Bill > S589

This bill aims to improve the quality, affordability, and accessibility of primary and preventive healthcare, reduce health disparities, and boost economic growth by establishing a State Health Service Corps to connect community health centers with healthcare professionals and support community-based care, creating an Office of State Health Policy for primary care development and coordination, and establishing two trust funds: the Essential Community Health Center Trust Fund for payments to community health centers and the Commonwealth Community Health Center Innovation and Improvement Fund for grants and low-interest loans for technology, capital projects, and equipment upgrades. It also introduces a Massachusetts community health center new markets tax credit to incentivize investments in community health centers, allows for training programs for community health center employees, and mandates that community health centers receive at least 100% of Medicare rates for medical services and reasonable costs for other services, with annual increases and wrap-around reimbursement for case management, graduate medical education, social services, smoking cessation, and diabetes care, while also ensuring participating community health centers in global payment projects receive at least 125% of the Medicare rate. Furthermore, the bill establishes a workforce development task force to address primary care clinician shortages, encourages partnerships for loan repayment programs, streamlines audits for community health centers, exempts them from state fees, and ensures their role in emergency preparedness and resource allocation. Finally, it mandates that community health centers be reimbursed for 100% of reasonable costs for patients under specific chapters of the General Laws and establishes a Medicaid and Health Care Reform FMAP Trust Fund to support health insurance coverage for low-income residents and improve Medicaid reimbursement to healthcare providers.