IDPH-MEDICAID PENALTY PAYMENTS

Amends the Medical Assistance Article of the Illinois Public Aid Code. Provides that in the event hospitals are deemed not to have reached the $40,000,000 in reduced expenditures as set forth under the Code, then for any individual hospital not meeting its established threshold, the Department of Public Health shall assess a penalty payment equal to one-half the amount of the differential between the hospital's actual liability related to readmissions and that of the threshold amount. Provides that these penalty payments shall be deposited into the Healthcare Provider Relief Fund and that in the event the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services finds that the penalty payments are an impermissible healthcare-related tax, the penalty payments shall be doubled. Further provides that the expenditures are to be defined as General Revenue Fund-based expenditures. Effective immediately.