There was a public hearing held on July 15, 2004, regarding proposed rule changes to Administrative Code Comm 47 and Comm 5, at which time numerous comments were received.

The proposed rule package, including the Usual and Customary Cost Schedule which was expected to be implemented as an Emergency Rule on September 1, 2004, has been postponed due to the following:

• The deadline for receiving all hearing comments was extended an additional week to July 26th.
• There were a substantial number of in-depth comments on the Usual & Customary package that require extensive internal review and drafting of appropriate responses.

After the responses are prepared, a meeting with the External Advisory Committee is expected to be scheduled this fall.

-- Sam Rockweiler and Dennis Legler

The newsletter is issued electronically every other month.

Please send comments or questions to Barbro McGinn, editor.