REGULATORY ACTIVITY:

• The South Dakota Department of Labor and Regulation’s Workers' Compensation Proposed Rules Web page (http://dlr.sd.gov/workers_compensation/proposed_admin_rules.aspx) has been updated to include the following notice of a public hearing.
  • Department of Labor & Regulation
  • Division of Labor and Management
  • Notice of Public Hearing to Adopt Rules
• A public hearing will be held in the Sharpe Conference Room, Missouri River Plaza, 123 W. Missouri Avenue, Pierre, South Dakota, on May 15, 2017 at 10 a.m., to consider the adoption and amendment of proposed rules to 47:02:02 and 47:03:05. The rules text can be viewed at http://dlr.sd.gov/workers_compensation/documents/proposed_rules_2017_fee_schedule_042417.pdf.

LEGISLATIVE ACTIONS:

• Senate Bill 4
  The enacted legislation requires the pharmacy board to, before the fourth Tuesday in January of each year, report to the Senate and House standing committees on health and human services on the monitoring and use of prescription opioids. This report shall include the number of opioid prescriptions from the prior three years. The report shall also include an update to any changes or advances made to the prescription drug monitoring program. Effective Date: June 30, 2017.

LEGISLATIVE ACTIONS:

• House Bill 1017
  An act to revise the definition of compensation for purposes of the South Dakota Retirement System, to provide a penalty for falsely reporting compensation, and to update references to the Internal Revenue Code.  Effective Date January 1, 2018.

FEE SCHEDULE NEWS:

• The state has adopted a new fee schedule with an effective date of June 28, 2016. The state is adopting the 2015 Relative Values for Physicians and conversion factors.  The state has increased the conversion factors approximately 1.5% for each category with the exception of two sections that had no changes.  The dental conversion factor has been increased 6.1% since the last update.

REGULATORY ACTIVITY:

• A public hearing will be held in the Conference Room 3, Kneip Building, 700 Governors Drive, Pierre, SD on Sept. 6, 2016, at 1 p.m. to consider the adoption and amendment of proposed rules to Chapter 47:01:01. The Rules Text can be viewed at http://dlr.sd.gov/dlr_public_hearing.aspx.

LEGISLATIVE ACTIONS:

• House Bill 1084
  The bill defines when concurrent employment may be used to calculate earnings in workers’ compensation cases.  The enacted legislation abrogates the ruling of the courts in the Wheeler v. Cinna Bakers LLC, 2015 864 N.S. 2d 17, 2015 regarding the aggregation of wages.  The legislation establishes that if an employee was working for more than one employer, the employee’s earnings used to calculate the employee’s average weekly wage in §§ 62-4-24, 62-4-25, or 62-4-26 shall include the amount of compensation for the number of hours commonly regarded as a day’s work for each employer in which the person was concurrently employed at the time of the person’s injury;  however, an employee’s earnings from concurrent employment are aggregated only if the injury occurred when the employee was actively working in the concurrent employment and when the injury prevents the employee from performing the employee’s duties at the employee’s other concurrent employment.  Further the legislation establishes a definition for earnings as the amount of compensation for the number of hours commonly regarded as a day’s work for the employment in which the employee was working at the time of the employee’s injury. It includes payment for all hours worked, including overtime hours at straight-time pay, and does not include any sum which the employer has been accustomed to pay the employee to cover any special expense entailed by the employee by the nature of the employment; wherever allowances of any character made to an employee in lieu of wages are specified as a part of the wage contract, the allowances shall be deemed a part of the employee’s earnings.  The legislation also places certain requirements on employers that have concurrent employees and receive a demand for information from any employer or insurer against whom an injured employee has made a workers’ compensation claim.  Effective Date July 1, 2016.