Sen. Ileana Garcia

Health Care Coverage; Establishing the Joint Legislative Committee on Medicaid Oversight for specified purposes; revising encounter data reporting requirements for prepaid Medicaid plans; requiring managed care plans to report to the agency and the Office of Insurance Regulation the existence of and specified details relating to certain affiliations by a specified date and annually thereafter; revising requirements for contracts between a pharmacy benefit manager and a participating pharmacy; revising and specifying additional practices pharmacy benefit managers are prohibited from engaging in, etc.

Agency for Persons with Disabilities; Requiring level 2 employment screening for all employees of residential facilities and adult day training programs; providing background screening requirements for such employees; requiring the agency to solicit input and conduct publicly noticed hearings for a specified purpose in each service region; requiring the agency to use certain information to identify certain core competencies and performance metrics and make recommendations for standardizing assessments, etc.

Specific Medical Diagnoses in Child Protective Investigations; Providing an exception to the requirement that the Department of Children and Families immediately forward certain allegations to a law enforcement agency; requiring a child protective investigator to inform the subject of an investigation of a certain duty; requiring Child Protection Teams to consult with a licensed physician or advanced practice registered nurse with specified pediatric experience when evaluating certain reports; authorizing a parent or legal custodian of a child who is the subject of certain orders to request specified medical examinations of the child within a specified timeframe, etc.

Student Health and Safety; Revising Department of Health responsibilities for educational programs concerning epilepsy; revising the definition of the term “school”; revising requirements for a student’s individualized seizure action plan; revising the list of which employees must complete training in the care of students with epilepsy and seizure disorders; requiring the Department of Education to identify for a specified purpose posters that meet certain requirements, etc.

Young Adult Housing Support; Requiring each Florida College System institution and state university to develop plans for prioritizing the placement of certain students; requiring the Department of Children and Families, community-based care lead agencies, and housing authorities to take any action required by the United States Department of Housing and Urban Development to administer the federal Foster Youth to Independence initiative and other federal programs and vouchers; requiring the Office of Program Policy Analysis and Government Accountability (OPPAGA) to conduct a study of the barriers to housing faced by young adults who are homeless or were formerly in foster care, etc.

Mental Health; Citing this act as the “Tristin Murphy Act”; expanding the programs and diversion initiatives supported by implementation or expansion grants to include training for 911 public safety telecommunicators and emergency medical technicians for certain purposes and to include veterans treatment court programs; encouraging communities to apply for specified grants to establish misdemeanor or ordinance violation mental health diversion programs; encouraging communities to apply for specified grants to establish pretrial felony mental health diversion programs; expanding eligibility for the Forensic Hospital Diversion Pilot Program to include Hillsborough County, etc. APPROPRIATION: $794,880

Geoengineering and Weather Modification Activities; Repealing provisions relating to the definitions, purpose, licensing requirements, applications, proof of financial responsibility requirements, license issuance and discipline provisions, publication of notice of intention to operate requirements, required contents of the notice of intention, publication of the notice of intention requirements, proof of publication requirements, record and reports of operations requirements, provision of emergency licenses, and suspension or revocation of licenses, respectively, of the weather modification law; prohibiting certain acts intended to affect the temperature, the weather, or the intensity of sunlight within the atmosphere of this state; requiring an operator of public infrastructure to report certain information monthly to the Department of Transportation, etc.

Foreclosure Procedures; Specifying mandatory requirements for foreclosure sales; requiring that a request to deviate from certain procedures be in a separate pleading; requiring courts to set forth any deviations in writing in the final judgement of foreclosure or other order, etc.

Designation of the State Birds; Designating the American flamingo as the official state bird and the Florida scrub-jay as the official state songbird; providing that such designations supersede the designation of the mockingbird as the official Florida state bird, etc.

Patient Protection; Citing this act as the "Florida Patient Protection Act"; requiring health care facilities to implement staffing plans that comply with specified minimum staffing levels for direct care registered nurses; specifying minimum staffing levels for direct care registered nurses based on the hospital or clinical unit setting; prohibiting health care facilities from using video cameras or monitors as a substitute for direct observation and assessment by a direct care registered nurse; providing whistle-blower protections; prohibiting health care facilities from discriminating or retaliating against persons who, in good faith, initiate, file, or cooperate in an administrative or civil action against the facility, etc.