LEGISLATIVE PANEL WILL MEET HERE

If state Rep. Dennis Ziegenhorn had any doubts about the importance many groups in Missouri are placing on improving the state's workers' compensation system, they were quickly erased two weeks ago.

During the annual legislative veto session, Ziegenhorn, co-chairman of House members on a joint legislative committee studying the issue, helped arrange a brief organizational meeting of the panel.

Although the committee planned to accept no public testimony, and only schedule future hearings and start the process moving, about 50 people showed up for the meeting just to observe.

Since workers' compensation insurance rates have been skyrocketing, Ziegenhorn said businesses are being hit hard and are anxious to see that a solution is found and implemented.

Rates increased by 14 percent in September 1990, another 4.8 percent in February, and in August the Department of Insurance granted another 13.5 percent hike.

"This is a problem that effects everybody," said Ziegenhorn, who will hold the first public hearing of the committee in Cape Girardeau this weekend.

On Friday at 1:30 p.m. at the Show Me Center, an orientation will be held for the committee. On Saturday at 10 a.m., a public hearing will be conducted.

Scheduled to speak at the Friday session will be Lew Melahn, director of the Department of Insurance; Mark Doerner, a member of the insurance department staff; and Richard Rousselot of the Division of Employment Security.

Ziegenhorn, of Sikeston, who also serves as chairman of the House Insurance Committee, said that representatives of many organizations in the state have expressed an interest in testifying on Saturday.

Groups include the Chamber of Commerce, organized labor, Missouri Bar Association, Missouri Hospital Association, Missouri Merchants and Manufacturers Association, Associated Industries of Missouri, and the Missouri Retailers Association.

"We are asking everyone to work together and come up with a new plan that is beneficial and affordable to everybody," said Ziegenhorn. He said finding a solution will require compromise by everyone.

Ziegenhorn said that in the past, workers' compensation legislation has been considered by the House Labor Committee. As a result, the focus has been more on benefits than how increased costs would be paid by businesses.

By getting the insurance committee involved in the study, there should be a broader evaluation of the problem, Ziegenhorn said. He is co-chairing the House members with Rep. Jim Riley, D-Richmond Heights, who is also chairman of the labor committee.

The Senate chairman is Henry Panethiere, D-Kansas City, who is a member of the Senate committees on insurance and on labor and industrial relations.

The joint committee, which hopes to draft legislation to be considered by the General Assembly in January, will be investigating such things as increased costs of workers' compensation; the increasing cost of medical care; lack of fee schedules for medical procedures; court decisions which expanded the traditional level of benefits available; and the increasing utilization of workers' compensation benefits due to a depressed economy.

Ziegenhorn stressed the importance of the committee and said there is a concern that some small businesses will be driven under by increasing workers' compensation costs.

"If it isn't a crisis already, it is going to be," he said. "If we can, we have to prevent a crisis before it happens; but I'm not so sure it hasn't become one already."