Rotunda Archive

April 17, 2009

The Nebraska Hospital Association – Nebraska's influential voice for health care.

If you have questions or concerns about any state legislation, please contact Bruce Rieker, Vice President, Advocacy, at (402) 742-8146 or brieker@nhanet.org; or Cora Micek, Advocacy Coordinator, at (402) 742-8153 or cmicek@nhanet.org. 

Bills of interest to NHA members advance

The following bills of interest to NHA members advanced recently. Behind each bill number and description is the bill's current status.

• LB 27— Change the Medical Assistance Act and the Autism Treatment Program Act
  Status: Moved to Select File
   
• LB 84 — Eliminate the termination date for the Women's Health Initiative Advisory Council
  Status: Moved to Select File
   
• LB 208 — Add false information about employees to the crime of fraudulent insurance act and to the Insurance Fraud Act
  Status: Moved to Select File
   
• LB 385 — Terminate sales tax provisions
  Status: MO32 failed on April 17
   
• LB 396 — Adopt the Medical Home Act
  Status: Moved to Final Reading
   
• LB 373 — Change death and disability-related provisions pertaining to emergency response personnel
  Status: Moved to General File
   
• LB 458 — Provide for vocational training for public assistance recipients
  Status: Moved to Final Reading
   
• LB 464A — Appropriate funds to aid in carrying out the provisions of LB 464. Require certain booster immunizations for students entering seventh grade
  Status: Moved to Final Reading
   
• LB 511 — Redefine intermediate care facility for purposes of certificate of need
  Status: Moved to Final Reading
   
• LB 622 — Provide time limits and penalties for late workers' compensation medical payments
  Status: Moved to Select File
  
  
   

Hospitals represented at economic roundtable with Rep. Fortenberry  

LINCOLN—Kim Russel, CEO of BryanLGH Health System, and Bruce Rieker, NHA Vice President of Advocacy, participated in an economic roundtable discussion with First District Congressman Jeff Fortenberry on April 16.  Russel and Rieker, along side two dozen small business owners, entrepreneurs, bankers, state and federal agency representatives, met with Representative Fortenberry to discuss the local, state and national business climates and key economic indicators.

Russel and Rieker were able to relay several challenges hospitals are facing during these difficult economic times, including increasing costs, the growing number of underinsured and uninsured, fewer elective procedures, government reimbursements and workforce needs. Additional topics discussed during the two-hour meeting included access to capital, lending restrictions, housing, regulatory burdens, the anticipated impact of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, energy, the Employee Free Choice Act, health care reform and the overall health of Nebraskans.
 

Medical home pilot program approved

LINCOLN— Senators gave final approval April 17 to a bill establishing a medical home pilot program for Medicaid recipients in Nebraska. LB 396, sponsored Grand Island Senator Mike Gloor, establishes an advisory council to consult with the state Department of Health and Human Services on implementing the program.

The pilot program will begin by Jan. 1, 2012 and a report will be due to the governor and the Legislature by June 1, 2014. The bill also requires HHS to design and implement reimbursement rate policies to create incentives for providers. The pilot program will terminate June 30, 2014. LB 396 passed 48-1.

— Unicameral Update, April 17, 2009

 

Safe haven-inspired efforts are shrinking

LINCOLN— Nebraska lawmakers once vowed that addressing the problems brought to light by the state's former safe haven law would be a priority this year.

Those promises were made in November, when lawmakers met in a special session to limit the law to infants. Now, say advocates for mentally ill children, the legislative solution has been pared down so much that it will do little to ease the frustrations and fears that drove parents and guardians to drop off 36 troubled youngsters at hospitals.

A compromise reached by key lawmakers would put $1.5 million into expanding children's mental health services in the next two years, down from the $30 million approved during first-round debate.

State Senator Tim Gay of Papillion, chairman of the Health and Human Services Committee, defended the compromise proposal as a "step in the right direction" during a year when the state is facing tight finances. Read more.

— Omaha World-Herald, April 16, 2009

Appropriations Committee agrees to fund waiting list problem

LINCOLN— The Legislature’s Appropriations Committee has tentatively decided to use about $15.7 million in state general tax dollars over the next two years to reduce the state’s developmentally disabled waiting list. The money will be used to stop the growth in the waiting list, Appropriations Committee members said Thursday as they voted to add the money to the $7.1 billion two-year budget plan. Read more.

— Lincoln Journal Star, April 17, 2009

 

Motion to advance sunsets for sales tax exemptions fails

LINCOLN— A motion to place a bill on general file, despite it being killed in committee, failed April 17. Omaha Senator Rich Pahls made a motion to advance LB 385, which was indefinitely postponed by the Revenue Committee on an 8-0 vote. The bill would enact July 1, 2011, sunsets for sales tax exemptions enacted or last amended prior to 2005; July 1, 2012, for exemptions enacted or last amended since 2005; and July 1, 2013, for exemptions on rebates relating to motor vehicles and motorboats and the sales tax on services. Read more.

— Unicameral Update, April 17, 2009
 

Full funding recommended for Beatrice center 

WASHINGTON— The Legislature’s Appropriations Committee will recommend full funding of the Beatrice State Developmental Center budget, despite misgivings about the ability of the center’s leadership to solve the problems. But the committee will ask for quarterly reports on how an additional $32 million in state tax dollars is used. The $32 million is necessary to meet Department of Justice and federal Medicaid requirements for upgrading staff at the center and for moving some harder-to-place residents into community programs. Read more.

— Lincoln Journal Star, April 17, 2009

 

White House seeks health plan compromise

WASHINGTON—President Barack Obama's top health care adviser has announced a compromise is within reach on a government health plan for the middle class that wouldn't drive private insurers out of business. Offering the option of government coverage to workers and their families has become one of the most contentious issues in the debate about overhauling health care to cover the uninsured and curb costs. Read more.

— AP/Yahoo News, April 16, 2009

 

Johanns touts jobs training, small business help

WASHINGTON—U.S. Senator Mike Johanns says that if President Barack Obama asked his advice on how to jumpstart the economy, he would recommend job training and helping small businesses.

Johanns says the employee-training program he offered while he was governor was very popular and successful. His other suggestion would be to “do everything you can to support small businesses from a tax standpoint.” Read more.

— Omaha World-Herald, April 17, 2009

 

NIH to offer stem cell research guidelines

WASHINGTON—The National Institutes of Health (NIH) will publish draft guidelines governing federal funding for human embryonic stem cell research. Acting NIH Director Raynard Kington said the guidelines are the “first step” in expanding stem cell research, and that it “will lead in a relatively short period of time” to an increase in the number of human embryonic stem cells eligible for public funding. Read more.

— The Hill, April 17, 2009

 

Stimulus' extension of COBRA benefits starts

Workers who have been laid off since September 1 will begin receiving letters from their former employers telling them how to get health insurance for less money. Under this year's federal economic-stimulus law, employers must notify laid-off employees that they can buy COBRA insurance with a 65 percent subsidy for nine months. Read more.

— Philadelphia Inquirer, April 17, 2009

For more information about health-related legislative bills or resolutions, contact: Bruce Rieker, Vice President, Advocacy, at (402) 742-8146 or brieker@nhanet.org or Cora Micek, Advocacy Coordinator, at (402) 742-8153 or cmicek@nhanet.org.

NHA Rotunda Review is published by the Nebraska Hospital Association, 3255 Salt Creek Circle, Lincoln, NE 68504. Phone (402) 742-8140, Fax (402) 742-8191. Visit our Web site at http://www.nhanet.org. Kelley Porter, editor, at (402) 742-8151, or email, kporter@nhanet.org.

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