BILL ANALYSIS

C.S.H.B. 3408

By: Gonzales

Public Health

Committee Report (Substituted)

BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE

Currently, the Health and Safety Code authorizes counties to provide certain basic health care services to indigent residents.  However, Hidalgo County clinics experience a number of visits from individuals who are not classified as indigent, but who do not have other health care options.  Many of these visits occur in winter, among Texans who reside in the state for only part of the year.  In such situations, clinics are forced to turn people away without treatment.

C.S.H.B. 3408 authorizes a county to provide health care services to a person in the county regardless of the person's income and to provide funding for such services from the county treasury.

RULEMAKING AUTHORITY

It is the committee's opinion that this bill does not expressly grant any additional rulemaking authority to a state officer, department, agency, or institution.

ANALYSIS

C.S.H.B. 3408 amends the Health and Safety Code to authorize a county to provide health care services to a person in the county regardless of the person's income as the county determines necessary to protect the public health, safety, and welfare. The bill authorizes the county to provide funding for the health care services from the county treasury and establish standards and application, documentation, and verification procedures for determining a person's eligibility to receive those services.

EFFECTIVE DATE

On passage, or, if the act does not receive the necessary vote, the act takes effect September 1, 2009.

COMPARISON OF ORIGINAL AND SUBSTITUTE

C.S.H.B. 3408 adds provisions not in the original to authorize a county to provide health care services to a person in the county regardless of the person's income, and as necessary to protect the public health and welfare, and authorizes the county to establish standards and procedures to determine a person's eligibility to receive such services. The substitute removes provisions in the original that expand the list of basic health care services a county is required to provide under the Indigent Health Care and Treatment Act and that require a county to notify the Department of State Health Services of the county's intent to provide such expanded services. The substitute restores provisions repealed in the original relating to optional health care services under the act.