|
The legislative session reached an important milestone with the passage of the Budget by the House. Policy committees are taking up bills that “crossed over” from one body of the legislature to the other in advance of a deadline imposed by House and Senate leaders.
While there are procedural mechanisms that can allow a bill that failed to meet the crossover deadline to pass in the same legislative session, in general bills that failed to meet the deadline will not be finished this session. Because this is the first year of a two-year biennium, some policy bills may pass only one chamber this session with the expectation that they will be taken up by the other chamber next year.
At this juncture, we’re publishing our annual Crossover Report detailing the budget and policy issues of interest to home health and hospice agencies that we expect to dominate the rest of the legislative session.
Highlights from the first half of the session include the passage of the Budget Adjustment Act which includes a much-needed Medicaid skilled home health rate increase, and the House version of the budget which includes a Choices for Care rate increase and the sunsetting of the home health provider tax burden.
These are welcome developments that will help offset the considerable pressures facing home health and hospice agencies including substantial Medicare cuts, a looming Medicare rate clawback, migration of Medicare beneficiaries to Medicare Advantage plans with poor reimbursement, and significant wage and salary inflation.
| 
