Get Full Government Meeting Transcripts, Videos, & Alerts Forever!
Get email alerts on the Budget topic
No spam. Unsubscribe anytime.
Board reviews fund condition as staff lays out fee options to avert projected shortfall
Summary
The Board of Chiropractic Examiners heard a DCA budget office presentation showing declining months-in-reserve and options to address a structural imbalance, including raising renewal fees, repaying a longstanding loan and further internal analysis of fee drivers.
The Board of Chiropractic Examiners on Jan. 16 reviewed its fund-condition statement and early options to address a projected budget shortfall.
Andrew Trude, a budget analyst with the Department of Consumer Affairs, told the board the fund ended the prior year with roughly $3.65 million in reserve (about 7.9 months) after collecting roughly $5.43 million in revenue and expending about $4.83 million. "The fund condition is a snapshot in time," Trude said, noting that future legislation or unanticipated events could increase resource needs.
Matt Nishimini, a research data specialist with the DCA budget office, walked the board through fiscal-month projections showing months-in-reserve declining in out years under current assumptions and outlined options to restore balance. He said a repayment schedule for a roughly $500,000 loan and a separate proposal to spread $250,000 in repayments over three years would shorten reserves, and that the boardcould raise its renewal fee within a statutory cap to generate additional revenue. "If you were to go to the cap, you could bring in about 1.9 more million," Nishimini told the board.
Board members pressed for detail on how prior cost studies were conducted and whether another cost study or an in-house analysis would better inform any fee proposal. "That study was conducted and completed in 2021," Nishimini said of the prior fee study, adding that the DCA budget office has started producing more analyses in-house because third-party studies can be costly and uneven.
Public commenter Dr. Makani Liu urged the board to take another look at the cost study before advancing changes, echoing board members who favor more granular analysis of cost drivers such as continuing education review and enforcement workload.
No formal fee changes were adopted at the meeting. Staff said they will work with the budget office to run further analyses and present options to the board for future meetings, and noted that any proposal to increase fees or change statutory caps would require separate board approval and possibly legislative or regulatory steps.
Next steps: staff said it will return to the board with more detailed fiscal modeling and options to address structural imbalance, including regulatory and statutory paths for fee adjustments.
