WSR 17-03-075

PREPROPOSAL STATEMENT OF INQUIRY

[Filed January 11, 2017, 2:23 p.m.]

Subject of Possible Rule Making: New rules for achieving a better life experience (ABLE) accounts including revisions to WAC 182-509-0320 MAGI income—Noncountable income, 182-512-0050 SSI-related medical—General information, 182-512-0550 SSI-related medical—All other excluded resources, 182-512-0860 SSI-related medical—Income exclusions under federal statute or other state laws, chapter 182-527 WAC, Estate recovery and predeath liens, and other related rules as appropriate.

Statutes Authorizing the Agency to Adopt Rules on this Subject: RCW 41.05.021, 41.05.160; ESHB 2323, chapter 39, Laws of 2016, 64th legislature, 2016 regular session; SSB 6210, 64th legislature, 2016 regular session; HR 647 - Achieving a Better Life Experience (ABLE) Act of 2014.

Reasons Why Rules on this Subject may be Needed and What They Might Accomplish: These rules are necessary to implement ESHB 2323 Individuals with disabilities—Savings and investments—ABLE Act. An ABLE account allows blind or disabled clients to save funds in tax-advantaged accounts for their disability-related expenses. The agency is amending additional WAC sections to support the implementation of this program. These changes include adding assets held in an ABLE account to the list of resource exclusions when determining eligibility, adding the distributions from an ABLE account for qualifying expenses to the list of income exclusions for identifying countable income when determining eligibility, and adding that contributions up to the specified annual amount and earnings on an ABLE account are not counted when determining eligibility. During the course of this review, the agency may identify additional changes that are required in order to improve clarity or update policy.

Other Federal and State Agencies that Regulate this Subject and the Process Coordinating the Rule with These Agencies: Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services and the department of social and health services.

Process for Developing New Rule: The agency welcomes the public to take part in developing this rule. If interested, contact the person identified below to receive an early rule draft to review. After the early review, the agency will send a notice of proposed rule making (CR-102) to everyone receiving this notice and anyone who requests a copy.

Interested parties can participate in the decision to adopt the new rule and formulation of the proposed rule before publication by contacting Katie Pounds, P.O. Box 42716, Olympia, WA 98504-2716, fax (360) 586-9727, TTY 1-800-848-5429, email Katherine.pounds@hca.wa.gov.

January 11, 2017

Wendy Barcus

Rules Coordinator