Hospital Community Benefit

The bill makes changes to the hospital community benefit and imposes certain requirements on the public presentation of each hospital's community implementation plan. The bill requires each hospital to:

• Solicit feedback from the community during each annual presentation of its proposed community benefit implementation plan for the following year;
• Submit a report that details who attended the public meeting, the topics discussed at the meeting, and any decisions made as a result of the discussion;
• Make the report available to the public; and
• Complete a community benefit implementation plan that addresses the needs described in the reporting hospital's community health needs assessment and includes an explanation of the community served by the hospital.

The bill requires the state board to promulgate rules governing the accessibility standards for the public meetings and to implement best practices to ensure public engagement from a diverse range of populations.

The bill requires the department of health care policy and financing (state department) to:

• Include in its annual report a summary of the estimated federal and state tax exemptions made by each hospital;
• Establish a minimum annual community investment target based on certain calculation standards; and
• Set requirements for compliance, and allows the state department to take remedial action if a hospital fails to comply with the hospital community benefit requirements.
  (Note: This summary applies to this bill as introduced.)