MoCo Inspector General Report: Montgomery County Public Schools Workers’ Compensation Program

OIG Report 19-003 (April 5, 2019)

Background: Montgomery County Public Schools (MCPS) employs over 23,000 people working at over 220 locations throughout the County. Each year thousands of employee injuries are reported, resulting in millions of dollars of Workers’ Compensation costs to the taxpayers of Montgomery County. The OIG sought to assist MCPS in assessing its Workers’ Compensation program to identify opportunities for improvements. Key Points in the OIG Report: Although individual case compliance was outside the scope of this audit, MCPS appeared to follow internal policies, procedures, and applicable laws and regulations. We found opportunities for MCPS to consolidate and exploit existing data potentially leading to reduced costs and improved services. We recommended that MCPS employ data analytics for use in incident prevention efforts and as a managerial performance measurement tool. MCPS should continue to work with the Self-Insurance Fund and third-party administrator staff on the accuracy of reporting and documenting events to improve the available data for analysis. Other providers of Workers’ Compensation coverage should be explored to establish comparison metrics for the services currently provided to MCPS. The ability to collect and analyze data, develop metrics, and assign responsibilities to improve outcomes could be impacted due to incident reports being routed through different MCPS offices. We recommended continued development of a consolidated incident and information system and suggested that an Incident Review Committee operating within the MCPS Division of Maintenance be expanded system wide. We also recommended that MCPS review and eliminate redundant documentation. We also noted that MCPS does not have a return-to-work or light-duty program, an industry best practice. We recommended that MCPS consider implementing a return-to-work or light-duty program...

https://www.montgomerycountymd.gov/OIG/Resources/Files/PDF/oig_annual_report_fy_2019.pdf