Health and Human Services Commission

Most of the savings would be achieved by reducing contractor hours. Capital projects affected include those supporting medical transportation, accessibility and removable data encryption.

The refugee program has state funding set aside in case the state must repay the federal government for refugee clients later found to be ineligible for services provided with federal funds. In recent years, the state has had minimal utilization of this funding. Federal funds supporting the program were excluded from reductions. In the event that an ineligible refugee receives services, general revenue would have to redirected from elsewhere in the agency.

Savings are anticipated from reducing travel, cutting back on trainings or seminars for staff, and canceling subscriptions and reference materials. There also would be savings from additional efforts to reduce the costs of utilities and consumables.

Salary savings are derived from actual vacancies and savings from filling positions at lower salaries than the position was budgeted for during the first four months of FY 2010. Also includes anticipated savings from a temporary hiring freeze on certain positions implemented January 20, 2010.

The items captures savings where contracts rates and payments came in lower than expected, or the contract start date was later than expected. Contracts for studies, evaluations, and certain pilots associated with the Frew settlement account for $12.7 million of the GR savings. Other contracted functions affected by this option include enhanced criminal history background checks for Medicaid providers, document imaging, and business continuity functions in the event of disasters.

HHSC received funding to implement a new program that would allow families to buy into Medicaid coverage to cover the critical health needs of their children. The program implementation has been experiencing delays and will not meet the original start date of September 1, 2010 as agency staff is still working out the program details with the federal government and there are extensive technology implications. The program will be implemented as soon as technically feasible but no later than January 1, 2011, subject to federal approval. 

Implementing the National Corrective Coding Initiative (NCCI) would standardize medical coding rules to align more closely Medicaid claim adjudication rules with those enforced by Medicare and private sector payers. 

Additional revenue related to charging for use of interactive eligibility request that non-provider third-party Value Added Networks use. This is already happening for single transactions ($0.075) but this item expands to batch request. This would primarily impact companies who work for large providers and search for retroactive payers. 

Adjust rates to align with incurred cost in Medicaid program. Current cost reports indicate costs are consistently below established rates.