Advisory Commission Thinks Sun Should Set on TWCC

The Texas Sunset Advisory Commission believes the Texas Workers’ Compensation Commision should be abolished. At a Sept. 15 meeting, the committee recommended dismantling TWCC’s current structure and shifting many of its responsibilities to the Texas Department of Insurance.

The recommendations included creating a separate unit within TDI to oversee the workers’ compensation system and establishing a health care network system for injured workers similar to existing plans for group health care.

Not quite ready to throw out the baby with the bathwater, TWCC Chairman Mike Hachtman responded to Sunset Commission’s proposals stating, “The Sunset Commission has made some good recommendations. However, the recommendation to abolish the Workers’ Compensation Commission is like replacing the crew of the Titanic but not changing course. The Texas workers’ compensation system is still headed for disaster. I am concerned we are spending too much time and effort talking about who is going to be driving and not on where we should be headed. The fundamental problems with the Texas workers’ compensation system lie within the system, not with the administration.

“We must have comprehensive reform creating a fair, balanced, efficient system to improve service and care to injured workers, get workers back to work, reduce disputes, improve certainty to all participants, reduce the ‘hassles’ of the system to all participants and ultimately lower costs. Workers’ compensation is intended to serve workers and their employers. While the insurance component is important and needed, it is an ancillary part of this mission.”

He said while TDI does a good job regulating insurance companies, “there is nothing in the TDI mission, goals or vision remotely close to administering workers’ compensation. They are not set up to administer disputes on medical issues, settle issues on injury compensability or income benefits.”

Hachtman acknowledged problems within TWCC’s organizational structure, but added the agency has already begun implementing many of the changes
recommended by the Sunset Commission.

“Nothing in the Sunset Commission findings warrants the abolition of the agency,” Hachtman asserted.

The Texas Legislature is expected to take up workers’ compensation reform in the session that begins in 2005.

Shortly after the release of the Advisory Commission’s recommendations, State Sen. Jane Nelson, R-Lewisville, who is Vice Chairman of the Sunset Advisory Commission, announced her support for major reform to the workers’ comp system in the upcoming session.

“The objective is to ensure that Texas workers get well as quickly as possible so that they can return to work. It is clear that the current system is not meeting that objective to the satisfaction of injured workers, employers, insurance carriers or health care providers,” Sen. Nelson said.

The Sunset Advisory Commission’s recommendations for TWCC can be found online at www.sunset.state.tx.us.