Representative Steven Howitt supports $693 million supplemental budget

Boston – State Representative Steven Howitt (R-Seekonk) recently supported a $693 million supplemental budget for Fiscal Year 2023, which contains funding to assist struggling hospitals, along with temporary provisions to help ease the school nurse shortage.

The supplemental budget, filed as House Bill 3982, was given initial approval by the House of Representatives on a vote of 154-0 on July 13. The bill now moves to the Senate for its consideration.

House Bill 3982 provides $180 million to assist “fiscally strained” hospitals. According to Representative Howitt, $91.4 million will be set aside for hospitals that are eligible for a Medicaid supplemental payment, $58.5 million for non-profit and municipal acute care hospitals with a high percentage of Medicaid patients, and $30 million for acute care hospitals “that demonstrate significant financial need.”

The House bill also proposes temporary changes to the hiring process for school nurses in calendar years 2023 and 2024. Specifically, it would allow the Commissioner of Education to issue a temporary certificate to a registered nurse who does not meet the certification testing requirements but is authorized to practice as a registered nurse in Massachusetts and has been employed as a registered nurse for at least three years.

Representative Howitt noted that House Bill 3982 includes a $75 million reserve account to reimburse qualifying school districts for “extraordinary relief” from out of district special education placement costs. The list of communities that would be eligible for relief based on the formula included in the bill has yet to be determined. However, the bill does specifically exclude from eligibility those school districts that still have unspent Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief (ESSER) money received under the federal Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act, the Coronavirus Response and Relief Supplemental Appropriations Act, the American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA), or any other federal act that provided COVID-19 response funds.

House Bill 3982 would also:

• increase the annual cap on tax credits authorized under the Housing Development Incentive Program (HDIP) from $10 million to $57 million in calendar year 2023, with any funding remaining at the end of 2023 to be carried over to subsequent years and the annual cap to be set at $30 million beginning on January 1, 2024;
• transfer $100 million to the state’s Pension Liability Fund;
• fund $226.2 million worth of collective bargaining agreements;
• extend simulcast racing authorization by five years, to expire on July 31, 2028;
• authorize the state’s Department of Public Utilities to allow electric distribution companies to recover expenditures and payments associated with the cost increases resulting from delays in the planned transmission line carrying hydroelectricity from Quebec;
• create a $60.3 million payroll reserve for the Department of Transitional Assistance’s caseworkers and staff serving applicants and clients of the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), Transitional Aid to Families with Dependent Children (TAFDC), and Emergency Aid to the Elderly, Disabled, and Children (EAEDC) program; and
• appropriate $506,140 for costs incurred by the Commonwealth through its interstate compacts for flood control.