Medi-Cal: continuous eligibility: semiannual status reports.

Existing law establishes the Medi-Cal program, administered by the State Department of Health Care Services, under which basic health care services are provided to qualified low-income persons. The Medi-Cal program is partially governed and funded under federal Medicaid provisions. Existing law, until January 1, 2012, requires the department, subject to the availability of federal financial participation, to exercise a federal option to expand continuous eligibility to children 19 years of age and younger for 6 months, after which date the continuous eligibility period shall be from the date of a determination of eligibility to the earlier of either the end of a 12-month period following the eligibility determination or the date the child exceeds 19 years of age. This bill would extend the inoperative date of the above-described requirement until July 1, 2012, but would also provide that the provisions limiting continuous eligibility to 6 months shall be inoperative from the date this bill becomes effective until the date the Director of Health Care Services executes a declaration specifying that increased federal financial participation is no longer available pursuant to the federal American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009. This bill would require the department to redetermine the continuous eligibility period of any child whose continuous eligibility period was determined or redetermined pursuant to the provisions limiting continuous eligibility to 6 months during the first calendar year quarter of 2009 and would require the department to grant that child the period of continuous eligibility that existing law provides shall be available on and after January 1, 2012, retroactive to the date that the determination or redetermination under the provisions limiting continuous eligibility to 6 months was made. This bill would make other conforming changes. The California Constitution authorizes the Governor to declare a fiscal emergency and to call the Legislature into special session for that purpose. The Governor issued a proclamation declaring a fiscal emergency, and calling a special session for this purpose, on December 19, 2008. This bill would state that it addresses the fiscal emergency declared by the Governor by proclamation issued on December 19, 2008, pursuant to the California Constitution. This bill would declare that it is to take effect immediately as an urgency statute.