Earlier this year, the Iowa House of Representatives introduced HF 2391, a bill aimed at regulating temporary nurse staffing agencies. Among the provisions of the bill was language authorizing the state’s health department to “establish an annual rate schedule that shall be no greater than one hundred fifty percent of the statewide average wage paid in the most recently preceding cost report year by a specific type of health care entity to a nursing services professional, within a specific nursing services professional category.”
Industry representatives led by Iowa lobbyists Bill Dix and Logan Shine; former ASA chair Bob Livonius; and Steve Heeg, chief executive officer of ASA member company Grape Tree Medical Services met with the bill’s sponsor, House Speaker Pat Grassley (R-New Hartford), to express their concerns with the legislation as written.
Although the House passed the bill, when it moved to the Senate, the group intensified its advocacy with key lawmakers. They explained the problems a rate cap system posed to the state’s long-term care community and urged lawmakers to address the nursing shortage instead of imposing rate caps that will exacerbate the shortage and harm patient care.
That hard work paid off when the workforce committee of the Iowa Senate failed to advance the bill to the Senate floor. Although it is possible the rate cap language could be included in another bill, HF 2391 is dead—thanks in large part to the Iowa group that led the opposition effort and to all the health care staffing firms that weighed in with the Senate workforce committee.
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