Please contact your legislators to support EMS in NYS. There are 18 days left in this legislative session!
Counties, Legislators, and Emergency Medical Service Professionals Unveil Legislative Package to ‘Rescue EMS’
https://www.nysac.org/news/posts/counties-legislators-unveil-legislative-package-to-rescue-ems/
The “Rescue EMS” package includes the following legislation:
- 4020-B (Mayer) / A.3392-B (Otis) – This comprehensive legislative package allows special taxing districts to be created to fund EMS services. In addition, this legislation would recognize EMS as an essential service and provide reforms to the Emergency Medical Services Council.
- 5000 (May) / A.4077 (Lupardo) – This legislation would remove EMS services from the real property tax cap, which would allow local municipalities to expand and better support their local EMS services. This measure is needed in the short-term while other solutions are being discussed.
- Authorization of Reimbursement for Treatment in Place and Transportation to Alternative Destinations (Hinchey / Kelles to introduce) – Effectively immediately, NYS should establish a mechanism within the Medicaid Fee Schedule for Ground Ambulance Services to provide reimbursement to emergency medical service agencies for providing emergency medical care to Medicaid enrollees without transporting them from the location where medical care was administered to the beneficiary. Reimbursements shall be made when emergency medical care is provided to a Medicaid enrollee after a call, text, or other request for emergency medical care.
- 6630 (Mannion) / A.6274 (Barrett) – This legislation allows volunteer firefighters and ambulance workers to claim both state income and local property tax credits.
- 7286 (Martinez) / A.7524 (Thiele) – This legislation increases the volunteer firefighters’ and ambulance workers’ personal income tax credit from $200 to $800 for eligible individuals and from $400 to $1,600 for eligible married joint filers.
- 231 of 2021 (Gottfried) – (MoA Hevesi to introduce) – This bill would create a methodology for ambulance reimbursement under Medicaid that more closely approximates the cost of providing the service. Ambulances are required by law to pick everyone up, including Medicaid patients. It is unfair to require these ambulance companies to accept Medicaid patients and then not fairly reimburse them for the costs of providing services to these patients.