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Joint Order, Directing the Joint Standing Committee on Appropriations and Financial Affairs To Report Out a Bill
ORDERED, the Senate concurring, that the Joint Standing Committee on Appropriations and Financial Affairs shall report out, to the House, a bill to the Second Regular Session of the 125th Legislature in accordance with the following.
1. Tax fairness. The bill must include provisions establishing a tax equalization payment on persons whose state and local tax burden is among the top 1% of all taxpayers. The payment must establish a tax equalization rate of at least 1.4% to be applied to every resident individual who is determined, solely on the basis of expanded income and with respect to the most recent tax incidence analysis report filed by the State Tax Assessor with the Legislature under the Maine Revised Statutes, Title 36, section 200 to fall within the top 1% of Maine resident individual taxpayers.
2. Ensure preservation of health and human services. The bill must include provisions that establish a separate nonlapsing fund for receipt of revenue from the tax equalization payment. Amounts in the fund must be transferred to the General Fund to preserve:
A. Mental health services mobile outreach crisis contracts administered by the Department of Health and Human Services;
B. The elderly low-cost drug program;
C. Ambulatory surgical center services as an optional service in the MaineCare program;
D. Screening clinic services for sexually transmitted diseases as an optional service in the MaineCare program;
E. Reimbursement for smoking cessation products;
F. Funding for MaineCare hospital crossover payments;
G. MaineCare coverage for persons 19 and 20 years of age;
H. Services provided by the Head Start program;
I. Medicaid services for parents and caretaker relatives of eligible children;
J. Support for family reunification programs; and
K. Services funded by the Fund for a Healthy Maine, including oral health funding, community school grants, family planning, home health visits and child care services.