BILL ANALYSIS
AB 41
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Date of Hearing: April 2, 2003
ASSEMBLY COMMITTEE ON APPROPRIATIONS
Darrell Steinberg, Chair
AB 41 (Daucher) - As Amended: January 16, 2003
Policy Committee: Aging and Long
Term Care Vote: 3-0
Urgency: Yes State Mandated Local Program:
No Reimbursable:
SUMMARY
This bill:
1)Creates the Senior Citizens Interim Payment (SCIP) Fund, which
would be continuously appropriated for up to $22 million in
Federal Trust Funds in any year in which the state budget is
not enacted by July 1.
2)Provides funding to pay for local administration of services
to the elderly provided through the California Department of
Aging's (CDA) Area Agencies on Aging (AAA) in the absence of
an enacted state budget.
FISCAL EFFECT
The creation of the SCIP Fund is contrary to general committee
policy to avoid continuous appropriations. The SCIP Fund would
continuously appropriate $22 million of approximately $140
million in Federal Trust Funds proposed for CDA in the 2003-04
Budget Act.
COMMENTS
1)Existing Law . Establishes (1) CDA as the state agency that
administers the federal Older Americans Act and (2) 33 AAA as
the local administrators of a wide array of home- and
community-based services under the Older Californians Act.
About 90 percent of AAA services are paid from the Federal
Trust Fund, while the remaining 10 percent are paid from the
state General Fund.
AB 41
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2)Rationale . According to the author, although approximately 90
percent of funding for local services administered by the AAA
is from the Federal Trust Fund, all funds remain "frozen" if
the state budget is not enacted by July 1st. This lack of
funding puts local home- and community-based programs at risk
for disruption or delay. This bill is intended to mitigate
this risk by providing about two months of funding to the AAA
in the absence of an enacted budget.
3)Related Legislation . This bill is modeled after AB 561
(Scott) Chapter 993, Statutes of 1998, which created the
Medical Providers Interim Payment Fund. This Fund continuously
appropriates up to $1 billion to pay Medi-Cal, AIDS Drug
Assistance Program, and Department of Developmental Services
providers in the event the state budget is not enacted by July
1 of any given year.
AB 1 (Berg), proposed in the current session, is also designed
to address the possible disruption of services provided by the
AAA when enactment of the budget is delayed by providing a
continuous appropriation from the Federal Trust Fund. AB 1 is
identical to AB 2552 (Daucher, 2002), which was held on the
suspense file in the Assembly Appropriations Committee and SB
657 (Ortiz, 1999), which was held on the suspense file in the
Senate Appropriations Committee.
Analysis Prepared by : Mary Ad?r/ APPR. / (916) 319-2081