TALHI Bill Action
HB 1073 (PWA clean up) and HB 1197 (temp license training time) both unanimously passed to the Senate Local Calendar. The Senate Business & Commerce Committee considered the bills at an early hearing yesterday morning. There was no opposition to either bill and no questions were asked.

Since the bills were not amended in either chamber, and barring any issues with the Local Calendar, these bills should have no problem getting to the Governor’s desk well before the end of the session. Other bills still moving through the calendar process include:

• HB 1243/SB 561: NCOIL Unclaimed Life Benefits Model
• HB 1566/SB 507: Balance Billing Mediation
• SB 1070/HB 2491: Credit for Reinsurance Model Act

TDI Adopts Privacy Amendments
The Texas Department of Insurance adopted amendments to 28 TAC §22.9, concerning annual privacy notices. TDI adopted the amendments with nonsubstantive grammar and style changes to the proposed text published in the December 2, 2016, issue of the Texas Register (41 TexReg 9444). Amendments to §22.9 were necessary to reduce privacy notice confusion by eliminating the requirement for covered entities to send out redundant privacy notices and aligning the rule with recent changes to federal requirements regarding disclosures of privacy policies found in 15 U.S.C. §6803 (part of GLBA), as provided in Insurance Code Chapter 601.

TALHI Member Call Next Week
The next TALHI member call will be held on Wednesday, May 10, at 10 am Central. To call in, dial 1-888-537-7715 and enter code 123-333-321# when prompted. An agenda will be posted next week.