Florida 2024 2024 Regular Session

Florida House Bill H5301 Analysis / Analysis

Filed 01/26/2024

                    This docum ent does not reflect the intent or official position of the bill sponsor or House of Representatives. 
STORAGE NAME: h5301.APC 
DATE: 1/26/2024 
 
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES STAFF ANALYSIS  
 
BILL #: HB 5301          PCB HCA 24-01    Medicaid Supplemental Payment Programs 
SPONSOR(S): Health Care Appropriations Subcommittee, Garrison 
TIED BILLS:   IDEN./SIM. BILLS:  
 
REFERENCE 	ACTION ANALYST STAFF DIRECTOR or 
BUDGET/POLICY CHIEF 
Orig. Comm.: Health Care Appropriations 
Subcommittee 
14 Y, 0 N Smith Clark 
1) Appropriations Committee  	Smith Pridgeon 
SUMMARY ANALYSIS 
HB 5301 conforms statute to funding decisions related to supplemental payment programs included in PCB 
APC 24-01, the House proposed General Appropriations Act for Fiscal Year 2024-2025. 
 
Medicaid is the health care safety net for low-income Floridians. Medicaid is a partnership of the federal and 
state governments established to provide coverage for health services for eligible persons. The program is 
administered by the Agency for Health Care Administration (AHCA) and financed by federal and state funds.  
Florida delivers medical assistance to most Medicaid recipients using a comprehensive managed care model, 
the Statewide Medicaid Managed Care program, to provide comprehensive, coordinated benefits coverage to 
the Medicaid population, leveraging economic incentives to ensure provider participation and quality 
performance. 
 
Federal Medicaid managed care programs are required to use actuarily sound capitation rates which represent 
the entirety of the Medicaid expenditures for such services. However, federal law or Florida waiver approvals 
authorize certain exceptions, allowing additional Medicaid payments to take place outside the managed care 
relationship for some provider types. These arrangements are called supplemental payment programs. AHCA 
collects local intergovernmental transfers (IGTs) to fund the state share of the Medicaid match funds from 
counties, local health care taxing districts, and publicly operated providers. Governmental sources of IGTs sign 
pledge letters with AHCA specifying their contribution amount. 
 
The bill makes, for certain hospital classes, participation in the Low Income Pool and Indirect Graduate Medical 
Education supplemental payment programs contingent on the hospital’s participation in the Hospital Directed 
Payment Program. The bill also provides definitions for Hospital Directed Payment Program, Indirect Graduate 
Medical Program, and Low Income Pool Program. 
 
The bill would have an indeterminate fiscal impact on local government and the private sector. See Fiscal 
Comments. 
 
The bill provides an effective date of July 1, 2024.   STORAGE NAME: h5301.APC 	PAGE: 2 
DATE: 1/26/2024 
  
FULL ANALYSIS 
I.  SUBSTANTIVE ANALYSIS 
 
A. EFFECT OF PROPOSED CHANGES: 
Background 
 
Florida Medicaid 
 
Medicaid is the health care safety net for low-income Floridians. Medicaid is a partnership of the federal 
and state governments established to provide coverage for health services for eligible persons. The 
program is administered by the Agency for Health Care Administration (AHCA) and financed by federal 
and state funds. AHCA delegates certain functions to other state agencies, including the Department of 
Children and Families, the Department of Health, the Agency for Persons with Disabilities, and the 
Department of Elderly Affairs.  
 
The structure of each state’s Medicaid program varies and what states must pay for is largely 
determined by the federal government, as a condition of receiving federal funds.
1
 Federal law sets the 
amount, scope, and duration of services offered in the program, among other requirements. These 
federal requirements create an entitlement that comes with constitutional due process protections. The 
entitlement means that two parts of the Medicaid cost equation – people and utilization – are largely 
predetermined for the states. The federal government sets the minimum mandatory populations to be 
included in every state Medicaid program. The federal government also sets the minimum mandatory 
benefits to be covered in every state Medicaid program. These benefits include physician services, 
hospital services, home health services, and family planning.
2
 States can add benefits, with federal 
approval. Florida has added many optional benefits, including prescription drugs, adult dental services, 
and dialysis.
3
  
 
States have some flexibility in the provision of Medicaid services. Section 1915(b) of the Social Security 
Act provides authority for the Secretary of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) to 
waive requirements to the extent that he or she “finds it to be cost-effective and efficient and not 
inconsistent with the purposes of this title.” Section 1115 of the Social Security Act allows states to 
implement demonstrations of innovative service delivery systems that improve care, increase efficiency, 
and reduce costs. These laws allow HHS to waive federal requirements to expand populations or 
services, or to try new ways of service delivery.  
 
