BILL NUMBER: SB 896 AMENDED
BILL TEXT
AMENDED IN ASSEMBLY MAY 18, 2006
AMENDED IN ASSEMBLY JUNE 9, 2005
AMENDED IN SENATE MAY 10, 2005
AMENDED IN SENATE APRIL 28, 2005
INTRODUCED BY Senator Runner
FEBRUARY 22, 2005
An act to add Chapter 9 (commencing with Section 5610) to
Part 5 of Division 9 of the Family Code, relating to child support.
amend Section 4011.10 of the Penal Code, relating to
inmates.
LEGISLATIVE COUNSEL'S DIGEST
SB 896, as amended, Runner Child support.
Inmates: health care services.
Existing law authorizes the Department of Corrections and
Rehabilitation, county sheriffs, and police chiefs to to contract
with providers of emergency health care services.
This bill would, in addition, allow other public agencies that
contract for emergency health services to contract with providers for
emergency health care services for care to local law enforcement
patients.
Existing law provides that specified associations convene a
working group to address fiscal issues relating to the provision of
this contracted emergency medical health services. This bill would
provide that to the extent that these contracts result in a
disproportionate share of local law enforcement inmates being treated
at any one hospital or system of hospitals, this working group shall
address this issue.
Existing law governs the collection of child support by local
child support agencies, or by means of a writ of execution, a notice
of levy, or earnings assignment order.
This bill would enact the Private Child Support Collection Act.
These provisions would regulate the activities of private child
support collectors, as defined. Among other things, the bill would
require a private child support collector to provide specified
notices and disclosures to the child support obligee in a written
contract and additional information about child support payments
during the term of the contract, authorize the obligee to cancel any
contract entered into with that entity in certain circumstances,
prescribe the rights of the parties with respect to child support
agencies and other governmental entities, and prescribe procedures
and remedies for enforcement of the provisions of the act.
Vote: majority. Appropriation: no. Fiscal committee: no.
State-mandated local program: no.
THE PEOPLE OF THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA DO ENACT AS FOLLOWS:
SECTION 1. Section 4011.10 of the Penal
Code is amended to read:
4011.10. (a) It is the intent of the Legislature in enacting this
section to provide county sheriffs, chiefs of police, and directors
or administrators of local detention facilities with an incentive to
not engage in practices designed to avoid payment of legitimate
emergency health care costs for the treatment or examination of
persons lawfully in their custody, and to promptly pay those costs as
requested by the provider of services. Further, it is the intent of
the Legislature to encourage county sheriffs, chiefs of police, and
directors or administrators of local detention facilities to bargain
in good faith when negotiating a service contract with hospitals
providing emergency health care services. The Legislature has set a
date of January 1, 2009, for this section to be repealed, and does
not intend to delete or extend that date if county sheriffs, chiefs
of police, and directors or administrators have not complied with the
intent of the Legislature, as expressed in this subdivision.
(b) Notwithstanding any other provision of law, a county sheriff
or , police chief or other public
agency that contracts for emergency health services, may
contract with providers of emergency health care services for
care to local law enforcement patients . Hospitals that do not
contract with the county sheriff or
, police chief , or other public agency that
contracts for emergency health care services shall provide
these services to their departments emergency
health care services to local law enforcement patients at a
rate equal to 110 percent of the hospital's actual costs according to
the most recent Hospital Annual Financial Data report issued by the
Office of Statewide Health Planning and Development, as calculated
using a cost-to-charge ratio.
(c) A county sheriff or police chief shall not request the release
of an inmate from custody for the purpose of allowing the inmate to
seek medical care at a hospital, and then immediately rearrest the
same individual upon discharge from the hospital, unless the hospital
determines this action would enable it to bill and collect from a
third-party payment source.
(d) The California Hospital Association, the University of
California, the California State Sheriffs' Association and the
California Police Chiefs' Association shall, immediately upon
enactment of this section, convene the Inmate Health Care and Medical
Provider Fair Pricing Working Group. The working group shall consist
of at least six members from the California Hospital Association and
the University of California, and six members from the California
State Sheriffs' Association and the California Police Chiefs'
Association. Each organization should give great weight and
consideration to appointing members of the working group with diverse
geographic and demographic interests. The working group shall meet
at least three times annually to identify and resolve industry issues
that create fiscal barriers to timely and affordable emergency
inmate health care. In addition, the working group shall address
issues including, but not limited to, inmates being admitted for care
and later rearrested and any other fiscal barriers to hospitals
being able to enter into fair market contracts with public agencies.
To the extent that the rate provisions of this statute result in
a disproportionate share of local law enforcement patients being
treated at any one hospital or system of hospitals, the working group
shall address this issue. No reimbursement is required under
this provision.
(e) Nothing in this section shall require or encourage a hospital
or public agency to replace any existing arrangements that any city
police chief, county sheriff, or other public agency that contracts
for emergency health services for those
departments, has with his or her health care providers
care to local law enforcement patients .
(f) An entity that provides ambulance or any other emergency or
nonemergency response service to a sheriff or police chief, and that
does not contract with their departments for that service, shall be
reimbursed for the service at the rate established by Medicare.
Neither the sheriff nor the police chief shall reimburse a provider
of any of these services that their department has not contracted
with at a rate that exceeds the provider's reasonable and allowable
costs, regardless of whether the provider is located within or
outside of California.
(g) For the purposes of this section, "reasonable and allowable
costs" shall be defined in accordance with Part 413 of Title 42 of
the Code of Federal Regulations and federal Centers for Medicare and
Medicaid Services Publication Numbers 15.1 and 15.2.
(h) For purposes of this section, in those counties in which the
sheriff does not administer a jail facility, a director or
administrator of a local department of corrections established
pursuant to Section 23013 of the Government Code is the person who
may contract for services provided to jail inmates in the facilities
he or she administers in those counties.
(i) This section is repealed as of January 1, 2009. All matter
omitted in this version of the bill appears in the bill as amended in
Assembly, 06/09/05.