LEGISLATIVE BUDGET BOARD Austin, Texas FISCAL NOTE, 77th Regular Session April 2, 2001 TO: Honorable Rene Oliveira, Chair, House Committee on Ways & Means FROM: John Keel, Director, Legislative Budget Board IN RE: HB2456 by Gray (Relating to the creation of a pilot program to provide indigent health care services funded by a county sales and use tax.), As Introduced ************************************************************************** * No fiscal implication to the State is anticipated. * ************************************************************************** The bill would amend Chapter 324 of the Tax Code to allow counties to adopt a pilot program to provide indigent health care services and to impose a sales and use tax to fund those services. The rate of the sales and use tax could not exceed 1 percent. The commissioners court of a county adopting such a pilot program could adopt guidelines specifying that the program should provide secondary or tertiary care services for county residents having no health insurance and living at or below 100 percent of the federal poverty level, and primary care services for county residents living at or below 200 percent of the federal poverty level. The guidelines would also specify that the benefits provided under the program would include primary medical services as outlined in the Indigent Health Care Act and secondary or tertiary care services as outlined in the state medical assistance program in Chapter 32 of the Human Resources Code. The bill would provide that a sales and use tax adopted to fund a pilot program could result in the combined rate of all sales and use taxes imposed by political subdivisions of this state having territory in the county exceeding 2 percent. A pilot program would have a sunset date six years from the date the program first provided services to county residents, unless otherwise authorized by the voters of the county in an election. The State Auditor would have the right to review any pilot program and report the results to the Legislature. The bill would take effect immediately upon enactment, assuming that it received the requisite two-thirds majority votes in both houses of the Legislature. Otherwise, it would take effect September 1, 2001. Local Government Impact Because a county would be allowed to impose a sales and use tax to recover the costs of the pilot program, no significant fiscal impact to units of local government is anticipated. Source Agencies: 304 Comptroller of Public Accounts LBB Staff: JK, SD, DB