Court adopts updated calculation for county's hospital provider participation fund; hospitals request 6% rate split for inpatient/outpatient

County and hospital representatives told the court that the Local Provider Participation Fund (LPPF) the county administers enables hospitals to access additional federal Medicaid dollars by contributing matching funds. Robin Oldham (Adelanto Healthcare Ventures) said Hays County has collected and sent about $170,000,000 from local hospitals to the state since 2015, which has generated more than $400,000,000 for hospitals in the area.

Oldham and hospital representatives asked the court to set a 6% assessment split between net patient revenue for inpatient services and net patient revenue for outpatient services (previously the calculation used a single net patient revenue figure). County Health Department director Matthew Gonzales said this change follows recent state guidance and is largely a technical split that should not materially change aggregate collections; staff and hospitals said they were still waiting final guidance from the Health and Human Services Commission. The court moved, seconded and adopted a resolution reflecting the updated calculation and the 6% rate as presented.