Florida operates under a Section 1115 waiver to use a comprehensive managed care delivery model 
for primary and acute care services, known as the Statewide Medicaid Managed Care (SMMC) 
Managed Medical Assistance (MMA) program. Florida also has a waiver under Sections 1915(b) and 
(c) of the Social Security Act to operate the SMMC Long-Term Care (LTC) program.
4
 
 
The Florida Medicaid program covers approximately 4.9 million low-income individuals, including 
approximately 2.4 million, or 49.6%, of the children in Florida.
5
 Medicaid is the second largest single 
program funded in the state, behind public education, representing approximately one-third of the total 
FY 2023-2024 state budget.
6
 As of September 2023, Florida’s program is the 4th largest in the nation 
by enrollment and, for FY 2021-2022, the program is the 5th largest in terms of expenditures.
7
 
 
Florida delivers medical assistance to most Medicaid recipients – approximately 72% - using a 
comprehensive managed care model, the SMMC program.
8
 The SMMC program was intended to 
                                                
1
 Title 42 U.S.C. §§ 1396-1396w-5; Title 42 C.F.R. Part 430-456 (§§ 430.0-456.725) (2016). 
2
 S. 409.905, F.S. 
3
 S. 409.906, F.S. 
4
 S. 409.964, F.S. 
5
 Agency for Health Care Administration, Florida Statewide Medicaid Monthly Enrollment Report, December 2023, available at 
https://ahca.myflorida.com/medicaid/Finance/data_analytics/enrollment_report/index.shtml (last visited January 17, 2024).. 
6
 Chapter 2023-239, Law s of Fla. 
7
 The Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation, State Health Facts, Total Medicaid Spending FY 2022 and Total Monthly Medicaid and CHIP Enrollment Sep. 
2023, available at http://kff.org/statedata/ (last visited January 17, 2024).  
8
 Supra, note 6.   STORAGE NAME: h5301.APC 	PAGE: 3 
DATE: 1/26/2024 
  
provide comprehensive, coordinated benefits coverage to the Medicaid population, leveraging 
economic incentives to ensure a level of provider participation and quality performance that was 
impossible under the former, federally prescribed, fee-for-service delivery model. 
 
Supplemental Payment Programs 
 
Federal Medicaid managed care programs are required to use actuarily sound capitation rates which 
represent the entirety of the Medicaid expenditures for such services. However, federal law or Florida 
waiver approvals authorize certain exceptions, allowing additional Medicaid payments to take place 
outside the managed care relationship for some provider types. These arrangements are called 
supplemental payment programs. 
 
Florida currently has ten supplemental payment programs to fund payments to Medicaid providers that 
are in addition to reimbursement they receive for services rendered to Medicaid enrollees. They are 
either authorized by statute or by the General Appropriations Act and are approved by the federal 
government. Non-General Revenue sources are used for the state share of Medicaid funds, which is 
used to draw down the federal matching payment. However, some supplemental payments are funded 
through General Revenue. 
 
Intergovernmental Transfers 
 
Certain programs, including but not limited to the Statewide Medicaid Residency Program, the 
Graduate Medical Education Startup Bonus Program, the Disproportionate Share Hospital (DSH), and 
certain hospital reimbursement exemptions are funded through county and other local tax dollars that 
are transferred to the state and used to draw federal match. Local dollars transferred to the state and 
used in this way are known as “intergovernmental transfers” or IGTs. IGTs may be used to augment 
hospital payments in other ways, specifically through direct payment programs authorized by the 
federal Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) through waivers or state plan amendments. 
Examples include the Hospital Directed Payment Program (DPP) and Low Income Pool (LIP) 
programs. All IGTs are contingent upon the willingness of counties and other local taxing authorities to 
transfer funds to the state in order to draw down federal match.  The local taxing authorities commit to 
sending these funds to the state in the form of an executed Letter of Agreement with the AHCA.  In 
order for AHCA to make timely payments to hospitals, AHCA must know which local governments will 
be submitting IGTs and the amount of the funds prior to using the funds to draw the federal match. 
Current law requires local governments who will be submitting IGTs to submit to AHCA the final 
executed letter of agreement containing the total amount of the IGTs authorized by the entity, no later 
than October 1 of each year.
9
 Funds outlined in the letters of agreement must be received by the 
agency no later than October 31 of each fiscal year in which such funds are pledged, unless an 
alternative plan is specifically approved by the agency.
10
 
