WiHPCA News

In early December, the Wisconsin Department of Safety and Professional Services (DSPS) unveiled a new streamlined Medicaid process for new clinicians.  In particular, the process captures data that medical professionals enter into the DSPS system when applying for an initial medical credential and automatically and securely imports that into the system that registers and validates new clinicians with the state’s Medicaid program.  Prior to this process change, new clinicians would have to manually enter required information in order to register as a Medicaid provider – much of which is duplicative to what is manually entered when applying for an initial health care credential. 

On December 4, 2024, Senate Majority Leader Devin LeMahieu (R-Oostburg) and Senate Democratic Leader Dianne Hesselbein (D-Middleton) announced the members of the powerful budget-writing Joint Committee on Finance for the 2025-2026 legislative session.

The following Republican senators will be members of this committee:

• Senator Howard Marklein (R-Spring Green), Co-Chair
• Senator Patrick Testin (R-Stevens Point), Vice Chair
• Senator Eric Wimberger (R-Green Bay)
• Senator Julian Bradley (R-New Berlin)*
• Senator Romaine Quinn (R-Cameron)*
• Senator Rob Stafsholt (R-New Richmond)*

The following Democratic senators will be members of this committee:

• Senator LaTonya Johnson (D-Milwaukee), Ranking Member
• Senator Kelda Roys (D-Madison)

* Indicates new committee member.

On December 11, Assembly Speaker Robin Vos (R-Rochester) announced the following Republican representatives will take the following positions on this committee:

• Representative Mark Born (R-Beaver Dam), Co-Chair
• Representative Tony Kurtz (R-Wonewoc), Vice Chair

On December 18, Assembly Speaker Robin Vos (R-Rochester) announced the following Republican representative will join this committee:

• Representative Karen Hurd (R-Withee)

NOTE:  As of December 18, 2024, Assembly Republican and Democratic leaders have not yet announced their remaining members of the Joint Committee on Finance.

The Wisconsin Department of Health Services (DHS) has announced that the agency will hold its second annual Wisconsin Harm Reduction Conference at the Chula Vista Resort in the Wisconsin Dells on July 16-17 of next year.  Various health professionals are invited to attend, including local and tribal health department staff, first responders, AIDS/HIV care workers, among others.  Those who are interested may also attend virtually. 

For more information on this conference, please go to the DHS website. 

In recent weeks, DHS launched a new online system to help alert health professionals regarding overdoses in our state’s communities.  The new system is called the Wisconsin Suspected Overdose Alerts for Rapid Response (WiSOARR).  According to the DHS website, “Authorized access to WiSOARR is available to professionals at approved organizations providing services across the continuum of care in substance use, from primary prevention to treatment and harm reduction.”

If you would like to obtain access to WiSOARR for your organization, or would like more information about this system, please visit the DHS website. 

Once again this year, Governor Evers has proclaimed November Hospice and Palliative Care month! Check out the Proclamation HERE.

WiHPCA’s Legislative Committee recently approved the association’s policy agenda for the 2025-2026 state legislative session.  The priorities are as follows:

• Promote public awareness and increase policy influence of palliative care, including the creation of a state palliative care advisory council.  This will greatly help with educating the general public as to the strong value of palliative care and, ultimately, allow more Wisconsinites who need this type of specialized care to receive treatment.

• Require all Wisconsin health plans who cover hospice services to pay hospices no less than published CMS hospice rates.  This will help with employee recruitment and retention by ensuring that the hospice workforce receives a competitive wage. 

The WiHPCA-WiAHC Joint Fall Conference was a great event, one that provided hospice and home health care professionals with fantastic educational content and networking opportunities. Public policy and legislative issues were also a topic of discussion at the conference, which was sparked by State Representative Dave Maxey (R-New Berlin) who helped open the conference that was held near his district in Brookfield, WI. In addition to providing brief comments before the full conference, Rep. Maxey had a long discission with several members regarding the policies important to both WiHPCA and WiAHC. Our Government Affairs Team will certainly be working with Rep. Maxey during the 2025-26 legislative session.

The results of the November 5 general election once again show how Wisconsin is indeed a purple state.  While Wisconsinites narrowly voted to elect former President Donald Trump, a Republican, to the Presidency, our state’s voters also re-elected Democrat Tammy Baldwin to the U.S. Senate.  This is a situation that has not occurred in Wisconsin in over half a century. 

In the State Assembly and Senate, the current Republican majorities lost a total of 14 seats – 10 in the Assembly and 4 in the Senate.  It was expected that Republicans would lose seats in both chambers of the Legislature, but not enough to lose the majority – which is what happened.  This was due to the fact that new legislative districts were put in place earlier this year. 

For a full list of newly-elected state legislators, including photos and a very brief background on each individual, please visit the WisPolitics website. 

The following are highlights from the two federal races of note – the race for President and for U.S. Senate:

President

In a race that many observers thought might take several days to finalize, former President Donald Trump prevailed in the nationwide electoral college count over incumbent Vice President Kamala Harris.  The Wisconsin results are as follows:

• Former President Donald Trump (R):  49.7% 
• Vice President Kamala Harris (D):  48.8%

U.S. Senate

For much of 2024, incumbent U.S. Senator Tammy Baldwin held a 5-10% lead over challenger Eric Hovde in the election polls.  As the November election got closer, the polls tightened considerably.  The results are as follows:

• U.S. Senator Tammy Baldwin (D):  49.4%
• Eric Hovde (R):  48.5%

State Assembly

Currently, there is a 64-34 Republican majority in the state Assembly, with one vacant seat in a majority Democratic district in the city of Milwaukee.  All 99 Assembly seats were up for election this year. 

