Senate Bill No. 279
(By Senator Bowman)
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[Introduced January 21, 2008; referred to the Committee on
Government Organization; and then to the Committee on Finance.]
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A BILL to amend and reenact §16-1-2 and §16-1-5 of the Code of West
Virginia, 1931, as amended, all relating to definitions;
appointment of the Commissioner and the State Health Officer
for the Bureau for Public Health; and qualifications for the
positions.
Be it enacted by the Legislature of West Virginia:
That §16-1-2 and §16-1-5 of the Code of West Virginia, 1931,
as amended, be amended and reenacted, all to read as follows:
ARTICLE 1. STATE PUBLIC HEALTH SYSTEM.
§16-1-2. Definitions.
Unless the context in which used clearly requires a different
meaning, as used in this
article chapter:
(a) "Basic public health services" means those services that
are necessary to protect the health of the public. The three areas
of basic public health services are communicable and reportable disease prevention and control, community health promotion and
environmental health protection;
(b) "Bureau" means the Bureau for Public Health in the
Department of Health and Human Resources;
(c) "Combined local board of health" is one form of
organization for a local board of health and means a board of
health serving any two or more counties or any county or counties
and one or more municipalities within or partially within the
county or counties;
(d) "Commissioner" means the Commissioner of the Bureau for
Public Health;
who is the state health officer
(e) "County board of health" is one form of organization for
a local board of health and means a local board of health serving
a single county;
(f) "Department" means the West Virginia Department of Health
and Human Resources;
(g) "Director" or "director of health" means the
state health
officer commissioner. Administratively within the department, the
Bureau for Public Health through its commissioner carries out the
public health functions of the department, unless otherwise
assigned by the secretary;
(h) "Essential public health services" means the core public
health activities necessary to promote health and prevent disease,
injury and disability for the citizens of the state. The services include:
(1) Monitoring health status to identify community health
problems;
(2) Diagnosing and investigating health problems and health
hazards in the community;
(3) Informing, educating and empowering people about health
issues;
(4) Mobilizing community partnerships to identify and solve
health problems;
(5) Developing policies and plans that support individual and
community health efforts;
(6) Enforcing laws and rules that protect health and ensure
safety;
(7) Uniting people with needed personal health services and
assuring the provision of health care when it is otherwise not
available;
(8) Promoting a competent public health and personal health
care workforce;
(9) Evaluating the effectiveness, accessibility and quality of
personal and population-based health services; and
(10) Researching for new insights and innovative solutions to
health problems;
(I) "Licensing boards" means those boards charged with
regulating an occupation, business or profession and on which the commissioner serves as a member;
(j) "Local board of health," "local board" or "board" means a
board of health serving one or more counties or one or more
municipalities or a combination thereof;
(k) "Local health department" means the staff of the local
board of health;
(l) "Local health officer" means the individual physician with
a current West Virginia license to practice medicine who supervises
and directs the activities of the local health department services,
staff and facilities and is appointed by the local board of health
with approval by the commissioner;
(m) "Municipal board of health" is one form of organization
for a local board of health and means a board of health serving a
single municipality;
(n) "Performance-based standards" means generally accepted,
objective standards such as rules or guidelines against which
public health performance can be measured;
(o) "Program plan" or "plan of operation" means the annual
plan for each local board of health that must be submitted to the
commissioner for approval;
(p) "Public water system" means any water supply or system
which regularly supplies or offers to supply water for human
consumption through pipes or other constructed conveyances, if
serving at least an average of twenty-five individuals per day for at least sixty days per year, or which has at least fifteen service
connections, and shall include: (1) Any collection, treatment,
storage and distribution facilities under the control of the owner
or operator of the system and used primarily in connection with the
system; and (2) any collection or pretreatment storage facilities
not under such control which are used primarily in connection with
the system. A public water system does not include a system which
meets all of the following conditions: (1) Which consists only of
distribution and storage facilities (and does not have any
collection and treatment facilities); (2) which obtains all of its
water from, but is not owned or operated by, a public water system
which otherwise meets the definition; (3) which does not sell water
to any person; and (4) which is not a carrier conveying passengers
in interstate commerce;
(q) "Secretary" means the Secretary of the State Department of
Health and Human Resources;
(r) "Service area" means the territorial jurisdiction of a
local board of health;
(s) "State advisory council on public health" is the advisory
body charged by this article with providing advice to the
commissioner with respect to the provision of adequate public
health services for all areas in the state;
(t) (s) "State Board of Health" means, and refers to, the
secretary, notwithstanding any other provision of this code to the contrary, whenever and wherever in this code there is a reference
to the State Board of Health.
(t) "State health officer" means the person appointed by the
secretary to serve as the chief public health medical advisor or
his or her designee.
§16-1-5. State health officer; appointment; qualifications; term.
(a) The Commissioner of the Bureau for Public Health
is and
the state health officer
and shall be appointed
by the secretary.
The commissioner shall be
a physician licensed under the laws of
this state to practice medicine or a person holding a doctorate
or
a masters degree in public health administration
and shall serve as
the chief executive officer of the bureau. The commissioner shall
have not less than four years' experience in health services
administration or a related field.
The state health officer shall
be a physician licensed under the laws of this state to practice
medicine. The commissioner
and the state health officer serves
serve at the will and pleasure of the secretary and shall not be
actively engaged or employed in any other business, vocation or
employment, serving full time in the duties of the office as
prescribed by this
article chapter.
(b) At the discretion of the secretary, the titles of the
state health officer and commissioner may be conferred upon a
single individual as long as the requirements of both positions are
met.
NOTE: The purpose of this bill is to allow for the separation
of the positions of Commissioner of the Bureau for Public Health
and state health officer and to define the requirements for each.
Strike-throughs indicate language that would be stricken from
the present law, and underscoring indicates new language that would
be added.
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