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costs will be a major driver of future <br />workers' compensation premium increases. <br />In addition, the 2013 legislature added post - <br />traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) as a <br />compensable injury and in 2014, a <br />Minnesota Supreme Court decision found <br />that provisions in the Workers' <br />Compensation statute which allow workers <br />compensation benefits for permanent and <br />total disabilities to be offset by disability <br />benefits and pension benefits such as Social <br />Security does not apply to retirement <br />benefits of the Public Employees Retirement <br />Association. The Minnesota Legislature <br />recently considered a bill to add a <br />presumption to post -traumatic stress <br />disorder diagnoses and has also regularly <br />considered proposals to expand the heart, <br />lung and infectious disease presumptions for <br />public safety workers, and to make the <br />presumptions more conclusive and difficult <br />to rebut. These types of benefit expansions <br />would further increase municipal workers' <br />compensation costs. <br />Response: Legislative action is necessary <br />to address increasing workers' <br />compensation costs, particularly rising <br />medical costs. The League of Minnesota <br />Cities supports use of the Workers <br />Compensation Advisory Council (WCAC) <br />system to consider proposals for changes <br />to the workers' compensation law, and <br />urges the WCAC and the Legislature to <br />approve medical cost containment <br />reforms. The League also supports filling <br />an existing WCAC employer vacancy <br />with a public -sector employer <br />representative or adding a designated <br />public -sector employer representative to <br />the WCAC. <br />The League opposes expansion of <br />workers' compensation and related health <br />insurance benefits because of the <br />potential for dramatically increasing costs <br />to cities. Specifically, the League opposes <br />expansion of the heart, lung and <br />infectious disease presumptions as well as <br />any expansion of the law that would <br />require payment of health insurance <br />premiums or that would include mental <br />injuries that have no physical cause or <br />manifestation. <br />The League also supports continuing the <br />WCRA as the mandatory workers' <br />compensation reinsurer for insurers and <br />self -insurers in Minnesota and supports <br />modifying state statutes to treat PTSD <br />events involving several affected parties <br />as one occurrence for retention purposes, <br />thereby reducing the exposure of self - <br />insured entities and the statewide <br />insurance pools. Such a change would not <br />have any effect on the benefit an <br />individual employee would receive. <br />The League supports legislation that <br />would disallow the "stacking" of PERA <br />retirement benefits and Workers <br />Compensation benefits due to the fact <br />that some injured employees could <br />receive total compensation from workers' <br />compensation and PERA retirement <br />benefits that would be well above the <br />salary that they had been earning and the <br />fact that the costs would ultimately be <br />passed on to cities and their taxpayers. <br />HR-14. Drug and Alcohol Testing <br />in the Workplace <br />Issue: Employer testing of job applicants is <br />governed by Minn. Stat. § 181.950 — <br />181.957 and is known as the Drug and <br />Alcohol Testing in the Workplace Act <br />(DATWA). It applies to all employers with <br />one or more employees, including cities. <br />The DATWA has not been amended for <br />many years to reflect various and significant <br />changes in drug -testing technology nor <br />policy changes at the federal level. <br />League of Minnesota Cities <br />2018 City Policies Page 89 <br />