North Dakota WSI Reaches New Agreement With Office Of Administrative Hearings

Bismark, ND (CompNewsNetwork) - Workforce Safety And Insurance (WSI) will return the management of its administrative hearing services back to the Office of Administrative Hearings (OAH) beginning August 1st, under a new agreement with OAH. The new agreement is designed to help injured workers in receiving quicker decisions in disputed cases.

“It was one of my goals when I first arrived here to restore the relationship between OAH and WSI,” said interim Executive Director and CEO Bruce Furness. “This new arrangement takes WSI completely out of the management of the process and gives it back to OAH.”

Last November WSI decided to stop using the services of OAH Administrative Law Judges (ALJs) and contracted with independent hearing officers to preside in disputed cases.

The move was made because of WSI's concerns that OAH was not rendering decisions quickly enough for injured workers.

“We believe we have addressed WSI's concerns in the new agreement with OAH so that injured workers will get a decision more quickly,” said Furness. Under the new agreement OAH will assign, manage and review the activities of the OAH ALJs.

In the new agreement OAH has agreed that the average number of days in the time period between the hearing closure and the issuance of the recommended decision will be no greater than 25 days. An ALJ hearing a case will be paid by OAH $120 an hour for the work they perform and $60 per hour for their travel time, up to a payment cap of $2,940. The new agreement runs through June 30, 2009.

About one percent of all injured workers ever request a hearing before an Administrative Law Judge. In fiscal year 2007 there were 21,309 claims filed by injured workers for benefits, 231 requests for hearings and 125 hearings actually held.

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