Inside Olympia: Bills that passed the Legislature

Wednesday, April 16 was the final cutoff for all bills to pass the opposite chamber (except for those deemed necessary to implement the budget). For bills that have passed both the House and Senate, the Legislature must now reconcile any differences before a final version is sent to the governor for his signature. If bills can’t be reconciled, they will be considered dead for the session.

Bills that reach the governor with fewer than five days remaining in the legislative session have 20 days to be signed or vetoed or they automatically become law. The final day of session is scheduled for Sunday, April 27. WSHA expects the final operating budget to be released this weekend. It remains unclear if a special legislative session will be needed.

This week, lawmakers continue to negotiate proposals to address the state’s budget shortfall. Two major tax bills that WSHA is working to mitigate include SB 5814 (new sales taxes on services) and HB 2081 (a new B&O surcharge on high revenue business and a general increase to B&O for certain services). We remain concerned for the hospitals impacted, the taxes and cuts are too large and will result in a reduction of health care services.

For more information on the tax proposals, please see last week’s Inside Olympia. We will keep you updated as we learn more.

Bills that have passed the Legislature

Bills WSHA supported

HB 1130	Utilization of developmental disabilities waivers.
SHB 1142	Standardizing basic training and certification requirements for long-term care workers who provide in-home care for their family members, including spouses or domestic partners.
2SHB 1162	Concerning workplace violence in health care settings.
SHB 1186	Expanding the situations in which medications can be dispensed or delivered from hospitals and health care entities.
HB 1287	Addressing the disclosure of health information for care coordination.
SHB 1392	Creating the Medicaid access program. (WSMA Covered Lives).
E2SHB 1432	Improving access to appropriate mental health and substance use disorder services.
E2SHB 1686	Creating a health care registry.
SHB 1879	Concerning meal and rest breaks for hospital workers.
SB 5079	Addressing the burden of unintentional overpayments on older adults and adults with disabilities served by the department of social and health services.
SB 5122	Enacting the uniform antitrust premerger notification act.
SSB 5239	Concerning the retention of hospital medical records.
ESSB 5480	Protecting consumers by removing barriers created by medical debt.
SSB 5557	Codifying emergency rules to protect the right of a pregnant person to access treatment for emergency medical conditions in hospital emergency departments.
SSB 5568	Updating and modernizing the Washington state health plan.
E2SSB 5745	Concerning appointed counsel for individuals detained under the involuntary treatment act.
SB 5764	Repealing the expiration date for the ambulance transport fund.

Bills on which WSHA is neutral

HB 1215	Removing references to pregnancy from the model directive form under the natural death act.
HB 1382	Modernizing the all payer claims database. (Amendment adopted to provide increased access to data to hospitals.)
SHB 1706	Aligning the implementation of application programming interfaces for prior authorization with federal guidelines.
SSB 5493	Concerning hospital price transparency.
SSB 5579	Prohibiting health carriers, facilities, and providers from making any public statements of any potential or planned contract terminations unless it satisfies a legal obligation.

Bills WSHA opposed

ESSB 5041	Concerning unemployment insurance benefits for striking and locked out workers.
SB 5463	Concerning the duties of industrial insurance self-insured employers and third-party administrators.

Bills not yet passed but deemed necessary to implement budget

HB 1198	Making 2025-2027 fiscal biennium operating appropriations. (WSHA has concerns)
HB 2045	Investing in Washington families by restructuring the business and occupation tax on high grossing businesses and financial institutions. (WSHA opposes)
HB 2081/SB 5815	Modifying business and occupation tax surcharges, rates, and the advanced computing surcharge cap, clarifying the business and occupation tax deduction for certain investments, and creating a temporary business and occupation tax surcharge on large companies (WSHA opposes)
E2SSB 5083	Ensuring access to primary care, behavioral health, and affordable hospital services. (WSHA has concerns.)
SB 5796	Enacting an excise tax on large employers on the amount of payroll expenses above the social security wage threshold to fund programs and services to benefit Washingtonians. (WSHA opposes)
SB 5814/HB 2083	Modernizing the excise taxes on select services and nicotine products and requiring certain large businesses to make a one-time prepayment of state sales tax collection. (WSHA opposes)

Notable bills that died this session

HB 1072	Preserving access to protected health care services.
SHB 1155	Noncompetition agreements.
HB 1168	Increasing transparency in artificial intelligence.
SHB 1313	Addressing mass layoffs, relocations, and terminations.
SHB 1344	Increasing access to respite care for those with intellectual or developmental disabilities and their caregivers.
HB 1507	Limiting health care nondisclosure agreements.
SHB 1546	Concerning general supervision of diagnostic radiologic technologists, therapeutic radiologic technologists, and magnetic resonance imaging technologists by licensed physicians.
HB 1567	Concerning licensure of health care administrators.
SHB 1784	Concerning certified medical assistants.
HB 1881 / SB 5704	Material changes to the operations and governance structure of participants in the health care marketplace.
SSB 5124	Establishing network adequacy standards for skilled nursing facilities and rehabilitation hospitals.
SB 5211/SHB 1200	Authorizing payment for parental caregivers of minor children with developmental disabilities.
SSB 5254	Strengthening patients’ rights regarding their health care information.
SB 5299	Concerning virtual direct supervision of diagnostic radiologic technologists, therapeutic radiologic technologists, and magnetic resonance imaging technologists by licensed physicians.
SSB 5335	Establishing the rural nursing education program.
SSB 5387	Concerning the corporate practice of health care.
SSB 5395 / HB 1566	Transparency and accountability in the prior authorization determination process
SSB 5683	Concerning health carrier transparency of payment timeliness of claims submitted by health care providers and health care facilities.