BILL REQ. #:  H-1716.1 

Read first time 02/18/2005.   Referred to Committee on Finance.

     AN ACT Relating to a program to develop proposed legislation that provides business and occupation tax credits to physicians serving uninsured, medicare, and medicaid patients; and creating a new section.

BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF WASHINGTON:

NEW SECTION.  Sec. 1   The department of health shall develop, in consultation with the department of revenue, a program to provide business and occupation tax credits for physicians who serve uninsured, medicare, and medicaid patients in a private practice or a reduced fee access program for the uninsured and shall submit proposed legislation to the legislature by December 15, 2005. The program must relate the amount of any tax credit to the extent to which a provider serves uninsured, medicare, and medicaid patients, such that providers who serve the greatest number of uninsured, medicare, and medicaid patients receive the greatest tax credit. The program also should recommend a minimum threshold of uninsured, medicare, or medicaid patients that a provider must serve in order to qualify for the tax credit.