The committee met to take up and consider bills as well as to receive testimony from Stuart W. Bowen, Inspector General. This report focuses only on invited testimony and discussion of HB 550.
Stuart W. Bowen, Inspector General
- Hoping to ensure the effective and efficient delivery of health care in the state
- Looking forward to hearing legislators’ concerns and expectations for and about the office
- Chief deputy investigator from Bowen’s previous office will be coming to work with OIG – has 39 years’ experience
- Quinton Arnold will be continuing as Chief of Staff
- Frank Bryan will be joining as Deputy Inspector General
- Mark Seal will also be a Deputy Inspector General for Policy
- Chair Richard Raymond noted fraud is important but the overarching theme of inefficiency is important to focus on as well
- Will be keeping that balance in mind
- Discussed those issues with Dr. Janek this morning; will be a collaborative effort to help HHSC work better
- Waste is an issue that has been insufficiently addressed in the past; using performance audits will help identify, through gap analysis and objective review, what areas are weak and need attention
- A new initiative from the OIG to promote best practices will be helpful in saving money
- Vast majority of providers work within the law however all providers are affected by waste
- Poor management within the office has been an issue in the past and that will be changing; values will be professionalism, productivity and performance
- Rep. Elliott Naishtat asked what the most important lessons Bowen has learned over his career have been
- Waste is a place where real financial benefits can be achieved through effective auditing;
HB 550—Price, Relating to the provision of health and human services in this state, including the powers and duties of the Health and Human Services Commission and other state agencies, and the licensing of certain health professionals; clarifying certain statutory provisions; authorizing the imposition of fees.
- HB 550 will make laws more transparent and readable – help provide clear guidance to agencies
- No Senator or Sunset Review member has their individual agendas provided for in the bill
- Substantive changes were necessary to reflect current actions of the legislature– bill does not include any policy changes; clarification bill
- Rep. Naishtat noted there may be confusion about the difference between a substantive change and a policy change
- References to old agencies and functions have been modernized to reflect appropriate offices and their responsibilities – bill does not give rule making authority
- For instance, Department of Health had a Bureau of Statistics but those duties are now in a division of DSHS – changes in the statutory codes had to be updated
- No general review of all agencies has been conducted since 1997
- Majority of changes fall under the following categories:
- Proper designation of authority
- Bill clarifies statute by specifying which agency has authority and responsibility over what
- Bill clarifies the executive commissioner’s role in relationship to each agency
- Rulemaking authority
- Unconstitutional administrative penalties
- Makes it clear that no penalty must be paid before a full judicial review
- Cleans up authority in statutes over defunct agency responsibilities
- Advisory committees
- Does not remove any active advisory committees, only committees already abolished by law
- Dedicated fund deletions
- Updates law to reflect abolishment of dedicated funds in the funds consolidation bill
- Directs fund interest to GR
- Update from HB 7 (83R)
- Addressing removal of fee caps and setting of license periods
- Done in HB 2292 (78R)
- No change in schedules or flow of money
- Changes concerning SOAH
- Specifies that SOAH hears issues for DSHS and entities previously folded into DSHS
- Clarifies that HHSC by statute can refer matters to SOAH that would have been heard by HHSC
- Implements the person first respectful language initiative
- Removing references to mental retardation
- Code cleanup
- Obsolete language
- Proper designation of authority
- Naishtat noted his office received calls regarding the role of the EC; is that role being expanded or decreased at all
- Received a lot of inquiries on those lines; not really expanding anything just clarifying who people report to when there may have been confusion before, and other similar situations
- Rep. Susan King asked if committees deleted in HB 2292 are being re-deleted; have they come back
- There are references in statute to abolished committees which were creating confusion
- Steven Ogle, Sunset, noted 21 advisory committees are being deleted in HB 550; not sure how those overlap with existing committees
- The bill was filed over 2 months ago to give plenty of time for review and analysis
- Have had multiple policy groups ensure there are no substantive policy changes in the bill
- There is an amendment; there was a need for some cleanup language
- Mostly very technical clarifications; changes some statutory references, changing some very outdated definitions technically, removing inconsistencies
- Rep. Stephanie Klick asked about a deletion; concerned that access to critical information is being taken away
- Some information is required to put on webpages of certain entities; these entities no longer exist so the bill clarifies that the information must be made available on DSHS website
Russell Graham, Texas Society for Respiratory Care
- In support of the bill
- The bill is a good idea
John Davidson, Texas Public Policy Foundation
- Reviewed the bill and determined there were no substantive policy changes
- The bill is necessary to provide a good foundation for the Sunset bills that will follow
- King asked if the bill would have been done if it weren’t for the Sunset review
- Price replied that many of the changes are needed because of the passage of HB 2292
Committee amendment adopted; bill reported favorably to the full House