Legislative Session number- 84

Bill Name: SF1941

Providing for a nursing facility closure and alternative service development
process; requiring and providing for the commissioner of finance in cooperation
with the commissioner of health to temporarily issue appropriation bonds to
establish the process to further state goals of ensuring consumer access to a
continuum of older adult services, creating an adequate supply of affordable
home based alternatives to nursing home care and providing adequate funding for
smaller nursing homes, establishing a separate and special debt service fund for
payment of the bonds; modifying certain requirements for requests for proposals
for exception from the nursing home bed moratorium and authorizing the
commissioner of human services at the recommendation of the commissioner of
health to adjust facility medical assistance (MA) payment rates above current
limits under certain conditions; establishing an interagency review panel to
advise the commissioner of health in the selection and ranking of projects
funded through the moratorium exception and nursing facility closure and
alternative service development processes; modifying certain criteria for review
of proposals and a certain relocation restriction; prescribing the application
and approval procedures for the nursing facility closure and alternative service
development process; requiring coordination of the process with the moratorium
exception process; restricting the use of payments received from the
commissioner under the process; providing for the measurement of outcomes,
requiring commissioner reports to the legislature on certain dates; requiring
the commissioner of finance to track medical assistance savings from bed
closures and to use the savings to fund requests for proposals and certain
initiatives, requiring deposit of savings in a nursing facility closure account
to be established in the general fund; requiring and providing for commissioner
of health designation of critical access nursing facilities, requiring medical
assistance reimbursement rate increases to the designated facilities;
appropriating money to the commissioner of human services for the moratorium
exception process, for community services grants and for critical access nursing
facility reimbursement rate increases and to the commissioner of finance for
bond payments
(mk)