Florida’s Direct Payment Program a rare area of bipartisan agreement on health care

Together representing Florida’s more than 300 hospitals, we are on a mission to ensure that all Floridians – regardless of their financial status – can easily access high-quality, affordable health care that is close to home. Health care is often a partisan battle, especially when it comes to structuring and funding safety net programs like Medicaid. However, the unique bipartisan coalition supporting Florida’s Medicaid Direct Payment Program (DPP) for hospitals shows this doesn’t have to be the case. Florida’s approach can be a successful model of health care bipartisanship for the nation if we don’t allow partisanship to get in the way of access to care.

Florida's DPP application for this year has been pending before Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) for several months. Yet, CMS has seen the proposal before: CMS already considered and approved Florida's DPP application the previous two years.

We urge CMS to approve the current DPP, as some things must be kept above the partisan fray. Given their clear public stance on this issue, we should expect that CMS will cut through any bureaucratic limbo to approve the DPP as quickly as possible.

As leaders in Florida’s health care system, we know firsthand that our Medicaid patients can’t afford this bipartisan momentum to stall. President Biden and his administration have been vocal in arguing that bureaucratic red tape should never get in the way of providing care for those most in need, putting the urgent need to protect Medicaid in Florida front and center in their messaging.

The DPP is a rare area of consensus among Republican and Democratic leaders in Florida and in Washington. Governor DeSantis included the program in his budget, while mayors, members of the Legislature, and the Florida congressional delegation on both sides of the aisle have consistently supported the program. In the heat of a contentious presidential campaign, we fear that the longer it takes to approve the application, the more that the fragile trust built into this successful program could begin to dissipate.

With more than five million Floridians relying on Medicaid for preventative, primary, specialty and behavioral healthcare, the DPP gives Florida’s hospitals access to federal funds to provide care for these enrollees. These are funds that help shore up traditional Medicaid underpayment and ensure a robust provider network to deliver timely care. Under this arrangement, local governments levy a special assessment against nonpublic hospitals. The funds generated by that assessment are matched with federal funds to support the hospitals serving Medicaid enrollees. Since State Fiscal Year 2021-2022, the DPP has been a sustainable funding source that the most vulnerable Floridians can rely upon regardless of political and budget turmoil.

Millions of the most vulnerable Floridians, including children and pregnant women, extremely low income parents, frail elderly and individuals with significant disabilities depend on Medicaid for access to timely medical and behavioral health care. Vulnerable Floridians deserve to have stable health care access, and the Biden administration has a clear pathway to making sure they can have it.

Some things are more important than partisanship. The health of our most vulnerable should unquestionably be in that category.

Mary C. Mayhew is president and CEO of the Florida Hospital Association. Since joining FHA in October 2020, Mayhew has advanced policies that strengthen the pipeline of health care workers in Florida, coordinated response and recovery from natural disasters, and successfully advocated for critical health care funding for Florida’s most vulnerable individuals and families.

Justin Senior became Head of the Safety Net Hospital Alliance of Florida in January 2019. Before joining the Safety Net, Senior served as the Secretary of Florida’s Agency for Health Care Administration from October 2016 to January 2019, and Florida Medicaid Director prior to that from 2011 — overseeing the procurement, implementation and operation of Florida’s Statewide Medicaid Managed Care program.

Donald Lee is the president of Florida Essential Health Care Partnerships, an association where non-public hospitals come together to advocate for and educate on sound Medicaid policies.  Lee spent 23 years as the executive director of an association of county governments in Texas after 10 years working in the Office of the Harris County Judge, the elected leader of the county. Lee graduated from the University of Houston, Downtown.

This article originally appeared on Fort Myers News-Press: Florida’s Direct Payment Program a rare area of bipartisan agreement on health care