Budget Amendment ID: FY2021-S4-219
EHS 219
State Action for Public Health Excellence (SAPHE) cost analysis
Ms. Comerford, Mr. Cyr, Ms. Rausch, Messrs. Finegold, O'Connor, Welch and Lesser, Ms. Chang-Diaz, Ms. Moran, Messrs. Tarr and Timilty moved that the proposed new text be amended by adding the following section:-
SECTION XX. (a) For the purposes of this section, the term “board of health” shall include any body politic or political subdivision of the commonwealth that acts as a board of health, public health commission or a health department for a municipality; provided however, that “board of health” shall include, but not be limited to, municipal boards of health, regional health districts established under section 27B of chapter 111 of the General Laws and boards of health that share services pursuant to section 4A of chapter 40 of the General Laws.
(b) The department of public health, in consultation with municipalities and other stakeholders, including, but not limited to, members of the Special Commission on Local and Regional and Public Health, shall establish a model uniform set of minimum local public health performance standards to ensure that every resident of the commonwealth has access to a core set of public health protections including, but not limited to, communicable disease control, public health nursing services, food and water protection, chronic disease and injury prevention, environmental public health, maternal, child and family health and access to and linkage with clinical care. The standards shall take into account recommendations of the special commission, national public health standards and applicable laws and regulations. The department shall hold at least five regional hearings throughout the commonwealth before publishing such model performance standards.
(c) The local public health performance standards shall include: (1) workforce education, training, and credentialing standards; (2) standards for contributing data to a unified standard public health reporting system; and (3) minimum performance standards for inspections, communicable disease investigation and reporting, permitting and other local public health responsibilities as required under laws and regulations.
(d) The department shall establish an estimated statewide sustainable local public health cost analysis, determined as the sum of (1) estimated state supplemental funding to local boards of health necessary to meet the standards established in this section, provided that such funding estimate shall use a formula based on population, relative equalized valuations, level of cross-jurisdictional sharing and sociodemographic data, (2) estimated funding needed for the department of public health and the department of environmental protection to offer training and technical assistance for local public health staff to support them in obtaining credentials and capabilities required under the standards, (3) estimated funding and timeline needed to establish and maintain a uniform data collection and reporting system available to all boards of health, provided that such system shall support data collection and reporting related to standard responsibilities of boards of health, including inspections, code enforcement, communicable disease management, and local regulations.
(e) The department shall provide a report on the standards and the estimated statewide sustainable local public health cost analysis to the joint committee on public health, the house committee on ways and means, and the senate committee on ways and means no later than June 30, 2021. The department may use not more than $100,000 made available by item 4510-0100 for the state action for public health excellence program to implement this section.
(f) The standards required by this section shall not be enforceable if sufficient funds, as determined by the department under subsection (d), are not made available to local boards of health and the department.