On Election Day, Republicans won 54 Assembly races, which gives them the majority for the 2025-2026 legislative session.  Assembly Republicans now will have 10 fewer seats than they did during the 2023-2024 legislative session.  Democrats won 45 Assembly races. 

State Senate

At this time, Republicans have a supermajority in the state Senate, with 22 senators, while Democrats have 10 senators, with one vacant seat in a heavily Democratic district in the city of Milwaukee.  Roughly half of the senate seats are up for election every two years.  As such, 16 of the 33 Senate seats were up for election this year. 

The final result in the Senate is that Senate Republicans lost 4 Senate seats, bringing their majority down from 22 seats to 18 seats for the 2025-2026 legislative session.  Democrats will have 14 seats in the Senate. 

The following incumbent senators lost their bid for re-election: 

Senate District 8 – Northern Milwaukee Suburbs

• Jodi Habush Sinykin (D):  50.8%
• Sen. Duey Stroebel (R):  49.3%

Senate District 8 – Southcentral Wisconsin North of Madison (and a portion of Madison)

• Sarah Keyeski (D):  51.1%
• Sen. Joan Ballweg (R):  48.9%

In early November, Republicans and Democrats started to vote internally on their respective leadership teams.  The following are the newly selected leaders, as of November 14:

Senate Republicans

• Senate Majority Leader – Devin LeMahieu (R-Oostburg)
• Senate President – Mary Felzkowski (R-Tomahawk)
• • She is new in this role. 
• Senate Assistant Majority Leader – Dan Feyen (R-Fond du Lac)
• Senate President Pro Tempore – Patrick Testin (R-Stevens Point)
• Senate Republican Caucus Char – Van Wanggaard (R-Racine)
• Senate Republican Caucus Vice-Chair Rachel Cabral-Guevara (R-Appleton)
• • She is new to this role. 

Senate Democrats

• Senate Minority Leader – Dianne Hesselbein (D-Middleton)
• Senate Assistant Minority Leader – Jeff Smith (D-Eau Claire)
• Senate Minority Caucus Chair – Mark Spreitzer (D-Beloit)
• • He is new in this role. 
• Senate Minority Vice Caucus Chair – Dora Drake (D-Milwaukee)
• • She is new in this role. 

Assembly Republicans

• Assembly Speaker – Robin Vos (R-Rochester)
• Assembly Majority Leader – Tyler August (R-Walworth)
• Assembly Assistant Majority Leader – Scott Krug (R-Nekoosa)
• • He is new in this role. 
• Assembly Speaker Pro Tempore – Kevin Peterson (R-Waupaca)
• Assembly Majority Caucus Chair – Rob Summerfield (R-Bloomer)
• Assembly Majority Caucus Vice Chair – Cindi Duchow (R-Delafield)
• Assembly Majority Caucus Secretary – Nancy VanderMeer (R-Tomah)
• Assembly Majority Caucus Sergeant at Arms – Treig Pronschinske (R-Mondovi)

Assembly Democrats

·        Assembly Minority Leader – Rep. Greta Neubauer (D-Racine)

·        Assembly Assistant Minority Leader – Rep. Kaylan Haywood (D-Milwaukee)

·        Assembly Minority Caucus Chair – Lisa Subek (D-Madison)

·        Assembly Minority Caucus Vice-Chair – Rep. Clinton Anderson (D-Beloit)

·        Assembly Minority Caucus Secretary – Rep. Mike Bare (D-Verona)

·        Assembly Minority Caucus Sergeant at Arms – Rep. Jodi Emerson (D-Eau Claire)

WiHPCA is happy to remind members about and provide links to the latest legislative and regulatory articles and information on the hospice industry from Hospice News and other publications:

·       House Passes Gerald’s Law to Establish Burial Benefits for Veterans in Hospice

Hospice News – By Jim Parker | Nov. 19, 2024

 

The U.S. House of Representatives has passed Gerald’s Law, which would close a hospice-related loophole in veterans’ benefits. When eligible veterans die, many of their families are entitled to a financial benefit from the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) to defray some of the costs of funerals and cremation or burial. However, when a veteran transitions from a VA facility to hospice, they lose access to that benefit. This is even the case when hospice care is provided by the VA itself. Read more...

·       Medicare Made $190M in Improper Hospice Payments to Hospitals

Hospice News – By Jim Parker | Nov. 19, 2024

 

Medicare made an estimated $190 million in improper payments to acute-care hospitals for outpatient hospice services between 2017 and 2021. An audit by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Office of the Inspector General (OIG) set out to determine whether Medicare payments to acute-care hospitals for outpatient services provided to hospice enrollees complied with Medicare requirements. OIG found that 70% of those payments were not compliant. Read more...

·       Hospices Leaders: ‘Vigilant’ Compliance Pivotal in MAC Auditing Climate

Hospice News – By Holly Vossel| Nov. 18, 2024

 

The auditing environment has heated up in the hospice industry, with inconsistencies reportedly proliferating among the various types of regulatory enforcement activity — particularly those performed by Medicare Administrative Contractors (MACs). The issue has some hospice providers delving deeper into a range of compliance strategies. Read more...

·       CMS Ramps Up Efforts to Root Out ‘Door Knocker’ Hospice Schemes

Hospice News – By Holly Vossel| Nov. 15, 2024

 

The U.S. Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) recently elaborated on its plans to expand public education campaigns designed to help protect hospice beneficiaries from fraudulent actors in the space. Program integrity concerns have heated up in the hospice industry. Swarms of new hospices have emerged in certain regions in recent years, with some unscrupulous operators receiving federal funding through illegitimate business practices. Read more...

Hospice News, which is part of the Aging Media Network, is a leading source for news and information covering the hospice industry.