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Committee kills three bills in executive sessions; amendment adopted then bill tabled on workers’ comp
Summary
The House Labor committee voted to make H.B. 1123 and H.B. 1,177 inexpedient to legislate and later passed an amendment to H.B. 13‑52 before ultimately voting ITL on the amended bill. The committee debated employer reporting, mediation and remote‑work definitions.
The House Labor, Industrial and Rehabilitative Services Committee voted this morning to make three bills inexpedient to legislate.
In an executive session on H.B. 1123, which would have required employers to post expected salary ranges on public job listings, Representative Granger moved to recommend ITL, arguing the requirement could impair employers’ bargaining power and raise compelled‑speech issues. Opponents including Representative Schultz said ranges help applicants avoid wasted travel and expense. The roll call was 10–9 in favor of ITL.
The committee then considered H.B. 1,177, a proposal to add a definition for remote work into Labor law. Representative Murphy moved ITL, citing testimony that the measure could force employers to restrict flexible arrangements or impose impractical compliance. The Department of Labor testified about statutory overlaps with OSHA and workers’ compensation; the committee voted ITL, 11–9.
The committee spent its longest deliberation on H.B. 13‑52, a workers’ compensation bill that sponsors amended on the floor of the hearing. Representative McKenzie’s amendment defined “good faith,” rolled back proposed penalty increases to prior levels, added an accountability requirement for carriers that do not act within the statutory 30‑day window and created an optional three‑year mediation pilot. The Department of Labor’s deputy commissioner, Danielle Albert, told the committee the amendment would require carriers to notify the department when they fail to pay or deny within 30 days and that mediation as drafted could be interpreted as mandatory once invoked. The committee approved the amendment 16–4 but later voted to make the amended bill inexpedient to legislate, 11–9.
What’s next: ITL recommendations send the bills back to the docket, and sponsors and agencies may revise language for future filings. The committee record shows the votes and the DOL testimony that framed several of today’s technical concerns.
Quotes: “You can’t be made to speak if you don’t want to,” Representative Granger said during the H.B. 1123 debate, arguing for ITL. Danielle Albert, deputy commissioner of the Department of Labor, cautioned that the accountability language “is requiring the insurance carriers … to report themselves to the department when they have not taken the requisite action” within 30 days.
