This bill amends RCW 51.16.035 to add legislative findings about transparency concerns in the state workers’ compensation premium rate-setting process and states legislative intent to promote open and transparent governance and proper reporting of annually proposed premium rates. It changes existing law by imposing new substantive and procedural requirements on the department that sets workers’ compensation rates. Under the amendment the department must classify occupations and industries by hazard and fix basic premium rates that are the lowest necessary to maintain actuarial solvency of the accident and medical aid funds and are designed to try to limit premium rate fluctuations. The department must adopt rules governing premium calculation, collection, and a rating system consistent with recognized workers’ compensation insurance principles and may readjust rates annually or as needed. The workers’ compensation advisory committee must review the first and subsequent state auditor reports under RCW 51.44.115 and make or update recommendations about contingency reserve levels and when to give dividends, similar measures, or temporarily reduce rates below the levels fixed under the statute. The bill also changes reporting and transparency procedures: for retrospective rating plans the department may treat each individual retrospective rating group as a single employing entity for dividends or premium discounts; the department must publish the actuarially indicated rate for each risk classification as part of its proposed premium rates for the upcoming year; and if the director limits a maximum premium rate increase for any classification below the actuarially indicated level, the department must disclose which classifications were limited and their proposed rates, what each class’s rate would have been under actuarial principles, and the premium rate increase imposed on other classes as a result. That information must be published on the department’s website, included in the proposed premium rates, and submitted to the appropriate legislative committees and the workers’ compensation advisory committee. The extracted material does not provide formal definitions for key terms (for example, "department," "director," "actuarially indicated rate," or which legislative committees are "appropriate"), does not include the content of the state auditor reports referenced, and does not supply citations or supporting detail for the factual assertions in the legislative findings.

If enacted, the bill forces the Department of Labor and Industries to show the actuarially indicated premium for each job classification and to publicly explain whenever the director caps a proposed increase below those actuarial levels, including which classes were limited, what their uncapped rates would have been, and how other classes picked up the difference. It also requires the department to classify jobs by hazard, adopt rate-setting rules consistent with insurance principles, allow retrospective rating groups to be treated as single entities for dividends or discounts, and gives the workers’ compensation advisory committee a required role in reviewing state auditor reports and advising on contingency reserve levels and dividend or temporary rate reductions. The most affected parties are the department (new reporting and publication duties and likely modest administrative costs), employers and risk classes (they will get clearer, class-by-class visibility into actuarial baselines and how any caps shifted costs onto other classes), retrospective rating groups (potentially different access to dividends or discounts), and the advisory committee and legislative committees (new review and oversight responsibilities). The text leaves some practical details unclear, including precise definitions of key terms and which legislative committees must receive the information, and the contents of the state auditor’s reports referenced are not provided here.