A new state law permits certain public and nonprofit hospitals to jointly self-insure for property and liability risks.

The law also requires that the state risk manager adopt rules for these public benefit hospital joint self-insurance programs (also called risk pools). The state risk manager's office is a program within the Washington State Department of Enterprise Services.

Prior to filing proposed rules under the state's rulemaking process, the Enterprise Services has been seeking input from stakeholders.

We would like to thank people for their input on draft rules to date, including feedback received during an Oct. 17 workshop. Feedback has been incorporated in the updated preliminary rules draft.

Enterprise Services is seeking any additional feedback on the draft rule through Dec. 1, 2017.

Next steps

The next step will be filing the proposed rules with the Office of the Code Reviser. The proposed rules filed with the Code Reviser will then be published in the next Washington State Register.

There will be a formal public comment period on the proposed rules, once submitted.

Additional information

The rules must include standards for solvency, operations, management and other important areas.

We anticipate the new proposed rules will contain standards similar to current rules adopted for similar type risk pools overseen by the state risk manager. Those rules include WAC 200-120 (housing authority risk pools), WAC 200-100 (local government risk pools) and WAC 200-150 (nonprofit risk pools).

Rulemaking steps

CR 101: DES has filed a notice with the state Office of the Code Reviser that the agency intends to engage in this rulemaking effort. This first step, the CR -101: Preproposal Statement of Inquiry must be taken before stakeholders can be invited to participate in the agency's rulemaking process.

CR-102: Proposed Rule Making marks the formal beginning of rulemaking. Once the CR-102 is filed, DES will hold a formal public comment period, including a public hearing, for the proposed rule.

More information

• More information is available on the Enterprise Services rulemaking webpage.
• If you have questions specific to existing self-insurance rules, please contact Shannon Stuber, (360) 407-8153.
• If you have questions about the rulemaking process, please contact Jack Zeigler, (360) 407-9209.