 
Low Income Pool 
 
The terms and conditions of CMS Florida Managed Medical Assistance Waiver Approval Document 
created a Low Income Pool (LIP) to be used to provide supplemental payments to providers who 
provide services to Medicaid and uninsured patients. This pool constituted a new method for such 
supplemental payments, different from the prior program called Upper Payment Limit. The LIP program 
also authorized supplemental Medicaid payments to provider access systems, such as federally 
qualified health centers, county health departments, and hospital primary care programs, to cover the 
cost of providing services to Medicaid recipients, the uninsured and the underinsured.  
 
Hospital Directed Payment Program 
 
The Hospital Directed Payment Program (DPP) was authorized in the state fiscal year 2021-22 General 
Appropriations Act
11
, and provides directed payment to hospitals in an amount up to the Medicaid 
                                                
9
 S. 409.908(26), F.S. 
10
 Id. 
11
 Chapter 2021-36, Law s of Fla.  STORAGE NAME: h5301.APC 	PAGE: 4 
DATE: 1/26/2024 
  
shortfall, or the difference between the cost of providing care to Medicaid-eligible patients and the 
payments received for those services.
12
 
 
The payment arrangement directs payments within each Medicaid region, to all hospitals in each class 
by an equal percentage for hospital services provided by hospitals and paid by Medicaid health plans. 
The DPP operates regionally. Each region’s DPP operates independent of other regions once certain 
conditions are met.
13
 
 
Participating hospitals must meet the following three criteria: 
1. Fall into one of the following three mutually exclusive provider classes: 
 private hospitals 
 public hospitals; or 
 cancer hospitals 
2. Operate in one of Florida’s 11 SMMC regions; and 
3. Provide inpatient and outpatient hospital services to Florida Medicaid managed care enrollees.
14
 
 
For a region to participate in the DPP, all hospitals in at least one of the classes (private, public, cancer 
hospitals) within that region must agree to participate and be subject to an assessment to fund the state 
share of the DPP.  
 
The DPP funding is contingent on Local Provider Participation Funds and IGTs. Private hospitals in the 
State of Florida must be partnered with a governmental entity in order to participate in the DPP. The 
hospital DPP is a local option that allows local governments to establish a non-ad valorem (non-
property tax) special assessment that is charged solely to hospitals. 
 
Indirect Graduate Medical Education 
 
The Indirect Graduate Medical Education (IME) program was authorized in the state fiscal year 2021-
22 General Appropriations Act, for the purpose of supporting hospitals with residents in graduate 
medical education (GME) who are in training to become physicians.
15
 IME covers ancillary costs 
associated with the educational process and the higher case-mix intensity of teaching hospitals with 
residency programs, that may result in higher patient care costs relative to non-teaching hospitals.
16
 
 
An eligible teaching hospital must have a resident to bed ratio between 0.1% and 100% and meet the 
criteria for at least one of the following groups:
17
 
 Academic Medical Centers Group 1(AMC 1) 
o Statutory teaching hospital with greater than 650 beds per license and 
 Greater than 500 FTEs, or 
 affiliated with the University of Florida Health. 
 Public Teaching Hospitals 
o Public hospital with residents in an approved GME program and is not classified as a 
statutory teaching hospital. 
 Academic Medical Centers Group 2(AMC 2) 
o Statutory teaching hospital with greater than 650 beds per license. 
 Children’s Teaching Hospitals 
o Children’s hospital that is excluded from the Medicare prospective payment system, or 
o Reginal Perinatal Intensive Care Center that does not meet the eligibility qualifications of 
the AMC1, AMC2 or Public Teaching Hospital groups. 
 Statutory Teaching Hospitals 
                                                
