BILL ANALYSIS Ó
Senate Appropriations Committee Fiscal Summary
Senator Kevin de León, Chair
AB 1231 (V.M. Perez) - Regional centers: telehealth.
Amended: June 27, 2013 Policy Vote: Human Svcs. 6-0,
Health 9-0
Urgency: No Mandate: No
Hearing Date: August 19, 2013
Consultant: Brendan McCarthy
This bill meets the criteria for referral to the Suspense File.
Bill Summary: AB 1231 would require the Department of
Developmental Services to inform regional centers that services
for regional center consumers may be provided through
telehealth.
Fiscal Impact:
Minor costs to provide technical assistance to regional
centers by the Department of Developmental Services (General
Fund).
Potential costs in the range of $30,000 - $60,000 to
collect effectiveness data from regional centers and report
that information to the Legislature (General Fund).
Unknown impact on the use of services by regional center
consumers (General Fund and federal funds). To the extent
that the bill results in regional center consumers using
telehealth services, there could be both increased
utilization of services and reduced costs for current
services. To date, there has been limited use of telehealth
in the regional center system, so predicting utilization
impacts is difficult.
There may be circumstances where greater knowledge of the
availability of telehealth services by consumers and their
families increases the utilization services. For example, in
rural areas of the state there may be limited numbers of
providers for certain services. For services that are
recurring or of long duration (such as behavioral health
services), greater access to providers in other areas of the
state through telehealth may increase the demand for those
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services by consumers from rural areas.
On the other hand, services provided through telehealth may
be less expensive than services provided in person. In such
cases, greater use of telehealth may reduce costs to the
regional centers.
Background: California provides community-based services to
approximately 250,000 persons with developmental disabilities
and their families through a statewide system of 21 regional
centers. Regional centers are private, nonprofit agencies under
contract with the Department of Developmental Services for the
provision of various services and supports to people with
developmental disabilities. As a single point of entry, regional
centers provide diagnostic and assessment services to determine
eligibility, convene planning teams to develop an Individual
Program Plan for each eligible consumer, and either provide or
obtain from generic agencies appropriate services for each
consumer in accordance with the Individual Program Plan.
Proposed Law: AB 1231 would require the Department of
Developmental Services to inform regional centers that services
for regional center consumers may be provided through
telehealth.
Specific provisions of the bill would:
Require the Department to request regional centers to
include consideration of telehealth in the development of
every Individual Program Plan and Individualized Family
Service Plan;
Require the Department to request regional centers to
consider telehealth in training programs for parents of
consumers;
Authorize the Department to implement vendorization
subcodes for telehealth services;
Make the use of telehealth services voluntary for the
consumer;
Require the Department to provide information to the
Legislature on the effectiveness of providing telehealth
services to consumers;
Sunset the bill's provisions on January 1, 2019.
Related Legislation:
SB 764 (Steinberg, 2012) would have required the use of
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telehealth to be considered when developing each Individual
Program Plan. That bill was vetoed by Governor Brown.
SB 1050 (Alquist, 2012) would have require the Department
of Developmental Services to establish an autism telehealth
taskforce. That bill was vetoed by Governor Brown.