Hospice licensure: moratorium on new licenses.

The California Hospice Licensure Act of 1990 requires a person, political subdivision of the state, or other governmental agency to obtain a license from the State Department of Public Health to provide hospice services to an individual who is experiencing the last phase of life due to a terminal disease, as defined, and their family, except as provided. The act also provides for the renewal of a license. The act imposes criminal penalties on any person who violates any provision of the act or any rule or regulation promulgated under the act. This bill would impose, beginning on January 1, 2022, a moratorium on the department issuing a new license to provide hospice services, unless the department makes a written finding that an applicant for a new license, or with a license application pending on January 1, 2022, has shown a demonstrable need for hospice services in the area where the applicant proposes to operate based on the concentration of all existing hospice services in that area. The moratorium would end either 365 days from the date that the California State Auditor publishes a report on hospice licensure or when these provisions are repealed on January 1, 2027, whichever is soonest. The bill would prohibit these provisions from being deemed to modify the authority of the department to renew a license pursuant to the act.