Prairie State Wire

Illinois Department of Human Services Developmental Disabilities Regulatory Advisory Board met Jan. 24.

Here are the minutes provided by the board:

Opening/Roll call

Members present: S. Aschemann, K. Beck, M. Bibo, K. Carmody, K. Hamann, V. Kean, A. Medley, S. Mendel, B. Owens, S. Myerscough-Mueller

Members absent: A. Lulinski, P. Winsel

The Board had 1 new member, J. Rath from the office of State Fire Marshall.  Jeff, who is serving as the Fire Prevention Manager, replaced Larry Eaton.

Annual Trainings

The Division has already received information regarding the 2023 annual training requirements. This information will be emailed to board members shortly. Board members are encouraged you to take the trainings as soon as possible and to log in regularly, so their password does not expire. DDD staff will remind board members at each meeting and by email.

At the request of board members, DDD will ensure only Board member required trainings are sent to the DD Regulatory Advisory Board members. Board members expressed concern that other Boards under other State agencies do not require members to take trainings such as HIPPA. DHS Board member trainings are required across all DHS Boards and Commissions, so while trainings such as HIPPA might not seem necessary to this Board, it may be necessary for other Boards.

DDD will ensure that training requirements sent via email are the required trainings for Board members, not just DHS staff.

Status of Administrative Rules 

Rule 115 was posted for First Notice in 2022; the Department received and reviewed all comment letters. Changes have been incorporated into the draft Rule based on the comments received. The Division has also drafted a response to each letter. The draft responses are being reviewed by DHS Administration. Once those responses are approved, Rule 115 will be sent to JCAR for Second Notice.

• Draft Rule 120 was submitted to JCAR for pre-review in 2022. The Division later decided to withdraw the draft Rule from the Pre-review process because it was not moving through the process as desired. It is expect that draft Rule 120 will go to JCAR within the next month.
• Draft Rule 119 was not submitted for Pre-review. This draft Rule is also expected to go to JCAR within the next month to be posted for First Notice.
• Draft Rule 117 was sent to JCAR in 2022 for the pre-review process. JCAR suggested several changes and posed questions about the draft Rule. The Division answered the questions and made some of the suggested changes. The draft responses are being reviewed by DHS Administrative staff. Once reviews and approvals are complete, Rule 117 will go back to JCAR to be posted for First Notice.
• The Division is currently making the initial changes to Rule 116. Once the draft is ready, the draft Rule will move to the DD Regulatory Advisory Board for its review and input; this is not expected to occur for several months.

The Division will notify stakeholders through DDD Comments when the Rules are posted for First and Second Notice.

Discussion: Frequency of updating Administrative Rules

The Administrative Rule revision process has proven to be both cumbersome and lengthy. This is partially due to fact that the Rules have not been updated in many years. In efforts to avoid this going forward, the Division will create a schedule/timeline for updating Rules. This Division solicited input from Board members on the schedule/timeline. The Board members agreed that a schedule was needed; comments include:

• Start amending a Rule as soon as we are aware of State statues the have passed; maybe even as we are aware of proposed statue changes. Session ends mid-May this year so we might know even sooner.
• Update Rules every 3 years.
• Update only 2 Rules at a time.

The Division will take these and other suggestions into consideration and maintain a schedule for updating Rules.

Public comments

There was just 1 public comment: In regard to creating a schedule/timeline for updating Rules, consider that the process takes at least a year to complete. This must be factored in as well.

Next Meeting

The next DDRAB meeting is scheduled for Tuesday, March 28. If draft Rule 116 is ready, then the Board will begin its review. If the draft Rule 116 is not ready for the Board to review by this date, the meeting may be cancelled, being that the Board does not currently have other Rules to review. The Division of DD will communicate by email whether the Board will keep the March meeting; it will also be posted on the DHS website.

https://www.dhs.state.il.us/page.aspx?item=147725