Get Full Government Meeting Transcripts, Videos, & Alerts Forever!
Get email alerts on the Priority Admissions Capacity topic
No spam. Unsubscribe anytime.
Panel recommends capacity investments and two‑year extension of 48‑hour sunset; committee lays over priority admissions bill
Summary
A legislative review panel urged funding to expand state and community behavioral‑health capacity, recommended continuing the medically‑appropriate‑bed standard and proposed a public dashboard. Lawmakers laid over House File 2,586, the priority‑admissions task force bill, for possible inclusion.
A legislatively convened priority admissions review panel urged the Minnesota Legislature on March 25 to fund increased bed capacity, expand community services and continue data monitoring while suspending a strict 48‑hour admission expectation for an additional two years.
Doctor Kylie Ann Stephens, executive medical director for the Department of Human Services’ Direct Care and Treatment (DCT) division, told the House Human Services Finance and Policy Committee the panel evaluated whether the state’s 48‑hour requirement for admitting certain individuals from jails remains workable. “Minnesota is the only state that requires admission within 48 hours,” Stephens said in committee testimony, citing a national review the panel commissioned.
The review panel — co‑chaired by former DHS commissioner Jody Harpstead and Attorney General Keith Ellison and including county, hospital, law‑enforcement and advocacy representatives — unanimously endorsed six recommendations: expand DCT capacity (including funding a 50‑bed addition on the Anoka Metro Regional Treatment Center campus), strengthen community‑based services and mobile crisis teams, continue a pilot to pay for long‑acting injectable antipsychotics in jails, increase transparency with a public dashboard of referral and admissions data, continue the current “medically appropriate bed” statutory language for two more years, and sustain limited financial relief for counties in some “does not meet criteria” (DNMC) cases.
Representative Zack Frederick carried House File 2,586, a bill that reflects the panel’s recommendations and that would extend the sunset suspension of the 48‑hour timeline and the county cost‑share for DNMC payments for two years while the state invests in capacity. The committee laid the bill over for possible inclusion; lawmakers did not take a final vote on its substantive provisions.
Panel members and witnesses described worsening demand over the past decade. Dr. Stephens showed DCT data indicating that DCT admitted 48 priority patients in the law’s first year but roughly 424 last year, and that civil commitments increased by about 36%. Panel members also pointed to lengthy waits for forensic inpatient care: DCT’s Forensic Mental Health Program wait times were described in the hearing as being on the order of hundreds of days in some programs, with the speaker citing an example near 300 days.
Hospital representatives and community providers urged targeted exceptions and capacity support. Danny Ackert of the Minnesota Hospital Association told the committee extending a limited exception that prioritizes up to 10 civilly committed community‑hospital patients per fiscal year to DCT beds reduces pressure on community hospitals and helps free up bed space. “Think about the 10 patients — not only if that exception is extended, they get better services, but then people in your districts… it’s 10 to 100 almost,” Ackert testified.
County officials pressed the committee about DNMC costs, noting a local cost‑share that can be roughly $2,300 per day when a county is billed for care once a patient “does not meet criteria” for a given state hospital while awaiting transfer. Angela Jungerberg, Blue Earth County director of business operations and then‑president of the Minnesota Association of County Social Service Administrators, said counties face large cumulative charges when individuals wait months for transfers to forensic or other state facilities.
The panel and witnesses urged a mix of investments: DCT capital (a recommended Miller/Anoka expansion and replacement projects), Medicaid rate increases for community and hospital providers, funding for first‑episode psychosis and bipolar programs, mobile crisis teams, and pilot programs to provide medications and clinical consultation in jails. The panel recommended continuing to meet and to publish referral and admissions data publicly to measure progress.
Representative Frederick said the bill represents a middle‑ground compromise between counties asking to reinstate the 48‑hour rule immediately and some stakeholders who wanted to remove the rule altogether. The committee did not vote on the bill’s underlying policy during the hearing; House File 2,586 was laid over for possible inclusion in the committee package.
