>

Two big telemedicine bills have hearings this week. Our primary focus continues to be on SB 5175, which requires commercial and Medicaid health plans to reimburse providers for health care services delivered through audio and video technology if the plans would cover the same service delivered face-to-face. Read the Issue Brief here. This bill passed... Read More >>

Mental health is a top policy and budget priority for WSHA this year, and for legislators as well. The Supreme Court case on psychiatric boarding helped bring the issue to the forefront, and a record number of bills on the subject have been introduced. However, funding all the new policy bills is a big challenge:... Read More >>

Overview of the Week The caucus and floor action continues as we approach this week’s cutoff for bills to be voted on and passed by their house of origin. Since most of the work is being done on the floor, no WSHA members testified at hearings last week, and we are not scheduled to testify... Read More >>

Bills that impact the state budget had another major cutoff last week, when they were supposed to have been voted on by their fiscal committees. By March 11, bills must be voted on and passed by their house of origin. Although the hearing schedule is significantly lighter when compared to the early weeks of the... Read More >>

It was an exciting week leading up to Friday’s cutoff for bills to be voted out of their committee. (Cutoff calendar is here) To make it easy, we’ve listed all of the major bills we’ve been tracking—the first table is the bills that have been passed out of committee, and the second table is the... Read More >>