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Speaking of appeals,
we continue to await the decision of the appeals court in our legal challenge
to the Division’s Supplemental Income Benefits rule.
Readers may recall that our firm, on behalf of an interested insurance carrier,
filed suit challenging the validity of the SIBs rule on the basis that it
impermissibly allows claimants to collect SIBs even if they do not document
their work search with job applications as required by the Texas Workers’
Compensation Act. Travis County district judge Maya Guerra Gamble agreed with
the carrier that the rule is invalid, and she enjoined the Division from
applying it. But the Division appealed to the Third Court of Appeals and,
because the Division is part of a state agency, the judgment is stayed during
the appeal.
The parties filed legal briefs in the court of appeals, and on August 30, 2021
the court announced that it did not need to hear oral argument and the
case was “ready for disposition on the briefs.” That was 10 months ago. By
comparison, in the recent case of Dobbs
v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, in which the Supreme Court
of the United States ruled that the Constitution does not guarantee the right
to an abortion, the court issued its decision 8 months and 11 days after
briefing was complete. And one could
conclude that the issues in that case are more complicated than the issues in
our SIBs case.
By the way, SLS partner Jane Stone will be discussing the SIBs case at the
upcoming Texas Bar CLE Advanced Workers’ Compensation seminar in August, by
which time the court might have issued a decision.
Copyright 2022, Stone Loughlin & Swanson, LLP