The Department of Health and Welfare (DHW) works hard to strengthen your trust and confidence in us and in the work we do. We’ve chosen four ways in our Strategic Plan to accomplish this.

Reduce the regulatory burden on the public imposed by our administrative rules.

• DHW met all established administrative rulemaking deadlines for the 12 chapters scheduled for review and rewrite this year. That included conducting at least one negotiated rulemaking session and two public hearings for each of those chapters.
• DHW also developed a redline version of each of the revised chapters that clearly shows the changes.

Proactively communicate with the public about how our work improves the lives of Idahoans in need.

• Communications staff developed training and other materials to help improve internal and external communications and branding consistency.
• We frequently promote cross-divisional work among our employees to staff and the public in blog posts like this one.
• We’ve implemented the use of plain language to improve the customer experience and make sure our communications are easy to understand.
• We’ve added the ability to subscribe to press releases and blog posts so you can stay on top of the most current news and information from DHW.
• We’re also implementing new ways to track our engagement with local media.

Manage our money, people, physical space, and technology resources to best serve the people of Idaho.

• The department developed a plan to consistently buy and upgrade technological needs to make sure business continuity is supported.
• Many of the other tasks associated with this objective are on hold, pending the transition to a new system that handles finance, personnel, accounting, and reporting for state agencies.

Enhance public health and safety by improving the effectiveness and visibility of regulatory activities.

• We are on track to implement a federally endorsed criminal history and background check system that enhances user experience and reduces the need for manual processing by October.
• We’re also on track to complete the background checks faster and more efficiently.

You can learn more about each of these objectives in our Strategic Plan.

I hope you have a safe and healthy Memorial Day weekend. Our offices will be closed on Monday in honor of the holiday.

The Idaho Department of Health and Welfare is dedicated to strengthening the health, safety, and independence of Idahoans. Learn more at healthandwelfare.idaho.gov.