BULLETIN: Calif. Comp Bill HeadsTo Floor

BULLETIN: Calif. Comp Bill HeadsTo Floor

By Daniel Hays

NU Online News Service, April 15, 12:07 p.m. EST?Early this morning, a conference committee of the California Senate and Assembly approved a workers' compensation reform measure for a vote by both houses.

Sam Sorich, president of the Association of California Insurance Companies said this morning that his group had not taken a position on the measure that passed at 3:30 a.m. because a copy was still unavailable.

Mr. Sorich said he knew some of the items in the bill, "but not how they are drafted."

Among the "concepts' contained in the legislation, he said, are the use of American Medical Association guidelines to evaluate injury, and reductions in disability benefits for injured workers' whose employers offered a return-to-work program.

The bill, he said, would call for treatment of injured workers through an employer-provided physician network, giving the worker a right to appeal the selection after treatment by three network physicians.

Employers would be required to provide immediate treatment for employees who claimed a job injury, Mr. Sorich said, adding he understood that a cap on the amount was a possibility.

According to Mr. Sorich, the current system of rate regulation would be kept, which basically confines any regulatory disapproval of rates to those that are financially inadequate or discriminatory.

According to published reports, the way was cleared for the bill when Assembly Speaker Fabian Nunez, D-Los Angeles, met with Republican Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and dropped a demand for controls on rates.

In the event no legislation is approved, Gov. Schwarzenegger and business interests have a signature campaign underway to secure a ballot initiative and obtain changes they favor for the workers' comp system

When conference committee measure is brought up for a vote in the Senate and Assembly, Mr. Sorich said he believes it would win approval because it has the endorsement of both parties' leadership. A spokesperson for Speaker Nunez said the bill will be taken up by the Assembly at 9 a.m. tomorrow.

The office of Senate President John Burton, D-San Francisco, said at 3 p.m. EDT today that legislators were in caucus and a vote in that chamber could come either this afternoon or tomorrow.