HB 1328

The bill creates the transportation community advisory board (TCAB) within the department of health care policy and financing (state department) and requires the state department to collaborate with the TCAB prior to establishing rules and processes for the safety and oversight of nonmedical transportation services and nonemergency medical transportation (NEMT) services. The bill states which rules for NEMT the state department, in collaboration with the TCAB, must adopt. The bill establishes how a transportation broker (broker) must roll out their implementation and requires the broker to provide all transportation providers (providers) with software, a communication toolkit, training, and technical assistance to facilitate NEMT services. The broker may require medicaid members (members) to book transportation services more than 2 days before their requested transportation date. The bill requires providers to accommodate member requests for preferred or alternate drivers when operationally feasible. The bill requires the broker, and, if there is no broker, the transportation providers to verify that individuals using the transportation services are eligible members during the scheduling of transportation services. The bill prohibits the broker from operating, owning, or controlling a provider in Colorado. The bill requires providers to provide their trip assignment rules and procedures to the state department for approval and for publication on the state department's website. The bill prohibits the state department from denying payment of services to transportation providers solely because the broker or state department determines that a member's eligibility or trip information was inaccurate. The bill requires the state department to annually audit brokers and a random group of providers and to make the audit reports publicly available. The bill requires the state department to categorize all NEMT expenditures as medical services and make changes to the NEMT program as necessary to obtain medical services federal match rates for NEMT services. The bill also eliminates the requirement that the state department provide transportation services as an administrative cost. (Note: This summary applies to this bill as introduced.)