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LifeHouse tells committee CCBHC expansion cut by slow payments and regional planning delays
Summary
LifeHouse’s executive director described service expansion across rural New Mexico, the value of CCBHC funding for 24/7 mobile crisis and assertive community treatment, and operational challenges such as delayed Medicaid and MCO payments, unpaid claims, and regional planning steps holding some state CCBHC allocations.
Philip Houston, executive director and founder of LifeHouse, briefed the committee on the nonprofit’s rural behavioral‑health expansion and urged faster disbursement of legislatively allocated funds and improvements to claims payment timelines.
Houston described LifeHouse as a rural CCBHC that has expanded services, including a 24/7 mobile crisis response team and assertive community treatment; he said outpatient waitlists have fallen from about 250 to near zero. But he told legislators that cash‑flow problems and billing delays persist: he cited unpaid commercial claims (including a Blue Cross Blue Shield claim he described as roughly $150,000) and noted more than $500,000 in unpaid claims for detox services billed in 2024.
On CCBHC funding, Houston said allocations in House Bill 2 were tied to regional planning and the Senate Bill 3 process; that has delayed disbursement in some regions. He urged consideration of a modest pilot for value‑based payments to reward outcomes, easing the zero‑margin constraint of current prospective payment systems, and recommended modest state support for peer support training and a return to a two‑year eligibility window rather than the three‑year wait currently in effect.
Committee reaction and next steps: Legislators asked where funds were held up and which agencies were responsible; Houston said the delay is tied to the regional planning/accountable‑entity process. Members discussed options to speed disbursement and examine payment timeliness from Medicaid and MCOs; several lawmakers suggested examining contractual timelines and potential statutory fixes.
No formal action was taken at the hearing; Houston asked the committee to consider legislative or administrative changes to accelerate funding and improve provider payment timelines.