12
 Agency for Health Care Administration, Presentation to the House Health Care Appropriations Subcommittee, Medicaid Reimbursement Rates and 
Supplemental Payment Programs, available at  https://ahca.myflorida.com/content/download/20776/file/House_HHS_Approps-
Medicaid_Supplemental_Programs_Overview .pdf (last visited January 17, 2024). 
13
 Id. 
14
 Id. 
15
 Supra, note 10 
16
 Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, Appendix F to Florida Title XIX Inpatient Hospital Reimbursement Plan, May 4, 2023, On file w ith the 
House Healthcare Appropriations Subcommittee. 
17
 Id.  STORAGE NAME: h5301.APC 	PAGE: 5 
DATE: 1/26/2024 
  
o Statutory teaching hospital with at least 200 beds per license that does not meet the 
requirements of AMC1, AMC2, Public Teaching Hospitals, or Children’s Teaching 
Hospital groups. 
 
IME payment amounts are determined by a distribution model, by hospital grouping, calculated using 
the most recently filed and available Medicare Cost Report
18
 extracted from the Healthcare Cost 
Report. Providers are reimbursed on a quarterly basis, based on the hospital’s IME costs for services 
provided.
19
 
 
Effect of the Bill 
 
HB 5301 amends s. 409.908, F.S., requiring a hospital’s participation in DPP as a precondition to the 
hospital’s participation in LIP or IME. The bill specifies that the term “hospital” is a health care institution 
as defined in s. 395.002(12), F.S.
20
, but does not include cancer hospitals, public hospitals, Medical 
School Physician Practices, Federally Qualified Health Centers, Rural Health Clinics or Behavioral 
Health Providers. 
 
The bill also amends s. 409.901, F.S., codifying into statute definitions for hospital directed payment, 
indirect graduate medical education, and low income pool programs. 
 
The bill provides an effective date of July 1, 2024. 
 
B. SECTION DIRECTORY: 
Section 1: Amends s. 409.901, F.S., relating to definitions. 
Section 2: Amends s. 409.908, F.S., relating to reimbursement of Medicaid providers. 
Section 3: Amends s. 409.910, F.S., to conform a cross-reference. 
Section 4: Provides an effective date of July 1, 2024. 
 
II.  FISCAL ANALYSIS & ECONOMIC IMPACT STATEMENT 
 
A. FISCAL IMPACT ON STATE GOVERNMENT: 
 
1. Revenues: 
None. 
 
2. Expenditures: 
None. 
 
B. FISCAL IMPACT ON LOCAL GOVERNMENTS: 
 
1. Revenues: 
None. 
 
2. Expenditures: 
None. 
 
                                                
18
 CMS Form 2552 
19
 Id. 
20
 “Hospital” means any establishment that: 
(a) Offers services more intensive than those required for room, board, personal services, and general nursing care, and offers facilities and 
beds for use beyond 24 hours by individuals requiring diagnosis, treatment, or care for illness, injury, deformity, infirmity, abnormality, 
disease, or pregnancy; and 
(b) Regularly makes available at least clinical laboratory services, diagnostic X-ray services, and treatment facilities for surgery or obstetrical 
care, or other definitive medical treatment of similar extent, except that a critical access hospital, as defined in s. 408.07, shall not be 
required to make available treatment facilities for surgery, obstetrical care, or similar services as long as it maintains its critical access 
hospital designation and shall be required to make such facilities available only if it ceases to be designated as a critical access hospital.  STORAGE NAME: h5301.APC 	PAGE: 6 
DATE: 1/26/2024 
  
C. DIRECT ECONOMIC IMPACT ON PRIVATE SECTOR: 
The bill would have an indeterminate fiscal impact on hospitals that currently participate in LIP and IME 
but choose not to participate in DPP. The bill’s requirement of DPP participation as a precondition to 
LIP and IME participation would reduce revenue to hospitals related to LIP and IME supplemental 
payments, if those hospitals choose not to participate in DPP. 
 
D. FISCAL COMMENTS: 
None. 
III.  COMMENTS 
 
A. CONSTITUTIONAL ISSUES: 
 
 1. Applicability of Municipality/County Mandates Provision: 
None. 
 
 2. Other: 
None. 
 
B. RULE-MAKING AUTHORITY: 
None. 
 
C. DRAFTING ISSUES OR OTHER COMMENTS: 
None. 
 
IV.  AMENDMENTS/COMMITTEE SUBSTITUTE CHANGES 
None.