Turnaround Time
We’ve finally made it to turnaround. While there are still numerous bills left in committee or on each chamber’s floor, a good portion of the bills we’ve been following made it through the official turnaround date. While it is easy to assume the remaining bills are dead for the remainder of session – we know there is always the potential for them to resurrect in a different form or with a blessing. This week the Senate Ways and Means Human Services subcommittee and the House Social Services Budget committee made their recommendations on the KDADS and KDHE budgets. LeadingAge Kansas made out fairly well on each side with the Senate recommendations including:
- Accepting the Governor’s budget recommendation for the nursing facility rebase and transition to PDPM at $22.2M SGF.
- Half the LeadingAge Kansas requested Medicaid Capacity Payment at $11.5M SGF.
- Rebasing PACE providers to 90% of the Medicaid capitated payment at $2.4M SGF.
- An interim committee to study the rate and cost discrepancies for the HCBS/FE waiver.
- Proviso language requiring supplemental nursing services agencies to register and submit quarterly financials at $25k SGF.
- Funding the 5% gap hospice providers receive for patients in facilities with Medicaid as a secondary payer at $738k SGF.
The House side recommendations slightly differed by recommending the full Medicaid Capacity Payments at $23M SGF, an involuntary discharge data tracking proviso at $75K SGF, an increase to HCBS/FE Personal Care Services at $18.6M SGF and bringing all other waiver rates including FE up to match the I/DD waiver rates at $10M SGF. The House did not recommend the staffing agency proviso or an interim committee to study HCBS/FE rate issues at this time.
Bills Above the Line
The following bills received final action on the floor and will move forward to the other chamber:
SB338 – Related to group-funded liability and group-funded workers compensation pools. This bill was uncontested as it was mostly technical changes to reporting requirements and passed out 40 Yeas to 0 Nays.
SB352 – Enacting the John D. Springer patient’s bill of rights; requiring hospitals to allow in-person visitation in certain circumstances. This bill received quite a bit of debate in Senate Public Health and Welfare alone this week, barely passing out of committee itself with Chair Gossage having to break the tie. An amendment offered by Senator O’Shea that failed in committee was brought back up on the floor and passed which establishes the medical care facility reimbursement fund and requires the state of Kansas to backfill any loss revenue medical care facilities receive by choosing to follow this state law instead of federal CMS rules and regulations. After the amendment was added, the bill passed out 26 Yeas to 13 Nays.
SB430 – The comprehensive workers compensation bill. Since this bill was heavily worked between various stakeholders and brought as a compromise, it was uncontroversial on the floor. The bill passed out 40 Yeas to 0 Nays.
HB2562 – Enacting the protect vulnerable adults from financial exploitation act. This bill was uneventful in the chamber passing out 120 Yeas to 0 Nays.
HB2777 – Prohibiting the state fire marshal and the marshal’s representatives from wearing or operating a body camera during an on-site inspection at a patient care facility. This bill gained support from the majority of legislators with Representative Tim Johnson stating at the Well, “One of the issues in this particular situation is that the Fire Marshal’s office is in fact not a full law enforcement agency as they have claimed.” He went on to describe the definitions and which employees do in fact meet the certified law enforcement criteria and which do not, which would be civilian inspectors. Representative Johnson added an amendment to include childcare facilities into the bill since the Fire Marshal has stated they intend to wear their body cameras in those settings as well. The bill passed out 108 Yeas to 11 Nays.
HB2784 – Relating to continuing care retirement communities; transferring authority for certification of such facilities from the Kansas insurance department to the Kansas department for aging and disability services. LeadingAge Kansas initially had concerns about the bill, but after it was worked in committee earlier in the week and most of our amendments were included such as removing all language related to the bed tax, the concerns subsided. While there were some questions on the floor on whether or how many FTEs this would transfer over from KID to KDADS, the bill did receive a majority support and passed out 118 Yeas to 1 Nays.
Coming Up
Both chambers will be out Friday, February 23, through Tuesday, February 27, with committees resuming hearings on Wednesday, February 28. House Appropriations will hear the House Social Services Budget committee recommendations for the KDADS and KDHE budgets on Wednesday and Senate Ways and Means will hear the senate subcommittee’s recommendations for the KDHE budget on Wednesday and KDADS budget on Thursday. Starting next week, there’s only six weeks until Drop Dead Day, where the legislature will reach first adjournment and begin wrapping up most of their session activities. Stay tuned to see what’s to come.
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