Reimbursement of emergency services under the Medical Assistance program when a patient is not transported; emergency medical services education; tuition and materials reimbursement for emergency medical responders and emergency medical services practitioners; reporting on changes to the scope of practice of emergency medical responders and emergency medical services practitioners; a levy limit exemption for regional emergency medical systems; eligible expenses of fire dues program; a live 911 pilot program; eligibility for the expenditure restraint incentive program; and making an appropriation. (FE)

Tuition and materials costs for emergency medical responders and emergency medical services practitioners The bill requires the Higher Educational Aids Board to develop a program to reimburse individuals or their employers for the cost of tuition and materials necessary for the individual to qualify for initial certification or initial licensure as an emergency medical responder or an emergency medical services practitioner. To be eligible for reimbursement for the costs necessary to qualify for an initial certification or license, the individual must satisfactorily complete any required course of instruction, pass any required examination, satisfy any further requirement established by HEAB, and receive a certification or license from DHS.

Report on scope of practice changes The bill requires the Emergency Medical Services Board, in consultation with DHS and the Technical College System Board, to annually submit a report to the legislature on national changes to the scope of practice of emergency medical responders, emergency medical services practitioners, or any equivalent practitioners in other jurisdictions and how those scope of practice changes may affect training for emergency medical responders and emergency medical services practitioners in this state.

Levy limit exception Generally, under current law, local levy limits are applied to the property tax levies that are imposed by political subdivisions. A political subdivision may not increase its levy by a percentage that exceeds its “valuation factor," which is the greater of 0 percent or the percentage change in the political subdivision's equalized value due to new construction, less improvements removed. Current law also contains a number of exceptions to the levy limit, such as amounts a county levies for a countywide emergency medical system, for a county children with disabilities education board, and for certain bridge and culvert construction and repair. The bill creates an additional exception to local levy limits. Under the bill, the amounts a city, village, or town levies for a regional emergency medical system are exempt. Under the bill, “regional” refers to an area consisting of at least 232 square miles or including at least eight municipalities.

Eligible expenses of fire dues program The bill allows cities, villages, and towns to spend fire dues payments received from the Department of Safety and Professional Services on purchasing emergency medical services equipment and training emergency medical responders and emergency medical services practitioners. Under current law, eligible cities, villages, and towns receive fire dues payments from DSPS, which are funded from assessments equal to 2 percent of premiums for private fire insurance and 2 percent of premiums paid to the state fire fund for the insurance of certain local government property. Current law requires fire dues payments to be spent on purchasing fire protection equipment, providing fire inspection and public education, training fire fighters and fire inspectors, and funding fire fighters' pension funds or other special funds benefiting disabled or aged fire fighters.

Live 911 pilot program The bill directs the Department of Military Affairs to distribute moneys through grants to enable real-time video and multimedia communications between public safety answering points and individuals who call for emergency services.

Further, the bill requires DMA to annually report to the legislature on the performance of the pilot program, including information on outcomes from the pilot program, the number of responses from dispatch that were altered due to increased information from the pilot program, and any cost savings associated with the pilot program. The bill does not require DMA to submit a report to the legislature in any year that DMA does not award any moneys through grants for the live 911 pilot program.

Expenditure restraint incentive program The bill excludes the following from being considered in determining eligibility for an expenditure restraint incentive program payment: 1) amounts levied for a regional emergency medical system that are exempt from local levy limits; and 2) fee increases apportioned to each municipality operating a joint fire department or joint emergency medical services district that are exempt from local levy limits. Under current law, a municipality is eligible to receive an expenditure restraint incentive program payment if its property tax levy is greater than 5 mills and if the annual increase in its municipal budget, subject to certain exceptions, is less than the sum of factors based on inflation and the increased value of property in the municipality as a result of new construction.